For what it is worth, I have finished my sampler of stitches for the Stitch Exploration.

To the left of the tent is green laid work couched with gold beads.

To the right, a casalguidi tree trunk with found items of beaded lace and wired leaves.

Peeking above the leaves is herringbone built up by overlaying the previous rows and cutting through the centre, then fluffing the ends.

Below the leaves is Chicken scratch with beads.

On the right side of the path is brick and net-darning (looked a bit like a wall to me)

In the lower right I did laidwork for the pool (do not choose colours and execute at night, the blue looked much paler to me then) I also couched the feathery yarn over a trellis of herringbone for greenery around the pool.

I finished with some Fimo leaves I made a while ago.

I tried various things to fill in more of the path but they overwhelmed rather than improved.

I’m not at all sure if this complies to Sharon’s idea of stitch use but it was interesting and surely stretched me.

Thanks Sharon for the opportunity to try stitch methods that were new to me.

All that remains is to properly stretch the work and speak nicely to DH asking him to make a frame for it.

Last week I found a Christmas tree with Blackwork – a freebie pattern from

Maria Vialle at

http://alarttex.wordpress.com/ I couldn’t wait to try this and have completed it quickly.  It has been altered slightly from the original, which was square, to fit a postcard size.

I admit my eyes were not working well for the tree count but I am happy with the result.

Thank you Maria for sharing.

I am still adding to my stumpwork for the Stitch Explorer Challenge and am happy that I managed, at last, some Assisi work -  the deer.  The dog may also become Assisi work later.

Should you be interested, there are some close-ups on my Flickr site at

http://www.flickr.com/photos/crazyqstitcher/

I’d like to thank everyone who has visited my blog and given encouragement.  I appreciate it.

I have been working on my trees.  Two background bushes/trees and grass near the large tree have been needle-punched with green mohair.

The large tree crown is worked over my found object but I guess I defeated the use of it, as it is totally covered.    The scarf ring above is a duplicate of the one under the random buttonholing.

There is a much better photo on my Flickr at

http://www.flickr.com/photos/crazyqstitcher/

I am finding WordPress photos are poor and do not enlarge anymore.  I thought perhaps it was just my eyes but the same photo was used in Flickr.

Sharon is back blogging again at http://www.pintangle.com/

I’ve been remiss with blogging this year but have managed to stitch my projects.  Sharon set June aside for catching up with the Exploration stitches so I re-did some of them and am trying to make a stumpwork picture with the results.

My castle has additions now.  There is a Casalguidi tree which has to have leaves added to it and a path which I hope is accepted as Assisi.  The original woven grassed area was added to with long arm cross stitches  and a feather stitch tree to point up the battlement.  I’m never sure about doing Assisi work but will try again.

I re-did the Chicken Scratch on a tent.  DH calls it a Yurt. It sits on a Trellis stitch lawn.  I’m finding out things as I go with stumpwork.  Next time I’d stitch in place a back-wall and add the tent fronts separately, although this picture doesn’t look too bad the interior tends to bulge.

More Trellis stitching grass, Woven shrub and flowers and a Lattice woven over-skirt for milady.

July exploring is to add mixed media so I hand painted the background and added an orange to the lady.  Here is the overall picture so far.  I think I may have mis-interpreted the instructions, thinking it could be painting only so it’s just as well I intended adding texture to the trees.

This month has been rather busy and I haven’t blogged for ages.

Here is the Southern Cross Seams Only block I added stitches to for April.     I am not happy  with the method of uploading pics.  I get a camera in a frame but don’t know how to see the photos so I can add text to each one.  grrrr.

If anyone can tell me how to work this new method I would be grateful.

I’ll just have to hope this works.  There is a picture of Oyster stitch in orange chenille and Sassa Lynne fly stitches. Above this I added the metallic Cretan stitch, detached cast-ons and French knots.

I added double cross-stitch in purple thread to Joy’s work and below, the heavier green silk thread stem stitch to Patti’s delicate branches. I whipped my stems in gold but that is not visible.

I did the green crossed Cretan stitches, the chiffon Japanese stitch flowers and metallic FKs.  also the silk leaves on Joy’s seam. Lastly I did a row of Fargo roses in the hand-dyed lace.  The block is made of gloriously rich colours and the girl’s stitching is just great.

I’ve just completed additions in the 2nd round on the seams.  Only one more set of seams to work on before we start with the floral motifs in June.

Ann Marie's 2nd round work

I have enjoyed this month’s stitch and learned by trial and error what would work.

I’ll present my failure first.   I could find little in the way of instructions or patterns so I chose a Blackwork pattern and changed it to negative, then covered fabric (not a good choice as it turned out) with Waste Canvas  and with 2 strands of DMC proceeded to stitch.  The 2 strands seemed to be sufficient to cover the holes.  I used a single strand to outline the pattern first.

The failure

It was difficult to stitch right up to the outline so I left these bits to finish at the end.  I dampened the canvas and the threads came out easily but still shifted the DMC so it didn’t lay nicely and the over all look was Yuk!

I intend this exercise to head straight for the bin but finished most of the left hand corner and overstitched the outline there too.

The fabric had slightly raised lines in it and I think this distorted the stitching too.  The thread should have been thicker and I’d never use canvas for Assisi again.  I should remember the advice to practise first.  Okay, that’s out of the way.

Then I made a freehand contemporary work using a pattern from Eileen Campbell’s Medieval applique book, which had the kookaburras on the initial.  I just added a background to this with various threads, starting at the base with DMC perle 8 and then DMC cotton in 4 strands reducing to 1 in the background.  Surprisingly it didn’t take too much time to finish. I think this leans more to Negative work rather than Contemporary Assisi but I like it.

Contemporary Assisi work

I had a break from cross stitching and happened on an Assisi pattern in a 1982  Harmony Guide book and this last work is from that.

Assisi work

This was the most enjoyable to do, surprisingly as the fabric had such fine weaving and I didn’t think my eyes up to working on it.  I don’t know what it’s called but has a 32 count.  I used a DMC 5 perle.  Again I used one strand to outline the work but went over this later with 2 strands which made such a difference to it.

This week I made a Simply hearts table-runner with fabric sent to me by Anne .  I am happy to say that for once I would let anyone measure my points and edges.  A miracle has occured.

With the three fabrics from Anne, I added the two plain fabrics to a pattern I got from here.  I used the orange/spot material on the back.   I found it was simple to make up and I am blessing the maker of rotary cutters and boards.  I can see me making more quilts.

Simply HeartsTable-runner

Front and back

I hope you like it Anne.

Here is Joy’s block after Ann-Maree’s additions in the 2nd round

Joy's block after Ann-Maree's additions

and mine in the 3rd round

My 3rd round

and some close ups.  I have added green tips of Up and down buttonhole and stem stitch.

3 seam photo.  Pink Chevron with green cross stitches and  detached Lazy daisies.  Feather stitches to the blue seam and Straight and Lazy Daisy stitches to the remaining seam.

On the 2 seam photo I added Bullions and Pistil stitches between the lace flowers for butterflies and gold Cross stitches in the flowers.

The seam above has a floss couched with French knots and below this are 1/2 Buttonhole wheels and chain stitch and Straight stitch with Lazy daisy stitches