Mary's Parrot

Mary's parrot is finished! It is nearly as big as the sheep!

This took way longer than it should have. I don't know why but I was just very slow with it.
It was stitched in a horizontal stem stitch. It definitely would have been much faster using a cross stitch, but I like the way it came out.

I have decided to stitch the big tree in the center next.
You can see that I have just made a small start on the outline.

I am getting worried that I will run out of silk. There should be enough because I am using everything that came in the kit, but I am almost out of white now, and I have the whole rest of the border to finish. Time will tell I guess.

Hope everyone is having a pleasant weekend!
Back soon!

Mary's little tree is finished

I worked on the tree on the left side of the sampler, and finally finished it.

It extends from the bottom all the way up to the strawberry border. I am glad I started at the bottom because there are exactly 2 threads separating the flower from the border!

Here is how the whole thing looks so far:

Next, I am on to stitch  a parrot that will be just to the right of the carnation. It is just as big as the sheep! Yikes! That is one big parrot!

On the home front, our new little chickies have just started laying. Four out of ten have started laying these little eggs.

Three out of the ten are laying green eggs!

In the beginning, the eggs are always very small. You can see how small they are compared to a regular sized egg. They will be big soon though!

Now, just a question to put out there -  Does anyone know why a perfectly good iron that has not been dropped, abused, or mis-handled in any way should start leaking? Aggh! For the past 20 odd years, I have been using Rowenta irons. They have always been very good. The last two however have not been so good! They have both leaked. Tricky business when you are ironing a sampler!
What kind of iron do you use? Are you happy with it?
I guess I need to buy another one.

Mary Eaton Update

It was when I posted last time that I discovered the mistake I made!
The inner saw-tooth border was supposed to be stitched in light blue, not white.

Fortunately, I hadn't gotten too far with it, but still frogging silk . .  ugh!

Here is my new photo of the area:

 

 

With that fixed, I was finally able to move on to the free-hand stitching. The area under the last red flower was to be filled in with a large fanciful tree/flowering bush. I stared at this for ages, but I couldn't figure out how to stitch it in place accurately. There isn't a lot of extra linen here to play with.

I opted to leave it, and move on to the sheep standing on the hill. This wasn't easy either.

The stitching here looks a bit helter-skelter, but I had to find my way to the bottom to get anything to work! I needed to "build" the hill that the sheep was standing on first.

The little sheep took me over 4 evenings to finish, but I was pleased the way he turned out.

The legs, head, tail and ears are done in satin stitch and then covered with black. The entire body was filled in with French knots. That is a lot of French knots! A single strand of silk does not make for a big knot!

After the sheep, I started on the tree to the left of the sheep. That is the tree that goes all the way to the top.

The tree trunk is filled in with a vertical stem stitch in two different shades of brown.

Since I took these photos, I have made a little more progress, but there has been as much frogging as stitching! That darn tree is causing a lot of grief!

I will be back soon with some more photos.

Mary Eaton and a very late TUSAL

I totally missed the new moon last week, but here is my August TUSAL:

Mary Eaton is coming along. I am following the suggestion on the pattern and leaving the right side and bottom border until the free style embroidery is finished.

Of course Furry had to supervise the photo shoot!
We are actually very worried about Furry. He is a Maine Coon cat and is quite large, but in the last year, he has been losing weight. We have had him to the vet and all his tests came back normal. Not sure how to account for the weight loss.

Here is a better look at Mary:

(Click to enlarge)

I am nearing the end of the cross-stitch part, and will soon be doing the free embroidery part. The counting in this transition is not easy and I have not yet figured out a strategy. I have to be careful and make sure the design doesn't "grow" because there isn't a lot of extra linen here.

I have loved seeing all of your work! It continues to be such an inspiration to me.
I love all your comments too!