First Start of the New Year

I went to Kim's on Friday to pick my threads for our upcoming canvaswork class. We're going to be stitching this with our preferred colours.

I believe it's one of Kim's designs. We will be using 7 different threads - velvets, perle cotton, sparkly thread, etc. I'm really looking forward to the class.

While there, I bought the fabric and most of the threads for this project, Stars by Drawn Thread.

It's a grey 35ct evenweave of some kind. Linen? Lugana?

All the threads are substitutes for the Dinky Dyes, and Thread Gatherer Silk 'N Colors called for.

I was able to find appropriate Gentle Art Sampler Thread (GAST) substitutes except for the Needlepoint Silk threads so will use DMC floss for that.

Several things drew me to this chart: the colours, the alphabet and lettering,variegated blue letters, the cute houses.

I started it last night and got this far.

I always start in the centre and usually work to the right and down. I'm really looking forward to starting some houses beneath the leaves.

In this chart there is an alternative verse to using the alphabet, if desired. It is the first part of the excerpt from 'Morituri Salutamus' by H W Longfellow:

          "Age is opportunity no less than youth itself, though in another dress..."

Instead, I'm going to do the alphabet and only the last part of the quote:

          " As the evening twilight fades away the sky is filled with stars, invisible by day."

The stars are added afterwards. There are small ones and extra big ones. There are a couple of Octagonal Leviathans in red. I also need to find some teeny weeny 4mm white or cream buttons.

The addition of some interesting stitches really 'draws' me to The Drawn Thread patterns. The first one I did was Pastoral.

I took most of the Christmas stuff down today. It always makes me a bit sad to put away my lovely ornaments for another year. I'll find random items I missed for the next couple of days and still need to get Skip to help me take the tree downstairs. The tree is an old one that requires assembly. However, the last few years we've just taken it downstairs whole rather than take it apart. I'm in the market for a new tree so I'm hoping to find one at the end of this season (I'd better get cracking) or early next Christmas season.