Cross Stitch Project- Update 1, Seasonal Dragons “Summer”, Patricia Allison Chart

Hot Summer Action!

This is the progress of the Summer Dragon after 1 month of stitching! (off and on stitching, not 24/7 stitching…) I feel really good about the progress and I don’t think it will take much more time to finish it up, (less than the 1 year I originally thought it would take). Most of the stitching is in this first page, the other pages are mostly borders of flames…not that the flames are easy, but they certainly aren’t large, monster bodies of teeny tiny quarter stitches all of the same hues! LOL

In person, the black crystal is shiny and shimmery. It’s all stitched with filament added to black and other dark colors. The dragon is very intricately shaded. Bravo to Patricia Allison! This is a fantastic chart! I love every detail of it!

To stitch up this Bad Boy, I’ve had to take to some creative aids. I’m colorblind and simply CANNOT tell where I’ve left off if I just use a simple pencil to scratch off the chart. I also HAD to enlarge this chart. There is NO WAY I can see the itty bitty marks for the zillion quarter stitches in this chart. NO WAY! I’ve employed the needle holder, all threaded, Mag Eyes…with a 7.0 magnifier…yes, it’s the one I use for micro mini stuff, a TON of different colored pencils, mega charts and two scissors…one I use as a ‘pointer’.

I’ve found out a secret though…and I will be using every bit of it to tame the next page of this moster Summer pattern… I WILL WIN and tame the Summer Dragon! Muwahaha!!!

Your life needs fun. Go ahead, have some fun!

smiles,

alicia in Hawaii

Cross Stitch Project- Seasonal Dragons “Summer”, Patricia Allison Chart

Sparkly filament, dark threads…and great linen!

Great Dragon Fun!

My Birthday was April 7th. I decided to take the gift money given to me by my wonderful teacher friend, Joann, and spend it on this wonderful chart.

I ordered the chart online, on my birthday April 7, from Clare, Clare’s Celtic Cornucopia, http://www.celticstitchery.com/. Normally, I would purchase from my local store, but my store, as well as several online stores don’t seem to have the “Summer” dragon listed with their suppliers. Clare has an easy to use site, great descriptions, a detailed shopping list/cart and an easy checkout. She also answers email quite quickly and is very helpful.

I had almost all of the threads and filaments required for this piece…enough to at least start it anyway. (I have the little Kreinik sampler boxes of just 10M each of lots of colors…thanks to a wonder artist hubby that bought them while we were still displaced out of New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina.)

I created my own thread board with some foam board, a magnet strip, and lots of loaded needles!

Wonderful Hubby took me to Fiddlesticks, our Local Needlework Shop, for my birthday outing and he picked out a great linen for this piece. We opted against the grey the model was stitched on and went with the complement of red…GREEN. He loves getting art supplies, and even though we have zero money, he bought me some great supplies there with HIS birthday money…(his BD is March 22) Clare was so nice to send me the supply list via email so that I could shop for my birthday. I didn’t have to wait for the pattern to arrive in the mail!

The pattern arrived Friday, April 10 in the late afternoon. I got busy with marking off the linen…and getting to the chart. After ONE FULL DAY of stitching on Saturday, I got this first little stone dragon done in the edging.

Whoo hoo!!!!! It’s stitched on 32ct. linen, over 2 threads. The holes seem very, very tiny. After stitching up the majority of the stone area, I decided that the thread was too bulky. (The pattern calls for 2 thread and 1 filament.) I’ve decided to reduce the stitching to 1 thread and 1 filament. Hopefully, the coverage will be satisfactory. Everything there that is stitched, aside from the greys, are blended with some type of shiny filament. I can’t ‘capture’ the sparkle…but believe me, it’s there!

To give you an idea of HOW FAR ALONG this all is within the BIG picture…

…did I mention that took me ONE FULL DAY to get done?

Money well spent for LOTS of ENTERTAINMENT TIME!

Your life needs fun. Go ahead, have some fun!

smiles,

alicia in Hawaii