Byzantine Icon Ornaments Are Done

Here are the Byzantine icon ornaments, all done!

The Blue Angel has a single line of the beads I also used on her halo all around the edge to hide the join.

The Red Madonna's corners--I used the same red beads as on the halos--gave me fits. The painted 13 count canvas was really stiff and the corners didn't quite meet the felt backing in the way I wanted. No problem, add a second line of beads just at the corners.

Beads hide a multitude of sins....

I'm sorry you can't see the gold lame, gold paint, metallics and beads shining on these two pieces. They are little gems in person but don't photograph well.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Finishing Made Easy: Front to Back to Edge

Now that the needlepoint covers the finishing foam that has gold lame on one side, let me explain something I didn't make clear when I was stitching the two little Byzantine icons. These designs are on 14 count canvas that has been covered with gold paint, then the figures and borders were painted on top of the gold. All that gold paint makes the canvas a bit stiffer than normal and when I ripped out stitches on the border, I discovered that this dulled the paint. If you purchase such a canvas, be very careful ripping out in areas that won't be covered by thread.

However, when you don't stitch an area at all (like the gold background behind the angel and the Madonna and Child figures), the gold paint looks great, especially with a piece of gold lame underneath it. I showed off the two finished pieces at Scarlet Thread yesterday and folks asked about the gold background. It is bare naked NP canvas, but it doesn't look like it. The gold lame definitely adds to the paint and make the background interesting-looking enough that the people in the shop commented on it and asked what made it look the way it does. Definitely consider trying this on any piece that could use some sparkle, particularly if you have light coverage stitches or no stitches at all in areas.

Ok, back to finishing. It's time to stitch the needlepoint and gold lame piece with its hanger to the back piece of finishing foam. To do this, all you need is a sharp sewing needle and thread that matches the color of your felt. I use a thimble but this isn't necessary. You can substitute DMC cotton floss for sewing thread if necessary but I prefer regular sewing thread as I feel it is stronger and more suited to finishing chores.

First, put the NP piece on top of the felt finishing foam and compare how well they fit. You probably will have to trim the finishing foam a bit but leave the felt alone. Right now it is fine that it is bigger all around than your needlepoint canvas front. Since my finishing foam was self-stick, I had to pull the felt back off the foam a little around the edges but if you are careful you can easily do this. Just don't yank. If I had glued the felt to the finishing foam, my glue would be applied about an inch from the edge so that I didn't have to pull the felt away there. You will need to remove just a sliver from the edges of the foam, just enough that it is very slightly smaller than the front NP piece. Now use your banker's clamps (or clothes pens or straight pins) to attach the front and back. Once things are just the way you want them, you can trim the felt edge so it is a tad more than even with the NP on the front. This gives you a bit of felt to overlap the edge a little. Now start sewing the front to the back. Pinch the front and back together hard with one hand as you go and be careful not to put stitches very far into the front of the piece. Because your sewing thread matches the felt on the back, stitches there will be invisible but they will show on the front if you aren't careful. If you need to trim the finishing foam on the back or the felt a bit, you can easily do so as you work. Remove the clamps and put them elsewhere as you work.

You will end up with an ornament ready to hang but with a slightly rough edge where you will see the stitches that attach the front to the back. This is why ornaments have trim or beads around the edges. They hide this edging.

The last step in finishing the ornament is to cover the edges. I use gold braid trim or beads or both to do this, depending on what the ornament looks like. You can also use ribbon. Beading an edge is tedious work but it seemed to enhance the Byzantine Icons so that is what I did. If I'd attached trim instead, I probably would not have sewn the front to the back completely before sewing on the trim. I normally cut a length of trim and then put one end inside the ornament at the top near the hanger, then sew the trim all the way around to the top again, where I tuck the other end of the trim inside the ornament, complete attaching the front to the back, and then finish sewing the trim. Note that you can also use glue but due to several unfortunate accidents, I prefer sewing. It takes a lot longer but for me it looks better in the end.

Now, if someone will help me remove pieces of self stick finishing foam from my pants, we will be done!
Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Finishing Made Easy: Sew Those Corners Down

The next step in finishing the Byzantine icons into ornaments is to sew the corners together so the raw edges stay turned under. Take a piece of finishing foam that has gold lame stuck on one side and put it, gold side facing out so it can been seen through the holes of the NP, under the turned down raw edges. [You may have to trim the edges of the lame covered finishing foam with your scissors--not the good embroidery ones!--so it fits well inside the needlepoint cover. Trim a little at a time, an edge at a time, until the finishing foam fits snugly without bending the NP front.] Bend the raw edges down again over the finishing foam, but this time once they are just where you want them, use banker's clips (or straight pins or clothes pens) to hold the corners shut over the finishing foam. The photo above shows my banker's clips in action. Because the Byzantine icons are small pieces I didn't need quite so many clips for them.

What I do next is sew the corners closed so they stay put. After all, I can't leave the banker's clips in place!

You might want to use glue here instead of hand sewing, but I find glue messy and I think it isn't as strong as regular sewing thread. However, my friend Pat who does magnificent finishing uses glue a lot for her ornaments, and of course ornaments don't get the wear that a pillow would. Note that instead of sewing thread you can use a ply or two of DMC cotton floss. It doesn't matter what color you use, what matters is that the corners are neat and tightly sewn in place. You might want to use a thimble to push the needle through the layers of NP canvas. I aim for the holes but occasionally miss, especially since there are layers and they don't always line up their holes.

The photo shows the two icons with their corners turned under and sewn together. You also see a loop of Kreinik gold metallic which is how the ornaments will hang. Once you get the corners of the front turned and sewn, make a loop and stitch it securely to the top of your ornament at the back. The felt covered pieces of finishing foam which will be the rear of each ornament are at the top of the photo. You don't need to do anything with them right now. Just get the fronts ready for the next step which I'll describe tomorrow.

It took me almost an hour to sew the corners down for the two sets of fronts and then attach the hanging loops. I am a slow stitcher and I am interrupted as I work, so you may not need as much time. Remember, finishing is a slow process. Turtles do better finishing than racing rabbits!

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Finishing Made Easy: Cut It Out

The first thing I did when I had all my supplies together ready to assemble the ornaments was make a black and white xerox copy of both designs. I cut out the paper copies so that they were the same size as my icons. (The photo above shows the pet guardian angel paper copies lying on one sheet of finishing foam. The second photo below shows a paper copy being cut.) Using a loop of Scotch tape, I stuck these paper templates onto my finishing foam and cut out the foam to the correct size. I did that twice as I need two piece of finishing foam for each ornament. The needlepoint goes over one piece of finishing foam and the black felt backing goes over the other.

So for the Red Madonna I had: one NP canvas, one paper copy, and two pieces of finishing foam. Ditto the Blue Angel: one NP canvas, one paper copy, and two more pieces of finishing foam.

Because I bought self-stick finishing foam, I peeled off the backing and stuck two foam pieces to the black felt, then cut out the felt with a little margin all around the edges. These two pieces of black felt will make the back side of my ornaments.

After than, I took the two remaining pieces of finishing foam, peeled off the paper backing and stuck them to the gold lame fabric. This time when I cut out the gold lame, I didn't leave any margin sticking out. These gold lame covered finishing foam sheets go behind my needlepoint with the gold lame facing out so that you can sort of see it in the empty holes of the gold background I didn't stitch. This adds sparkle to the Christmas ornaments and also hides the innards of the ornament from view.


The next step now that the finishing foam pieces are cut and glued to the fabrics, is to cut out your needlepoint, leaving a margin of about a half inch all the way around. (For my 14 count canvas I cut to within 7-8 threads of the stitched area.) With rectangles, this is really easy, unlike the pet guardian angel shapes which you see above. Those have curves which have to be clipped, etc. For your first project, I'd recommend a square or rectangle ornament as those are very easy shapes to cut out and then turn under. MAKE SURE you do not use your good embroidery scissors to cut the needlepoint canvas. That will dull the blades very quickly.

Once you have trimmed your needlepoint canvas, using your fingers press the raw edges under. The edges will stay sort of turned under on their own once you mash them. At the corners it is often easier to mitre the corners. That just means you turn under the corner so it looks like a triangle on the back side, then fold the top and side edges together. This website shows you how in Figures 1 and 2.
http://books.google.com/books?id=mgivU2XxDvUC&pg=PA15&lpg=PA15&dq=embroidery+how+to+mitre+corners+in+finishing&source=bl&ots=asqEzVSBwf&sig=gqQ0nlckzThFfhSWhNmT3bQe7AQ&hl=en&ei=qeY4SpmmMYOHtgfDqZ3jDA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=2

Or Tiny URL
http://tinyurl.com/lny3rv

That's enough for today. I estimate all the above takes about 60-90 minutes for two ornaments but I've done this many times. Your first attempt will take you longer, particularly if you are constantly interrupted as I usually am or if you have to pull together all your supplies from all over the house.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Finishing Made Easy: The Ingredients

As I assembled the two small Byzantine Icons into ornaments, I took careful notes and photographs so that I could explain how I finished them. It's not a hard process, just tedious and time-consuming. Let me start by listing all the stuff I needed to finish the ornaments. Things that are optional are noted.

________________________________________________________

• Stitched needlepoint pieces
• Black and white xerox copy of my stitched icons
• Scissors (both good scissors for threads and fabric, and not-so-good ones to cut paper, NP canvas and finishing foam)
• 2 sheets of finishing foam, one for each ornament (may substitute 2-4 pieces of plastic canvas, you’ll need extra to put inside to stiffen the final ornament, or a piece of matte board)
• Tape (either Scotch tape or masking tape)
• Fabric glue if your finishing foam isn't self-stick (I generally use Aleene’s Easy Flow Tacky Glue)
• Felt (in a color that coordinates with your stitching)
• Sewing thread in a color that matches felt (may substitute one ply of DMC cotton floss)
• Sharp sewing needle (and thimble if you like)Trim or beads to cover edges of ornaments
• OPTIONAL: 6-10 Banker’s clips or clothes pins or straight pins to clamp ornament parts together
• OPTIONAL: Gold lame (to put behind the ornament)*
• OPTIONAL: Waxed paper to protect your working surface from glue

________________________________________________________

*Since I didn't stitch the gold background of my two icons, my gold lame fabric isn't really optional since I have to hide the innards of the ornaments with it. However, you may not need this to cover up or add sparkle to your design. Lame comes in many colors--I mostly use gold but I have some silver and some variagated blue that I use occasionally when gold's not the right color. Pick the color that works for your project.

Before I end for the day, I need to explain what finishing foam is. It is a slightly rubbery sheet used in kids' crafts that you can easily cut with scissors. Lightweight but rigid, I love using it in finishing. You can buy it at the big crafts stores like Michael's and Hobby Lobby or at Joann's Fabrics. Look for something called "foam sheets." It comes in various colors and also in metallic sparkled sheets, you can buy it in archival quality, you can buy it with a peel off back that will self-stick to your fabric. It also comes in various thicknesses: Be sure you buy sheets of the same thicknesses if you plan to use it in finishing.

Here are some photos to help you find it. You can buy single sheets or a package of a dozen or more. I usually buy a big package with a 40% off coupon every other year. There are a lot of brands. As far as I can tell, they are all the same thing.
http://www.craftsetc.com/store/item.aspx?ItemId=41880&dep=50&cat=4&subcat=5&Search=Y

http://www.craftsetc.com/store/item.aspx?ItemId=44260&dep=50&cat=4&subcat=5&Search=Y

http://www.craftsetc.com/store/item.aspx?ItemId=41884&dep=50&cat=4&subcat=5&Search=Y

My local stores carry a huge variety of this stuff in kits of cut out letters and shapes to be glued to plain sheets in contrasting colors for signs or to be glued to foam hats to personalize them. If you find packages like this one in the link below, that area will also have the plain sheets nearby.
http://www.michaels.com/art/online/displayProductPage?productNum=gc1394

Note that many folks like using matte board inside their ornaments. I personally find it hard to cut to anything but the most simple shapes in matte board but that's just me--not to be trusted with an Exacto knife! I've also used plastic canvas inside my ornaments. I find plastic canvas sometimes isn't rigid enough and I have to add an extra piece sandwiched in the middle of my ornament. I also sometimes think one can see the grid underneath the fabric backing so I have to put quilt batting around it. Also, plastic canvas is not as easy for me to cut with scissors as finishing foam. However, whatever material you use to make your ornaments rigid is up to you and depends on personal preference and what materials you can easily get in your area.

Tomorrow I'll start explaining how the Byzantine icons were assembled.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Blue Angel Icon is Done

The Blue Angel is done! I got the gold Kreinik border couched around the outside of the design yesterday morning and started the finishing for both pieces last night. Here is the finished design. I think she's lovely! Some details on her face and hands don't show up well in the photo and the beads don't photograph well, but over all, I am very happy with her.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Beads and Wire

Last night was Wrestling with Beads Night. It doesn't look like much work but to finish the beaded edge of the halo and then attach the pairs of pearls took a lot of time. I set each halo bead individually which is time-consuming. Then I had trouble with the pearls because only 4 of them had holes big enough to insert even the smallest beading needle I own. And I have some pretty small ones!

Enter the wire threader, which you see above in the photo. These are my favorite type of needle threaders. They are cheap and usually easy to find. I used to buy mine at Walmart for 3-5 for a dollar before they stopped carrying sewing goods. I recommend when you buy them you take them all out of the package and line them up on a counter and put a drop of Superglue on each where the tiny wires connect to the base. Once the glue dries it will keep you from pulling the wires out as you tug a thread through a tiny needle's eye. This extends the life of the wire threader a very long time. Usually I have to toss my wire threaders after a year or two because the wire tips are bent, not because I've yanked the wires out.

When I have a bead with a hole that is too small for my needle, I pull out the wire threader and insert the wires into the hole, then thread the bead as if I was threading a needle. That's how I attached the pearls to this canvas. It takes forever, I'll warn you. You have to thread your needle on a knotted length of your thread, and attach it securely on the back of your canvas, then come up where you want the bead to go. Remove the needle, put the wire threader through the pearl, pull the thread through the hole. Remove the wire threader and put a needle, any needle, back on the thread and sew the bead securely to the canvas. Then come up where you want the next bead to go and remove the needle, put the wire threader through the pearl, and repeat. It takes a while to get all this done when you are attaching a dozen pearls!

When I finished I celebrated by adding a few little gold Mill Hill Petite beads on the arch framework to set off the blue Kreinik stitches and also echo the gold background. I think they look nice.

The last step is to put the gold Kreinik border around the outside of this piece. I'll do that tonight and get started on the finishing of these two pieces. I plan to talk about finishing in detail, so pull up a chair and take notes. Finishing is pretty easy if you know what you are doing.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Halo on the Way

As you can see, I've made a lot of progress on the Blue Angel Byzantine Icon from Designing Women. I decided the white wing tips brought out the blues of the rest of the design and looked better overall than the blue Kreinik wing tips I test-stitched yesterday. It can be awfully hard to decide these things. Kreinik brought shine to the party but the deciding factor that made me go with white wing tips was that this piece when made into an ornament will be seen from a good distance. The white wings really added contrast that made the angel more noticable, especially when hanging on a Christmas tree among lights and other ornaments.

I had all the Kreinik I'd pulled out, though, so I tent stitched the rest of the top and bottom corners with it. It looks very dense next to the ligher blue ribbon floss and adds weight to the decorative arch the angel stands under. It is less impressive in the corners but I haven't put the border around this yet. I'll use gold Kreinik for that the same way I did for the Red Madonna piece.

Can you see I've added crystal beads to the spaces between the pairs of wing stitches and started attaching them to the outside of the halo? I've run into a snag with the white pearls that came with these two canvases. I planned to use all them on this piece in the white painted spots but the eye of my beading needle is too big. It won't go through the pearl holes! Today I'll hunt out a thinner thread to attach them with and a smaller sized needle. If that doesn't work, I'll improvize. Don't worry, those pearls WILL get stitched. LOL

Once I finish the halo, attach the pearls and do the final gold border, the Blue Angel will also be finished. I will then talk in detail about finishing them. I'm going to use the same technique to finish them that we are all using for the pet guardian angels we are stitching for the ANG Auction. I deliberately didn't talk about that when I was finishing six angels in a row. That would have been too depressing! But now I'll go over how I am finishing ornaments. It is not really quick but it is durn easy.

Even I can do it!

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Angel Hair (Do These Wings Make Me Look Fat?)

I'm making great progress on the Blue Angel. First, her hair. It is stitched in packed stem stitch and packed outline stitch (the needle is on the right or left, depending on which side of her face I'm working on, which changes the stitch name). using the same Wildflowers (Caron) that I used for the French knot curls on the Baby Jesus' hair in the Red Madonna piece. The color is 196 Sable, which is a mix of black and dark brown. In the photo above the right side of the hair is done. You can see I added bullions here and there on top of the outline/stem stitches to raise the bangs or indicate curls on her choulders. On the left side there are no bullions yet. Because Wildflowers is a thin perle cotton thread (you can see a strand of it on the canvas on the left), I found I could make fat bullions by using 15 or so wraps and tiny skinny ones with only 8 wraps.

Once the hair was finished, I moved on to the collar. I added a bit of blue Sparkle Braid #SK19 on top of my tent stitches to add a bit of embellishment, then stitched a row of clear Toho crystal beads (size 11/0) on top around the neckline. They barely show up in the photo and in real life but you can sense the sparkle, always a good thing for an icon and a Christmas ornament in my opinion.

Next I did the inner part of the halo, using ribbon floss as I did with Red Madonna. But this time I used Shimmer Blend #148F-32 Smoke Blu/Blu which is a lovely shade that coordinates with her robe. I used the same thread in long stitches on her wings. The gaps where the pairs of stitches meet will be filled with a bead, probably a crystal one like the ones on her neckline.

I used the same thread for tent stitches in the framework over her head, again the same thing I did for the Red Madonna, but in another color. Now I've started outlining the wings. On the left wing you see regular (not Shimmer Blend) white ribbon floss ##142-F2 White. Last night I wasn't happen with the long white stitches which I had to stitch twice (one stitch right on top of the ones that looked skimpy) so I used Kreinik's medium #16 braid in o33 on the right wing in long and skinny cross stitches. This morning I like the white wing edging better than the blue!

Guess I'll think this one over. It may be that natural light is kinder to the white wing tips and electric light kinder to the blue wing tips. Since this is a Christmas ornament, I may go with the metallic blue. These sorts of pieces will be seen in artificial light from the Christmas tree probably. I think I'll start working on the halo's outside edge while I mull this one over. Any opinions?

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Blue Angel in SIlk and Merino Wool

Now that the Red Madonna icon is done, I've started on the Blue Angel. I stitched her face and praying hands first, using the same set of Splendor Bronze skin tone silks with a bit of pink DMC cotton tossed in for pink cheeks that is on the first piece. I used the same brown Sheep's Silk for her brown eyes and also did a few tent stitches in it near her neck with this thread. I like using tent stitches for faces and other details like necks and hands. It is the perfect stitch for smooth skin. Note that I had to use 8 plies on this 14 count canvas except when I switched to one strand of the dark brown Sheep's Silk wool/silk mix.

Her blue robe was a quick stitch. I used the same Scollop stitch from Brenda Hart that was on Mary's robe but this time it was done as a horizontal curve like a smile instead of the ) shape on Mary's clothing. Because there is less space horizontally you don't see much of the pattern but it is there. If you look at the photo of the unstitched canvas over on the left side of this page, you'll see that there are three shades of blue in the robe, but I only used two to stitch it. I often ignore shading. This shall be our secret, ok?

I didn't have three shades of the blue thread I wanted to use, so there! If I don't post anything tomorrow you know a Blog reader blabbed and the NP police arrested me.

The dark blue is a silk/Merino wool blend from Felicity's Garden called 023 Blueberry. The medium blue is a silk/Merino wool blend from Silk & Ivory called 102 Cornflower. Note that the two threads are both a 50/50 blend of silk and Merino wool but they have different finishes. Silk & Ivory is shinier and is plumper in diameter. It is actually made for 13-14 count which this piece is. (Brown Paper Packages also has a thread called Trio in the same colors as Silk & Ivory made for either 14 or 18 count that is strandable. You don't use all the plies on 18 count, just like Paternayan wool. You remember Paternayan, don't you?) Felicity's Garden is denser and the shine more subtle. It is also thinner. If you look very carefully at the two tiny compensation stitches at the base of the angel to the left of her folded hands, you'll see that the Felicity's Garden doesn't quite cover there. I pulled a little too tightly on them and the background shows. Not to worry, I just stitched right on top of them with another strand of the Felicity's Garden. Just be careful of your tension when stitching. It is all too easy to pull too hard when you have a tiny stitch to do.

The Felicity's Garden was used for the collar. Again (GASP!) I stitched over the gold on the collar as I plan to use the blue as the base for something that will go on top. Already I've done button hole stitch around the edge of the collar to raise it a bit. I pulled tightly on the poor Felicity's Garden when doing buttonhole to make the raised edge the proper size. The thread doesn't hide the gold paint but that's ok. Blackwork (in a thin gold metallic thread) or beads or perhaps the pearls I didn't use from the Red Madonna will cover the bare bits.

I had planned to also talk about the Blue Angel's curls but this is so long I think I'll wait to talk about that tomorrow. Just note that I used three different brands of silk/wool threads. That's one trick I used to stitch on 13-14 count--fatter threads that have the shine of silk appropriate to an icon and a Christmas piece and the ability of wool to fluff out and fill hole to cover the canvas.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Background Abandoned

The Red Madonna is done! Boy, that didn't take long. These small pieces (they are 3 inches wish by 5 inches tall) are quick stitches, particularly on 14 count canvas and when you don't stitch a background at all.

Yes, after fiddling with the Maltese Stitch and trying to reduce the example I had to a size that worked on the background, I gave up. I never did come up with anything that looked good using that stitch. So I worked on the bottom corners and the top framework instead.

I took several photos and this is the best one. You can't really see the Kreinik gold and red striped thread I used well on the framework. I'll try a closeup that is heavily enhanced to show detail. Ok, here it is. Let me work from the top left corner out, explaining what is there, then I'll do the bottom corner, again working from the corner out.

I've talked about the outside border I added so we'll skip that, ok. The next thing you see is a red Toho bead (size 11/0) in the corner, followed by a cluster of 5-6 gold Mill Hill beads (size Petite). The next area is my red and gold mix Kreinik #203 couched down with red Kreinik #003 in #4 braid. (203 is called Flame and it is a mix of red and gold in one thread, not very attractive on the spool, but Oh Baby! it looks good stitched.) I laid a pair of stitches across the area and tied them with four stitches, two at the bottom and two at the top. Then you see the gold Kreinik done in the diagonal mosaic stitch. This is the area that I added three crosses on top of. They are all in the red and gold Kreinik mix. Then we return to another pair of couched red and gold Kreinik threads. The next area is interesting. It's just tent stitch but I used ribbon floss to do the tent stitches. I think ribbon floss, usually done in long stitches, makes great tent stitches if you can get over the fact that it twists and turns like crazy while you are trying to do the stitches. A laying tool of some sort is a must when it comes to tent stitches in ribbon floss! I like how the gold is shinier than the gold in the diagonal mosaic section but less shiny than the bright Fyrewerks gold in the halos. When it comes to mixing a lot of gold threads, if you can get the same color of gold but mix the textures, you get a lot of interest in the look of a piece. The last area is more red and gold Kreinik, also in tent stitches. If you look at the original unstitched canvas photo on the left side of this page, you'll see white pearls came with this piece and two were supposed to go in this area. Instead, I used two more red Toho beads. The white pearl in the corner also turned into a red bead. This is what happens when you hand a stitch guide to Jane--she runs wild! LOL

Before we look at the bottom corner, look at the two decorative areas right over Mary's head. I used my gold Kreinik to do a box turned on its corner edge and then my red and gold Kreinik to do a second box under the first. The gold box has a red bead in the middle and the red and gold box has a gold one in the center. These make a decorative pattern in the middle of the arch that the Red Madonna and Child stand under. The stitch I used has a name but I can't remember it and can't find it in a quick browse. Sorry!

Now the bottom corner. It is much simplier, just tent stitches in the red and gold Kreinik with another red bead in the corner next to the gold frame I added. The hardest part was deciding whether to make the two bottom corners match. They were not painted to be identical, in fact the top corners weren't either. Looking at the design, you'll see how there is much more open space to the left of Baby Jesus than there is to the right of Mary. That weighs the canvas to the right and focuses your eye on Baby Jesus on the left in my opinion. So there is more "stuff" on the right side so the corners are a bit less to make room. I finally shrugged and stitched the corners more or less as painted. After all, this is more realistic. Very few things in real life are symmetrical.

After all this, you can see why a plain background looked good to me. Sometimes you need a resting place for the eyes. I'll put gold lame behind the canvas to add a little more sparkle and to hide the finishing foam that'll be inside. I'm going to finish both pieces together, however, so I've put Red Madonna away and have started Blue Angel. You can see the plain canvas of Blue Angel on the left side of this page under the Current Project title.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow