Thursday, August 11, 2016

A Few Finishes




First up, the second of the JCS Strawberry Scissor Fob ornaments, the flower.  I stitched this on Lakeside Linens 28 count Buttercream with Carrie's Creations Sassy.




Next, Harvest Blooms.  I decided to frog the brown shading after all.  I went with WDW Terra Cotta.









And a new start and finish: Workbasket's Quaker Bear.  It was meant to be a polar bear but that didn't fit my theme so I made it a brown bear.  I used my darkest dye lot of GAST Maple Syrup for the solid area and much lighter dye lots for the Quaker motifs at the center.  If you look carefully at the head of the bear, you will note a gradually darker to lighter wedge extending from the face to a point at the back of the neck.  I was running short of the darker dye lot and blended a strand of Maple Syrup with a strand of DMC 3371 [for two 18" lengths] to transition from two strands Maple Syrup to two strands DMC 3371.  I think the strategy worked well.   I used two other dye lots for the motifs: one with a grey undertone and one  with a rosy beige undertone.


Next, I resurrected a needlepoint class piece: Making Waves ... from July 2015.  When last seen, I'd worked only two and a half rows of satin stitch.  See this link.  I am much further along and the color gradation from  white to palest blue to darkest blue is becoming evident.  The bulk of the piece is done in the satin stitch, giving me the chance to use my lovely laying tool.  Later there will be some basket weave, some eyelets and some bullion knots.







And then, because I would like a few quick finishes, I pulled out Ink Circles Celtic Halloween ornaments and completed the Celtic Cross and the Spider.  I am using some scraps of Lakeside Linens 28 count Luna and some partial cards of Catherine Jordan and of Carrie's Creations over dyed cotton floss for these little beauties.





These are fun stitches.  Even the designer's notes are amusingly macabre, as befits Halloween, explaining that the spider's legs look like a cat had played with the hapless arachnid [though no actual spiders were harmed in my project].  There are also suggestions for making boldly unrealistic color choices as in key lime spiders.  I went with the slightly more conservative Purple Pansy blend of medium purple and raspberry from Carrie's Creations.








I started the Polipus, aka octopus in Scot's Gaelic.  For this one I am using Needle Necessities 194, a color way of violet, blue-violet and pale sage.









And a short shout out to Rita re the recent giveaway: I sent an e-mail but have yet to receive your mailing address.

2 comments:

Anna van Schurman said...

Retirement seems to agree with you! Look at all you've stitched! Your bear looks great.

Jo who can't think of a clever nickname said...

Great work on your smalls and the waves too. I like the way you blended with different threads on the bear to minimise the change in colour.
I love Ink Circle's charts for the descriptions. I have Little Alien Schoolgirl Sampler after reading Tracy's story about how she came across the original in a top secret bunker!