Ethereal Sounds

It is a sound like no other. The bugle of an elk. A majestic animal that can weigh 700 pounds and stand nearly 9 feet tall, a bull elk is a imposing, scary, really unbelievable sight. During the rut and hunting season bulls and cows call to each other (often all night long!) in a process of herding up into groups of several cows and one bull.

I am not a hunter, but everyone else in my family is. Over the years this Yankee turned Texan has learned a lot about hunting and the benefits of managing wildlife.

One of my gals and very good friend who frequents the shop is Miss Barbara. She and my Other Redhead, Kathleen are probably my most prolific stitchers. Barbara is also one of the biggest hunters I have ever met. Her family owns several ranches and she has hunted everything. But when she visited us in New Mexico during a stitching retreat, we found out she had never hunted elk. Well we had to fix that! And so it went…..for the next two years, nothing. First year there were too many other hunters and then a mountain lion roamed through the ranch, that really messed things up. Second year, a poacher came on the place and killed an elk right out from under her….geez.

So then we decided to call in the big guns, (figuratively!) my daughter Harper and her husband, Eric. Eric has been hunting elk in northern New Mexico most of his life, and specifically on our ranch for several years. He and Harper know the ranch well and knew just where to take Miss Barbara.Yes, three was a charm, and yes this would be Barbara, Harper and I drinking champagne, in the woods, in the dark, after one clean shot took the largest spread ever from our ranch!! Love it. Love you Bobbie!

My son in law Eric is a patient and gentle person with a wicked dry sense of humor (where was he when Harper was in high school !?!?!?, but that is another story). Eric is currently the tallest member in our family, and as chance would have it, he also has the biggest stocking. This wasn’t intended, it just happened.

Being the hunter that he is, choosing his stocking was easy. Another Liz Goodrick-Dillon stocking, this is Woodland Christmas. The original canvas had a deer with a much smaller rack. The first thing my husband, The Redhead, told me is you have to “fix” those antlers. So the ones on Eric’s stocking are a little bigger, a little heftier.

The background is a squared eyelet stitch, hopefully depicting snowflakes. The edging on Santa’s robe is a massing of french knots (I love french knots), kind of a shearling look.

In most of my Liz stockings there is some form of animal. Usually, I use Wisper by Rainbow Gallery in random straight stitches for the bodies and using the same threads, I basket weave the faces. For these stockings I am always searching for the more realistic, traditional look. But the big cap to this one is the Canadian coyote hide cuff. I like the look and feel of real fur (of course, I do). If you have put that much time and money into an heirloom piece, it doesn’t seem right to put fake fur on top. For hides that I do not already own, I go to glacierwear.com, they offer amazing quality hides at fair prices, not cheap, but fair. The hide on this piece was huge! So, therefore the stocking is huge. It was suppose to match the coyote on the heel, but I think it may have overwhelmed him.