Wedding Cake Embroidery Part One

I am stitching this wedding cake from the Wedding Embroidery Set.  
My original plan was to use gold, rose, burgundy and cream as the color scheme.  
So far I have stitched the cake platform in gold:

The ribbon in gold and the cake in the cream.  I sewed a large pearl bead on the bow:

I like the cream and gold color combination!

To the bottom tier, I have started sewing on some small cream colored pearl beads:  

Two more tiers to go - I don't know if I will incorporate the other colors or stay with the cream and gold? 
I will keep you updated on my progress with this!  

Strawberries Embroidery

Stitching complete!  If you follow my Instagram account, you may have seen my work in progress picture of this project:

I used a motif from the Strawberries embroidery pattern set:

I love this particular motif  {I have also stitched it up in all pinks ~ you might remember this one from a few years ago}:  

This time around, I did a more colorful version. Another difference is that I did most of the stitching this time with perle cotton floss instead of the six strand cotton floss.

I recorded all the information in my Embroidery Journal.  I like to look back over this journal and see how long these projects take from start to finish!

Here are the floss color numbers I used:

French Knot Border Stitch

Time for another 100 Stitches Plus post.  This is the French Knot Border Stitch.  It is a composite stitch composed of two stitches - the Fly Stitch and the French Knot.   

While learning this stitch, I had a bit of trouble keeping my stitching size even.  I found that marking some guidelines really helped! 

I drew two horizontal lines 1/2" apart.  These will mark the top and bottom of each stitch.

The stitch is worked from left to right so I first came up through the fabric on the left end of the top horizontal line:

Next, I formed the Fly Stitch by going back into the fabric a little to the right of where my needle first emerged:

I pulled the thread through until a loop formed. Notice the loop is fairly loose: 

I brought the needle back up through the fabric right on the bottom parallel line, halfway between the spots where the thread very first emerged and where it went back into the fabric.  

Notice that the needle is going to pass up and 

over the loop.  I pulled the thread all the way through so that the loop was now snug against the fabric. 

If this were just the Fly Stitch then at this point, I would have made a Straight Stitch to secure the loop in place.  But for this composite stitch, the loop is secured in place with a French Knot.  I formed the French Knot and went back into the fabric right at the base of the loop:

I pulled the thread all the way through and that completes the stitch:

I started the next stitch just to the right of the first stitch:

and then just continued the previous steps all the way to the right edge of the horizontal lines:

This makes a beautiful border stitch!  According to the stitch instructions, this stitch is often used alongside simple line stitches to form a multiple border.  I am going to try that next!

Here is a look at the underside of this stitch:

This stitch is from the book Embroidery Stitches by Mary Webb.  

The floss I used is perle cotton - color variations no. 4200 by DMC.

Mermaid Embroidery Part Two

I finished up the stitching on my mermaid and dolphin project.  
I am really happy with the result!
As you can see in this close up I used pearl beads and sequins in the mermaids hair 

and to accentuate the ocean waves

I like the sparkle and dimension these added to this project.