One of my bucket list items is to eventually learn how to do Hardanger embroidery. I’m getting there – I took the plunge in 2021 to cut threads for the first time, but I need to do some practice scrap work to figure out Dove’s Eye stitch and some of the other wrapped bars.
Enter Victoria Sampler charts… which are well known for their use of Hardanger at the bottom of their band samplers…
Jazz Sampler by Victoria Sampler (Thea Dueck)
In 2014, I received a copy of the Jazz Sampler by Victoria Sampler as a door prize at the Stitcher’s Hideaway Winter Escape retreat. It also included the floss pack. I loved the piece, given my love of music, and knew that eventually I’d want to stitch it. Not quite yet, though. At that time Max was only a year old, sleeping was still a luxury, and I was just barely able to stitch my basic stuff – Hardanger was not in the cards!
Fast forward a couple years, and I thought it was time to get it going. I had fabric ready to go, had project bagged it (the “now it’s official” move), and I had it in my “will start in January…” batch. But then it didn’t happen… and didn’t happen… and didn’t happen.
Finally for the #NYE12x12 (New Year’s Eve 12×12 stitch-a-long) in 2021 hosted by Just Keep Stitchin’ on FlossTube, I decided to just get it going. Didn’t matter if I only put a few stitches in. It needed to start. With the basic outline of one house, it was underway before the ball dropped in Times Square.
Jazz Sampler by Victoria Sampler as of May 1, 2023. Stitched per instructions on 28 ct ecru evenweave with charted silks.
I feel like getting this first band of houses done will be the hardest part until I get down to all of that cutwork. I always struggle with the first batch of motifs in any project before I get into a groove on a piece. Jazz Sampler will move quickly into a series of less intense bands. The people are fairly blocky with color – not as many color changes to progress as there are with these houses.
And if I don’t feel comfortable with the Hardanger by the time I get to the bottom? Well… I can always leave it off. 🙂
No timeframe for finishing this one – I imagine it’ll fly pretty quickly once I get into the groove on it. I’m not quite there yet, though.
This week’s WIPGO brings us to a project I took as a class in 2018 at Celebration of Needlework. Jeannette Douglas was there, and it was the first time I can recall seeing her since my fun class in Mystic in 2011. The Celebration class was for her Love to Stitch Box – one in a series of little compartment groupings that she has designed and published over the years.
Love to Stitch Box by Jeannette Douglas
Our class kit came with everything to finish the project – including the box tray. Like my Four Seasons of Mystic years earlier, everything was tidy and well labeled and easy to read. If you ever have a chance to do a class with Jeannette – do so. She is an absolute gem and a wonderfully relaxed, welcoming teacher.
I started my piece in class with everyone else and had a happy little acorn done. It quickly stalled after Celebration because I was focused on completing Four Seasons of Mystic. My rotation at that time had organized into “try not to have more than one design by any designer going at a time,” due to the glut of Wentzlers I had stacked up in progress. So Love to Stitch would have to wait – Four Seasons was the project in rotation, and I could get back to Love to Stitch once it finished in 2018.
But then 2019, my energy was drawn to finishing two other big projects – Max’s birth sampler (To Have a Child- Rosewood Manor) and Teresa Wentzler’s Floral Bellpull. And then the Steotchalong grabbed my attention to stitch on the Golden Girls mystery. And suddenly it was 2020.
And… well, we know what happened there.
I picked the project up again in 2021, and quickly made work of most of the main Love to Stitch square. I finished everything but the border. I was convinced that I would get it all done that year – so much so that I actually dated the piece. (that was arrogant of me!)
And then it sat again as I plowed through some other pieces.
Love to Stitch by Jeannette Douglas as of May 1, 2023 – stitched 1 thread over 2 on 32 ct Legacy linen from Picture This Plus with charted silks
Between WIPGO and Stitch Maynia, my goal is to get that border done. The stitching on the other pieces for the box will not be as intense. If I can finish up this one, I’ll be very, very happy.
Hoping to have this done by the end of the year or early next year at the latest. And then the finishing will begin… 🙂
I’ve told this story before… but it’s been deleted in the Great Blog Purge… My Teresa Wentzler addiction has existed since about 1990, when I first laid eyes on a stitching chart featuring a dragon posing over a castle. I was 15 and at either the Ben Franklin craft store in West Park Plaza or Hancock Fabrics in Billings, Montana, where I grew up. I’d started stitching four years before and only finished two small bookmarks, but this piece just grabbed me. It was the first stitching piece that I knew I absolutely needed to stitch. And so I bought the chart. In the next couple weeks with allowance money I got the fabric (Aida!!!), all of the floss, bobbins, and bobbin box… and off I went. I didn’t know blended threads were supposed to be intimidating, or that even Wentzlers were supposed to be intimidating. I just loved the pattern. It’s just X’s right? A whole ton of them. Oh – and some weird fractional stitches. And a crapload of backstitching. But no big deal. It’ll be the same idea as those little Dale Burdett bookmarks I did, just on a bigger scale… right?
(this is where 2020s me says… “Oh Measi… you sweet summer child…”)
It took me the better part of 16 years to finish The Castle – with stops and starts for moves to college, accidental packing it in a storage facility for a while, etc. But it was finished. And it finally was framed last year. It’s all about the journey, right? 🙂
Well… that was just the start of the insanity.
The second Wentzler I ever fell in love with was Egyptian Sampler. And that’s this week’s feature for May’s WIPGO picks.
Egyptian Sampler by Teresa Wentzler
One of the other fascinations I’ve had since childhood is ancient Egypt. Mummies, pyramids, the deities (Blessed Bastet and Sekhmet, watch over me…) all of the carvings and painted reliefs… I loved all of it. Even today, if there’s a National Geographic or Smithsonian special on ancient Egypt on the TV? I’ll watch it. The complexity of the society, the technological advances for the age – I find it absolutely amazing.
When the Egyptian Sampler came out in 2001, I purchased the pattern when I first laid eyes on it. I knew I wanted to stitch it. At the time, though, I didn’t know that it was okay to have more than one project going. And of course, I still had The Castle in progress. At that point it was still pretty far from being done. So the chart was put away for “someday.” And it quietly sat.
Fast forward a couple years. I’ve met and moved in with Erich. I decide to do my first ever trip to Plymouth, Massachusetts because I have this strange invention called a car for the first time since I moved to New England. There’s a cross stitch shop in Plymouth called the Sampler Needlework, and I’ve wanted to check it out for years – but had no way of getting there until now.
When I went to the shop, they had bolts of linen. (it comes on bolts?!?) One of the linens was a gorgeous antiqued/aged style that looked like some old scroll that had come out of a tomb. I knew immediately it was perfect for Egyptian Sampler. This was before I knew what a floss toss was – I knew it just had to be the one. The shop owner helped measure and cut the fabric for me.
On that trip I also purchased my copy of I Love New England, BTW. It was a very fruitful trip for big projects!
And now the pattern and the fabric were collected together in a poly envelope. Where it continued to sit – because I still hadn’t learned it was okay to have multiple projects going.
Finally, in 2005, I started it. I got through the center large cartouche motifs. And then it stalled due to the backstitching, and then having Max… and the rest of the stuff that stalled so much of my stitching for years.
BUT… it’s now moving pretty well within my rotations. I’m beginning to work a lot more of the framing to help me feel like a ton more is done – and that’s getting my energy up to moving forward on it. Like so many projects, the interest waxes and wanes. It’s waxing right now.
Egyptian Sampler as of May 1, 2023 – stitched 2 over 2 on 28 ct linen (non-Zweigart) with charted DMC threads.
My goal for this year is to finish the top half of the border and get the backstitching done on that center motif and the scarab above it. I have a lot of work to do – but it is a doable goal. I’ll probably have this as my focus in October to really make progress on it!
Like any of my Wentzlers, these are journey pieces. I have no timeframe to get them done, but will enjoy the stitch and enjoy the finish. Once this gets done, it will be absolutely stunning on the wall – whenever that happens to be.
Considering how wild April was around here… I got quite a bit done on my projects! I’m happy. April’s short-short version, in no order of priority, are:
I’m back on track with WIPGO. Finished my stitches for March and all of April
My husband got a new job, started his training, and today started his first regular shift – which means a total adjustment for Max and me in the evenings.
Max passed his most recent belt test at martial arts and is now an apprentice black belt (yellow rank). 7 more stripe colors and he will test for his full black belt.
Work was crazy… total chaos. But that’s April at my job every year. Now with just a bit of added zing as the department gets bigger.
I got absolutely no writing done this month for letters. Very frustrating. Work stress just had me in a mood where in the evenings I needed to grumble and stab fabric.
I did get quite a few postcards out for Postcrossing, though.
My eye doctor has confirmed that I get to avoid bifocals for another year (yay!)
Erich’s new job confirms that we can actually take our first family vacation this summer since Max was born because Erich finally has TIME OFF.
Max is all signed up and ready to go for summer camp. (Day camp – not away camp).
I’m now the Secretary for the Tudor Rose Sampler Guild, and loving the energy. Me taking minutes during meetings? Sold. Great way for me to be involved, especially as a long-distance member.
What the heck Boston Bruins?!? Grrrrrr….
Cities: Skylines is an obnoxiously addicting computer game.
So is Dinkum – which is the Australian-themed Animal Crossing. Introduced to this one at PaxEast.
And onto the April stitchy updates. The theme of this month was “frogging and move forward.” Oh, so much miscounting that had to be fixed to get anywhere.
Picking up where I left off in March, I completed my stitches on the Halloween Candlestick SAL from Lakeside Needlecrafts. This was a SAL that I had a very, VERY small start on last October.
Halloween Candlestick SAL as of 4/30/23 – stitched 2 over 2 on 32 ct Pumpkin evenweave from Fabric Flair with charted DMC.
It turned out that my small start of only – 30? – stitches from the link above was already miscounted. That’s what I get for rushing it through during a short SAL! Thankfully I wasn’t off by too much. Repaired the count and moved it forward. It’s now starting to look much more like the center ghost-shaped candlestick. I can start removing some of those grid lines that I needed to center it. With Halloween Candlestick done, I could cross off my final WIPGO goal for March. Huzzah!
Next came Book of Ink Circles (aka BoINK) by Ink Circles. I joined a challenge on this one to stitch for Stitchy Clue in Semi Sane Stitchers, but had to bail on the game after only a couple days… just too much with everything else going on. One 600 stitch roll just killed my momentum for the game. I’m not a fast stitcher, even when I’m just doing lines like on BoInk. But hey… again, made some really good progress here:
BoInk by Ink Circles as of April 16, 2023. Stitched 2 over 2 on 28 ct Thunderstorm linen by Silkweaver. Outlining in GAST “Cinders”.
I added another row of squares at the bottom of the framing for this one. One more set of those large squares with the notches from the top row, plus the adjoining middle squares, and then I just have the edge work to finish for the full frame. And then the fill work will begin! My d20 needleminder is positioned in the exact center of this piece, just for perspective. It’s not as big as I thought it would be. I seem to say that about a lot of projects.
The next piece I worked on was Early Americans. With Betsy Ross and Molly Pitcher squares completed, it was time to move onto a new one. I decided to add one of the gents – John Hancock. It’s a much lighter square than the other two so far. I’m nearly halfway done already.
Early Americans: John Hancock by Little House Needleworks as of April 16, 2023. Stitched 1 over 2 on 40 ct Granite Dust linen by Silkweaver with charted threads.
Very brown, I know. But it moved quickly! After how long Molly Pitcher took me, it felt so good on this piece to get through a bunch of the block in one go. There’s a pretty heavy roof on this one, but it’s straight back and forth rows – so again, should go quickly. And then three down, six to go! Maybe Martha Washington will be the next, since that one is the one with the exceptionally large house.
I then took a break from WIPGO for a weekend online stitch-in with the Tudor Rose Sampler Guild. Members in the Dallas-Fort Worth area had an in-person stitch in, and I hosted the remote one. I decided to pull out my Temperature Tree SAL and start adding some leaves on it. I was able to get all of January and most of February’s high temperatures recorded!
Temperature Tree by Stitchin’ Mommy as of April 30, 2023. Stitched 2 over 2 on 32 ct Dreamin’ Lugana from Silkweaver with custom DMC temperature range.
Really, really liking how these colors are patterning so far! Eventually this piece will come up on my WIPGO this year. When it does, I’ll post my exact temperature breakdowns and the colors I’m using for each range. But the quick summary is that I have 4-temperature increments. I start at 23F (-5C) and below, and the highest is 96F (35C) and above. So far it’s clearly cold – but that’s January and February in New England! The colors will get much warmer in tone to deep reds for the summer. Each branch on this one is a month, and each leaf is colored to the high temperature for that date as recorded on Weather Underground. Knowing how fast these leaves stitch up, I’m going to plan to do some on other meetup weekends with the guild. This will definitely get done this year!
Next up was Live on Little by Plum Street Samplers. This was the second piece that needed some frogging work before I could stitch. The entire white line that starts running to the right at the roofline was miscounted. I had some legs going over one, some going over three. Really not sure what I was doing when I originally put them in, but I figure I may just not have had good lighting! So I had to carefully frog those stitches out.
Live on Little by Plum Street Samplers as of April 30, 2023. Stitched 1 over 2 on 40 ct Old Massachusetts linen from Primitive Hare with charted threads.
My floss was pretty ratty after that, so I finished off the end that remained good. I then moved back over to the bricks on the “front” of the house to do a little work there. But I didn’t get much done. That’s okay. Not quite feeling this one right now. But the correction work is done. That’s what’s most important. I won’t be stuck. I’ll get back to this one!
Finally, I stitched on Winter Welcome by Park Hopper Bart for a couple of evenings while watching Bruins hockey. I did some very good progress on this one, especially considering the evil Etoile thread. One more good round of stitching, and this one will be done!
Winter Welcome by Park Hopper Bart as of April 30, 2023. Stitched 2 over 2 on 32 ct Winter Berry linen by Fortnight Fabrics with charted threads.
This project is very hard to photograph well. The fabric is a beautiful blue, but it just washes out in photos. The white floss is much more visible against the fabric in person. I’m guessing I may have about 4 hours left of work to wrap this one up. Not much at all! The rest of the “Winter Welcome” text on the bottom, a few smaller snowflake motifs in the center and on the side of the words, his arms, his carrot nose, eyes, and hat. That’s it!
So a very good month. I’m happy with the stitching progress. Now it’s time to settle into the insanity of Stitch Maynia. I want to film a FlossTube this week for Maynia. I’ll probably do it on Friday night since Max has a “parents night out” event at his martial arts studio and I’ll be free for about 3 hours.
For the past two years, I’ve been attending a stitching retreat in Troy, New Hampshire at The Inn at East Hill Farm. It’s held the first weekend of November – so past peak for the autumn color, but still early enough in the crossover to winter that the weather shouldn’t be too iffy. The farm is honestly just perfect – completely isolated with bad cell service that forces us to unplug for the weekend. Home cooked meals, beautiful scenery, lots of animals to visit on the property – including fresh eggs to bring home right from the coop. Both years as I’ve left, my reaction has just been “OMG, this was exactly what I needed.” And I totally want to just book a couple days there to get away and relax on my own!
This past year, several attendees decided to start on Live on Little by Plum Street Samplers as an ongoing SAL for a personal keepsake of the retreat.
Live on Little by Plum Street Samplers (via the pattern photo)
It’s a perfect New England-ey sampler, although East Hill Farm is not by the sea. It’s also a very involved sampler. Tons of stitches, lots of solid stitching. And there are a bunch of color changes to show the bricks in that house! It has a hidden secret, though – it’s a fabulous piece to bring to retreats. There is a ton of fill-in stitching to do that, if set up properly at home, will allow for easy stitching while chatting with others at the farm table with almost minimal counting.
Quite a few of us were debating changing the verse on it. I was among those at the retreat, although I admit that it’s growing on me… so I may just stitch it as charted. I have plenty of time to decide. This piece will be with me for a long time!
Live on Little by Plum Street Samplers as of April 1, 2023 – stitched 1 over 2 on 40 ct Old Massachusetts linen by Primitive Hare with charted threads.
The above progress is what I started at the farm last November. It was a decent start for a few hours of stitching before the light waned and I needed to switch to a project with larger crosses. I noticed as I was returning on that white line of the roof that I’d screwed up my stitches somewhere and not crossed over two. Since I’m so early in the stitching, my first order of business for April WIPGO will be to fix that row. This piece is just too big for me to have a counting error like that and leave it so early. After that, I’m planning on continuing down with the brickwork of the house for a bit just to get the width of the house correct. By the time The Farm comes around in November, I’ll have the framing the top of the house so I can focus on filling in roofing during the retreat.
This is definitely going to be a slow-progress piece, and truthfully I count on it being one of those pieces I bring out at each retreat just to work on for a bit for fill-in. It’ll be a nice little memorial to time spent away stitching with friends.
