Up close

Well, I finally got this! Thanks for all the encouraging words! I am doing the long stitches of the Willow stitch with 3 strands of Impressions and the short stitches are being done in six strands of Splendor. Every few rows, I color ahead some, and then go back and cover over any areas that need it. When you see it in the enlargement it looks like there are white spots but instead they are the reflection from the flash on the black I have colored in. I shot this very up close as I did not think the stitch details would show up due to the navy. Hope you can see it better!

Painting or Stitching??

Okay, first I finished painting all the background very dark so that the navy threads will cover them. It really makes the focal pop now doesn't it.
Next, I used 3 plies of the navy Impressions and 6 plies of the navy Splendor and started working the Willow stitch. The background still shows through! Aarrgghh!
I am going to rip this all out again. I cannot...read... will not put another coat of paint on top of this canvas, so OMG I am going to take a black magic marker and color over the background one more time.....don't tell the needlepoint police!

P.S. I just read Jane in Chilly Hollow.......LOL! Jane is doing the same thing!!

Going in the mail

I finished the Tooth Fairy Box! It is being mailed to the finisher on Monday! Woohoo! Another one done!
I also painted on the background of the Tassel and Roses today! I will resume stitching on it tomorrow!

Slowly getting it

I got out my paints and brushes and started painting over the background.....again. This time I am going a lot slower as I now have stitching in place! I did part of this last night and then what you see here is the result of tonight as well. You can see I still have a lot of "in close" painting today and I will mix one more batch tomorrow and do in amongst all the stems and such in the center. In looking at my photo I can see I need to even out the right side a little more as well.

Just a bit more

Last night I worked on the tooth fairy box and got quite a bit more done! I am concentrating on the blue only and will come back and fill in the gold and the bead when all the rest is done. I am thinking maybe one more session and this will be fini!
In the meantime, I also pondering the blue background on the roses and tassel piece. I am going to repaint the canvas another shade darker so I can use my navy fibers and get moving on that background. Having set it aside for a day and mulling it over, I have made that decision. If I have time I will start painting it tomorrow night. If not, who knows what will be here tomorrow! LOL

And the right

Yes, the right streamer is all done except for the silver. I have ordered the #16 from my LNS and it will be here fairly quickly. It took about two and a half hours to finish the streamer on the right side as it is a little longer than the left one. I started working on the background stitch.....but had to pull it all out. It did not cover the way I though it would so I am dropping back and reconsidering what I will do there.

And on the right

I started down the right streamer and finished through the first rose and down under the large bottom rose. I also added the silver in that far down, which is where I ran out of the #16 Kreinik. So I will continue on with the rest of the ribbon tomorrow, and then come back later and fill in the silver. I did go and pick up the Caron Impressions that I will be using to stitch the background and maybe I will start some of that tomorrow....who knows?
I did get a nice surprise today however. Boots Bailey called!! She has the purse flap for finishing and needed some information before completing the purse, i.e., drop length, leather or suede. I was so surprised she called and thrilled when she said she loved the stitching! I told her it was such a beautiful canvas that I could not cover it up, and she also added she really liked the center of all the roses! Many thanks, Boots, for providing such a beautiful piece to stitch! I can hardly wait to see the bag!

I did it!

I finished the left streamer! Woohoo! It even looks like one...to me anyway! And! The background fiber is in and I am picking it up tomorrow! I can do some of what looks like acres of background and also work on that right hand ribbon.....stay tuned!

More & More

Ribbon, that is. I worked down the left streamer and am past the bottom left rose and at the point of the white highlight. This canvas is on 16 inch wide and 28 inch long stretcher bars. Whew! That makes for a lot of reaching even though I am working the canvas on its' side--the top ribbon is on my left when I am working on the streamer. Jane in Chilly Hollow is starting Stars on her blog--check it out--and wanted to know how us counted work people buried our threads when we were starting on pieces with the border worked first. I left her a comment and told her that I use away waste knots--then and now--when the frame is so big. When I first start a color on the streamer, I make an away waste knot about two inches from where I am going to start stitching. I do all my stitching, until I have about two inches of thread left and then I pull the needle to the front of the canvas. I start another needle full and keep doing this all night. TaDa! I only turn the canvas over when I am done stitching for the night. I snip all my knots and bring the threads to the back and can choose to bury them where ever I please......just in case you too, were wondering!

Moving on

I added all the silver to the top right loop all the way around. I moved back over to the left side, and finished the streamer down past the first full rose, and then added silver down to the the first rose bud. I intend to finish all the streamers from here and then hopefully, the background fiber will be in and I can start working on some of that while also stitching the roses.

Intermission

I took a one day break from the Roses & Tassels. It is a very large piece, and I gave my arms and shoulders a break tonight. I picked up the Tooth Fairy Box and did another inch down. I think I am over half way now! This is almost done and I should finish it and get it off to the finisher for the kids, but not right now. Tomorrow I will be back working on the Ribbons!

The leaves and you did what?

I finished all the leaves and sepals!! Put the green fiber all away! Then I did the silver on the left loop--top and bottom and started down the streamer on the left side.
And then, Jane asked me to talk about the painting, how and why, I changed my canvas. So I will blather on a bit. When I saw this canvas, I was drawn to the roses and the tassel, which I told you before. However, it sat in my stash as I was really unsure about how to stitch it. So, I took it to the Carole Lake class and when I put mine on the wall to discuss it, I explained that. Everyone said the yellow rose (now gone) popped as the focal point and it was very busy, which I did not want (maybe that is why I kept avoiding it!)l. I think it was Carole that said "paint it out". . I had acrylic paint and I mixed it up . I started with white, added some black and made a nice gray color and then I added in the navy blue. I mixed it about four shades up from the color I wanted the actual background to be. I grabbed one of my brushes and, with small amounts on the brush, started carefully covering what I did not like, once going horizontally and once going vertically to cover. You remember I took out not only the rose, but the shading behind everything, and the tile design in the background. Since it was acrylic paint, it does not take long to dry at all! I let it all dry about 4 hours and then went back over any areas that needed a little more coverage-the rose and the tiles. After waiting a couple more hours, I checked for holes that were filled and took an awl and carefully reopened them. I have also very lightly drawn in a rose and bud on the right side that I will stitch in when I start the roses, following Mom the artist's advice. I resumed my stitching at this point.
Since I am a mathematical personality along with career, I tend to work a lot of counted and/or geometric designs and am (according to my friends and family) an organized person! LOL, Anyway, as I kept looking at this, I still did not like the balance in the borders. I took it with me on Friday when I visited my LNS and we decided that it would look more balanced if I made the border uniform on all sides. So I grabbed the paints and mixed up another batch. It is a little bit different in color, but it will all be covered by stitching later on.
I doubt that I will do this with any of my other canvas, but I now know that I can . It wasn't too scary and I am pleased with the results. I know that I will not be sitting around painting canvas as drawing and painting are my Mom's talent, not mine, but I know I can tweak something that is painted if I want to. I appreciate the time and talent the designers spend on these pieces and I applaud them. This makes this canvas mine and it will also now blend with other pieces in my home as this one is for me.

Almost all of them

I stitched most of the stems and sepals on the right side. I did not quite get them all done, but most of them are. I will finish them tomorrow and go back to working on the ribbons. I made one more change to this canvas. It kept bothering me that the left and bottom borders were so wide and it was throwing the focus off kilter. So, I mixed up some more paint, and changed those too!

All but one

Yes, all but the one stem near the center on the left side are finished. If you enlarge the photo, you will see that all the stems and sepals are done! Today, I also picked up some of the threads I need for the background! Moving right along. I do plan on getting the stems and sepals on the right side done before Sunday as I mentioned last night....we will see! It is snowing here again. The forecast was for a dusting to a half an inch and an hour ago we were already at over 2! Crap....are we ever going to see the sun again???

A leaf, a few stems

The top left leaf is completed as are the sepals on the top left bud. I also worked on the top left stem. I put a piece of silver behind this tonite to shoot it, and hopefully the silver on the bow shows up more silver and less gray. My goal is to have all the greenery done this weekend....can you say turbo needles?

Two more greens

My other greens arrived! One is called Guacamole and the other is Dill Pickle! They are from the Edible Greens in the Silk & Ivory line. I worked on the large leaf in the top left. I also added more of the Kreinik #16 Silver to the loop on the left. I am a lot happier with these two new colors of green and hope to get all of the stem stitch leaves and stems done this week.

More ribbon

The top right streamer is done down to where I will add the rose back in using the pinks. I also added a little bit of silver on the top left ribbon to see how it will look!

Up close

I cropped this up close, just for something different. I think you can see that the top right loop is finished and that I started down the right streamer. I also did the straight piece behind the bow and it is worked in basketweave.

Lining the loop

The inside loop of the left side of the bow is now completed using the Diagonal Mosaic stitch and the darkest of the Silk and Ivory. The highlight color is Silk & Ivory's Wisteria. I also barely started the right loop.

Thanks again for all the wonderful comments and emails about the framing of the Kimono. I took it back to Fast Frame today as Bob and Maggie would like to display it in the store window for a couple of weeks! Hopefully, they will receive lots more positive feedback on the excellent work they did!

The Kimono is framed!

I picked this up from the framer today! Fast Frame did this piece for me and I think they did an exquisite job! The top mat is black linen, the under mat is gold and they left a black edge of the canvas around the entire piece. The gold frame hints at oriental and of course it has museum glass, so I shot this without the flash. I am taking it back to them tomorrow so they can use it in the window for a couple of weeks--they should be proud of this one!

One part of a loop

I finished all the packed stem in Honeydew. Since I am waiting on the other two colors I need, I went ahead and started on the top loop of the bow. I am using the Diagonal Mosaic stitch and the colors are from lightest to darkest: Taffy, Rose Marie, Lida Rose, Irish Rose and Ramblin Rose--great names don't you think?

I hope you are all safe, weather wise, we got a little sleet, a little snow, a little ice.....adding to the variety...it rained....next up is more snow....are we having fun yet?
For some fun, go look at My stitching gallery.....Pierette: That is gorgeous!!

I decided

Yes, I decided how to fix the color issue for the leaves. I am changing out those two. So until I get the other two colors, I went ahead and started the lightest color on the stems--Honeydew, it is called. The stems I worked on are on the left side.

Oops

I stitched on the rose leaf tonight. I did most of the left side and veined it. It looked awful. The colors were all wrong. So, before posting, I ripped it all back out. The color called Honeydew, I think will work, but the Sagebrush is too yellow. I think I have to change those two or move the Honeydew and drop the Sagebrush....will let you know tomorrow what I will do!

Starting at the back

Using a single strand of Silk & Ivory color called Pesto, I worked the background leaf first in Basketweave. I then did the veins in the leaf on top of that using the packed Stem Stitch. I moved to the darkest area of the stems on the left and Stem Stitched those as well. All of the greenery is going to be worked in the packed stem stitch.
Thanks for the monogram idea to Jane, and to Judy for suggesting I do just a bud on the right, and to all who like what we came up with. Thanks to mom for agreeing it does need to be a rose, and in the future, I sure hope it looks like one!

And then I...

Mixed white with navy and some black and created the new background.  It sure made a difference to the look of the entire canvas. Notice the area where the yellow rose used to be. I will stitch in another pink rose to balance the piece. (She said with a lot more confidence than actually available at this point!)

Below are all the threads that I will be using. The Needlepointer in Washington sent most of the following threads when I ordered the canvas. I have already made some substitutions, of course, since I changed the design somewhat. The threads are Silk and Ivory, top, greens for stems and sepals, dusty roses to burgundy for the ribbon. Below that on the right is the Soie d'Alger for the border in blue instead of teal and navy Splendor and Impressions for the background. Bottom right is Silk and Ivory for the rose, and above that Soie d'Alger for the tassel and cord. Ready, set, stitch!