Poppy Pouch - Halfway there

Well not really halfway there. There's still so much to do (twice!), but we have had 3 out 6 lessons so far.

Since my last post, I got busy putting in the vertical lines. It was important to get that first line in as straight as possible. So using a blue pencil I drew a line down the center and that became my guideline for the first row. 

The rest of the rows are stitched against that first one and were nice and straight.

For the first two weeks I did nothing but work on these vertical lines. It got old very fast.

In lesson two, we were starting the flower so I needed to put in the bijoux at the center. The beads used at the center are margarita bead crystals. In our kit, we get a random selection of crystals but I really want the front and back to match, so I went shopping.

As Swarovski was no longer selling to hobbyists, I decided to try out a new crystal brand sold by Artbeads called Prestige. Now that I've seen them first hand, I think I'll be quite happy to start using them. The Prestige vitrail (dark green rainbow crystal) was a little darker than Swarovski's but not enough to annoy me. Luckily I bought two of each crystal and just swapped the ones in the kit for the Prestige.


With the centers in, I can start playing with the pretty blue beads. There are three shades plus a transparent white not pictured below.

But first I needed to add in my padding. A line of beads is stitched inside the petals following the curve before it goes downwards. I again used my blue pencil to draw a guide so I didn't lose my way.

As part of my homework for lesson 2, I needed to put in the first row of beads. It took me a few tries before I was happy with them. I was told my lines should be longer, but I'm not crazy about having long lines of beads that are not couched (as these lines are going over padding, only the last bead or two are couched) with a possibility of getting them snagged and the thread snapping.

During our third lesson, we covered how to stitch the inside of the petals. The aim is to recreate long and short stitches using beads. The stitches also needed to be loose and free, not super packed. That second one is very important as one of my teachers biggest regret is how packed her flowers were. Having seen her piece and some others, I agreed with her.

However, you know me, I'm not good with random or loose. So this took some practice, but I think it worked. Both Cecilia and I were very happy with how the petal came out.

Now that I've figured out how I want my petal to be stitched, I needed to plan where I want the colors to go. So I took out my coloring pencils and tried to figure out where my shadows would lay.

I think it's working, but I'll find out when I get more petals in.

With the two petals I have in, I have enough done for the next lesson which covers the leaves. This will give me time to catch up on the other side, which is feeling very lonely right now.

However, I wonder if it is more prudent to complete the poppies on the first side to make sure I like how it comes out before replicating it on the other side. Decisions have to be made.

January TUSAL

First TUSAL of the year and I'm already late. I was hoping to show off a pretty ORT picture this month from all the pastel colors in my Contrast Color wheel but it all got snowed by the threads from Poppy Pouch. So here's a picture of the color wheel itself.

This piece is more work than I expected. I finally completed the orange on the weekend and am now stitching in purple. I felt guilty of not working on my Poppy Pouch homework but I was missing working on counted work. I'll make up for it this weekend, we're having lesson 3 on Saturday.