Ladybug Embroidery Project Part Two

I finished my ladybug embroidery project.  I first blogged about this {here}.

I had wanted to challenge myself to use as many different stitches as possible.  By my count, I ended up using eight different stitches.

The ladybug's antennae and body outline are Stem Stitch, her wings are outlined in Double Knot Stitch and filled with lines of Running Stitch. The spots on her wings are Satin Stitch and French Knots.  For her body, I used Trellis Couching Stitch:

For the flowers, I outlined the petals in Blanket Stitch, and put in a Lazy Daisy Stitch.  For the flower centers I used three French Knots.  I also used French Knots for the blue accent dots spaced randomly round the motif:

I am really pleased with the variety of stitches I included on this project!

I think this project would look really sweet framed in this hoop - maybe embellished with some matching trim?  This is a 6" hoop and is the perfect size for this motif.

Here are the floss colors and numbers I used for this project:

A little early for this wip...

Even though we are having beautiful warm weather right now, I am busily stitching up a huge set of autumn napkins!

I plan on using all the autumn colors like orange, red, yellow, and brown. I love these two shades of orange. The brightest, which is outlining this leaf is the almost neon-bright dmc#608 "bright orange":

I am going to use a running stitch to decorate the hems. Here are orange, green and yellow:

I am really liking the way they are turning out!

100 Stitches - Running Stitch

Next up on the 100 stitches journey is the running stitch.


I selected this stitch because I already knew how to do it - I used it for the hem on this acorn tea towel:

After the struggle with the bullion and lazy daisy stitches, I wanted to do something really easy!

So here is my example of the beautiful and useful running stitch. The basic running stitch is shown on the far right. But according to the 100 Stitches book, the running stitch can be used as a decorative border when you add another thread with a contrasting color. The middle stitching shows the running stitch "whipped" and the row of stitching on the far left shows the running stitch "laced".

These two decorative additions were fun to do and mine look just like the instruction pictures in the book :) The running stitch is #4 and is in the flat stitches section of 100 Stitches.