Sunday, September 29, 2013

Back to Spring?

Yes, it is autumn here in Toronto, where we have been having some really spectacular weather recently, with mild, sunny days and cool nights. So it is not appropriate at all for me to have revived this project, Breath of Spring, but, that's what I've done.

Mary Corbet posted a photo of her grasshopper from this project a few weeks ago, which made me guiltily aware that I hadn't touched mine since March! I was hung up on this bee:


I stitched the left wing at least three times in long and short stitch with varying degrees of success. This time I stitched them both with closely worked rows of stem stitch in one strand of DMC floss. You may recall that I am doing something similar for the Viceroy butterfly on the Meadow quilt too. Anyway, I'm finally happy with the bee!

I went on to lay in a lot of the green stems and background leaves in more stem stitch, with one or two strands of floss:


There are a lot of inconsistencies in the instructions. I'm sure that Inspirations has published corrections, but I am just taking the opportunity to do my own thing instead. These large flat leaves below are one example:


They were supposed to be worked in a very bright Kelly green solid coloured floss, but instead I borrowed some of the hand dyed floss from the grasshopper. I covered the outline with split stitch in a co-ordinating DMC floss (which you can see on the left), and then worked a slightly open fly stitch with two strands of the hand dye (on the right).

When it's finished I want the flowers to be the first thing you see, not the leaves, so I'm hoping that these more muted colours and open stitches for the leaves will blend into the background a little better.

It would be nice to have this done by spring, because I am thinking of putting it on the front of a new spring/summer bag. However, that is probably a long shot, based on past experience!

14 comments:

  1. If you work on it during fall and winter it will be you little piece of spring sunshine. It's looking absolutely wonderful so far!

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    1. You're right, I'll be starting on the flowers just as it starts to get really grey outside around here. Thanks very much, Rachael!

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  2. Hi Monica. I still really like this project. Your bee almost looks like stump work, (which is something that I would like to try. Someday...!). Using the hand dyed floss in the leaf is a great idea; it adds interest. I look at pattern instructions the way I look at recipes. It gives me an idea; it's a starting point. Then I check what's in the fridge and make it work. You have inspired to work on some embroidery again. Hopefully soon!

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    1. Thank you! I recall that you've done some beautiful work, so it will be fun to see what inspires you now!

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  3. very nice pieces and it is so good to read how you went about it rather than just the photos. It has certainly worked well, must try and find the inspirations magazine the project is in. Have every magazine except the last one, now no longer getting it due to price etc and to be honest have only stitched one project from them

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    1. Thank you, Margaret! It's in Inspirations 56, if you want to look it up.

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  4. Lovely stitchery. Your skill really shows!

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    1. Thank you! I am starting to feel like there's some noticeable improvement. Practice, practice, practice!

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  5. Love the little bug! It looks fantastic

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  6. Thanks, Metanoia! Nice to see you again. :)

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  7. The hand-dyed thread works well. Your bee is looking seriously good. Stem stitch forever and avoid satin stitch, I say. Works for me most times.

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    1. Thanks, Jillian! I agree, the stem stitch seems to do the job a lot of the time. :)

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  8. Your bee wings look great in stem stitch. The few times I've tackled a long short stitch project I've done a fair bit of unstitching too especially trying to get the angle right. The leaves look really good and you've done such a nice job using the open fly stitch. Twill be a great winter project.

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I'm told Blogger has been bouncing some comments, so if it happens to you I'm sorry! But the settings look right so I can't explain it. In any case, thanks for reading!

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