Last night was the reveal for my EGA chapter's design challenge. Early this year we were given a piece of evenweave and a sheet of instructions with some fibers looped into holes along one side. There were orange and green pearl cottons, gray and tan floss, variegated green, red, yellow floss, a fuzzy brown thread, a bit of gold, and a few beads. Our challenge was to make a project of our own design using at least a little bit of each fiber. We could add one fiber and one embellishment.
I decided I did not want counted, nor did I want flat. I played around with options and on a trip to the Inspired Needle shop in Lamont I was inspired by a book on mini biscornu. I filled pages of a notebook and several sheets of graph paper with ideas and thoughts and this was the end result.
I left the bottom plain. The photo above shows the "extra" fiber I purchased, the only extra I got. It's the same color family as the variegated floss but it's glitzy and thicker. These flowers are double chain stitches--one inside the other. The center is a circle of the fuzzy brown couched in two places, filled in with knots in the same thread as the petals. For the bottom dividing lines, I used the fine gold thread to couch perle cotton.
I mainly used chain stitch (and detached chain). I used up all of the variegated, all of the orange and all of the green. I have some brown and gray floss left. I also used up all of the fuzzy brown in the tree trunks. I stitched the trunks in rows of the light brown floss and then used a blunt needle and wove the dark brown from side to side behind the stitches. It mostly shows at the edges, but it does peek through a bit on the trunks to add some depth. The leaves are the variegated, green perle and gold thread.
I used the beads to cover the stitches that pinch it in the middle. For the seam, I counted backstitched the sides, front and back and then whipped it together.
I really enjoyed doing this challenge and was totally wowed last night by what the others did. A gorgeous Pisces design, a very personal sampler, a lovely floral motif, a small banner hanging, a gorgeous box top...everyone who participated did something lovely. And very different and personal. I know pictures were taken so I expect them to appear soon at the chapter blog, Flying Fingers Plus.
