Skip to main content

Bleeding Hearts Framed


I've gotten another piece framed.  I'm afraid that this stitched piece has been sitting in a drawer for over 10 years so it's about time.

The frame came from gift box of frames and is a simple 5 x 7 frame.  Several of these where in the box - 2 of them unfinished wood.  This one was painted unevenly - like the phone rang and interrupted the painting and it was never finished.  On the bottom and left sides there is a lot of gold and almost none on the top and right sides.

 If I were painting it myself I would be more even.  But, I didn't paint it and I decided I'm happy with the way it looks.  Finished IS better than perfect.  I think there is a lesson there.

I don't have the pattern anymore and I had to do some searching to find the designer of the pattern.  It is by Curtis Boehringer from the Wildflowers of America series and was published in the late 90's.  His website is his name and I discovered that I still like his patterns.

When I started cross-stitching again I purchased 4 of the series.  I'll talk about the other 3 later.  I'm not sure why I decided upon Bleeding Hearts.  The design must have appealed to me as I wasn't very familiar with the flower.  In fact, I don't think I'd ever seen one growing in a garden.

That has changed in the last few years.  At work, under a shady well-irrigated overhang by an entrance are several bleeding heart plants.  Every spring I watch them sprout, grow and flower.  They are flowering now (but these are last years flowers).




Every spring I want to get one to plant in my garden.  But, I'm afraid my garden is too dry and they wouldn't be as nice as the ones at work.  So, for now, I'll enjoy the ones at work and the framed piece that is now on my wall.

Comments

  1. Nice work. I love bleeding hearts - they are one of my favorites. I don't have any right now because the deer like to eat them.

    I agree with you on the framing - better late than never.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It's about time - the big reveal

My bright quilt was finished in June but I wanted to wait until both were done before sharing the pictures.  Quilting the blue quilt didn't take long but finishing the binding sure did.  I did procrastinate a bit as it was too warm to have a huge quilt on my lap for most of the summer.  After this, I'll probably do all the binding on my sewing machine (and stick to smaller quilts). Notice the cut-out corners?  That was a challenge.  I found instructions here and it looked easy enough but I wished I had practiced some.  After a lot of finessing I finally got good miters but I could have done much better. The cut-out corners allow the quilt to hang nicely over the edges of the mattress and it's a perfect match for a full sized mattress.  But, the top edge isn't even close to the pillows.  I wonder how the quilt fit on the bed it was made for. Here, at last, is the original quilt that I was copying.   I just noticed - all of the baskets are

The last 2 blocks and the tops are done!

I needed 2 more blocks to finish the gray version of the quilt.  I ended up making simple 9 patch/half square triangle blocks.  One is the yellow block in the lower left. Here it is closer up.  When I made the half square triangles I had the red fabric going the wrong way so you are seeing the backside of the fabric.  So the red in the triangles is a little lighter than the red in the center.  It wasn't worth redoing. The other corner has a blue block and I managed to get the front of all the fabrics showing. So, here's what it looks like almost complete. And here's the blue version of the quilt. I've got the backing and the batting for the gray quilt (the backing is in the washer now) and I'm working on the thread to use for quilting and how to quilt it. They are too big for me to free-motion quilt.  I don't have the space.  As it is, quilting with the walking foot will be a challenge.  These tops deserve so

Basted

A few weeks ago I was at the Local Quilt store basting my bright sampler. It's been ready to go for a while.  I've been working on a baby quilt and it's now done.  It's been a while since I've quilted so I'm glad I had a quilt to warm up on. Next I need to pull a folding table out of the garage and re-arrange my quilting space.  This quilt will have a lot more drag than the baby quilt. I've also been looking at pictures of similar quilts looking for quilting pattern inspiration.  I'm thinking of taking the easy way out and u se wavy lines like this quilt . I should start quilting next weekend!