Works in Progress Report

I'm not sure which piece readers are most interested to see first, so let's start with how the Paradise Island cross stitch looks these days.  I've put in another leaf, as you can see on the bottom right hand side and have started another.  I'm hoping I might get that one finished later on today, but I'll have to see how much time I have for stitchery.

The other current project is the Helen M Stevens' design, 'Painted Ladies' from her book 'Embroidered Butterflies'.  The last in progress shot I posted about this was more than 6 months ago and just featured some of the berries in the right hand cluster.  This is how far I've got up to yesterday tea time:

It's interesting to see how much the greens in this large leaf shine, which could also be because the greens in this project are DMC and that has more sheen than Anchor.  The berries are in Anchor (as are the orangey bits), but they haven't come out well in these shots.  Red is a nightmare to get clear!  I use a special camera setting for the cross stitch to get the various coral-reds to show up at all (instead of one indistinct mass).  Maybe I should try it on this piece too....  Any ideas??

I'm hoping to get the larger leaf that you can see the top of underneath the butterfly outline in the larger picture done later on today, so it's a leaf day today.

I'm not 100% satisfied with the quality of the stitching so far, but then I never am when working these designs.  Once the fine details are added, however, they look a great deal better, (cover a multitude of sins - I'd better start calling them love-stitches!!), and I always feel happy with the completed piece.  For now, I'm just pleased to be getting on with it and trying not to worry too much about unsatisfactory mid-way things.

I also need to remember to use my sellotape trick to de-lint the fabric before the next WIP photo shoot!!

I've also been doing quite a bit of Stash Enlargement of late, more on that in a later post, and also making a start on planning my entries for the Sheffield Fayre this summer.  I'm thinking of doing two pieces for the 'own design' cross stitch - one adapted from a needle-painting design in a book and the other adapted from a photo of a stumpwork floral ring, to which I plan to add some hardanger and beaded sections as they went down well last year.  Again, more on that in a forthcoming post.  For now, I've e-mailed the organisers to see if the Show Schedule is available yet.  I need to know if there's a general embroidery category again this year before I start on my piece, which I'm planning to be a Korean lady.  I want to do it during August so that it'll qualify to enter into the Leeds Flower Show in 2016 too.

The blog Instagram account is going very well indeed, attracting 67 followers in just the fortnight since I started it.  Don't forget to look me up there, if you're on IG. Find me at: @sew_in_love_blog  I check out the stream of everyone who follows me or even marks a 'like' or leaves a comment. =)

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2015