Both of Melissa Shirley's little Japanese girls hold butterflies. Butterfly is flying a butterfly-shaped kite and Fan holds a butterfly in her hand. I think myself Fan's butterfly is a hair ornament and she is studying herself in the mirror to see just where in her hair to place it. So obviously the two butterflies are both important elements in both designs.
Because the hair ornament butterfly is rose red, I used my dark rose red Bella silk for the lower wings and the medium rose red Mandarin floss for the upper, lighter-colored wings. You'll see my first step above--using one ply of the Mandarin floss (it is a six ply thread made from bamboo fiber) I outlined the butterfly wing shapes.
You may remember that the pale yellow background stitch went right on top of one wing and the antenna, so I used a sharp and small 28 needle to go right through the background stitch in places. Once I had the outline, it was easy to fill in with little short stitches of various lengths.
The finial touch was the gold Kreinik antenna (stem stitch) and outlining the wings with one strand of Treasure Braid in purple. Fan has purple in her (the other little girl doesn't--it's the only color they don't both wear) and I decided a bit of purple shine would make the tiny butterfly stand out. After all, the gold antenna don't show awfully well against the pale yellow background. Below you see the end result.
Now, on to finish that kimono! This entry is also shown at my main blog--
