It never pays to get too excited about an imminent finish. Something always goes wrong ... as evidenced by the first photo today. Somehow I managed to stitch the blue clad stitcher four threads to the left of where she should be, throwing off the symmetry of this delightful little scissor case. Now, I know I will never be able to enjoy the piece until I fix it so there is some frogging in my future this evening. It won't take very long to re-stitch, even with the re-positioning of the waves and plait stitching below. So, only a minor irritation. On a more positive note, I did manage to form the silk ribbon seed stitches for the leaves on the vine properly. I have finally learned that the trick is to draw the ribbon v-e-r-y s-l-o-w-l-y through on the second leg of the stitch. It pays to read the directions carefully! Who'd have figured? And, of course, I'll have to readjust the red stitching guide on the left to make the whole deal work properly but that'll be the work of a minute or two. I know that red stitching is annoying to look at but it will make the sewing finish do much easier to manage.
In any case, since I'll be delaying the frogging and re-stitching till this evening when I can take my time, I decided to get a bit of a start on the needle book in this series. I chose the needle book option using the dockside street scene rather than the stitchers yet again. I thought I could do without another round with those two ladies, especially since I'll be frogging and re-stitching one of them anyway. As you can see, I didn't get very far but that's all right. I have promised myself that I'll subdue my mania for completion and just enjoy the process. Maybe if I take my time, I won't make rookie mistakes like the one above.
