After the Fact (Christmas Ornament)

I had had this piece finished for some time, but waited to post it as it was a gift! then blog ennui happened and now it's March.  Heigh-ho.

Anyway, it's the "Christmas Angel 1997", a free chart by Marilyn Leavitt-Imblum of Lavender & Lace.  I'm very impressed with the shading details in this piece, which are quite lovely and effective.  My mother-in-law collects angels, so I thought this would make a good gift for her.

I confess that I started this quite a number of years ago, and got lost on the wings, certain that I'd made a mistake somewhere but unable to tell among all of the shades of white and off-white where I'd gone wrong.  After re-starting (and finishing!) the decades-delayed "English Cottage," I felt a bit guilty that I'd left this so long -- it's a much smaller project, after all! -- so I just picked it up and finished it, not worrying overmuch about flecks of white in semi-random places! and the main stitching was done in one long evening.

I didn't want to buy the braids and filaments -- four things! of which I'd need only a small amount -- and so I sort of "unvented" a bit of sparkle by blending a strand of floss plus a strand of the metallic gold thread I already had bought for the hem of the gown.  Here I used DMC 304 floss plus metallic 5282 for the red braid, and 3347 floss plus the same gold metallic for the chartreuse braid.  I did "splurge" on the Mill Hill beads, partly because I'm also hoping to do the companion angel some other time!

I mounted this more-or-less the same way as in this video, attaching the fabric to pieces of mat board by way of gathering stitches, and whip-stitching the front and back together.  My whip-stitching was a bit, um, erratic, and so I went over it again with some floss in long-armed cross stitch (in lieu of ribbon).  The hanger is a piece of heavy-ish beading wire that I had on hand, twisted into a clothes-hanger shape with a loop instead of a hook, I mean with "shoulders" inside to help distribute the weight of the ornament.

All in all, quite successful!  It's still hanging up at my in-laws' house, months after Christmas, so I'm happy that she likes it.  With luck, the 2005 angel won't take me as long ...

Comments

[d]

thats awesome!!