In the spring of 2005 I did a Google search for images of “spherical geometry.”  One of the images (dielectric sphere) was part of a scientific paper about electricity.  After I stitched a temari of it I was reminded of lines of longitude and latitude.  It occurred to me that a temari globe might be possible. (Dielectric Sphere was found at http://cce.linl.gov/eiger/tutorials/die_sphere/overview.html )   This idea hovered in the back of my mind until the first ever Temari Stitch-In  Orange County in September 2005.  Janet Bochin drove all the way from Fresno to the Stitch-In and heard the story of my Latitude temari.  When she returned home she emailed me Nancy Nehring’s article “Embroider a Globe“ from PieceWork Magazine.

The mari core was wrapped with yarn and then dark blue thread.  The final wrap was done with 2 strands of variegated and 1 strand of solid rayon sewing thread.  Because this thread is extremely slippery I secured the wrap with zigzag stitches all over the mari  using the same variegated blue rayon thread.  The final circumference was 20.5 inches, just shy of 7” in diameter. Even though this thread is a real pain to use, it gave the wrapped mari the look of sunlight glinting off the ocean!  Exactly the effect I had hoped for!  Without this contrast between the water and the land, the Temari Globe would not be nearly as exciting! The wrapped mari was divided into 18 Simple Divisions with an obi.  This is “temari talk” for 18 equally spaced vertical lines which circle the sphere and intersect at the North and South poles.  The obi is the equator.  The mari was also measured for 9 additional equally spaced mark lines above and below the obi.   These lines were stitched with bright Red thread to serve as guide lines which would be removed later.       How to stitch the continents?  The traditional stitching patterns used for temari did not seem suitable for creating land masses.  The shapes were just too detailed.  However, a temari technique for fabric appliqué overlaid with a thread grid looked promising.  Counted cross stitch would allow for precise color placement and seamless coverage.  The embroidered fabric could then be stitched to the wrapped mari.

To kick myself into gear on this project, in early November I went to the needlepoint store to look at threads.  After an hour of drooling over the variety of threads available I selected my colors and purchased some 18 stitches-to-the-inch waste canvas.  (Waste canvas is a fabric grid which is meant to be removed after the stitching is complete.)  This was basted to some cotton fabric.  Now I was prepared to stitch!          My son, Christopher, gave me the final key to the puzzle.  I was looking at flat maps in books and on the internet.  It was messing up my spherical thinking.  I needed to make an outline of the continents so I could draw my color chart onto the waste canvas.  Chris remembered a geography project we had completed at Cub Scout Day Camp.  The Cub Scouts had cut out a paper globe printout and glued it onto a tennis ball.  The kids loved it!  John Cassidy’s “Earthsearch – A Kids’ Geography  Museum in a Book” by Klutz Press is the source for the tennis ball globe and a wealth of other hands-on geography projects for kids.  It is absolutely wonderful! The wrapped mari was measured from pole to pole.  I enlarged the “tennis ball” master to fit my mari and made several copies.  One I carefully put away so I will have it for future reference.  The other I cut into individual continents.  The beauty of this master is the small pie wedge cutouts in the larger continents to allow for the curvature of the earth.  I didn’t have to figure those “darts” out myself.  Thank goodness! I pinned all of the paper continents onto the wrapped mari to be sure the sizes were correct.  They Were!  So with great excitement during the first week of November (2005)  I began stitching.

Europe and Asia, canvas completed showing open wedges and sewn darts, to form sphere.	Africa, stitching complete
Antarctica, showing waste canvas appliqued onto backing fabric to stitch; finished and trimmed	Australia, complete

In January Piecemakers Country Store in Costa Mesa holds it’s annual “thank you” luncheon for all of their teachers.  At the 2006 luncheon I asked to be seated next to an experienced appliqué quilter.  Pat Palmer looked at my work in progress and made some wonderful suggestions for how to proceed. While my husband, Tom, skied for a week in February, I sat in the warm lodge and cross-stitched the outlines of my continents.  Pat had suggested that if the continents were outlined in the same color as the ocean, my appliqué stitching would be less visible.  This proved to be some of the best advice I received.          On March 8th at about 9:45 p.m. I finished the cross stitching!  Or so I thought.  The next morning in the harsh light of day I discovered about 30 individual missing stitches scattered throughout the continents.  I carefully made a list of locations and began to correct my omissions. By March 10th the stitching was truly complete.  I cut out the continents and began removing the waste canvas.  What a royal pain in the @#*%!

This shows the progression for each piece - the waste canvas on fabric backing, and being cross stitched; the stitched piece trimmed and excess canvas removed; canvas threads being pulled; complete. After all the waste canvas is removed, the darts are stitched to fit the applique into the globe shape to fit onto the prepared temari.

Antarctica is worked in a wonderful, subtle variegated white threads making it much more interesting that solid white would have been. The blue outline cross stitches really show surrounding the frozen expanse of Antarctica.  It even accentuates the small islands in the bay. Europe/Asia was the most difficult to stitch.  None of the waste canvas has been removed from this continent.  Quilter Pat had suggested that I stitch blue around the islands to make them easier to appliqué.  As I filled in the blue cross stitches, the coastal outlines became less jagged.  The appliqué process will be much easier as a result.   The tedious process of removing the waste canvas took days!  Each thread had to be pulled out individually.  Because I was using a small gauge the threads were tight and the cross stitches through the weave were tiny.  Many of the threads through the wider sections of the continents refused to come free.  I had to carefully trim them away.  I cheated and used a blue Sharpie marker to color the tips of the waste canvas threads when I couldn’t remove them or trim them close enough.  The darts in the continents came next.  I used a doubled strand of embroidery floss which matched the surface stitching so the dart stitches would blend in if they popped through to the surface.  Now things start to get exciting!  The continents have Shape!  Now the worry is “will they fit”?  With the darts finished it is time to turn under the edges.  I used the same variegated blue rayon thread with which I wrapped the mari.  I owe Quilter Pat a temari for that suggestion!  The edges of the continents would never have been so clean without her suggestions.

On March 18 in the middle of March Madness I began to place the finished continents onto the mari.  Using the red stitched meridian lines the placement actually went very fast.  Stitch by tiny stitch the continents were secured to the wrapped mari.  Next I added a few islands worked in French Knots in the oceans of the world.  Can’t have a globe without the Hawaiian Islands and Polynesia! I finally gave up and went to bed on March 19 at 2 a.m. with all of the continents stitched in place and 2/3’s of the meridian lines worked over the top in Gold. You’re gonna love this.  The last detail was a Mariner’s Compass stitched in the Pacific Ocean.  I chose a two color traditional temari kiku pattern and botched the stitching!  After all of the intricate details to stitch and appliqué everything onto the mari, I botched a simple kiku pattern!  In my excitement I forgot to weave over/under on one leg of the pattern and had to remove all of the second color!  Bummer! So on the first day of Spring 2006 the Temari Globe is done!  It has been a fun and unique journey.  I learned a lot of geography along the way.

After getting a little sleep and posting some photos on the internet it was time to crank out some big thank you letters! The first one went to John Adams for his vegetation charts.  The email address which was linked with the charts must be an old one, because his message bounced back to me.  Maybe some time he will discover this story and know how grateful I am to have found documentation of his research.  The beautiful colors on the globe would have been much more difficult without his charts. Next I emailed the folks at Klutz Press.  They replied with a joyous message of congratulations on the project.  I am a huge fan of Klutz Press books.  My kids grew up with their books.  It is always fun to see what they will do next.  The Earthsearch book provided me with paper pattern outlines for my embroidery.  I asked them to share the Temari Globe story with John Cassidy, the author of Earthsearch.  I want him to know how valuable his book was, not only to me and my Temari Globe, but also to all of those Cub Scouts!  NASA’s Earth Observatory got a long thank you letter and photos from me for the inspiration their website provided.  I’ll say it again, you must visit EO and see the photos.  They are amazing. The National Geographic Society also received a group of photos.  I would really like to see an article in NGM about our beautiful craft of temari.  Such an article might encourage young people in Japan to become more interested in their unique native craft.  It might also inspire others around the world to give temari a try. Thank you to all of the temari stitchers I consulted about the Globe project.  You encouraged me and offered great suggestions.  And the biggest help of all was your secret support.  I know it was hard not to tell, but I didn’t want the word out too soon.  I needed some “wiggle room” in case things didn’t go as planned. It would have taken me another 6 months to put together a website to tell the story of the Temari Globe.  Ginny at Temarikai.com saved me with an offer to put together this photo journal.  Thank you, Ginny!  It has been a fun journey!  I have learned a lot along the way and made many new friends.  Hope you enjoyed the story.