I almost wish that this had taken me longer to stitch, because I enjoyed it so much! It is "Mrs. Campbell, 1805" from Hands Across the Sea Samplers. I love the colors, the rampant and exotic central field -- the garlands of which are ostensibly symmetrical but actually aren't -- contained in an neat and tidy border that would be severe if it weren't for the bright colors.
This is in the DMC colorway, on Zweigart Newcastle linen (40-count) in "Antique White." I'm still a bit undecided about tea-dyeing this to be more like the original, but I suspect I'm going to leave it as it is now. (If you're curious, you can see the original sampler in an old Barneby's auction listing here.)
This is the first sampler from Hands Across the Sea that I've worked, and to be honest, I don't really like the beautifully-printed and spiral-bound booklet that the chart comes in -- while the small pages allow for a large image of each section of the chart, there are too many sections -- twenty, in this case, not even counting the key -- which necessitates a lot of flipping back and forth as one stitches, and the spiral binding, while it lies admirably flat, prevents the heavy-paper pages from flipping easily. I managed it well enough on the border and alphabet, which are logical and relatively intuitive, but when I came to the central field I soon scanned the pages and cobbled together a full chart that let me carry on in any direction to finish a particular leaf or flower bud. Were I to buy another chart from them -- and there are certainly a lot of charmers to be had! -- I would probably simply buy the PDF version.
Alas, nothing is known of Mrs. Campbell, except that we can assume, partly from the fact that she was not a schoolgirl and partly from the admonitory motto, that she was a teacher in Oban.
The little parrots are delightful!
I made a slight wobble here, putting the "c" in "clean" one space too close to the "l" -- since I happened to be working it from right to left, this put the next letters one space off as well, but once I noticed it, about halfway along, I started the "K" in the correct spot. The lower-case letters being worked over-one, they are a pain to pick out, but I would have done so if they hadn't been in red -- I had had to pick out a few stitches somewhere in "Mrs Campbell Oban" and the red thread left a rather obvious "stain" of red fibers -- and so I decided -- pace Mrs. C -- to leave the "c" where it was. I think it's almost unnoticeable ...!
A pleasure from start to finish!
And then -- I admit, the moment "Mrs. Campbell" came out of the frame -- because I've been saving this, my sine qua non of counted-stitch samplers, Darlene O'Steen's "Virtue Outshines the Stars" ...
