~ Free-Styling ~

Happy Sunday Afternoon

~ friends & folk ~

what a beautiful day!

4 loads of line-dried laundry

farmhouse has been swept

windows are open

chicken dinner in the oven

and now it's time to stitch a little ~

I'm working on a couple of 'free-hand' cross stitch designs at the moment...

you can read more about this fun type of stitching I do

on a previous posting

HERE

I begin by drawing out my motif onto my cloth.

I am using osnaburg {Cupboard Cloth ~ available in my Etsy shop}

this will be a sweet & primitive girl...

you can see my wonky stitches below ~

being that the stitches are not counted, some are large and others small ~

a few are stitched over 3 threads ~ perhaps even four, 

using 1 strand in areas and two strands in others

to achieve this extremely naive look I love.

my threads are DMC and are always waxed 

with sweet & smoky scented beeswax just like in the old days...

I'm working on her skirt now, 

and below you can see her pantaloons and feet ~

 a favorite needle-minder I made from a rather large antique mother of pearl button

keeps my needle handy for me while I choose thread colors...

my 'witchy' scissors-fob is simply made up of many items that I treasure:

a hand-stamped antique silver spoon that was gifted to me, 

a diamond pinky ring, beads, silver findings and antique bone rings

along with a tiny silver skeleton key charm and more shell bits.

{I especially love the chime-like clatter it makes while using my beautiful Bohin scissors!!}

these are the thread colors I've chosen ~

640, 869 & 611

sitting out on the porch

with needle in hand

listening to Roxy snore nearby...and the hum of bumbler-bees.

you can see where I pencil-in the motif,

~ then just simply stitch my X's to fill in...

I do continental stitch even though I'm not counting my stitches - but merely 'eye-balling' them.

{all 1/2 stitches going one way first ~ then coming back to cross over them}

I'll be framing this under glass, in one of Peter's wooden frames ~

think I'll paint the frame black & distress it heavily.

...love that look too :)

Hi Roxy ~ sleepy face

Well folks, the timer just went off ~

which means our supper is ready.

I'll stitch again later on this evening and hopefully finish this to show you tomorrow.

OH!

 TOMORROW!!!!

please don't forget to join me over at 

Pat Sloan's Creative Talk Network

where I will be a guest around 4:00 pm EST

{can you hear my knees knocking?}

http://www.creativetalknetwork.com

have a peaceful evening my friends...

~ Blessings from the Farm ~ 

 Lori