Erica's Stitches

Alphabets are quite popular on cross stitch samplers and there are many decisions to be made when choosing an alphabet.  Upper case or lower case is one decision.  It seems that upper case is most popular.  Using lower case causes all sorts of compications.  Extra space is needed for j, k, l, p and the other letters that extend above or below the main line.  Another important decision is even or odd.  The alphabet above is odd.  That is, it is and odd number of stitches high, in this case 7.  Notice the B and D.  Both are symmetryical. This is an even alphabet that is 6 stitches high.  Notice that the B and D are no longer symmetrical.  I prefer odd alphabets.  I've been known to change the size of a sampler to mak an even alphabet into an odd alphabet. Both of these samplers are in a traditional font.  But it is easy to re-arrange the stitches to create different looks for you alphabet. ...

Last Christmas during an ornament exchange I recieved one made in a technique I did not recognize.  I've been stitching a long time now and this doesn't happen too often.  I tracked down the lady who made it and discovered it was the Aztec Stitch.  Some quick googling revealed information and a free project from Piecework Magazine that I quickly printed out.  I didn't have the supplies on hand so it was put aside, but not forgotten. My EGA (Embroiderers' Guild of America) Chapter was looking for program ideas so I suggested the Aztec Stitch.  Patience paid off and the program was a few weekends ago but I had to miss it.  I picked up the canvas and instructions last weekend and dropped everything to get started.  This bookmark is stitched using 18 count canvas and #8 pearl cotton. Canvas threads are removed and the design area is outlined with nun's stitches.  Then the fun begins.  Alternating stripes of wrapped b...

Thing #1 and Thing #2 Last weekend was my monthly class at the local needlework/quilt shop.  It's called Art Journal and each class is a secret until we arrive.  Every month we get to play with a different technique.  So far this year we've done kool-aid dyeing. fusing, free-motion quilting, free-form embroidery, made fabric buttons, made layered fabric and others things I can't remember right now. Many of the these techniques I've seen in books and magazines.  They are the type of thing that I want to drop eveything and try but end up not doing.  All year I've had a few hours every month to just play with these ideas.  Last Saturday the teacher brought in scraps of fabrics, beads, yarn, threads, batting and a few examples.  We went crazy.  Each of us picked different fabrics and beads and immediently went to work creating our people.  No two ended up the same although many had really wild hair. On many class...

Rocky Mountain Wildflowers This is my Rocky Mountain Wildflower Sampler.  Here I have featured two wildflowers that grow all over the Rocky Mountains.  They grow in my yard in the meadows just over 7,000 feet.  They also grow high up in the mountains over 10,000 feet. Rocky Mountain Bluebells These are Rocky Mountain Bluebells.  Every flower identification book I own has a different species of this plant in it.  Streamside Bluebells; Mertensia ciliata.  Tall Bluebells; Metensia paniculata.  Alpine Bluebells; Metensia alpina.  Long-flowered Bluebells; Mertensia longiflora.  I do not know which version this is. I first saw this flower along a small alpine stream near the ghost town of Hancock, CO, elevation 11,050.  When I moved here I was surprised when spring came along and bluebells sprouted up in my yard at 7,200 ft.  They are much shorter than the tall bluebells growing up higher - only 6 to 12 inches off the ground....

Wyoming I started taking pictures in the 70's when film came in rolls with 12 pictures on a roll.  On a long family vaction of 3 weeks I might be allowed to use 2 or 3 rolls of film and it might be another 2 or 3 months before they where developed. Montana Sometimes I allowed myself 2 pictures a day - one of scenery and one of family.  Sometimes I would go crazy and take more.  Especially if we where someplace scenic like Yellowstone. Yellowstone Falls Old Faithful Now I have 2 digital cameras where I can take over 1000 photos on one memory card.  Oh, the luxury!  I can stroll through the yard on a beautiful day and snap 50 or more pictures.  I'll probably keep 10% or less of them, but it gives me the freedom to try different angles and perspectives.  And talk about instant gratification.  I can look at them right away, not when the memories of taking the pictures are a distant memory.

These are my Funky Flowers.  Until now, most of my flowers have been realistic interpretations.  These started as doodles.  I decided to see if they could be successfully transfered to cross stitch so I transferred one to a 4 inch graph paper square.  By working bigger you can definitely get in more detail.  I like the way the hastily scribbled leaves turned out. The flowers where more difficult.  Actually, upper left and bottom right where more difficult.  I liked the other two as soon as they where drawn.  But the difficult ones where redesigned many times.  Interestingly, those two are sort of based on real flowers (Upper left the blanketflower and bottom right a flower growing in a friends yard that I don't know the name of and never had a chance to look up).  Since the other 2 came totally out of my imagination they didn't have any expectations to live up to. Since the flowers where more cartoony I gave them black and whi...

These ornaments are my latest design availaible on patternsonline.com earlier this week. These are another simple/not simple design.  It's simple to come up with different striped patterns but not so simple to make the round shape.  I ended up with a compass and graph paper tracing various sized circles until I got one that lined up nicely.  The patterns still don't look like a perfect circle, but they are close enough for me. I could have spent the whole day designing stripes on graph paper but I restrained myself after designing just four good ones.  I have several not so good ones that I'll work on later. Next came the colors.  It was hard using the same four colors for each ornaments.  There are so many great shades of red and green to choose from.  I ended up with 2 greens, a red and a pink.  Although pink isn't as traditional as red and green it's fun and brightens up the ornaments. Although these patterns look like they ...