Winter Stars Pincushion

One of the things I like to do when I am up in the mountains is look at the stars.  Without the city light pollution I am used to, they are astounding.  They are so numerous there seem to more stars than night sky in between.  Sometimes it feels like I could reach out and touch them and gently outline the constellations in awe.  

I have a number of night sky books but my favorite way to identify stars and planets is the "Star Walk" app on my iPhone.  It allows me to point my phone anywhere and the sky appears with all the stars, planets, satellites and even the ISS.  If I'm using it at night, there is a red light version so that you don't mess with your night vision.  I can even point it at the daytime sky and still see the stars!  

This screen shot was taken this morning.  The one below was taken just now (lunchtime) and the one with the nighttime sky was taken pointing at the ground so is the night sky visible on the other side of our planet!  Mind boggling.

When my son was little we painted the Winter star constellations on his bedroom ceiling, because he was born in January.  He is 22 now and still won't let us paint over them!  This pincushion is inspired by the stars, by the Winter constellations and the meteor showers we are sometimes lucky enough to see.  

The stars are french knots of different sizes in white floss and the meteor or shooting star is silver metallic thread with a colorful tail.  I know we don't see colors like that in shooting stars but might we be able to, if our eyes could separate out the colors in light, like a prism? In my imagination, I see colors in the streak of space debris shooting across the night sky, like an artist painting a swathe of color across a piece of paper.  

Around the side band I have embroidered a fragment of a poem by Lord Byron, "Ye stars! which are the poetry of heaven"

I am hoping to get these finished and stuffed later today.