Happy Dance: Examplar IV

After the trellis motif took so long, I never imagined I'd be completely done with Catherine Theron's Examplar IV by this time!

The strawberry motif worked up fairly quickly. The leaves are all done in detached buttonhole with return. The stem uses long arm cross, diagonal cross, and colonial knots, and the strawberry itself is in tent stitch over 1 with occasional cross stitches for the seeds.

The caterpillar (who seems to be heading for that strawberry!) is also done in tent stitch, and the crown in the lower right corner is in rice stitch.

After these, all that remained were the corner motifs in double-running and diagonal queen stitches, and the personalization.

Catherine had the great idea of personalizing her sampler with both start and end dates. I wanted to do the same, but also wanted to add a bit more detail. After a bit of thought, I ended up with "2007 Mid-Eastern Region EGA" to commemorate the seminar at which I took the class. The "SMH" in "SMH 2009" stands for Strong Memorial Hospital, not that I'll readily forget where and when this piece was finished!

As of tomorrow, I'll once again be working on Joan Thomasson's Celebration Santa, which DH brought in today!

***********************************
Pregnancy ticker: 34 weeks, 1 day.
Less than 1 week to go!

Examplar IV progress

This motif is one of the simplest on the entire sampler, but it is so elegant! I can see using it when I need a little something on other pieces. The flower petals are just long laid stitches, the leaves are made up of tied stitches (like very shallow fly stitches), and the center is yet another spiral trellis.

Over the past two days, I've also been working on the strawberry motif in the upper right corner. This motif should be finished tomorrow.

The sampler is getting there! Thank you to Catherine Theron for a design that's doing a great job in distracting me as the days seem to be getting longer here in the hospital!
******************************
Pregnancy ticker: 33 weeks, 5 days.
The doctors tried to confuse me this morning when they made some mention of inducing me on Friday. I pointed out that I'm sure they meant next week. It was pretty funny to see three doctors all spinning around to look at the calendar (with my ticker written on each day) and do a double-take. Oh, yes. Next week! :-)

More flowers on Examplar IV

After lots of over-one stitching, the flower trellis in the lower right corner of Catherine Theron's Examplar IV. This motif took a lot more effort than it appears at first glance. The green bars are outlined and filled with chain stitch. All of the flowers are tent stitch over 1, with backstitch over 1, and the yellow flower centers are tiny spiral trellis with one strand of floss.

This has kept me busy over the course of the weekend! Here's the entire piece so far.The next few motifs should work up a bit more quickly.

************************************
Pregnancy ticker: 33 weeks, 3 days.
Sorry. I know some of you worry when I don't post for a while. Everything's fine. It's just that I've been taking it really easy over the last few days, and didn't want to drag out the laptop. My blood pressure seems to go up considerably when I'm up and about, so I waited 'til DH was here this evening to get the laptop out.

On the other hand, today was the first time the doctors seemed to think that making it to January 30th (35 weeks) was a likely possibility! We're continuing to hang in there!

Examplar IV again

As I mentioned in my last post Examplar IV is now the piece keeping me busy during my days here at the hospital. At left is what it looked like when DH brought it in to me.

The good news is that this piece has lots of detail in it to keep me from getting bored. The bad news is that this means it moves pretty slowly, so there's not much to blog about! In the last few days, I've finished the spiral trellis stitch in the pink flowers next to the butterfly, and I've made some decent progress on the diagonal trellis area on the bottom right. The centers of these flowers are spiral trellis, too!********************************
Pregnancy ticker: 32 weeks, 6 days.
As of this morning's ultrasound, BJ is up to 4 pounds, 4 ounces! We're still hanging in there!

Rotation trial: Over already!

I really, really appreciate some stitchers' dedication to their rotations. It does take dedication to put down a piece you're enjoying and pick up something else. If a rotation works for you, that's wonderful!

I've tried a rotation for a couple of weeks now, and I've decided it's not for me. I need to be in a certain "mood" to work a given technique, and I can't schedule that. If I'm enjoying a certain piece and making good progress on it, I don't want to put it away until its next "turn" in the rotation. I'd rather ride the momentum on the project until I need a break on it or until my mood changes to work a different technique.

Aaahh! I feel better.

For the last few days, I've been "cheating" on my rotation (or, to be more honest, I gave it up a few days ago but just didn't "officially" end it by posting here). I've been having fun with the Bargello motif on Catherine Theron's Examplar IV. I also worked the first color of the spiral trellis stitch on a couple of the flowers.
I'm going to continue working on this piece until either ScottLee or Cinders starts calling my name! I'll keep these three as my "focus pieces", and still plan to start something new in each of my three categories (linen, canvas, and uncounted) when the current piece in that category is finished. That little incentive will hopefully keep reminding me to work, at least occasionally, on each of these.

A girl, her dog, and a BIG flower

Actually, the title should be "A girl, her greyhound, and a REALLY big flower". I've been making good progress with Catherine Theron's Examplar IV. I took breaks from the seemingly-unending yellow basketweave background around the spiral trellis flowers by working on the next few motifs, shown here. I morphed the girl's non-descript dog into a greyhound so it would feel at home here. Ok, so it's either a small greyhound (I refuse to believe it's a whippet!) or the girl is a giant. The backs of my greyhounds come up to my hip, but I didn't have the room to make Ms. Sampler Greyhound that big. If she was tall enough, she would need to be longer, and there just isn't room! I can rationalize this because next to the girl and Ms. SG, the flower is HUGE! In a sampler, it all works! :-)

I've been too tired the last few nights (since I finally finished the yellow background) to concentrate on the spiral trellis stitch, so I've started on the bargello motif. It's nice to see good progress on this piece!

Spiral Trellis stitch

****Warning - picture-heavy post!*****

As promised, when Examplar IV came through the rotation again, I took detailed pictures as the spiral trellis stitch was worked.

I mentioned in the last post that my first spiral trellis bloom was a bit flat. Here's a close-up of the flower from above.

And from the side.

On to the second flower. I had previously outlined the flower in double-running stitch. I specifically did not use backstitch because it has more thread on the back side, and therefore has more slack. This is the foundation row for the spiral trellis, and a loose outline would pull into the center and might leave gaps around the flower.

Here is the basic trellis stitch. Bring the thread up a the corner. Slide the needle under the next outline stitch. The needle point should be outside of the circle. Wrap the thread over and under the point of the needle, then slowly pull the needle through.

As you pull away from the circle, the knot will tighten up most of the way. Finish the knot by pulling the thread across the circle.

Slide under the next outline stitch to work the next knot. I stitch the spiral trellis counter-clockwise around the circle, but it can be worked in either direction. If working clockwise, the thread wrap will look different. Just be sure to bring the thread over and under the point of the needle.



Here are two completed knots.







After the first row is worked all the way around, start working into the previous row of stitches. The first stitch of the second row is the trickiest, because you'll insert the needle under the working thread before the first knot you worked. It's the loop between where the thread came up in the corner and the first knot. If you don't get it exactly in the right place, nobody will really know, though!

Work the rest of the stitches into the loops between the knots of the previous row. See the arrow? It's pointing to the loop between the first and second knots of the first row. That's where the next trellis stitch goes. This is why this is spiral trellis stitch. It spirals in to the center.

Here's my flower after three rows of spiral trellis. At some point, you might think you have have enough of this color and want to move to the next shade.

Bring your thread to the back close to the last stitch, but don't pull it too tightly. Your spiral trellis is starting to stand up from the fabric, and pulling this tightly will create a dent in your flower! I secured my thread with an L-stitch so it wouldn't pull any more, then brought the needle through to the front several inches away. After the flower is done, run the thread ends through the outline or neighboring stitches on the back.

With the next color in the needle, start your thread with an away waste knot (to be worked into the outline later) and an L-stitch. Bring the thread up in the middle of the flower close to the next stitch to be made. Notice that I brought it up slightly before the point where the other thread ended. On the next row, I worked a stitch into the little gap between these two threads so it looked seamless.

So far, you're still working the same number of knots on each row, and your spiral trellis is getting taller. If you do this long enough, you can get some interesting effects. You could make a chimney, standing straight up from your fabric. We don't want a flower to be too tall, though, so we need to start decreasing stitches. To do this, simply skip a stitch. See where the arrow is pointing? That's where the next stitch would be if I didn't start decreasing. Instead, I skipped that stitch, and worked into the next loop.

Judging when to decrease is one of the trickier parts of spiral trellis. The first time I tried this stitch, I ended up with a tall bump that looked a bit like a beehive. (That might be your objective. You could even stuff it! I don't know if this stitch was ever used in stumpwork, but why not?) That's why my first flower on this sampler came out flat. I decreased too quickly that time!

Keep working the stitch into the center, decreasing and changing colors as needed. You'll find you need to decrease more frequently as the circles get smaller. When you reach the center and can't fit in another stitch, stick the needle straight down into the center of the flower and through the fabric. Again, unless you want a dent in the middle of your flower, don't pull it too tight! You can then end off all of your threads.

Here's a couple of comparison shots of my two flowers. Both are fine in their own way, but I think I like the puffy one better. In her original sampler, Catherine Theron made hers much more puffy than mine, then squashed them flat. None of these is wrong. They're just different! Isn't it wonderful that we have so many options, all with the same stitch?


A side-on view shows the height difference in my two flowers. I haven't decided yet if I'll take the first one out. We'll see how it looks when the others are puffy. Maybe I'll make them all be slightly different, so the difference between these two isn't that strange.

If you try spiral trellis, please let me know how it worked for you! Also, please feel free to comment with corrections. I'd like to make sure these instructions are as helpful and as clear as possible!

Slow sampler progress

I'm making very slow progress on Examplar IV. The bits of over-one tent stitch, which I'm doing in basketweave, take forever! This is compounded by the fact that I'm using two strands of floss and I'm compulsive about laying any stitches that use multiple strands. (I've tried telling myself that nobody will notice if these tiny stitches aren't laid, but within a dozen stitches I'm reaching for the laying tool because I can tell the difference!)

The red-to-pink blooms in the yellow area are done in spiral trellis stitch. To show this stitch, I'll try to take good pictures of the next flower in progress. I may have to redo the first one because I think I decreased the stitch too quickly as I worked toward the center. It's supposed to have a bit of a three-dimensional effect, but mine doesn't stand out much at all. I think I was over-compensating because my doodle cloth from class ended up with something that looked like a beehive on it because I didn't decrease quickly enough!

Attempting a rotation

On Sunday, I stitched on Examplar IV. Monday evening, Jean Hilton's Scottlee found it's way onto my stand for the first time in six months. Yesterday, after prompting from Cynthia and Joanie (thanks for keeping me honest, ladies!), Cinders was unearthed.

You know, it felt a little strange to be working on something different each day, after so many months of concentrating on one project at a time for a few weeks, but I enjoyed it! I used to have a "screaming rotation", wherein I worked on whatever project screamed at me loudest. That's how I ended up with so many WIPs and UFOs!

I've decided that I'm going to take this as a lesson. I like working on a focus piece because I feel like I make a lot of progress, but I also like the way working on something different each day alleviates boredom with a single piece. I find I actually stitch better if I'm not tired of a given section or a given piece.

The result? A three-day rotation! I'm going to work on three focus pieces, rotating to the next each day. I often am able to stitch at least an hour a day, with much more time on the weekends, so I should be able to make progress on all three. I'll be keeping three types of projects in the rotation:

• a sampler or other counted linen project. For now, that's Examplar IV.
• a counted canvas project. That would be Scottlee.
• a non-counted project. Since most of the rest of Cinders isn't counted, it will fill the role for now.

I won't keep it so constrained that I have to keep these projects in the rotation until they're done. I know I won't stick to the rotation if I make a rule like that. For example, when the next part of Mystery in a Corner or the next Jim Wurth ornament shows up, Scottlee will be set aside for a bit.

I am going to try to stick to the rule that I need to finish two items in a given rotation slot before I start a new one. The exception is for this first round, where I'm giving myself an option to only finish 1 in each slot before pulling something from my stash.* I think I've been pretty good at limiting my starts this year, and a few things are calling loudly!

Here's where the rotation pieces stand now:

Examplar IV (Catherine Theron) - sampler

Scottlee (Jean Hilton) - counted canvas

Cinders (Marion Scoular)

*(Oh yes, of course the Jim Wurth ornaments and new class pieces are exceptions too, but I'm only expecting two more ornaments and 1 class piece for the rest of the year.)

A twining vine

There was almost no progress on Examplar IV on Wednesday and Thursday evenings. Wednesday was our ANG meeting, and I led another session of stitching on Gay Ann's Mystery in a Corner. On Thursday, I was late getting to the LNS stitch night, and then spent quite a lot of time with the owner trying to figure out how Winds of Color should be framed. With so many vivid colors in the piece, finding a mat and frame that would complement it was very difficult. It was also hard to figure out how something would look with a round cut mat in a square frame, especially since all of the sample mats were the standard right-angle cut. I'm glad we persevered, though, because I think it will be stunning. I'll be sure to share pictures when I get it back.

On Friday night, I worked on the next motif on Examplar IV. Here's where I left it at the end of the day.

I was able to spend several hours stitching yesterday, and made fairly good progress on this. It may not look like much, but the base of each of the flowers is done in trellis stitch, which takes a lot of time and concentration (for me, at least) to come out evenly.

Once again I'm finding that things actually get done when you spend time working on them! :-)

Surely knot!

Sorry for the cheesy title on this post, but I couldn't resist. :-)

I've just finished the bundle of knots below the butterfly on Examplar IV. You can see the very bottom of the butterfly at the top of the picture. The gap between these is for personalization. I haven't figured out what I'm putting there yet.

One of my pet peeves about stitching reproduction and historical-style samplers is the way the instructions usually say to outline first and then fill in the outlines. That was the case with these knots. I often hate outlining first, because then I'm fighting with the outline stitches as I try to fill them in. I think the purpose is to reduce problems with counting stitches, although it may also be more historically accurate. (Does anybody know?)

For the butterfly, I outlined it first, so I didn't have to count all of the tent stitches. I did struggle a bit with the outline around padded satin in the butterfly's body, and ended up stitching the outline on the body again after I finished. With the knots though, I did the knots first, then the outlines. I didn't have a problem counting the stitches in the knots. That's my rule of thumb: If I think I can count it correctly, I'll save the outlining until later.

----------------------
On another note, I finally posted my colors for Gay Ann's Mystery in a Corner. They are in this post.

Examplar IV sees the light of day

As much as I love canvas work, working on the Quaker biscornu reminded me I also love working on linen. Because of this, Examplar IV found it's way back onto my lap stand. Before I put it down last, I had finished the strawberry border and started the butterfly. Yesterday, I was able to finish the butterfly.

I made one major change from Catherine Theron's original. I flipped the butterfly right-side up. Catherine explained that her original had the butterfly upside-down because historically the thought was that the butterfly in my orientation would look like it was flying out of the frame. All animals, bugs, etc. on such a sampler would be positioned so they were flying in to the sampler so that the viewer's eye would stay within the frame. I thought that as a sampler designed today it really didn't matter, and that the upside-down butterfly looked like it belonged in some entomologist's specimen collection. I wanted my butterfly to represent one that was alive, thank you.

I've now proceeded to the knots below the butterfly. I've stitched a bit more since I took the picture, and I might be able to finish the knots today during our EGA picnic, if it's not way too hot to stitch!

Queen Stitch strawberries

On Saturday, I sent in my registration for EGA's national seminar. This year is EGA's 50th anniversary, and seminar promises to be spectacular. Since it's being held in Louisville, Kentucky, home of national headquarters, one of the advantages is that we'll get to see the National Exhibit! I've never been to a national seminar before, and am really looking forward to this. Now to see what classes I get!

--------------------------------------------------

To ensure the colors dried completely, I wanted to wait a bit before continuing with Winds of Color. For a change of pace, I picked up Catherine Theron's Examplar IV. I started this at the regional seminar last year, and thought it would be a good idea to make some progress before national comes and more class pieces find their way into my WIP pile.

Continuing around the border, on Saturday and Sunday I stitched the strawberries at the bottom. These are stitched in queen stitch. This stitch was one I struggled with for years, until I took a class with Eileen Bennett. I found that, contrary to my brain's logic, they really do work best if stitched left to right and all tacking stitches are taken right to left (or vise versa - tied down stitches right to left, tacking stitches left to right). They don't turn out the same if you do the two outside (or inside) tied down stitches first and take the tacking stitches always from the inside out. I don't know why. They also have to be stitched fairly tightly. (If anyone wants to see this stitch done step by step, let me know, and I'll try to do a queen stitch tutorial and take pictures along the way.)

Ok, Blogger's being stubborn and won't let me upload the picture of the entire piece. It will have to wait!

More strawberries

Half of the border of Examplar IV is now finished! Tonight I completed the right side, the strawberries in detached buttonhole.

This stitch didn't give me too many problems until it came to decreasing. When continuing with straight borders, you work into the previous row, stitch by stitch. Once the strawberry starts tapering to a point, it's difficult to figure out which stitches on the previous row should be used and which should be skipped. I did it sort of randomly. When things on the current row got a little crowded, I skipped the next stitch on the row above. I think it came out ok, better on some berries than on others.

My apologies if the above paragraph sounds a bit cryptic, especially if detached buttonhole is new to you. If you've tried this stitch, you may understand my frustration! Any and all hints are appreciated, because it shows up in other parts of the sampler. From a comment on a previous post, I know of at least one reader here who has just started this sampler (Hi Theresa!), and advice on the trickier types of sampler stitches is always welcome!

Strawberries in detached buttonhole

Tonight I picked up Examplar IV and worked on the right border. On this side, the strawberries are in a version of detached buttonhole stitch. Since the strawberries are in three colors and I didn't want to keep switching colors, I decided to do the darkest color for each strawberry. I'll go back later and add the next two colors (as in the top berry).

Most of the instructions I've found on the web for detached buttonhole are of the "away and back"variety, where it is worked left to right and right to left, as on this site. The technique taught by Catherine Theron for this sampler is a "left to right and return" version. This can be seen best in the bottom strawberry. The area is first surrounded by backstitch or double-running. The thread then comes up at the right side of the area and a long stitch goes across the area. The thread is taken to the back at the left side. The detached buttonhole then starts on the left side (coming up one thread down from the long stitch), with each buttonhole stitch going into the row above it and under the long right-to-left stitch. On the first row, each buttonhole stitch goes under one of the outline stitches and under the long stitch.

Does that make sense? If anybody wants a better description, a diagram, or step-by-step pictures, please add a comment and I'll try my best to explain it better!

Seven strawberries

Since Scottlee is on hold for a bit, I picked up Catherine Theron's Examplar IV yesterday. It's been a while since I've shown a progress picture of this piece, but it hasn't progressed very far. I did, however, finish the top border yesterday! The strawberries across the top are stitched in a combination of italian cross and smyrna cross.

Actually, I see that the web page I just referenced distinguishes between the italian cross and the arrowhead stitch. The italian cross shown is the way both Catherine Theron and Eileen Bennett's Red Book describe it, with the bottom horizonatal stitch done first. When I did it this way, the diagonal stitch always pulled the bottom stitch up underneath it. I then referenced Darlene O'Steen's The Proper Stitch, and she describes italian cross as the website describes arrowhead stitch. In this stitch, the diagonal is stitched first, so the horizontal and vertical don't get pulled out of alighment. This is actually the stitch I used because I though it laid better.

WIP: Examplar IV

This weekend, I picked up Catherine Theron's Examplar IV for the first time since early June. I took this class at our EGA regional seminar in May, and have barely looked at it since!

Instead of alternating between bits of the border and parts of the middle, I've decided to actually work in the order prescribed in the instructions. That means border first, then the center motifs. It's weird, but I feel like I'm accomplishing something this way, and I won't have the thought of "I've still got to do the border" hanging over my head while I'm trying to enjoy the middle.

Because of this decision, I picked up at the first unfinished part in the instructions. I worked on the leaves in the border. So far, I've finished the queen stitch leaves along the bottom and left sides, and the smyrna cross leaves on the top and right are almost done.

Examplar IV: A Trellis Stitch Strawberry

The past two nights I've been working on Examplar IV. I've finished all the single-strand tendrils and strawberry tops. Each side of the border is different. The tendrils and leaves are the same on top and right, but the tendrils change on the other two sides. Some sides have symrna cross leaves, others have queen stitch leaves. And the strawberries are made with different stitches on each of the four sides!

I've started a strawberry on the top in a cross stitch variation, but I really wanted to try the trellis stitch. I only stitched it on a tiny doodle during the class. After MIL mentioned that this stitch is covered in detail in Darlene O'Steen's The Proper Stitch, I put this book to real use (i.e. not just browsing & drooling!) for the first time since I picked it up at the end of last year. Here is the result. I'm pretty happy with it, considering I hadn't done this stitch prior to last week in class.


I'm off to try another strawberry...

(Edited to add a link to trellis stitch instructions, as found in one of Jane Nicholas's books. I hadn't tried Google's Book Search feature before, but it's really useful!)