It's been quite a while, but I'm still alternating a large self-patterned project and @mathysphere samplers as I have time! First up was my version of the Ocean sampler, and now the Autumn sampler has joined the completion pile. As with the ocean one, i did a bonus variation on one of the squares for 17 pieces total.
Technical details under the cut, for those of you interested in such things.
The fabric I used for these was a 28ct evenweave in a muted light brown, stitching two over two. Since I was doing them as individual squares rather than one full piece, I did the borders in backstitch rather than cross-stitch to let the designs shine! I did not bother to keep track of the orientation for each fabric scrap as i went, which is why some are a smidge taller and some a smidge wider. Evenweaves be like that sometimes.
First row: owl, mushrooms, goose, moon
All of these were stitched as given, nothing particular to add here! The moon is my favorite of the row. <3
Second row: apples, pumpkin pie, black walnuts, squirrel
This row got a few changes. The apples were patterned with a sky-blue background, which I left off and later gave to the squirrel instead. The light brown of the squirrel's body was too close to the fabric color to stand out the way it needed to without some help. I also worked the pie border from the reverse side, to give it a thicker line since it was such a light color (plus a bonus fancy-crust twisted effect).
Third row: produce crates, grasshopper, icy leaf, pumpkin patch
This row was also stitched as given. I love the leaf one, but bonus points to the pumpkin patch for feeling particularly fairy-tale!
Fourth row: preserves, campfire, deer, hedgehog
This set got a bit of extra backstitch -- I outlined the lids on the preserves jars, and also the hedgehog's face. In both cases, my fabric color was just close enough to the floss colors to muddle things. I very deliberately did not outline the deer, though -- it seemed so much more fitting that they would blend into the background a bit, as they always did in the woods where I grew up. ^_^
Bonus campfire: The campfire was my favorite square of the sampler, and I had a scrap of mottled dark brown fabric sitting around, so I decided to stitch it again! I could not be bothered to dig out waste canvas; instead I just slapped some of the light brown evenweave onto the back of it with a running stitch and worked right through both. Some of the stitches in the center are a little wonky as a result (parallels to the bookmark, Geri! haha) but it came out pretty well! I do wish I'd thought to stitch the middle of the flames in three strands instead of two, to get more intensity of color, but the visible Xs are fun too! The only changes I made from the pattern were leaving off the black background and using black for the border instead of dark red.
I recently started a self-patterned project that is larger than I usually work, and in order to avoid burnout I’m alternating it with @mathysphere samplers -- in card-sized pieces, as is my habit! First up was the Ocean sampler, because I just barely had enough blue scraps for it and I didn’t want to accidentally use them for something else. I also did a bonus navy edition of the tenth one, which I think looks really neat! My goal is to do two hours on the big project for every sampler stitchbit, and I am currently right on track at 34 hours.
Fun tidbit: I got to show @tkingfisher the whale fall one during CrossingsCon! Due to the combination of Ursula being a guest at the convention at the same time as I got to the final piece of the sampler, her whale fall acceptance speech was hovering in the back of my mind every time I worked on it. xD
Technical details under the cut, for those of you interested in such things.
As mentioned, I was working with just whatever blue scraps I happened to have in my stash, so my options were a little more limited than I’d hoped. In particular, the top row is a touch lighter than I would have chosen, and I would have liked to have four colors, for a more proper gradient effect from top to bottom. That said, I was mostly just happy I had enough to do them all, and even each row one consistent color!
First row: crashing wave, playing dolphins, breaching ray, splashing gull.
The fabric here is a very pale blue aida, 14ct. Everything was stitched as given in the pattern, but I did end up adding a subtle tent stitch fill to the sky on the gull one, to help those bright white wings be visible. I wanted to use up some of my orphan thread pile for the outlines on the whole set, and to my delight I had some blue that matched perfectly for this row so that was the obvious choice.
Second row: coral reef, whale and baby, fish swarm, seal in kelp.
This fabric is a grey-blue linen, 32ct, and you may notice that I was not paying attention to the orientation each time I grabbed a new piece! Linen is a little tricky because even ‘evenweave’ linens may not be precisely the same count vertically and horizontally, and that’s especially visible with small pieces like this. Everything here was also stitched as given (over two), and the border color for this row is a muted purple because I didn’t have any green in the orphan pile.
Third row: hungry clams, jellyfish, lanternfish, hermit crab.
Same fabric as the second row. You might notice that the first in the row is a little mottled in comparison to the rest; this was mostly intentional! After an accidental encounter with some fabric glue, I noticed that the linen held onto it more visibly than my more usual fabrics, and decided to lean into it as ‘background detritus’. I do wish this row could have been on a slightly darker fabric for the sake of the jellyfish, mostly, but I made up for that with the bonus navy jellyfish at the bottom! This row got a warm brown border to match the hermit crab’s shell.
Fourth row: giant squid, angler fish, tube worms, whale fall.
This darker blue fabric is another linen, a 28ct this time, and you can see around the edges that the color is a bit lighter inside the weave than on the surface. Once again I failed to coordinate my orientation, so there are some pieces that are wider and others that are taller. All of these were stitched as given with the exception of the angler fish, where I swapped out the blues for 813 and 826 to better match my fabric. This row got red outlines, carefully patched together from a few different red variegation orphans.
Bonus jellyfish: Last but not least, I used a 14ct faded navy scrap for the glowy version of the jellyfish! The fabric was very stiff and felt a little weirdly coated with something; it’s one of the perils of using random scraps picked up from wherever! I’m quite pleased with how it looks though. All thread colors are exactly the same as the original jellyfish, including the brown border, so the only difference is the fabric.
