After finishing stitching the “Vintage Eggs” cross-stitch ornament series by The Prairie Schooler last week, I am taking a little break. I’m not sure what big (or little) needlework project I want to start next, so I dragged out a UFO to see if I could complete it.

Remember “Anhinga Blues“? Well, here it is again:

So, I may plug away at some backstitching over the next week or so.

Monday night I went to the monthly meeting for the Homewood Embroiderers Guild, of which I am a member. The group currently has a little exhibit up in the park district building where we meet. The ladies who arranged the displays did a fabulous job, and I am always blown away by the work that some of the members do. I am lucky to get to hang out with such talented needleworkers.

I took some photos of the exhibit cases:

The large framed piece on the top shelf in the left photo is mine. It is a cross-stitch piece I finished a couple years ago. The design is based on a pattern by William Morris. It is the biggest and most labor-intensive thing that I’ve stitched.

I also received a kit at the guild meeting to make a wrap bracelet. The kit includes leather cord, #8 perle cotton thread, beads, a button for fastening and 2 twisted wire needles. I could not find a website for the designer, “On the Surface,” but this wrap bracelet on Etsy looks like it uses the same technique. The bracelet I making, however, is much longer and will wrap around my wrist 4-5 times when it is finished.

So, I opened the kit and read the instructions and started on the bracelet. It doesn’t look like much of anything yet, but here is a photo of the mess so far:

Finally, I want to share some sketches, too. I mentioned in my last post that I am thinking about designing some cross-stitch patterns–especially patterns inspired by books and literature. I have so many ideas, but there are a few that I am actively working on. Here is one design element that took me many tries to get right:

A few of the versions of this hat are laughably awful, but eventually I drew something that clicked. Can you guess whose hat this might be? :)

That was a surprisingly long update. Thanks as always for reading!