Christmas in July

I started one of the Christmas ornaments I planned to stitch this month - 'O Christmas Tree. 

I thought I'd try stitching 1 over 1 with the threads I had on hand. and it came out really small. That's a 5' hoop. It wasn't very fun doing the Algerian eyelets on such a small scale.

I got the floss colour I was missing and started it again, two over two, and changed the shape of the tree a little bit. I also added some length to the trunk. Much better. What a difference between 1 over 1 and 2 over 2!

I just need to finish the star at the top. The pattern calls for beads but I'm going to use my HotFix tool to add some 'bling'.

I got a lot more done on my Starburst Flag of Canada. 

I didn't like the look of the backstitching across the middle with two threads so switched to one thread. It fills it in nicely. I'm trying to decide if I will pick out the white area where I did the backstitching with two threads and redo it with one. 

Then I'll need to figure out how I will FFO it.

Thanks to the colour selections of someone on the Steady Thread Blackwork SAL, I was able to stitch this week's flower - amaryllis (bottom left). I did French knots for the anthers (I remember that term from high school science class).

It isn't a very big area so I got it done quite quickly. 22 done - 19 to go. Then the fence all around.

I have not idea what I'll do with it once I've finished stitching it but it has been a very enjoyable exercise.