Colombina: Fifth Post - Framed

And now for Colombina:

It's harder to see on this mat, but it's the same as Anthera's, just silver.  These swirls are actually easier to see in real life than Anthera's.  It's odd how the pictures display the opposite of real life.  This one was my favorite of the two from the beginning. And I think I like the framing job better as well.  I really wish I could have used a matching black frame on Anthera, but it just didn't exist.

As I mentioned before these were Christmas/Birthday gifts for my mother to put in her "mask" bathroom.  However she decided she didn't want them in that room.  She decided she wanted to put them in her "gray" bathroom downstairs.  In a way this is nice, more people will be able to see them in this bathroom since it's downstairs.

Well, this is it for me today.  I'm hanging out at my parents' house and since I finished Lambent I have nothing to work on.  I'll find something to occupy my time.

Colombina: Fourth Post - Complete

Finally complete!

As I mentioned I got the thread last week, Wednesday, I think.  This morning, well, Sunday morning since it's now technically Monday, I went to the Aquarium with my family, my cute little nephew just loves "ish", so I was able to pick up the piece from my mother.

As I was plugging away at the 79 remaining stitches, the far right curl, the long one with the filament around the eye, wasn't matching up.  After spending about 10 minutes counting and recounting I finally realized I missed two rows causing the whole curl to be two stitches low and one stitch left.  And the curl I was working on literally ran into it.  So out it came. :(  Well, about 100 more stitches came out.  All in all it took me about an hour and a half of counting, stitching, frogging and cursing.  But it's finally done!  I just have to focus on that.

Project Stats:
Pattern: Colombina
Pattern by: Fire Wing Designs
Started Stitching: September 28, 2012
Finished Stitching: January 13, 2013
Fabric: 28ct. hand-dyed Evenweave
Floss: Caron Waterlilies 2 over 2, or 3 over 2 with silver filament

My next Signet project will be Samurai for myself to join Paladin on my wall.

Colombina: Third Post

I've been a bad, bad girl.  I started two other projects while I swore to myself that I wouldn't start any until after I had finished one.  So this will be a quick post as I have tons of things I want to finish by the end of the year, and less time to do it in.

On the other hand, I'm incredibly close to finishing Colombina.  Here it is after I completed one side:

And here it is right now:

No, your eyes are not deceiving you.  I have not completed the last curl.  Why, you may ask, am I posting with the project being merely 79 stitches from being complete?  I'm glad you asked, I ran out of thread!  Can you believe it?  :(  So off I go to buy one more skein, and while I'm at it I'm going to order an extra skein of the color I'm using for Anthera, just to be sure.

Project Stats:
Pattern: Colombina
Pattern by: Fire Wing Designs
Started Stitching: September 28, 2012
Fabric: 28ct. hand-dyed Evenweave
Floss: Caron Waterlilies 2 over 2, or 3 over 2 with silver filament
Percentage: 97.84% complete
Stitches: 3,579 out of 3,658 complete

So we'll see what happens first, will I get far enough on Anthera to post before my thread arrives to finish Colombina?  I feel like I'm writing a cheesy cliffhanger for a television show.

Colombina: Second Post

I'm sorry I've been a bit dark recently.  Honestly I was working on sewing a Halloween Costume, which, in hindsight, I realized I should have taken progress pictures and posted those.  Unfortunately I did not.  Anyway after that was finished for last weekend's party, I lost my job on Tuesday, so needless to say, Not much has been done.

Here's what I got done on Colombina before all the chaos of Halloween costumes and employment issues.

I've done a little bit more, the two curls closest to the center on the left hand side.  I'm planning on getting this done next week.  Without work to hinder me, I should get it done rather quickly.


Project Stats:
Pattern: Colombina
Pattern by: Fire Wing Designs
Started Stitching: September 28, 2012
Fabric: 28ct. hand-dyed Evenweave
Floss: Caron Waterlilies 2 over 2, or 3 over 2 with silver filament
Percentage: 73.23% complete
Stitches: 2,679 out of 3,658 complete

Colombina: First Post

As I mentioned in my last post I started working on my Mother's Christmas / Birthday present.  There's two pictures so she gets on for Christmas and one for her Birthday in January.  My plan is to get both stitched and given to her on Christmas, then have them framed in time for her Birthday, but since they're going to hung up at her house I want her to help pick out the frames and mats.

I started with Colombina, as I guess would be obvious from my post title.  Here's a picture of it on the right.

I couldn't find the exact colors I was looking for in fabric so I eventually decided to try hand dying my own fabric.  I took 28 ct. evenweave fabric, cut it in half, one for Colombina and one for Anthera.  For Colombina I dyed the fabric a dark gray.  Then I used a dying technique I found online using black dye.  This is what I came up with.

I don't think it looks too bad for my first attempt.  The thread at the top is the variegated thread that I'm using, but in my usual fashion it's a  little washed out.  The thread is Caron Waterlilies in the color Ash.  My initial intent was to have a silver thread along with it to make it sparkling.  However, I was so excited to get started I completely forgot about the silver.  Before I knew it, I already had quite a bit done, what I've started to call its mustache.


I was a little bummed but it looked really good and I didn't want to take it apart so I figured I'd just do both without the shininess.

I talked to my sister and told her what happened and she asked why I didn't just start using it from this point on.  I told her it would look funky with the one part not being stitched, then I realized that my weird sense of stitching the mirror images gave me a way to have some fun.  I decided to just add the filament to the parts that surround the eyes on the masks.  So I did those next.

Unfortunately it doesn't show up very well in this picture  but everything stitched in the picture that wasn't stitched in the last picture has silver in it, and it looks pretty cool, even next to the same color without the silver.  I also found out what a pain it is to stitch with the stuff.  It took me forever to get these four lines done.  Now I'm kind of happy I initially forgot the silver.

The rest of this will be stitched with just the variegated thread, no silver, so hopefully it will go a bit quicker from this point.  I am, however, worried about running out of thread.  Only time will tell.

Project Stats:
Pattern: Colombina
Pattern by: Fire Wing Designs
Started Stitching: September 28, 2012
Fabric: 28ct. hand-dyed Evenweave
Floss: Caron Waterlilies 2 over 2, or 3 over 2 with silver filament
Percentage: 54.84% complete
Stitches: 2,006 out of 3,658 complete