Erica's Stitches

Ah, the joys of an assortment of bulbs.  As soon as one color tulip fades away, another starts blooming. Right now these red and yellow tulips are blooming and also some lemon yellow ones are just beginning to flower. For the Spring Garden SAL I've started stitching.  After doing the center motif about 3 times and not liking the result, I switched fabric.  The linen I originally chose isn't suited for blackwork. This fabric is more even and tightly woven and the stitches don't disappear.  I also changed the colors a bit.  I swapped out the bright red for a more subdued color (which coincidentally are about the same shade as the tulips now blooming).  I've also made a few tweaks to the pattern as I go along. I'm notorious for not liking hearts (sorry) and there are 2 hearts coming up.  I haven't decided if I'll stitch them or not.  The instructions include graph paper so I have a feeling I'll be doing some dood...

Last year, my birthday present to myself was some wildflower tulips from here .  It was a very dry winter and tough spring, alternating between above average temperatures and below average temperatures.  There would be a few days of warm and sunny weather followed by blizzard conditions for a few days.  This cycle continued for over a month.  I was afraid the bulbs would die. But, the tulips survived to bloom.  First where some bright magenta ones that defied photography.  Now there are yellow and white ones blooming. Tulips are on my mind.  So, as I was finishing up my last project a SAL invitation involving tulips arrived that I couldn't resist.  If you'd like to join it's not too late. All the supplies from the last project are put away so I've been picking out my supplies for the SAL.  With visions of spring colors I started going through my scraps for some suitable bookmark shaped fabric.  The best I coul...