Time for the Thanksgiving Tree

Here is a shot of my Thanksgiving Tree.  I usually switch out the Halloween ornaments for Thanksgiving ones on Election Day.  But due to camera issues, I have been delayed.  While I don't have quite as many Thanksgiving and Autumn ornaments as I do Halloween ones, this tree is still a pretty full one with 15 ornaments in all.  The Halloween Tree has 21 ornaments, many of which are twice the size of these, giving a fuller appearance.

I have a few wall hangings for this holiday and for the Autumn season though I haven't made any throw pillows with a Thanksgiving theme.

My favorite is this Liz Turner Diehl sampler complete with beading and specialty stitching.  It replaces my Halloween poem wall hanging in the living room.  I am particularly pleased with the hardware I found for this: the finials are acorns.

The other is a vintage Silver Needle Secret Needle Night banner.  I use this to decorate my office at school.  The children seem to like it.  It was designed by Mona Best.

I also have two lovely little Fall framed pieces that I set up on easels on the bookcase shelf and on my entry table.  But apparently, I put them away so carefully last year that I can't find them this year.  I will, of course, continue to look but for the life of me, I don't know where they can be.  [You can see one of the easels in the shot of the Thanksgiving tree above, sadly empty, waiting till I find the proper piece for it.]

And, of course I have my Homespun Elegance Sheepish designs, also displayed on my bookcase.  The idea is to change out the "blanket" each month with another appropriate seasonal design.

And, because I'd like the Fall/Thanksgiving tree to grow to be as full as the Halloween entry, I have stitched another fall ornament, the Stitch an Inch Acorn, a free chart from By the Bay Needlearts.  I ignored the charted colorway since the designer identified the WDW fibers by number.  Mine are filled alphabetically by name since that is the way most designers identify them.  I hadn't the patience to go through my rather extensive WDW stash in search of the numbers.  Instead I used the colorway for the acorns from Band 7 of The English Band Sampler: DMC 3722, 3011, 3012, 3013.  And since I stitched this over 2 on 32ct linen instead of over 1 on 28ct linen, my ornament is 1 3/4" square rather than 1" square.  I'll finish this as a small pillow ornament and hang it at the back of the tree to fill in the empty spaces.  I have to say I think the acorns look more like sadly diseased strawberries than acorns and those leaves look nothing like oak leaves.  Can you tell this is not my favorite ornament for the Fall season?  It looked better in the model photo.  I probably should have gone searching for those WDW fibers, after all!

I try to add an ornament a year to each of my trees, until I manage to fill all the little hooks on the wrought iron tree.  It pleases me to stitch a small ornament chart for each season as it rolls around.  It keeps me in a celebratory mood.  Since this one was a bit of a disappointment, I may try to stitch another Thanksgiving ornament during the month, probably one from the Prairie Schooler chart with round ornaments for every month of the year.

In addition, each year I tend to concentrate on a particularly bare seasonal tree and stitch three or four ornaments for the selected season.  In 2014, I worked on hearts for my anniversary & Valentine's Day tree.  In 2015, I will be working on Easter ornaments.  Here's where the Better Homes and Gardens 2001 Cross Stitch Designs comes in quite handy.  It has pages and pages of small seasonal designs.  The only thing I dislike about the charts is that they are done in little blocks of color instead of in black & white symbols.  It takes a bit of deciphering since some colors are so close to others.  But that is a minor irritation; on the whole, the book is a great resource.