The First Stitch

First stitch of the Lady with Unicorn: Sense of Hearing.

I pressed the fabric and stretched it in the scroll frame. Then I worked the first stitch in the upper left corner.

Looks pretty lonely, doesn’t it? (You might not be able to see it in this photo view. It’s just barely visible.)

Every one of those squares is 100 stitches.

The first stitches were absolute misery because my frame holder is not large enough or sturdy enough to hold a 23″ wide scroll frame. Now I wonder how I managed the Teresa Wentzler “English Garden Sampler.” The pegs sticking out of the bottom aren’t long enough to support a frame with a lot of fabric wound around the bottom bar and the arms don’t extend wide enough to allow free access to the back, which is essential. (For you non-stitchers, one hand is held behind the fabric at all times and other is held in front.)

I improvised a frame holder with two thick dictionaries and a couple book stands. It’s unwieldy but it will do the job until I can figure out a more practical solution. Shipping a frame holder from the US or the UK would be very expensive and I don’t know enough about their design to try drafting a plan and taking it to a professional wood-worker. (If you can offer any suggestions, please help me!)

Here are my efforts for the first day — about 150 stitches. Only 130,230 to go! You can stop laughing now…

I really like the colour combinations (very fall-like), so this project is better suited for me than the White Lilies I just finished. White Lilies’ background had too many brown/purple stitch combos for my taste and I had a tough time distinguishing between the browns in poor light.