Success! Sorta.

[lady_songsmith]

Finished one color on the Border of Doom. The other two should be easier since they fill in. Here it is:







That's the easier side to do. The other side is practically empty, and given how often I ripped huge swaths of this side out because I'd missed one row and not caught it until ten later, I'm very scared to do the side with nothing to cross-check to.

Also, if you've got sharp eyes you can just sorta see the black stitching in the lower right corner of this. It's more visible in real life than a bad scan.... but not by much. I've still got nearly all that space under the riverbank to do. There's a few grey rocks, the rest is black water.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

Was it YOUR idea to do this on dark canvas?

[lady_songsmith]

It's a kit.

[florentinescot.livejournal.com]

That's just beautiful! I love working on black cloth!

[lady_songsmith]

It'll be worth the headaches when it's done, I think. :-)

[florentinescot.livejournal.com]

nods. The designs just absolutely snap off that ground fabric.

[mysryael.livejournal.com]

Absolutely lovely

Sweety, you can actually build yourself a row of different coloured half-cross stitches to give you the cross-check reference you are looking for.

What I do is mark the top and the bottom of the piece by pulling a thread through in a running stitch and then I lay a line of colour out on a piece of graph paper that helps remind me where I am. I use the same colour for ten rows and then move to the next colour and by the time I'm done I can see by colour code exactly where I am. Yes it takes time and material that you didn't plan for but it can save you a lot of time when you realise how often you have to go back and recount and swear then rip out the wrong stitches.

I'd be happy to have Cormac drive me over and show you what I mean with a couple of small pieces I have been working on in my head for a while now.

(My device and my badges)

[lady_songsmith]

I think I get it. I used a running stitch to mark off a 10-high space running from the center to the left edge when I started. That random red bit in the middle of nowhere is the center. Getting from there to anywhere else involved either counting a large enough number that I knew I'd mess up, or stitching in the white cranes. Since I've been taking this project places, I didn't want to do white first; it would have wound up grey. So I dug out some bright blue from my general supply and put in a loop, used that to position the tree, and pulled it out once I had enough in to give me a good reference.

I had thought to do something similar, but while the running stitch shows me blocks of 5 and 10, it doesn't really locate me on a long border. (The piece is 18" long, 10" wide.) I like the various-colored half cross idea. I could run them up the two-square edge that'll be gold thread eventually, keep the border spaced correct. thanks!

[mysryael.livejournal.com]

yes that is exactly how it is done.

Have fun!