March Gifted Gorgeousness
It is my birthday later this month, so it truly would be a shame for me to not include a Gifted Gorgeousness post this month!
I realize I never shared with you some very nice presents my husband gave me for Christmas! You may realize by now that I aspire to Adventurous Stitching. Now my eyes may be bigger than my needle at the moment given I am too busy raising kids to really settle down and spend those prime daylight hours learning something new, but I really do wish to expand my skills beyond cross stitching, my true first love! My dear husband is supporting that…at any rate, he is buying me good presents! Or maybe he thinks I’ve already met my lifetime supply of cross stitch kits!
Here are the kits he gave me for Christmas:
They are Millefiori Butterfly Brooch from Jenny Adin-Christie, the California Dogface Butterfly Stumpwork kit from Alison Cole, and Foxy from Becky Hogg.
Beautiful, aren’t they? Unfortunately, they all really need to be stitched on fabric held taut, in some kind of frame that allows for both hands to work. And I did not have such a frame so all I could do was LOOK at these gorgeous kits for the past 3 months. But last month someone on Facebook was selling a sit on frame and I snagged it! Now I could begin! Begin what? Well I’m going to start with Foxy. I have read through the directions of each and he seems the easiest. (Ha ha) Here is my first night of work, felt padding…
and the first couched threads.
Oh, so fancy and shiny! That alone is good motivation to work on this! But it is a lot harder than cross stitch or ribbon embroidery! It will take me a lot longer than I thought as this little bit, sewing the felt on and then the gold took a couple hours.
And here is my Sunday afternoon progress:
I don’t usually make time to stitch during the day but I made a big mistake on the gold on the fox’s back last night. I had to step away and sleep on it. Today I resolved to take it out and fix it, and I ended up going quite a bit beyond the fix to finish that step. I’m ready to begin the “plunging” which is how you take those loose ends of gold thread to the back. I hope to get it all “plunged” tonight and fill in the middle spiral.
Now if you want to see more Gifted Gorgeousness, head back to our dear friend Jo’s blog to see who else is linking up this month! Thanks for stopping by!
Foxy is stunning Mary! It looks like you did an awesome job on him to me and I look forward to seeing him finished.
Thank you! It is a beautiful project! I am enjoying the fact that I’m learning goldwork because I really admire it, but I don’t think I’ll be giving up cross stitch for it!
What beautiful work, foxy is stunning. Lovely pressies from your DH for Christmas, I wonder what your birthday will bring. Happy birthday for later this month
You are certainly expanding your skills!!! The fox looks to be such a difficult project but your work is beautiful. It’s good to have a challenge and those butterflies certainly look challenging! Stay well, Mary and RJ
Oh my goodness, what exquisite patterns. Your stitching is lovely too! That fox is AMAZING!! I can’t wait to see him finished. I wish I could sit by and watch how you do this, it’s fascinating to me!!
Those kits are amazing (and tempting) I’ll keep looking to your progress, this fox chart is so cute and the work on felt very interesting (never see that before). Thanks for sharing. xxx
Wow how different since I’m just really a cross stitcher. It will be a lot of fun to watch your progress on these. Good luck!
Thanks for taking part in GG this month. Love your kits. I am sure Dima stitched the fox. If you don’t already follow her blog, you should! She is very inspiring.
Yes, she did!
Here’s the link to her posts from 2017. I have a very good memory!
http://d1-d2.blogspot.com/search/label/Foxy
All lovely patterns from your husband, I think I would have started with the fox too. He looks great so far, he’s going to be amazing when finished.
He is totally amazing and beautiful, thank-you for sharing.
Stay Healthy
Catherine