Thursday, December 27, 2012

almost winged!

Finally reached the top of Titania's wing!  Just one more to go... should be easy to finish tomorrow evening.  And then there's the (dun dun dunnnn) over one skin and her hair, plus beads.  Noooo!  She has so much skin, it's almost like a mini HAED in the middle.  But with only four colors. :p


Speaking of HAED, I picked up a few more charts in the 45% off sale. *naughty*  But I'd been waiting on Winter Rose being turned into a mini, so... I couldn't pass her up!  And then the other three I got were part of set of four.  Did I NEED all four?  No, but they're cute and small so there. :p


Isn't she lovely? ^___________^

Sunday, December 23, 2012

Titania is endless...

I can't believe I've stitched so much and still haven't reached the top of her wing!  I had to move back to the left wing because I reached the top of the q-snap and I don't want to move it until I've done all I can without moving things around.


Not too bad, considering I've only stitched the last three days or so!

I don't think I can finish her by the end of the year, but maybe I can get those wings done...

Saturday, December 15, 2012

wings of forever

Or something. Lady Titania continues to grow... slowly. :p


I feel like I'm going a bit faster now.  Took her off the scroll frame and put her on the trusty q-snap, which is so much more comfortable for me.  Can still stitch two-handed if I want, but with the fabric positioned exactly where I want it.  Yay!  I don't think it's realistic to finish her this year, but I'll try.  Maybe over the long Christmas weekend... (ha ha ha)

And HOLY COW have you seen the new Mirabilia?  WHOA.
Roses of Provence
More like Roses of AWESOME if you ask me!

Wednesday, December 12, 2012

octopus octopus octopus OCTOPUS

PS OCTOPUS

Sorry for the pooptastic pictures, but it's hard to take good ones when it's dark outside and you have lame shaky hands that can't keep the camera steady!  I'll add more as soon as I can. :)

The best "full" shot I got:

Lookit dem beads! :D

I decided that spiderweb roses don't belong in the ocean.
So I put real shells instead! :)

The handsome devil(fish)!

And I tried to scan it, but that didn't work either... this is the only part that came out okay!

As for the changes I made to the pattern... there are some worth noting. :)

- Changed top blackwork pattern to one of my own design.  The original had a ton of stitches that were over only one thread, and it didn't look good on a dark fabric.
- Changed the color of top and bottom blackwork from green to purple (the thread I was subbing for the green was a lot darker than the actual color and it didn't show up against my fabric).
- Coral to the left of the octopus was moved in (toward the octopus) two stitches.  It was way too close to the border originally.  I had to rip this out and redo it or I'd never like it.
- The same coral has the lines stitched in orange, not yellow as charted.
- Large border shells are backstitched in brown PTB, NOT orange PPP.
- Outlined starfish (bottom left) with blue PTB instead of black DMC.
- Octopus suckers were done with white beads turned on their sides, because I'm clever like that.
- Replaced spiderweb roses in the border with real shells.
- Stitched dense shells on border with peachy Kreinik, not yellow DD silk.

And finally, most of the threads were subbed with whatever I had in my stash, though I suspect all the DD silks were the correct colors.  I have a bunch of unmarked DDs that I got in grab bags of slightly imperfect threads, and they matched the colors I found by looking online.

So that's my first Chatelaine finish!  It won't be my last. :Db

Sunday, December 02, 2012

Octopus, Octopus...

The final part of Octopus Treasure Cave came out yesterday.  I had intended to finish it this weekend, but you know how things go sometimes.

I did get one of the four sides done.  Sorry for the terrible pictures (yay flash) but there are about nine different colors in the big scallop!  I'll get a better picture when I do another one.


Then again, I don't know if I'll do another one.  At least, not without changing it.  I have to say that I'm not a big fan of this part as all the elements are kind of weird.  The blank spaces to the right and left of the beads were supposed to be something like spiderweb roses... in the ocean?  And the shell looks an awful lot like the Shell logo with the bold orange backstitching.  And I don't really like the shell stitches either, they look pretty bland in that brown color, and not very shell-shaped.


Seriously. :(
I mean, I work in the oil industry but I'm not THAT fond of it!


I'll try making the outline brown instead...

YES, this is much better!  The shell is outlined in brown Petite Treasure Braid, and the small shells are restitched in a pinkish beige Kreinik.  The small shells still look like blobs, but now they're SHINY blobs and that makes them awesome. :p