Melitastitches4fun's Blog

Thanks to a combination of stitches including padded satin and freestyle stitching I am happy with the oranges areas. I combined 3 Bark (WDW) for the padding. Then, 2 Hazlenut + 1 Bark or 1 Bark + 2 Hazlenut for the top layer. Plus, a little freestyle stitching on the top.

The strip along right side that is blueish green worked up quicker than last time when I used Diane’s Stitch on that side!

I used the blue portions of one strand of the overdyed thread, ThreadworX 1067, but switched to two strands of a darker overdyed green thread from Weeks Dye Works named Lucky (medium greens).  You should be able to see the difference between the Blue patch I added yesterday & this one.

The blue patch among the dark green grassy areas needed to be angled & upright. So, I found Zig Zag Stripe but did a variation of it by off setting the stripe. And, I filled in the empty spaces by a single cross stitch. It increased the denseness of the stitch & added to the slope.

I mainly used the blue portions of the overdyed thread (ThreadworX 1067) but also switched to some green from the same overdyed thread combined with blue & up close you can see the differences.

My shoulder has been bothering me but seems to be better now. So, I hope to make up ground on my Poppy Field while I can – kind of a pun!

In the 3 very dark green grassy areas, I wanted to use different but related stitches. So, I selected Criss Cross Hungarian for the left patch because of the denseness of the stitch & the longer length. The Woven Trellis is in the center patch because it is about as long a stitch as the left patch and because they are on about the same distance. And, Serendipity was selected for the right patch because it is farther away than the other 2 areas and is a smaller stitch.

The darker the thread (still using Sampler Threads 7042 Raven) the less of a stitch pattern is evident but up close you can see the differences.

For the top long row, I used the 3 threads layed in the same direction to get a few patches of light green from the overdyed. But, in the smaller 3 areas, I layed 1 in the opposite direction for a more solid dark effect.

In case you forget what Monet’s look like by now, here part of it is again.

For the large medium dark green grass area, I used one strand each of Weeks Dye Works overdyes named Grasshopper (yellow-green), Collards (dark green), and Moss (medium green).  The stitch, Diane’s Lace from Suzy’s Portable Stitches, was difficult to get the hang of but especially slanting up & to the right (on the left side). The other angle, slanting up & to the left, just clicked for me.  Odd how the brain sees some things better than other.  It’s a good stitch for full coverage & looks somewhat random (especially using overdyed floss).

The little dark blue-green area in the center (with arrow pointed to it) used a portion of the 2 threads with the blue portion and 1 thread with the green portion in an encroaching gobelin stitch.

The far dark green section is done using random straight stitches & Weeks Dye Works (WDW) thread (color named Raven) that is very dark with portions of a slightly lighter green. I like that a little canvas shows through – especially up close as it seems more natural.

And, I removed what green & orange threads I had placed in the upper right area from stitching in class because I found more shades of WDW. I plan on doing a lot of thread blending with what I found (but more of that with my next blog).  http://www.weeksdyeworks.com/index.php (great overdyed floss selection that I was able to get at The Strawberry Sampler in Glen Mills, PA which is southwest of Philadelphia & not too far).