SO CLOSE I CAN TASTE IT
Alllmmoooosssstttt there….
This is the last quadrant. I’m using yet another non-historical fill behind the scrolling flowers. This one is just cross stitches, arranged on the diagonal so they form on-point squares. I also worked this filling (and for that matter – all of the other fillings) using only one strand of my floss, so the shading is quite light. By contrast, all of the foreground stitching is done with two strands. You can see this quite clearly in the red lozenge twist, about five strips down. The foreground is two strands of red, and the simple box treatment background is only one strand of red. I’ll post a whole-sampler shot when that last stitch is complete.
So what’s next?
A couple of things. First, I have another sampler promised to a pal. This one will be heavy on the words, with far fewer accompaniments. I haven’t composed it yet, but I’ve been playing with concepts in my mind. One idea that keeps popping up is to work the thing more or less like a manuscript page, with a very demonstrative single large capital letter in the upper left; the phrasing flowing down from there; possibly with a single figural strip across the bottom, but a foliate edging of some type all the way around. Oh, and it will probably be monochrome or nearly so – a darker, unbleached natural linen ground, with deep forest green stitching. I’m not ruling out accents in another color yet, but the predominating color will be the green.
I also have promised some knitstuff to the spawn. It’s cold-hands time here in Massachusetts, so Younger Daughter has requested a replacement for her pair of fingerless mittens (muffatees). Long time needlework pal Kathryn has sent me some sequined black yarn that just cries out to become a pair of Suzie’s Reading Mitts. I’ve made this design before, and I know it knits up quickly and looks great, especially in black. Here’s one from the last iteration, knit as a gift for my niece:
And Elder Daughter has loved her angel-variant Wingspan scarf to pieces. It was the first one I did, and she’s been seasonally-inseparable from it since 2012. Here it is in less frayed times:
I’m considering several candidates for this project, but right now the leader is the Stripes, Stripes & Stripes Scarf from Knitting-and-so-on.blogspot.ch. I think Sybil Ra’s stuff is pretzel-clever, and with some screaming orange fingering weight, plus some wild but coordinating variegated, I think I can make an eye popper for sure. After this I’d probably attempt one of her even more dramatic pieces, for myself. 🙂
THOSE SNAILS
Another question from the inbox: “So, what’s up with those snails?”
No mystery – just a bit of silly that’s been codified into semi-tradition.
The original strip of snails was one of the first patterns I doodled up – inspired by the non-counted snails in Scholehouse for the Needle (1624). That was way long back ago, when I was still in college. They’ve wandered in and out of my notes over the years, first appearing as a spot motif, and eventually ending up in my first and second hand drawn pattern collections (published in ‘76 and in the early ‘80s) and eventually my own New Carolingian Modelbook. I dedicated that form of the pattern to Mistress Peridot of the Quaking Hand – a local resident of the SCA Barony of Carolingia (Eastern Massachusetts/greater Boston area), famed for her calligraphy and her unselfish sharing of the same. The artist behind so many excellent awards scrolls. Peridot’s own device features a sleepy snail.
Maybe it’s a subliminal comment on slow, steady perseverance inherent in needlework, but for whatever reason, I have used that snail on the majority of my samplers. Not all, but most. Here are charts for some of the ways my little creeping friends have shown up. The original row is at the top left. The all-over of snails circling little gardens with ominous intent is from the Trifles sampler. The ribbon strip at the lower left is the bit I’m currently stitching in blue and red.
String-Or-Nothing 