New Justine progress pics

Here's my latest -- one picture taken with a flash, one without. Maybe I'm a quarter done...? It's going slowly; I wish I had more time to stitch!

Progress pic...

Novemre???

Ok, so why is there no "b" in the French "November" in Justine? Novemre??? This does not seem right to me.

But that is the way it was stitched in the original Justine and, hence, that is the way it is charted. So I will stitch it this way. But I'm curious about the spelling.

Justine, a comedy of errors

I started Justine maybe 2 months ago or so and got as far as the letters "SE" in Louise. I actually stitched them several times, sure and then unsure about the daggone vertical thread. Argh!

Anyway I put it down and stitched something else. Well, I returned to Justine and was happily stitching away and had completed another 13 letters, only to discover that I'd miscounted by one thread and none of my new stitching lined up with the vertical thread! I'm sure a purist would have frogged those letters and done them correctly. But I just figured it was a sign from Providence to accept my inadequacies and perhaps to give me license to make more mistakes on this sampler!

I am stitching it with DMC linen floss. There are only 24 different colors of linen floss, so there's not a lot of color options. Anyway, I started stitching "Louise" and "12345" with a color called dune. I think it would look nice on a cream colored or antique white linen, but it seems to blend in with this vintage Maple Sugar fabric. So I'm switching to ecru, as in the word "cette."

I realize that the blue for "*AaBC" is really too light, but there are no other options if I want to stick with linen floss (which I do).

Despite these snafus and setbacks, I remeain entranced by Justine and its beauty!

Score!!

Ok, so I am supposed to be "on the Wagon," meaning I am supposed to be stitching from my stash and not buying anything new. But I stumbled on "Sampler Wreath" by Mary Beale and couldn't resist it. I got it for $25 on eBay and was happy to get it for that price.

Lovely, isn't it?

And then I heard of a needlework shop closing in the Washington, D.C. area. I believe the lady who runs the shop also designed a few pieces (under the name Merry Designs). So I had to buy her Day Lily design before it becomes unavailable. I saw it in person at a needlework exhibit a year ago, and it was striking.

Well, so much for staying on the Wagon...!

Peace, without an "I"?

This is a beautiful piece. I admire all the work that must have gone into designing it, and I realize the dedication it would take to complete this piece. But... I am aware that many historic alphabet samplers do not include the letter "J." But I have never heard of anyone omitting the letter "I." I wonder why the designer did it? Any ideas?

Bent Creek 'Love'

I decided to stitch something quick and easy. This is "Love" by Bent Creek.



I stitched it on a piece of 19-ct driftwood Cork linen that had been in my stash for eternity. It's not the ideal fabric for this because the white floss kind of disappears into the white fabric threads, but I really wanted to use it up. The heart at the top is supposed to be done in French knots, but I just used whole crosses. I'm disappointed with the dye lot for my Weeks "Cocoa." There is essentially no color variation. I could have just used regular DMC for the same effect. The buttons used are a little bigger than the suggested buttons (which I couldn't find).

I'm thinking about giving this piece away (my brother's anniversary is later this week; I think this would be cute in lieu of a card...) and restitching it for myself one of these days. If I can't locate smaller buttons, I think next time I'd omit the heart button above the "v" and maybe only use one button beside the "z" to make it less busy.

All in all, a fun cute stitch!