The End At Last

It took me about 6 months to finish this project and it is finally done. I will add that I didn't work on it every day of the past 6 months, sometimes setting it aside to work on other projects, sometimes a month at a time, but I did start about 6 months ago.

The best part about this is that it turned out good . . . even if I did have to rip out several sections because I mistook the color for one symbol for another (the symbols were very much alike) and because I got off count a time or 500 (okay, not really 500 times, but it seemed like it at times). It is finally done and I am quite proud of it.

The finished piece is hanging on the back of my rather large desk chair and needs to be washed, ironed (on the back only and with a pressing cloth), mounted, and framed. I'd say it's about 18 x 26 or possibly 30 inches in size.

Voila!

The finished swan. You can almost see the Joadoor signature at the bottom.




 As always, click on the pictures to get the full view. I'll post more pictures when it is framed and ready to hang . . . and maybe after it is hung. 

A better idea of the size. That is part of the window in the background, as well as my desk, and the chair. The swan is quite large.

Now what I need to do is design a black swan facing this swan in the same size as a match.

The triangles inside the rectangle is the signature of Joadoor, who is actually two Dutch artists whose names combined become Joadoor. I did a leopard/cheetah seen a year or so ago on this blog (search back through the archives), which was my introduction to Joadoor's art work. I do enjoy the style and the workmanship, and especially the backgrounds for each piece of Joadoor's work.



At any rate, I am done with this one, except for the necessary steps to frame it and hang it on the living room wall. There's something about swans that has always pleased me. Maybe it was Hans Christian Anderson's story, The Ugly Duckling, or maybe it is the supreme calm and grace of the birds when flying or gliding on water that speaks to me. Whatever it is, this is one piece I will look forward to seeing whenever I go into the living room.

If not a black swan, maybe a crane about the same size as a companion piece. I wonder....

That is all. Disperse.

Relaxing stitching

I've been fairly busy with the new house, but I have taken the time to relax. My favorite way to relax is to cross stitch. Joadoor's Swan and Lanarte's Eastern Beauty. I do think of her as an Arab beauty since she is obviously Middle Eastern and the Middle East reminds me of Arabs. I would daresay a Persian Beauty. I'm also working on 2 smaller pieces, Dimensions Gold Geisha and Lanarte called Arabian Woman, another of Lanarte's Cultures Collection. I would love to own and stitch them all. They are quite fascinating and prove Marco Polo's point when he told Kubla Khan that every country on the world boasts women who are beautiful in their own way when asked which country had the most beautiful women.

At any rate, here is the nearly completed Eastern Beauty from Lanarte and it is a haunting piece. I'll post the finished piece once I've stitched all the remaining bits and bobs and added the metallic silver threads. Don't forget to click on the picture to make it bigger.

Happy stitching.

Leopards, Butterflies, and Illuminated Manuscripts

I didn't show the finished Leopard, and now seems to be a good time to rectify that mistake. I suppose I'm the only one that knows the bottom right of the finished piece is one stitch off, but it still looks good. Now more people know my mistake. Oh, well, that is -- in the Chinese version of ultra-perfection -- more proof that I am not infallible and make mistakes, as if I didn't have hundreds of ways of telling that without the Leopard.

 I believe this particular piece was adapted from a painting by Joadoor -- and it was. I suggest checking out more of his work. I googled him and found some lovely work, many of which I wouldn't mind adapting for cross-stitch.

This is the original and I definitely see the differences. I do think the artist adapting the painting for cross-stitch did a good job of rendering Joadoor's striking work.






I doubt you will remember it, but I originally (as in ~20 years ago) stitched a piece from a cross-stitch magazine. It was adapted from an original illuminated manuscript and I fell in love with it as soon as I saw it, and so I stitched it in a feverish week that resulted in the first piece of a project. Now, 20 years later, I am stitching the companion piece to give to a good friend because I think she will appreciate it.

This is the original done ~20 years ago.  My sister Tracy sent it to me, along with a whole lot of DMC floss. The companion piece, published in Cross Stitch and Country Crafts a couple issues later can be mated to this to make a pillow. I decided on the full piece so as not to lose the rest of the work.

All these years later I find the colors are more vibrant than the original, but still beautiful. I have a long way to go to finish this one. Suitably framed, they will make a lovely gift.

While not cross-stitch, this is one of a set of pillow cases I began last year as a gift. Other projects have taken precedence, not only because they are cross-stitch, but because I'm still honing my embroidery skills. Once the stitching is finished, the pillow cases will be washed (to remove the embroidery lines), ironed, wrapped, and sent to someone who loves butterflies almost as much as I do.



I have found that when someone receives a gift that is handmade, it says more than the usual happy whatever day or merry Xmas. It says that you took the time to choose something for the person and stitched it yourself. No matter how small or how complex, the gift that usually ends up in pride of place in someone's heart is the handmade gift. My mother kept horrible clay projects I did decades ago when I was a child; she kept everything. Going through all those paintings, drawings, sketches, ceramics, and thread work is a lifetime of memories, and she kept them all.

Happy stitching.