Work In Progress - Folk Art Flower

 I have a new project to share - this is a flower border from my Folk Art Flowers embroidery pattern set. 

I am experimenting with several folk art inspired colors and some interesting stitches:

When I finish all the stitching, I will share the stitch information and my floss color numbers!

I have shared several projects from this pattern set - you may remember this:

and this:

And now this - so many different color palette options for flowers!

Color Palette Inspiration

 This vintage image has such a lovely and unusual color palette.  

I would like to use this palette in an embroidery project, so I am collecting floss that will match as closely as possible.    

I matched the main colors, ending up with a 10 color palette: 

I like to add new inspiration pictures and their color palettes in my inspiration journal.  I usually glue the picture in first:

then add floss swatches and numbers:

Trim everything up:

and start planning what I will make using this palette.

Whipped Fly Stitch

 The latest stitch on my 100 Stitches list is the Whipped Fly Stitch.

This easy stitch is started by forming a Fly Stitch.  You can see my Fly Stitch tutorial here. Then, the Fly Stitch is whipped {usually in a different color}.  I am going to use these two greens in perle cotton to form my stitch.  The dark green is DMC 3347 and the light green is DMC 164:

The first step is to form a vertical line of Fly Stitches:

Now the line of Fly Stitches can be whipped with the second color.  To start, I brought the needle up through the fabric inside the first Fly Stitch:

I pulled the floss all the way through and then wove it 

over the diagonal arm of the Fly Stitch and under the vertical anchoring arm:

  

I continued with the next Fly Stitch.  Notice that the needle is not going back into the fabric, it is just sliding over and under the arms of the Fly Stitches:

At the bottom of the line, I took the needle back down through the fabric and secured the floss on the underside:

I learned this beautiful stitch from the book Embroidery Stitches by Mary Webb.

Spring Monogram Pattern Details

In my last post, I introduced a new monogram hand embroidery pattern set.  For my sample picture, I stitched the letter "N" with the floral accent from the pattern.  

In this post, I want to share the stitches I used to create this and the floss color numbers of my palette.

The N is rows of Stem Stitch.  The floral stem is also Stem Stitch.  The leaves are Fish Bone Stitch and the flower buds are French Knots.  The flower petals are Long and Short stitch.

Here is the color palette:

Spring Monogram Embroidery Pattern

I have a new pattern set available in my shop.  This one is Spring Monogram - perfect for a table napkin in a spring tablescape!

I posted a design in progress picture on Instagram:

This is such an easy pattern to stitch:

and I love the beautiful result!

Valentine Conversation Hearts Embroidery Project Finish

Since my last post, I have finished my valentine conversation heart.  

Here are my floss color numbers:

I was looking at all the different ways this heart motif could be used.  Here are three different projects I have done using the same heart:

I decided that for this project - to be a true conversation heart, there should have a message in the center like these from the inspiration picture:

I decided to add the words Be Mine.  This pattern set has a lot of text motifs in different sizes for use with the other motifs:

But I wanted to have a font that looked just like the inspiration picture so I used a block letter template:

and then traced it onto my fabric and stitched the letters using Straight Stitch:

The stitches I used for this heart are Lazy Daisy Stitch and French Knots:

Valentine Conversation Hearts Embroidery WIP

photo courtesy of Jill Wellington - Pixabay

I am borrowing the beautiful color palette from these Valentine conversation hearts for my latest work in progress.

This Lazy Daisy heart is from my Be Mine Valentine embroidery pattern set: 

Almost finished - I still need to fill in all the French Knots. I will post soon with the final result and my floss color numbers!