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| Gregory Peck Block Finished |
Yesterday's scan of Stars made me realize that I needed to add a few more beads to the center star, this time at the sides where the star touched the terracotta lozenges. Photographs and scans are really useful when it comes to pointing out problems that your eye just doesn't see. For example, there is a white hair stuck to the top leg of the star in the photo above, courtesy of Watson (looking guilty below.) I didn't see it until I looked at the scan.
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| The culprit |
I used black beads this time. In order to keep the bead sizes the same whether I was using black or violet beads, I used Mill Hill's Magnifica beads. These are faceted beads, roughly size 11 (or 11/0, depending on how the size is written). Using the same brand and type helped me keep the bead sizes the same. Sometimes you will want to do this, sometimes different sized beads will look better.
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| Gregory Peck's on the right, middle row |
Once the beads were added, I finished the sashing that surrounds Gregory Peck. I'll put Stars away now until I finish Temple of 1000 Cranes and its stitch guide, then I'll move on to the Ava Gardner block on Stars after I work on Luna a little.
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| Progress to Date |
Here's my progress on the total design to date. As a special treat, I have a photo of another finished Stars.
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| Arlene's Pink and Blue Baby Stars |
This photo was contributed by Arlene. It is notable because this is the only pastel Stars I've seen. Arlene stitched this as a baby gift for a close friend so she used pink and blue as the main colors and alternated pink and blue as the highlights in each square. It was exhibited at Woodlawn a couple of years ago where I saw it. Note the variation on the border which squares it off and makes it easier to frame. This piece and my experiences while stitching my version of Stars make me want to see it done in ecru and beige with red and gold accents or all in grays or white and silver.
Thank you for sharing this with us, Arlene. It's beautiful.
Written by Jane/Chilly Hollow Blogging at http://chillyhollownp.blogspot.com Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow
7 comments:
What an adorable culprit, Watson is really cute. Guess is his way of "participating" in needlepoint, we all know how catchy it is. Who can blame Watson?
Jane I wonder if anyone knows when the new Kreiniks (wire and candy colors) will be commercially available. Did some searches and came up empty. I'm about to start some Easter eggs and the candy colors would be a great addition.
Usually the new things at the January Market start showing up in February-April. If you want to use the new Kreinik threads, you might have to wait a little while to get them.
Bet your local shop can give you an estimate, though. Or if you don't have a local shop, perhaps one of the Kreinik mall shops can help.
http://www.kreinikmall.com/
Hi Jane,
Seeing your Stars to date is wonderful. You are over the hump. Looks awesome. Thanks for sharing Arlene's Pink/Blue Stars, too. Lucky little recipient. Please, give a hug to Watson.
Wonderful! How could anyone be upset with Watson....I can tell he is saying "Sorry, Mom!"
Hi, Jane -
I feel so special and honored to be a part of a ChillyHollow blog post! Thank you for sharing your work on Stars and the image of the adorable Watson.
For those that are following Stars work closely, perhaps doing one themselves or contemplating it, I thought I might share a few more details of mine. The main colors are actually Violet (think DMC 3740) and Brown (think DMC 840). The secondary color was Ecru. For an accent color, I couldn't decide between blue and pink (violet, brown, blue, and pink were all in the overdye that I was using to help with my planning) and came to the conclusion that I would try to include both.
I *think* I began with the square you just finished (I know it was middle square and not an edge one). I liked the way the accent color was shown in a small part, symmetrically in four parts but in the center, and decided to make thread changes to all the squares so that this accent would show up like this (near the center and symmetrical) in all squares. I decided that I wasn't going to use the overdye at all, instead hoping the colors flowed nicely as is. I ended up making lots of thread changes despite the best of planning, mostly to continue using lighter rather than darker shades. I did my own thing for sashing and border rather than what was suggested in the pattern.
All of this to say that while I am a "planner," there was a lot about this piece that wasn't figured out until I was in the midst of it. I have so enjoyed watching yours, Jane, evolve over time and the others that have been out there from time to time on various blogs. Thank you for giving me the opportunity to share!
Stars is coming along very nicely, Jane! My group is going on a retreat this weekend to try to make some significant progress on ours. I hope to have something to show for two days of stitching by the time I get back on Sunday afternoon.
Have a great time, SL, and tell everyone hello from me. Please take lots of photos so we can see all the varieties of Stars your group is working on.
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