More Trees on Tulle: The Cedars

Left Cedar Tree

The cedar trees on this piece are tall and narrow so I went looking for a stitch that was upright and skinny, just like the trees.  I found the perfect stitch in June McKnight's Plants and Animals in Needlepoint (a great book if you are stitching flora and fauna and critters, by the way).  I'm calling the trees that are on either side of the fish topiary cedars, by the way, and they were both stitched with one ply of the same thread-- Soie Crystale 8092.  This is also the same thread used on the big spruce tree on the right side.

Tall Straight Cross

The stitch I choose is called Tall Straight Cross.  It's diagrammed on page 14 of June McKnight's book.  It is a very simple stitch, just rows of long vertical stitches over four threads.  You skip a channel (or two threads) between each long stitch.  The second step of the stitch is to cover those long stitches in the middle with a shorter vertical stitch over two threads.

In the example above you see the yellow straight stitches I worked from left to right and two horizontal backstitches that I have started working over the middles going from right to left.  You can work the stitch in any way that makes sense to you, however.  The rows above and below the first row interlock so that your canvas is covered with cross shapes.  Because you are using light coverage stitches, some paint shows but this is a much denser stitch than the one used for the juniper bushes last week.

In the photo above the cedar on the left is stitched but the one on the right (which is partly behind the arch of the gate) is not.  That's because I worked it slightly differently, but with the same one ply of the same thread.  I stitched it without doing the horizontal tie down stitches.  In other words, do the yellow stitches in the example without adding the tie downs on top.  This allows more paint to show as this tree has more shading.  It's also easier to compensate the cedar stitches that show between the latticework if you don't have to worry about the horizontal stitches.

Doing the first half of Tall Straight Cross is the same as during Parisian stitches.  Many stitches are created by not doing steps in another stitch.  Here's a photo of both cedar trees done.

Next time I'm probably going to work the short juniper bushes to the right and left of the cat topiary but I haven't decided yet.

Written by Jane/Chilly Hollow Blogging at http://chillyhollownp.blogspot.com and at http://chstitchguides.blogspot.com