A cute little owl

It’s quite the rainy day here in Central Florida. I got a bit more stitching done on Trick or Treat Fairy. She’s moving right along. The holes will be filled in with beads and metallic thread once I have them. The little owl is so adorable! I can’t wait to get more of this one finished.

 

 

Happy stitching!

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Trick or Treat Fairy came calling

I was having a bit of a down day and just did not feel like stitching at all. After getting done with work, I went through all of my challenge pieces and saw this little cutie at the bottom of the pile. This Mirabilia is called Halloween Fairy in Cross Work and Needlework Magazine, but I call her Mirabilia’s Trick or Treat Fairy.

Here she is after my first day on her in January for the challenge.

 

Here she is after cheering me up today.

 

I love her look. She reminds me of a 1920’s Flapper a bit. I’m loving how the Dragonmyst evenweave from The Blended Needle looks like a Halloween night. I don’t have any of the beads or metallics for her yet, so I don’t expect to finish her soon, but I do hope to get most of the normal stitching done on her in the next few weeks. I’ll have to pick up the bits and bobs for her a bit at a time as I can afford them.

 

The girls are having a three day weekend, so I plan to take it easy and work a bit on this cutie and Emerald Mermaid as the mood strikes me!

Happy Stitching!

Diana

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Pretty rainbow beads!

After a busy weekend of playing hard with the girls and visiting family, I did not get that much stitching in. I decided to continue on with some of the beading of Emerald Mermaid. I am trying to finish my working copy page before moving on to other parts of the mermaid. I was surprised when I got to the beads in the seaweed and center of the flowers. I thought the “rainbow” term in them was because they give off an iridescent color that picks up colors around it, but no. Each bead is a different color- some are more tan, others more blue or more purple etc… This leads to a pretty random look to the seaweed. I have been just dipping my needle in the beads and not caring which color it comes up with instead of worrying about which color is next to which. I like the randomness of this.

 

I filled in some of the bright green beads in her neckline and left the pearls for later once I have all the regular floss in place. I don’t want to have to work around the beads with my floss because it sometimes knocks the beads into a weird tilt. I also started working down her side in the Emerald metallic. I love the dark green on the fabric I chose. I also got one rose done. I wanted to see how the lavender colors looked for the flowers because I am thinking of changing the pink roses in Rose of Sharon to purples. Having the color conversion already done from the colors used in this one will make that much easier!

 

Here is where Emerald stands right now. I am putting her away for a bit to work on something else. I haven’t decided yet which wip will be next, but feel like a change of colors today. J

Happy Stitching readers!

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Emerald Mermaid and pearls

I’m not sure what to categorize this one since she is not officially one of my Cross Stitch Crazy 2012 Challenge. J I decided after finishing the Ariadne page to pull a name out of a bowl for which one to stitch on next. Emerald Mermaid came up. I decided to start filling in some of the holes in her hair and top with beads. There are still some pretty aqua colored beads to put above her head and those gorgeous green ones to loop out from her hair and arm, but the pearls in her hair are done. I hope I have enough pearls for her. I only got one package since the pattern called for one, but I noticed part of the intricate design work on her chest and down her front is also done in the pearls. I think I used a good third of the package in her hair, lol. I think I might have another pack somewhere I bought for a different design. If not I’ll order some more. I think I may need to start buying beads in bulk if I keep doing Joan Elliott and Nora Corbett pieces.

Emerald Mermaid copyright Nora Corbett of Mirabilia designs

 

I have to say I am in love with my husband’s new camera. I love how it captures the colors so well in my stitching. The fabric looks so blue in the sunlight, but sometimes turquoise under lamp light. This was taken with me holding it up in front of the window in full sunlight. I wanted to catch the sparklies around her neckline I started filling in and the shine in the pearls. It is hard to capture how the pearls shine in a photograph. They are much prettier in person. I may work a few more hours on her and then move on to another one just for variety. I would like to finish the beading around her head this go around if I can sit still long enough to bead that much.

Happy Stitching!

Diana

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Ariadne page 1 finish!

Hi Everyone! After finishing Mirabilia’s The Kiss last week, I took some time off from stitching Miras to work on my HAED stitching. I am part of an Ariadne stitch-a-long and this weekend was the first weekend of it. I took advantage of the stitching time my family gave me for my birthday last week and for Mother’s Day yesterday to work on it.

 

I am really enjoying the vibrant blues and purples in the curtains so far. Here is page 1 of Ariadne- artwork by Rachel Anderson, chart by Heaven and Earth Designs.

 

 

I apologize for the slight curve to the fabric. Since it is overcast today, I took it off the q-snap and held it up to the window with my left hand while trying to photograph it with the camera just in my right hand. I did get more natural light that way, but it was hard to keep the fabric straight with my left hand. I love that you can see the folds of the fabric and bits of light already. I can’t wait to do more on this one, so I can eventually get to her face. That will be quite a few pages though unless I start to work down once I go across a bit more.

 

She will have to wait awhile though. I am stitching a few rotations of non-HAEDs and then some on my SK Blue Moon, and Opalite before getting back to Ariadne. At least that is my plan, lol! I think all super serial starters now how plans go. J

Happy Stitching this week everyone!

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The Kiss by Mirabilia Finished!

I am so thrilled that I finished The Kiss on May 5, 2012. I was hoping to get it finished by our wedding anniversary on May 10, so am happy the beading went faster than I thought it would. I love how it came out. This one is my fourth finish for the 2012 challenge, so I need to get my needles flying for the rest of the pieces in my 15. I’m starting to wish I had thrown some more small designs into the mix, lol. I think even if I don’t finish my 15, I will consider this stitching year a success if I am able to finish all of the wips that I’ve had languishing in my craft bag for years. That leaves a few Mirabilia’s, one Joan Elliott and one Whispered by the Wind design. The rest of my current wips are the ones I started brand new in January. My oldest remaining wip is Whispered by the Wind’s Dance of the Winter Solstice, so I think that will be my next challenge piece I work on, since I plan to take a break this week and work on my HAED stitching. The next oldest wips I have are Christmas Flourishes by Mirabilia and Midsummer Night’s Fairy by Mirabilia. I know I took Middy out of the challenge when I lost her pattern, but she is back in since I found it and want to make sure she gets done before I lose it again, lol. After those three the only other one started before January for the challenge is Joan Elliott’s Autumn Fairy. So if I can get those four done before December I will be happy even if it does only make 8 of the 15. My charts were ambitious choices, so we will see how far I can get through my list. I’m really enjoying the process of stitching and of seeing actual finishes, so I think this concentrating on one piece, but not being afraid to switch to a different piece if I get bored is working.

 

Here is my completed The Kiss. I love how it came out. With the names and date on it this piece measures around 8″ across by 20″ down on 16 count Cameo Rose Aida.

 

This week I will concentrate on my HAEDs. Page 2 of the SK Blue Moon SAL came out, so I need to tackle more of the confetti in page 1. I want to at least finish page 1 by December. I also made a goal of finishing the top row on Opalite by New Year’s, so that means two and a half pages to go on that one this year. I’m dying to get back to stitching on Ariadne. The colors are just so bright and cheerful. I think I will work a bit on the confetti and then big blocks of color on Opalite for the most part this week saving Ariadne for moments when my stitching bug is in danger of running off. Lol.

Happy Stitching everyone!

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The Kiss- added text

I know it has been awhile since my last update. I have been busy finishing up the normal thread stitches on The Kiss. I decided to add my husband’s and my first names to the picture and our wedding date at the bottom to turn this into a wedding cross stitch for us. We are celebrating our 23^rd wedding anniversary on the 10^th, so I am hoping to have the remaining beading done by then.

 

I finished all four corner bees and I really think they turned out adorable.

The picture doesn’t capture just how sparkly they are.

 

I chose the font from Joan Elliott’s wedding sampler to use for our names and the month we got married. I love Joan Elliott’s work! The flowers in the letters seemed to fit the Kiss so perfectly.

The numbers I took from my Teresa Wentzler wedding sampler chart. They were the exact height of the capital letters in the Joan Elliott one so I thought it would add a uniformity to the text.

 

Sorry about the difference in colors in the photos. The first one was taken under my daylight bulb and the second one I just took by the window. J

I took the colors for the text and flowers from the pattern. The greens are all greens used in his jacket and the flowers behind them and the pinks are from the flowers in her bouquet. I wanted to make sure my colors went with the rest of the picture. This is such a long pattern I don’t have a frame that fits it while I bead, so beading will go a little slowly. To give you an idea of how long it is, here is me holding it and you can see how small my hand looks next to it.

I plan to work on this exclusively until the beading is all done, so the next update should be the finished piece!

Happy Stitching!

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