Aesop Frame Finish - almost

 

I was very pleased with my finished fox and frog. The brown colour change shows up disappointingly in the photo but much less so on the linen. 

The end of daylight saving gave me an extra hour which I spent working on the owl (and finishing a book, and several other things. It's amazing how far that extra hour can stretch). The owl was fun - although the white Renaissance thread was a bit fluffy to work with and hard to tame. Strange how different colours in the same thread type react differently.

Here's the owl in context

and the bottom of the frame as I moved my hoop. It is quite exciting to see the whole piece coming together like this.

The pied woodpecker was a delicate exercise - all in the fine Renaissance threads.  My challenge is to fill in the tree trunks in ways that blend colour smoothly. I'll go over some of the trunks again at the end with a single thread touch-up.     I was fairly pleased with this result.

The peacock was a very interesting stitching exercise, with a variety of threads and stitches.  In general I stuck to the colours and threads suggested, but I played a bit within the parameters. It was a great place to finish.   

As this is the last piece of crewel work to go on my chair, I wanted to add text to the centre of the frame and had intended to do so before blocking. 

It was, however too crumpled when I took it out of the hoop so I blocked it overnight while I gave some thought to the lettering. In the end I printed a page on paper, then on Sulky. It is too long and exposed to risk scribing it by hand, even with ruled lines.  I will block it again when I've stitched the text.

I got the start date wrong (took a guess and, fortunately, checked later). I am now stitching it - practising my slow but effective Quaker stitch. I've fixed the date. My next post will show the finished text - and hopefully the piece in situ on the completed chair!