Monday, June 22, 2009

Camelot's Done


I finished this more quickly than I thought because the last six pages were all one stitch. I did it while I was waiting for my hair color to set. The stitch is a Hilton double fan double and it's the middle one. I still want to redo this in blue, but I think it came out pretty well in the pink. Two of the dodecagon ornaments are now done, but instead of starting a third, I digressed to the Bargello Bag. I'll get back to the ornaments soon.

Left Side Done




One of the things I like about crewel is that it progresses so quickly. I've already completed the left side of the needle case and there really isn't all that much left to do on the right. I'm thinking that next time I take it out, I'll just complete it. I love the way it's turning out.

Sunday, June 21, 2009

A Bargello Start


I actually finished Camelot this week (yay! post soon) and so was able to start another project. This one is Bargello Medley Bag from The Gift of Stitching issue 35. I bought the kit and the colors look much better than in the pictures in the magazine, even though those look really nice. It's my first time using Tentakulum silks. My only problems so far are with the directions. It's easy to tell that the designer isn't used to putting together bargello designs. She has the whole area colored, which makes it hard to see the actual pattern you're supposed to stitch. Luckily, I've done bargello before. If I hadn't, I probably would have given up. Anyway, I'm really happy to have a new start and I hope this one goes well.

Saturday, June 20, 2009

Part Six Tangled


I completed part six of Zentangle this week. I think I'm a bit more than halfway done with it now. I'm still two parts behind the others, as part eight was released last week. Once I get Tam's mystery done, I'll catch up more.

Some Gold for the Middle


I finished up all the cross stitches on this and have now started on the specialty stuff. There are lots of bits of gold, so I started with them. With these workshops, the biggest part of the stitching seems to be in the first month's directions, so I should be coming close to completing this, too. Of course, I haven't even started the rice stitches this workshop is supposed to be about yet.

Friday, June 19, 2009

A Teaching Temari

In October and November I'll be teaching temari to my local embroidery guild. This is the pattern I chose. I made the temari to show at the June meeting to start the sign ups. They're pretty excited. The October meeting will be making the mari itself, and then in November we'll mark and stitch it.


This is just a view from another angle. I think I did a pretty good job of it.

It's a Claw!

In this picture, at least, the outline of the second egg looks like a claw to me. I've decided to do one needle-ful of thread on the connecting lines and one on the eggs each time for a bit, so there's some progress on each. For such simple lines, those are a lot of stitches.