The weather over the long holiday weekend has been lousy (hot, humid, overcast, thunderstorms) so between washing windows and other household chores that need doing I worked on the body of the teapot and started the background. Note that the empty area between the wisteria vine handle and the body of the teapot has been totally stitched. I decided to fill that area rather than trying to cut it out when this is made up. That is much easier!I have started doing three rows of basketweave around the perimeter of the design. That's because I've been reading Judy Harper's blog where she talks about surrounding ornaments with tent stitches for easy finishing. You can read her comments here, in date order.
http://fairy-crafts.blogspot.com/2009/05/basketweave-background-for-shaped.html
http://fairy-crafts.blogspot.com/2009/05/more-shaped-basketweave-background.html
http://fairy-crafts.blogspot.com/2009/05/amoeba-with-background-needlepoint.html
How did I decide to use white for the background area? That color is part of the design but not part of the outside edge so it will set off the design. I did consider pale yellow as I thought that would make the purple wisteria flowers and the blue teapot itself pop out visually, but in the end I went for simplicity as my mother collects blue and white china. She would prefer the colors be blue and white with purple touches instead of blue, white, purple and yellow.
I found three Melissa Shirley teapots for sale on at this eBay shop. You can see why I think my wisteria teapot came from her. The black one with pink flowers and leaves has a very similar spout, although all three teapots are smaller than mine.
http://stores.shop.ebay.com/dogwoodfan__W0QQ_armrsZ1
By the way, I worked with these threads in this order:
First, the white band around the middle of the pot (Gloriana Winter White 190 edged with Crescent Colours' Belle Soie silk in Violet Water).
Secondly, the blue diamond shapes inside the latticework (mostly in Crescent Colours' Babbling Brook, cutting out the right shade of blue for the area, with some solid blue Splendor silk in S860 for the very lightest blue diamonds).
The purple shading around the white band (Belle Soie silk Violet Water again).
The blue body of the teapot, working from left to right in the lightest blue, then the medium blue and finally the dark blue. (light blue is Splendor S860, medium blue Splendor S914 and dark blue is Kreinik's Silk Mori #5013).
I've started testing packed stem stitch for the brown wisteria vine on the handle. I plan to use Mandarin Floss (a six ply floss made of bamboo) in dark brown M830 and medium light brown M886. The stitching you see is three plies but I think two might work better. I will pull this out and restitch next. I want the wisteria vine stem finished before I do the white latticework.
Jane/Chilly Hollow
Main blog at http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow
