Threading Along: A WELCOME update

One of my resolution projects for 2013 is to finish my Brazilian embroidery WELCOME. To encourage myself to work on it, I keep it in Massachusetts to stitch when I visit my husband. Not only do I not have to carry it back and forth, but my husband enjoys watching it come together. To see where I left off back on January 3rd, you can follow this link to my last posting.

I was back in Massachusetts February 1-18 and here is my progress. As you can see I have finished the flowers on the three letters which I had worked the greenery on in December (C, M and the final E) and stitched all of the first E. I even started the gold work on the O. Let's look more closely.

The first E is composed of a profusion of greenery done in buttonhole stitch, alternating satin stitch and detached lazy daisy stitches along stem stitch ribs. The flowers are made of bullion and cast-on stitches. Eventually, I will sew beads into the centers of the bullion "violet" and cast-on daisy and pearls onto the blue dots along the leaves. Each of the letters has a row of pearls that will fancy them up.

I have the most work left to do on the C. The daisy is made up of bullion-tipped lazy daisy stitches and filled with turkey work. Interestingly, the yellow and purple of this flower come from the same variegated thread (Iris 019) which I cut apart to use the purple and yellow sections separately. The turkey work loops will need to be cut and brushed out and then trimmed. It will make a fuzzy yellow center. The blue stamens on the "creeping flowers" look creepy to me. I don't mind the color, but the Lola thread I used is too think. One of my finishing jobs will be to find an Iris-weight substitute. I think it will look better with a lighter-weight thread and perhaps beads at the end of each stamen. The printed stars are meant to be stitched with Krenik ribbon. I have seen it done and don't like it. I think I will sew on some beads, but my bead stash is in Denver, so that will have to wait to find the right beads.

I think the M may be my favorite letter so far. I love the reds and pinks against the green and gold. The rolled rose buds turned out particularly well. The other roses are the same Bossa Nova Roses that are on the L. They consist of 13 overlapping bullions pulled tightly around each other. By pulling them in tightly, they force the first bullions upright. Each flower stands a full 1/4" above the surface of the fabric and took two full lengths of thread to complete. Although this is the most complete letter. I see some places that may need extra gold work. I have to wait until the piece is washed and the blue lines are gone to make a final determination.

The flowers on the final E are each composed of 5 overlapping cast on stitches. They will sport beaded center eventually. I did the first flower 4 times before I finally got it right. They are simple, but getting them to lay just right took a little time.

Finally, I've begun the gold work on the O, but the gold thread was shredding again, which made the stitching slow. I will need a second spool in order to finish the O and W.

While I wish I didn't have to go home yet, I have run out of 4 of the 6 threads I've been using for the greenery, so I guess I couldn't have made much more progress on this trip. I expect to finish the W and O on my trip home in April. After that, I will take the piece back to Denver to wash, prep and do the finishing work, before bringing it back to Massachusetts for framing in June.