Floss & Color Choices for Glorious Spring!

I'm on the last row of One May Night! I hope to have it finished and framed by the end of the weekend, if life doesn't intervene. And while I was going to stitch Sanctuary next, it just has to wait till I can complete Glorious Spring! :)

Spring is exploding like cannons here in the mountains. I look out the kitchen window to the forest which is only a few feet from it and the daffodils are just dancing in the breezes! We've had a raccoon raiding the cat's food and a bear came a couple of nights and raided the seeds and suet in our bird feeding area, so we know spring has indeed arrived!

I did take some time out to select my fabric and floss and wanted to share that with you. I also decided that that top row of daffodils that are bent over as they are rising up and blossoming, should be slightly darker yellow than the bottom with slightly darker leaves. So if you have the charts already you can either keep them as they are or make that change.

The fabric is an 18 count Zweigart aida in a dark teal green, and I'll be stitching it with one thread over one square and will be using all Vikki Clayton's HDF silk floss. Her floss has such a lovely quality to it and stitches so easily. Her prices are VERY good and she is happy to ship internationally so don't hesitate to check her products out.

Colors - (and I'll probably only need one skein of each except for the Cream for the border)

For the border & snow in the center motif, I'll be using - Cream

Violets - flowers will be Ultra Violet #2123 & leaves will be Hemlock #3111

Top Row Daffodils - flowers will be Liquid Gold #4175 & leaves will be Isle Green #3213

Trees, Initials & Date - bark and initials will be Bewitched & leaves and date will be Wrasse Green #3315

Second Row Daffodils - flowers will be Gold Rush #4227 & leaves will be Isle Green #3211

Bluebells - flowers will be Fugue Blue #2241 and leaves will be Hemlock #3113

Butterflies - Outer border will be Terra Firma & inner area will be Yellow Spice #4163

Now, off to try and get One May Night done and start Glorious Spring! while it is still spring.

Fabric & Floss

These last few days I have done some editing of the Heart Note Alley chart, changing a few bands that weren't working for me. When I first put them together it was more to get an overall feel for the piece and now as I'm getting ready to put floss to fabric it is time to finalize the design. Though there will doubtless be some changes as I stitch the particular bands, I think I can safely say that the design is as final as it can be at this point in the process. And this is what it looks like.

I also spent a fair amount of time looking at silk floss considering possible colors. In our very rural area there are no brick & mortar shops I can go to to actually see floss so I ordered some online, hoping that the actual colors were close to what my monitor was showing. Thankfully, most were and after trying many combinations of possibilities, getting rid of the 'disturbers', I've decided the color palette.


For fabric I'm using Zweigart's 18 count Aida cloth in ivory. I've tried many types of fabric over the years and I come back to such an evenweave because I simply enjoy how it feels, looks and stitches. I have friends who do gorgeous work on linen and this design will hopefully work well on whatever type and count you might prefer yourself.

The floss I'm using is silk. Since first trying silk floss I haven't used anything else, again it is just what works for me. This time I'm using silk floss from both Vikki Clayton's Hand-Dyed Fibers collection and some from Carrie's Creation Threads

The palette will be three shades of green, three of mauve and two purples.
From Carrie's Creation - Wild Orchid (dark mauve), Violet (medium mauve) and Garden Green (dark green)
From Clayton's HDF - Wrasse #3315 (medium green), Wrasse #3313 (light green), Ultra Violet #2121 (light mauve), Sue-Purple #6115 (dark purple) and Sue-Purple #6109 (medium purple)

I began doing some sample stitches to see which color I want to use for the border, hopefully you can get an idea of what they look like in the photo below. The second group with the medium green won and will be the border.

As soon as I receive full skeins of the selected colors I'm more than ready to get started!