Fabulous framing

My cross stitch series is back from the framer and it looks great! It took a lot of time and collaboration to sort out all the details, but it was worth the effort.

This had to be photographed outside because inside shots resulted in the mat board appearing pink.

My wish was to frame all five designs together but was unsure how to accomplish it without them looking unbalanced or really, just plain stupid. So I was amazed and relieved when Sales Manager Lucy, a Master Certified Picture Framer, in very short order, whipped up a configuration complete with ideas for filling the empty spaces above and below the center design.

Right off the bat, Lucy determined a suitable estimated finished size (~ 33″ x 23″), margin width (1⅛”) and mat spacing (1½”) so we could get on with the business of selecting a frame, mat, and filler for the middle.

Leaning heavily on her expertise, I chose this frame, which was almost perfect, but for the metallic element running through it, making it shinier than I could tolerate.

Lucy said they could do some things to tone it down; indeed, they worked their magic and it turned out perfectly. John thinks they probably sanded it.

Mat choice was a lot more difficult but after much back and forth, I opted for a medium taupe colored silk to coordinate with the taupe in the all the borders.

A silk mat was chosen because of Lucy’s suggestion that embossing be used to fill the spaces above and below the center design, upon which she produced a notebook of designs for me to peruse. The tulips won.

Over the next six weeks, Lucy forwarded emails with photos of embossing options – lots of trial and error done on cheaper mat board, with the images cut out instead of embossed, but good for showing the general concept. For whatever reason, the first one forwarded did not contain tulips, and while exciting to see from a conceptual point of view, it generated zero enthusiasm as a design element.

Meh.

Back on track with the tulips, these options came in:

Good start, but the connecting line doesn’t look good.

The zig-zag line looks even worse.

No.

Now we’re heading in the right direction, but too many tulips. I’m liking the straight standing tulip in the middle a lot.

A preview of how the embossing will look on the chosen mat – loving it!

Outer tulips facing in. Still too many, with growing preference for the straight standing tulip.

Yes, the one on the bottom, but five is too many.

Better . . . .

Bingo!

Here’s a closer look at the center section:

The day I delivered the cross stitch pieces to the framer, two other customers were in the shop wanting framing for a large architectural sketch. They were insisting on the use of archival materials, museum glass, the whole works. I was thinking that they had come to the right place because this business knows how to do it right. Then they saw the price and the whining ensued.

It was all I could do to keep quiet. Several years ago, this framing business rescued multiple, badly damaged needle works belonging to our family caused by careless, inexcusable framing techniques and poor-quality materials. The level of disrespect uncovered as each piece was removed from its original frame was reprehensible. See what I mean HERE and HERE. I wondered: had those two customers seen the physical damage inflicted on my pieces by other framers, would the whining have stopped? Then I saw this:

Indeed!

After the two customers left, Lucy and I discussed the whining, during which, she showed this:

True!

Thanks for stopping by!

Frame-ready

Number five in a series of five cross stitch designs is now finished, and I’m looking forward to visiting the framer next week.

The biggest decision will be whether to frame each one individually or to combine them in some way. I like the idea of framing three of them together in a vertical stack, but not sure how to handle the remaining two. The framer will have some great ideas, so I’m not overly concerned about it. It’ll just be nice when at least one of the upstairs bedrooms no longer has naked walls. I’ll keep you posted.

Until next time, Happy New Year, everyone!

One more for the tree

In the annual quest to clear out my Christmas stitching projects drawer, this year, I managed to finish this little Mill Hill beaded stocking ornament.

Merry Christmas, all!

Cross stitch finish – #4

At the end of August, I finished number four in a five-piece collection of cross stitch images I’ve been working on through the years as time and mood permitted.

I prepped and started the fifth one in anticipation of working on it during our vacation last month but didn’t touch it because of the poor lighting in the place we were staying. Since I require airport runway quality lighting for handwork, it was no surprise that the lighting in our room fell short – even the bulbs in the table lamps were dim.

I did make a little progress on the border after we got back but then got busy with other life stuff and had to set it aside. Still, it’s good to be close to the finish line with this series.

Year-end finishes

With one day to spare, I am sooooooo happy to say that I accomplished my goal to have all 30 vintage tree blocks done by the end of the year!

Throughout block construction, I’ve been struggling to come up with a layout beyond the standard on-point-with-sashing-and-cornerstones variety. After all this time, nothing had come to mind until a few days ago when it occurred to me that maybe a pieced border would be the solution I was looking for. I plugged the idea into EQ and it was perfect – lots of work, but perfect.

I also combed through my stash and found the perfect fabric for the alternate squares and setting triangles. It’s a homespun plaid and fortunately, there was more than enough to work with. I had considered unbleached muslin, but the effect was underwhelming. The homespun worked because it provided great contrast for the tree blocks.

Earlier this month, I finished these cute little felt ornaments for the Christmas tree:

And finally, a piece of my stitching past came back to me when we received my dad’s Christmas gift.

Tucked into the package was this, cut from the corner of a flour sack towel I had cross stitched for my mom when she and my dad moved into a new home in 1991-92.

Stitched with waste canvas and 6 strands of floss

Accompanying it was a note from my dad which read “A memento from the past.”

I was amazed at how well the stitching had held up and was amused that my dad had used Mom’s pinking shears to cut it. I don’t know what to do with it, but it was sweet of him to think to save it instead of throwing it away with the rest of the towel.

A cross stitch finish

At some time this month, I morphed into a sloth and became consumed with a case of the slows, just like the animal. But while slow is natural for this unusual creature, it’s not so much for me. I think all the extended shelter-in-place hogwash has not been kind to my motivation level. I’ve been going into work almost every day but miss the daily interaction with others at the office. Normal cannot return soon enough.

In the meantime, the green lawn chair quilt is getting quilted in fits and starts, but that’s about it. So today, I’m showing off a cross stitch project finished at the end of February which didn’t get any coverage here because I posted about other things.

This is number three in a five-part series by Linda Bird.

Thanks for stopping by.

Framed

The cross stitch project I started while our house was under construction is done and hanging in my sewing room. The framer suggested that it be hung on point and I wrestled myself out of my comfort zone and agreed.

The frame (almost not found from among the hundreds available) is ideal: a speckled gray/green/brown which blends perfectly with the outer stitched border

It’s good to finally have something pretty adorning the big, blank, sterile section of wall above the printer table.

Thanks for stopping by!

A guide to cross stitch sanity

My ADD tendencies pushed me into another cross stitch project, one of a three-part series with a garden theme and very different from the types of patterns I typically stitch. The finished image is small, measuring only 3⅞” x 5¾” and is jam-packed top to bottom with color changes, many of which require a single stitch immediately followed by the burying of the thread tail because a repeat of that color is nowhere close by.

For copyright purposes, most of the pattern has been blurred, but you get the idea.

Keeping track of my stitching position and nine shades of green was driving me crazy, so I did two things: massively enlarged the pattern (~400 percent) and gridded the ground cloth.

The pattern as originally published measured 7¾” x 5⅜”, with each 10 x 10 graph paper square measuring only ¾”: insanely tiny.

I scanned the image and printed it on E-sized paper with the final image measuring 31″ x 21¼” with each 10 x 10 graph paper square measuring almost 3 inches. Yes, it’s big and a bit unwieldy to handle, but reading the chart is now a breeze.

In addition to marking the horizontal and vertical centers on the ground cloth, I also added grid lines in the same location they appear in the pattern.

It was tedious, to be sure, but highly beneficial for keeping track of my stitching position.

For all you stitchers out there, I hope you find this helpful. What are you stitching?

In the cross stitch zone

I finished a cross stitch project while on vacation earlier this month

Fern Lake trail in Rocky Mountain National Park

and took it to the framer yesterday. Finishing it inspired me to pick up where I left off on this one, number three of five in the Heirloom Quilts series by Linda Bird:

I made a small upgrade to the organization system I created two years ago for the embroidery floss colors required for a project, which you can see here. Instead of using sheets of paper, I cut 1¼” x 2½” scraps of Aida cloth,

overcast the edges and added labels to the bottom which contain the floss color number and chart symbol. The cloth holds up much better than the paper, so it was worth the effort.

A visitor and some cross stitch minis

My brother visited earlier this month and we had a good time hanging out. He brought the cross stitch designs I stitched for my mom back in the mid-90s. They’re done in her colors and she displayed them in her dining room. After she died, my dad said he didn’t mind if I had them.

Now I need to make two decisions: where to hang them in my house and whether or not to replace the pink matboards. Although I like pink, I think those two look dated. Anyway, here they are:

The designs are from the Just*Nan Ornamental Treasures collection and include

Nosegay

Snowberries

Rosebuds

Victorian Floral