 There we go. Okay, we need a needle. I like a long, large, sharp. I should say, wait, let me correct that. Back with the meditation journal and our Back to Basic series part three. The first part we did a page with a variety of straight stitches. In the second part we did a page with a variety of cross stitches. This is a journal in which I do some slow stitching on fabric and then create to create a composition and then I glue it into this journal that I made quite a while back that has sort of a mixed media cover and plain white pages. I don't think this is a mixed media paper but it's kind of thicker like drawing paper. So anyway, so we work loosely on the fabric first to create our composition and then we glue it into the book. Now, after sharing a few of these pages on social media, I was asked if I could do some sort of slow stitching basics and tutorials about how I work in this journal. So that's how this little series started and this is episode one or part one and this is part two and now we're going to work on part three. So as with the first two pages that we did and the first two parts of this, I'm going to grab the reading glasses because I can guarantee you I'm going to need those, we are going to start with a piece of plain cotton fabric for the background. This is just a plain piece of muslin. I'm going to put the glue stick here so that kind of camera kind of has something to like focus on. I don't always with these pages start that way but with this series we are. Sometimes I start right away with the patterned paper. It just depends on the mood that I'm in to be honest but in this case we're going to start with the muslin and then we're going to start grabbing different pieces and parts to create maybe an interesting composition. I have this tin here full of fabric scraps that honestly this tin is getting full so I'm trying to use out of here first. Not that I don't have plenty of other fabric and stuff around the art room because I do but I need to use up what's in here. Now I pulled this out when I was working on a project the other day. Didn't use it then. I might use it today though. It's a piece of fabric that has a quote on it and it says love is a fruit in season at all times and within the reach of every hand and it's by Mother Teresa. It's a good quote. I kind of like that right there. So the first thing I always do is place pieces and parts and scraps onto the page. Let's see. No, I'm kind of just liking that the way it looks. Maybe. Maybe some felt. Okay. This is felt. Not felt. This is felted wool. Yeah, that's kind of nice. I kind of like that. I think for the moment I'm going to stick with that. I'm going to glue these down. We're going to glue base them down. You can use a fabric basting glue stick which I do have one but you can also just use Elmer's washable school glue. Either would work and they're just a temporary basting product that washes out with water but it is a little easier I think to do these kind of slow stitching projects without having to worry about a ton of pins. I'm going to take our quote, put some glue on the back of that and get that down. Now we're going to pick some thread colors. Let's see. I'm going to try to use just what I have on the table. That's too blue. I could use this yellow. That would work and if I'm feeling so inspired, I have a red. It's a variegated red color but it would work too. I don't think I'm going to use the red to be honest. I like a long, sharp, large-eyed needle. That's my preferred needle to work with. Partially because my vision is not what it used to be. Partially because I have arthritis in both my hands. So that being said, there you go. Bullion stitch takes a lot of thread. I'm going to start with the green because I am kind of really feeling the green. I'm going to use half of the sixth strand. This is DMC embroidery floss and this is color 164. I'm going to split the six strands into three and three tie a knot at the end. In every video I show this. So I put the cut end between my thumb and finger and then I wrap the thread around until they meet and then I roll them between the two fingers and then I put my fingernail. Well, I don't have much of a fingernail but I put it right here and then pull and that creates a knot. We're going to come up from the bottom through all of the fabric here. We're going to go up about here and we're going to go in and we're going to come up again where we came out that first time so that you have a stitch about like this. Don't pull the needle all the way through. Then we're going to wrap the thread around the needle until we have enough loops on the needle that it's about the same length as this space between our two holes in the fabric. Okay, so we're going to just wrap, not too tight. Wrap and push it down. Do a few, push it down. Don't wrap it too tight until it's about the same length. Just eyeball it. You don't need to measure anything. Hold the loops in your hand and then pull the needle up and then let go and flatten it out and just give it a gentle tug, pushing the loops down and then put your needle down in the bottom. And there you have a bullion stitch which is basically a bar, if I get the needle under here, a bar of looped thread that creates this interesting pattern. So I'm going to do those all the way across here and probably across the bottom and then we'll take a stop and take a look and see how it looks and see if I need to do any more. I'll be right back. Again, DMC colors 164. This is 3822. Two unnamed reds. I don't know. They were gifted to me and they're not marked so I don't know what colors they were. I ran, I used up all of this one and then I used this one. And then this is color 739. And I did the bullion stitches going a few different ways and directions until I got a composition that I'm happy with. So now we're going to take our meditation journal and we are going to grab some yes paste and we are going to get that glued down. I generally use yes paste because it is a good quality sticky glue but it's not too wet and watery. It's also like a thick paste so it'll kind of fill in any indentations that it needs to to get a really good sort of a seal on the fabric to the paper. Bullion stitches. Give them a try. They're really not that hard. If I can figure out how to do them so can you. If you have suggestions for stitches you'd like to see me demonstrate. Even if I've never done them or haven't done them in a while I am open and willing. Leave something in the comments below. Please don't forget to like, hit that thumbs up, share and subscribe if you're not subscribed already. Support the free content here on YouTube and over in the Facebook art groups. Not just for me but for any and all of your favorite creators. I know they could use the help and support whether it's Patreon or they have an Etsy shop or they have some other means of supporting their channel and their content. It's probably in their video description as are mine and so please check it out and don't forget to stay safe, stay healthy, stay creative. Please wear a mask and go out and do something nice for yourself because you deserve it and I'll see you later. Bye guys.