I know, I know. I can't be too proud of myself, since I have another series of 12 yet to be finished, but I only have 3 of those to go, and I think a small happy dance is in order here.
I named #11 a fussy guy, but this gent turned out to be a bit fussy too. And I didn't have ANYTHING to do with it!!
As always, if I had it to do over or more patience to take things out, I would have done a couple of things differently on him. I was fixated on having some gold background on all 12 of the stockings, so I did the usual skip tent around the numerals. I think having 2 colors of Soy Luster for the ground and grass was a bit much. (I had the same set up on #11, I think, but there wasn't a hedge on top of the green grass - there were darker spruce trees, so more contrast.) The stitch guide called for all of it to be done in the tan thread - even over the green part - it was also to be a different darning pattern, more obvious - and I actually tried it on the tan part, but it was WAY too busy. So it came out and I put in the same stitch as for the green.
I ended up using Burmilana for the trim on his coat. I used a darker thread than was painted on the canvas, but I like it.
Here are some things I learned during this series (not in order of learning or importance to future stitching):
- I like Soy Luster.
- I like open patterns. I would have to say I was pretty averse to this before, but in the right places, I think they're perfect and beautiful.
- I can do long and short stitch fairly well (at least by my standards).
- I hate Pure 'n Simple thread.
- I like Vineyard Silk. As I stated previously, I tried it 2-3 times and thought it was horrible. It worked fine this time. Not sure what changed - me or the thread.
- Interlocking gobelin is an invaluable stitch. Not my favorite, but a great stitch.
- There are more birds in the 12 days of Christmas than I would have guessed.
- Liz is still one of my favorite designers.
- I love overdyes. Especially for the birds - they eliminated a lot of changes in thread in the needle.
- I need to go out and buy a big silver bowl. (Thanks to Jane of CH, the enabler.)
I'm going to stare at this last one for a few days and see if I think I'd like it better if I replaced the hedge with a darker thread - and that reminds me, I was going to put in some red beads for berries, so I will definitely do that.
Opinions?? I know you have them!!
Happy stitching,
Love, Jane
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