More progress and some shopping (yay!)

Firstly to the shopping... One of our local shops finally has the new DMC colours so as a birthday treat I bought one of each of the new colours.  Is it weird that makes me really happy?  I guess some of it is my control freak nature.  And some of it is that I've felt a bit cheated since the colours came out when I spent what felt like so long building up a full set.  When they went and released another 35 colours my wonderful colour swatch book was suddenly incomplete again!   Mind you I do have to agree there were some gaps in their range. 

So I have sewn up swatches for 25 of the 35 colours and just the last 10 to go.  It will mean I need to unbind my book of swatches mind you, but I've never been totally happy with the way the binding works (and looks if you look closely enough) so maybe thats a good thing.

As for my houses quilt/embroidery I've made some good progress today.  I admit now I couldn't face another window today - I really must find another (quicker) way to do the windows.  

Anyway so I made a start on the lamp post outside of House number 2, that came together pretty nicely I think.  For the post itself I used a full 6 strands of DMC and then used buttonhole to couch it down.  For the light, I used some felt to get a bit of height and then used long/short stitch to cover the felt.  I'm quite pleased with how it came out.

I'd done the door for the house last weekend but the door frame was bothering me.  The painting has just some white dots on the black surround and a French knot wasn't going to be big enough as its about an inch wide (and I already have plenty of French knots).  So I tried a single strand with some detached chain and some tiny French knots, it looked Ok so I carried on.  I did at this point use a ruler (oh no!) just to make sure the straight stitches were about the same height on both sides (or there abouts) to make sure when I got to the top things were in the right place to go around the corner.

For the door I back stitched the planks down the door in a slightly darker colour than the fabric, then put a few slightly darker straight stitches for provide some shadows.  The horizontals are two rows of back stitch which I think whipped to get a more pronounced line.  Then I back stitched around the whole door to provide a bit of definition with the slightly darker brown.  It wasn't until it was too late that I realised that the wee gap around the door should actually sit out a bit from the door (per the painting) but oh well.  I can't fill it in now even with couching as of course I didn't use a ruler so the gap is uneven.  But oh well its not like its supposed to be a real house anyway 😆.  The door handle is just a couple of straight stitches across and a large one to connect them, I then buttonholed the vertical stitch.  So if you had really tiny fingers you could actually pull on the door handle, wouldn't help you open the door but thats not the point right? haha.

Stitches used since my last post:

Detached Chain, couching, buttonhole, split stitch, whipped split stitch & back stitch.

P.S.  The final count of French knots on the tree was approximately 2100 - thats a lot of French knots!

Thanks for stopping by!

Thats a lot of French knots...
So the French knots are done! yay!  I had an approximate number that I thought I had done but now when I try and work it backwards based on how much floss I used approximately it doesn't make sense.  So I'll need to dig out my tally and double check the count.  I did end up using the 3865 'white' that I had, I couldn't see the difference.  Maybe what I had down as Blanc was in fact 3865 to start with, the thread was so old its entirely possible thats the case.  But if I can't see it now, once its up on the wall there is even less chance of anyone spotting any difference.

So with all the French knots done.  And the decision on how to embroider the leaves still pending.  I didn't have too much choice but to make a start on the houses and in particular the windows.  Although I did still delay the windows a bit more by starting with the roof of the first house haha.

House One:

Running stitch - Pretty easy decision for the first roof, the original painting had what looks like running stitch.. so easy peasy decision made, turquoise floss picked to tie it in with one of the other houses and first roof done.  

Split stitch - Used for the brick work on the chimney,  I used an light orange floss that tones in with the roof fabric.

Detached chain with French knots  - I used this under the roof eaves I'm not sure if the stitch has a name, well I'm sure it does have a name, I just don't know what it is.  I thought I'd done it before but I can't find a matching chicken haha.  Its simply detached chain secured down with a French knot instead of a small straight stitch.

Raised Stem Band - I used this for the outer window frames.  Because I'm not using any rulers or anything I had of course to eyeball the spacing on the band bit.  I then used a single strand of floss to weave the band.  Each window took over two hours, probably closer to three.  But when I tested it a double strand would've worked up faster, but would've been too thick I think.

Long/Short stitch - Used for the inside of the window frames

Cross Stitch - I couldn't find a fabric that really made me happy for the brickwork at the bottom of the houses.  But I think the few cross stitches I've sprinkled on the brick work of the first house has made me a bit happier with it.  And I've managed to use another stitch!

So technically I could say thats House One done.  I'm still debating some additional stitching within the lighter windows themselves to get that lights on look.  And whether or not I need the dark outline around everything like the original image.  But I'll think about that as I go.

Thats it for now.  Thanks for stopping by!