BFF Month 2.1 Stitching

With the Thanksgiving holiday last weekend, there has been very little stitching going on around here. Instead, I had a full week of Thanksgiving planning, shopping, cleaning, baking and cooking. So much production for one meal! But, I have realized that I think I enjoyed the meal a lot more than those who just sat down and ate it, lol. You appreciate the details more when you understand what was involved!

It's been a little challenging to get back to business as usual, but last night I did manage to finish the first motif for Month 2 of Best Friends Forever:

This is probably the least interesting motif in the Month 2 set, but at least it was fast. And I did manage to squeeze in one new element:

These little purple buds are just circles, but I stitched them in blanket stitch to give them a little more presence and tie them together with the flowers from last month.

The next motif will be the apple tree. I decided to try out the apples in padded satin stitch:

In the lower left corner you can see the remains of a failed attempt at this! But, I secured the thread so firmly that it is melded with the fabric. So, like it or not, I am now committed to satin stitch for the apples! But, I did find that the padding acts as a stabilizer and the fabric didn't pucker, so I think it will work out ok. Stay tuned!

And, today I have managed to link up again with all the Canadian blogs for WIP Wednesday at The Needle and Thread Network. There's lots to see this week!

Free Fabric for Life

Wouldn't that be nice? I got this notice in my email today, and if you already haven't seen it yourself, I thought it was too good not to share it. "Free fabric for life" means 52 yards of fabric per year for 20 years, supplied by Keepsake Quilting. The contest is open to residents of the U.S. and Canada, and no purchase is required. Click here to enter the contest!

Good luck to us all!

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!