Painted Ladies complete!

I took a few shots whilst the piece was still in the working hoop (above), then some more after having stretched it around piece of thick cardboard (below) (the back of an old art pad!)

And here it is in situ after judging at the Sheffield Fayre last weekend.

Don't be too impressed at the 'First Prize' docket - it was the only entry in the category!!!!

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2015

Working the Butterflies

Here we go with a photo-heavy post showing the working of the butterflies.  Lots of small stitches make for long-winded work and I would say there was at least 10 hours work here, if not more!

Here you can see some error correction taking place.  As I worked this first butterfly, I noticed that the stem above it didn't quite meet the edge of the wing, requiring three stitches to be re-worked.  Also, the bottom edge had caught on the stem there, so that also needing taking out and replacing.

These two 'whole butterfly' shots were taken before those mistakes were corrected,  but I don't think they're too visible. =)

Moving onto the second butterfly now:

The butterflies were worked in Anchor stranded cotton with Kreinik Cord 102C for the 'feelers' (what are those called?!)

And the whole piece?  Coming up soon....

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2015

Progressing with the 'Painted Ladies' piece

Hello everyone!  A special, warm welcome to anyone visiting from the Inspirations Magazine newsletter!  I'm delighted to have been featured there this morning. 

=)  

It's been rather difficult to keep up with blogging of late for a few reasons, but mostly because I'm still dealing with headaches which either start with or are made worse by wearing the glasses I need in order to be able to deal with photos and blog posts.  I'm braving it today though lest new visitors think Sew in Love is one of the (sadly) many dormant blogs, and also to bring you up to speed on how one of my current projects is going.

Here you can see how far I've now got on the Helen M Stevens' 'Painted Ladies' piece from her book 'Embroidered Butterflies'.  I started it last September and it's got stalled and neglected many times.  I love her work, but I find it rather hard to emulate.  Anyone else feel the same?

This second photo was the last shot I posted of this piece a few months ago and it got stuck there for quite some time after my having done that big, double-coloured leaf you see in the foreground.

Actually, I was finding the snake stitch needed for the thicker stems rather hard to do, so I shied off for a while - as is my wont.  I really have to stop doing that - allowing projects to get stalled for so long because I'm scared of a certain part!

Anyway, I had a go and it seemed to go OK.

Then it was onto the pinky-brown stems and the curling tendrils, which were working by couching Kreinik Very Fine Braid 102C in single, double and even triple rows down with their 102C Cord.

The short straight stitches at the tips of the berries were also worked in Kreinik Cord, this time 087C.

The stranded cottons used so far have been from DMC (the greens and brown) and Anchor (the oranges and reds).

The next stage is another one that fills me with dread and that I feel inclined to delay indefinitely and that's the butterflies.  Getting all those little, bitty areas worked all in the same radial directions and without being able to use guidelines like I could in the leaves (it would clutter up the outline just too much) is frankly scary.  Also, the tracing is disappearing and needs retouching.  Not easy.  However, as I want to enter it in the Sheffield Fayre next weekend, I need to get on with it, and that right quickly!

I've also been working a whole new cross stitch piece for the Fayre and I'll show you that soon.

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2015

Leafy greens ... and oranges!

Take a look at the other end of our sofa.  I'm sitting in the bit that remains.  So much for a workroom of my own, I hardly ever actually stitch in there!!

Actually, I don't mind not having my own room anymore (I'll probably lose it when we move), as long as I can have my own desk and a decent amount of storage space.  I realised that it doesn't matter about having things all 'drawing room proper' for guests as we have them so infrequently and, as an old friend said, 'You live here, don't you?'

Back on topic.....

Here you can see the whole of my two current WIPs and what stage they're at, although we're just going to talk about the green and orange leaf on the freestyle piece today.

To be honest, the idea of getting both shades of the leaf in line bewildered me somewhat (and that's nothing compared to the butterflies later on!)  So, I decided the only way to get them in line was to draw some lines onto the fabric.  I think Trish Burr does this, so it's hardly an 'unprofessional' way to deal with the problem.  It's just that Helen M Stevens seems to have a natural flair for just getting stuff in perfect line.  OK, she stitches all day every day and has a real gift for it, but I need help!  The next few shots will show how the leaf developed and how I managed to keep it in line.

Inner section more or less in line with the drawn guide markings (above) and how I managed to adjust for deviations from the guidelines (below).  The few helper stitches I put in at this stage were done more in line with the green stitches than anything else.

Here's the main shading on the leaf complete.  Of course, there'll be a vein to add, which will bring it to life much more.  The odd thing was that, although both 'rings' were worked in one strand, the outer one appears thicker.  I suppose this is more to do with the 'geography' of the work than the fact that the green is DMC and the oranges are both Anchor.

Here's most of the piece with the newest leaf in the foreground.

The next things to do are the stems and then the rest of the plant bits - leaf veins, trims on the berries and the vine-type parts that are wrapped around the lower stems.  I hope to have that complete for the next update.

To close today, here's Sir's current WIP - his entire PhD spread across two screens!!  He's done the first draft and is now re-working the newest sections, and fine-tuning and finalising the rest.  He hopes to be in a position to submit at the end of the month.

All being well, I'll be back Sunday with my Anchor Pearl Cotton #12 collection and early next week with some WIP photos from the cross stitch piece.

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2015

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

Needlequest September round up

Well, I had hoped to complete half of this piece this month, basically all but the butterflies, so the autumn foliage and berries in keeping with the theme for the month, but I only managed a couple of mediocre-ly worked berries and let my piece gather dust - literally!  Things did not go according to plan this last month, with this or other things.

Speaking of other things, thanks very much to those who sent some comforting clucks and pats on the shoulder last time.  I really appreciated that.=)  I feel a lot better now.

OK, back on topic.

I'm happy to say that I wasn't working alone this month with the NQ as Wendy has been working on her 12 month hardanger piece and has completed the September block.  I'm assuming it's not that the blocks themselves are seasonal, but that it's meant to be a block worked per month?  I missed any earlier segments, so I'm not sure, but it's very pretty and was worth Wendy's hard work on it.=)

So, yeah, September hasn't been the best on a few fronts, but I'm still alive and kicking and hoping to progress my two current projects substantially, plus do some work on October's NQ theme (more on that tomorrow) and to be able to share more pretties with you all in the weeks to come.

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2014

Needlequest Update - 8 September 2014

This is how far I've got with my latest Helen M Stevens' design - just the transferring and colour selection done.  Actually, that represents almost an hour and a half's work!  I used a new piece of white carbon paper to transfer the design, so there was a LOT of extra dust to remove.  Anyway, it was done finally and I was able to get down to picking out the threads.  As you can see, I've got Anchor (from several generations of packing type!!), DMC and Kreinik here ready to use.  Hope to get stitching on it soon.=)

I want to ask readers about thread storage etc.  Now, my problem is this:  My main stranded cottons (the complete set of Anchor ones) are stored in press top bags in colour number order.  This is very convenient for getting threads out for cross stitch projects, or other pieces where I'm pulling things out according to colour number, but not so good when I'm selecting shades for today's piece.  Then my storage for the few DMC threads I own is better, where I have them arranged by colour in bags.  How can I marry these two systems up so that they're useful for both?

Of course, I have the real thread shade card for my Anchor threads and I use it a lot, but it's better to hold a real skein against your fabric etc than a tiny bit of sample thread that doesn't often reach anyway.  Any ideas  Here's the solution I thought of earlier, which I would like your opinions on:

I thought of taking all my Anchor threads and re-sorting them according to colour families and making a list of the colour numbers which I would then attach to the bag in number order.  I'd also include my DMC threads in each relevant bag and on the shade number list.  I'd also create a list of all the Anchor shades (there's one on the shade card I can copy) showing which bag they were now in so that it would be a bit easier and quicker to find needed shades for counted designs etc.  It means several hours work, but could well be the half-way house solution I need.

Will that work, do you think?  Or can you think of a way to improve it?  Thanks!

Text and images © Elizabeth Braun 2014