The most enjoyable stitches in a canvas are the first 10 and the last 10. The first ten are filled with anticipation of the joys to come; and the last ten are taken almost with relief that the task is finished. That's how I feel about the stylish ladies. I'm glad I allowed myself two weeks to finish stitching "the ladies"--it took almost all that time to actually finish the job. I took a photograph of the back of the canvas, because unstitched areas show up better from the back.
When viewed from this side, you can see that there's more work to be done than was apparent from the front. Also, I realized that I had some more "frogging" to do. The eyebrows were all painted black. Now, how realistic is that? So I picked out the eyebrows I had already done of Fifi so I could make them more natural/realistic.
I made the eyebrow color for each lady coordinate with her hair color. I also changed the eye colors. Fifi was painted with medium-blue eyes. To me, red heads have green eyes. The blues I selected for Mimi and Claudette were different shades of periwinkle and I gave Gigi a paler shade of green than that I gave Fifi.
Other areas I stitched were the tassel on Giselle's beret, which I did in the long/short split stitch; the buttons on Mimi's blouse, where I repeated the Raised Maltese Cross; and I finished the chain stitched "star fish" design on Mimi's beret.
For anyone who is interested, I have the stitch guide for these ladies for sale at
nnicely@gate.net.
Hope you enjoyed watching my stitching as much as I did doing the stitching. Now to force myself to part with the ladies and send them to the finisher. I should have a photograph of the finished Kate Spade-style tote by August. AND, what will I stitch next?
Mary Agnes, this is simply fabulous! Your choice of colors and stitches is spot on, and not a drop of "goop" anywhere. It's vibrant yet tasteful--super job! Congratulations!
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