Yay! Completed needle painted dogroses

It took something to get me to get on with the side elevation rose on the back of this project (by which I mean it will be on the back of the manicure set, not that it's on the reverse of the main embroidery!!), and there have been a few false starts, but it's finally done.

I got stuck at this point pictured <- here for a while as I just could NOT get the last petal to look decent!  I tried it twice and pulled it out in exasperation.  You would have expected it to be the easiest, being more or less flat, but it was a real challenge to get a flat petal with no real colour change to look even passable!  In the end, I just did it - not exactly 'third time lucky' as I'm still far from content with it, and it'll have to do.

It got to this point and then I realised that the centre and the stamens really weren't the right shade of green and certainly didn't match the corresponding section on the front.  This second shade was much bluer than the very yellowey, browny green of the full flower centre and, as it was supposed to be all the same flower and  a matched set, I fished out the original colour and re-worked it in that.  This-> is the finished back of the piece.

Then it was on to the spider's web.  This was a bit challenging as there is a slight give in the fabric and, if I had it taut in a hoop, then when it was released, the long stitches in the web would certainly sag.  So, I put it in a snap frame and have it held firm, but not tight, then caught in the slack on the reverse for anything that hung a bit.  It looked at first like it went a little too far the other way now and seemed a bit too tight, but it ironed out just perfectly.  It's not needed for months yet, but I'm not keen to re-do parts - I have other projects planned!

The gauge of the Kreinik Cord can easily be seen here.  It's rather fine, isn't it?  I think it works perfectly here.  I didn't have the prescribed Madeira thread and hadn't access to any - and I didn't want to spend money on any more stuff when I surely had something perfectly adequate in my ridiculously large stash!!  So, it was good to finally have something to use the Kreiniks on as I stocked up on a goodly number of those a few years ago in about two thirds of the shades they do.  Time to try and use them more, methinks!

So, drum roll please - here's the finished thing:

Hope you've enjoyed the WIP discussion and like the finished embroidery and also that I can produce one or two in the months to come.=)

© Elizabeth Braun 2012