The little three camels mini stocking is finally made up. Hope you like it!
To recap, this is a painted canvas from Liz (the precursor company of Tapestry Tent?) that I picked up cheaply to stitch for my neighbor who loves camels. It's on 18 count and is around 6 inches tall and about 3 inches wide at the widest point.
I learned several important things finishing this piece. As you remember, I decided to use foam core inside the piece and make it up as an ornament, not as a functioning stocking. I think it is really too small for me to successfully make it a Christmas stocking. Stockings are a bit tricky to finish and I know my limits! The thinnest foam core I could find was 1/4 inch thick. While it makes for a very light weight but rigid piece, it's a bit thicker than I like. Not much you can do about that--I doubt foam core comes much thinner than what I found. So I went with a broad wired piece of trim to cover the fat edge. I'm also not sure I would use wired trim again, either. It was very easy to mold into shape but it would not tie the fancy Chinese knot I wanted to put at the toe above the glass bead that hangs from the toe. I ended up using Kreinik's 002 gold in the #32 braid thickness for both the bead dangle and the loop to hang the stocking up instead. And that doesn't show the fancy knot well. Or maybe I just didn't tie it quite right since that was my first attempt!
The real moral of finishing this stocking is to not be intimidated by roadblocks in finishing. I just changed directions when things didn't work all that well and tried other things. Another example is the little bump of beads over the edges. (Squint and you'll see them in the photos.) When I got my trim attached at the edges, there were a few places where it didn't really cover the front and back join that well. I thought that over a minute and then rummaged through my beads and found half a box of Mill Hill gold seed beads. I just did another round of couching the trim to the stocking but this time I came up, threaded three gold beads on the needle, and then went down over the trim. This is couching with beads and it puts a cluster of beads around the trim periodically. I tried to space the beads evenly but where they would hide untidy spots. I think they look nice and they add a bit of interest to the plain gold trim. This piece is pretty busy, so a fancy gold trim wouldn't look good in my opinion but a plain one wasn't quite right either. I think I killed two birds with three beads, so to speak, by hiding problems and fancying up the trim with couched beads.
The last thing I'd like you to notice is how important it is to have the bead hanging from the stocking toe. Jane and I (yes, we have the same lovely name!) realized when we were looking at photos of finished Christmas stockings how important it is to consider how the stocking will be displayed. We saw a Santa with a long coat stitched in vertical rows that looked odd hanging because the very straight ||| stitches were slanted when the stocking hung off the mantelpiece. I was just starting to stitch this little mini sock when Jane and I made our discovery. This both influnced her choice of stitches for her Santa stocking and made me look at the design of mine. I photographed the finished piece laid flat and hanging at an angle so you could see what I mean. Go to the Yahoo 360 blog and look in the right column to see "The Wise Men's Stocking is Done" photographed straight to compare how the direction matters.
I realized that Liz designed the camels to be viewed from an angle. Look at any photos of this design on my Yahoo 360 blog and you'll see I stitched it in a frame with it upright but the camels look much more real hanging at an angle. That's why I added the heavy glass bead--the make sure the camels were always seen at their best angle. It's sort of like movie stars who always want to be photographed from their best angle only. When you stitch your stockings, think about how they will be displayed and choose stitches and finishing options that will make it look its very best.
Hope you enjoyed my stitching of the three little camels stocking.
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