I've been taking it fairly easy this summer as you can tell by the lack of new posts. Sorry about that but sometimes you just have to wallow in slug mode. I decided to do something a bit on the fun side and this being a small piece, it should be a quick stitch. Using a piece of scrap canvas I painted a bluebird from my In My Garden series and added a pink flower with leaves. The area to be stitched is only 2.75 by 6 inches, 18 count canvas. When finished I will insert it into one of the Lee's Needle Art wallets. (see above post) At this point I have the background to finish and the brown center of the flower. I used threads from my overflowing stash so I didn't even have to make a trip to my LNS. The background is worked in a Mosaic stitch using Impressions. The bird's body is worked in a Criss-Cross Hungarian stitch using Splendor and Tiara for the shiny dots. The beak and tail are done using 2 shades of Soy Luster solids. The cheek is a Wound Cross stitched in Splendor and the wing is worked in Gold Rush 18 with Petite Sparkle Rays for the white Smyrna crosses. The flower is edged with Tiara and filled in with Splendor. And last but not least, the leaves and stem are worked in 3 shades of Splendor. All these stitches are rather basis and can be found in most needlepoint books.
