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Your butterfly picture is so delicate! Lovely work. Poppies come in many colours - in the Netherlands we almost only see the red ones, so I was surprised when in my garden in England they were mostly yellow and orange!

On the other subject, my favourite needles are Prym quilting needles, which like petites are shorter than regular ones. I use size 3 for double wool, 5 for single wool, 7 for most other things and 9 for single strand stuff.

I'm just trying out one of the size 28 petites for some backstitching...

Mabel: The numbered needles your refer to are pointed Crewel needles, I use blunt tapestry needles for my cross stitch because it increases the chance of the thread going through the holes in the fabric. I use Crewel if I need to do quarter stitches on Aida but it is so easy to split the threads with a sharp end of a pointed needle.

I managed to pick up a packet of size 26 Prym Tapestry needles, but so far I cannot find anyone who does size 28. The size 26 are ok for 14 count Aida.

Jo

Yes you're absolutely right, they are pointy needles - for Hardanger and cross stitch I use size 24 and 22 gold-plated, but unfortunately the company I used to get them from in bulk doesn't do them anymore

I have found another butterfly:



There is a Peacock flying just above a flower on the right. I am not sure what it is because I normally see our Peacocks sitting on the fragrant Buddleia flowers.

Have you ever noticed that Peacocks make a hissing sound if you alarm them? This is caused by rubbing their forewings and hindwings together. Just imaging if you were a bird and you thought you had found a tasty insect when suddenly it opens its wings to look at you with those eyes and then starts hissing at you

Jo

Scary !
Unlike your embroidery which is beautiful

I have found another butterfly:



This one has challenged me initially I jumped to the conclusion it was an orange tipped like those I keep finding trapped in my conservatory but then I realised the orange colour is on the lower wings.

Jo

You're right, definitely not an ornage tip, they have no brown at all I think. Will have a ponder!

This is a fairly quick one :



Quick ... so far. Other parts will be a bit more tricky and I am still waiting for some of the threads.

It has been a pleasant relief to do this rather than getting frustrated trying to get the clutch off of the bottom of my lawn tractor engine so I can replace the drive belt

Jo

Dragon!!!! Jo, how did you find the purply blends, when I put them together they look rather odd combinations

The two individual strands work together as a pair but I find the three pairs especially the one with the 3832 looks a bit odd next to the other two pairs. I decided to keep going and see how it looks ... It is a mythical beast

Jo

The colours look better with a bit of backstitching:



Jo

Beautiful! A dragon can be any color it wants to be! That reminds me so much of the TW pieces I have done. Still have a sampler hanging up and have given several as gifts. I love it!

Carole

My Dinky Dye thread and the Kreinik #4 braid has turned up.



I am a bit concerned that the reel of Kreinik seems a bit light of thread. The end of which shows signs of being hand wound. I thought these usually turned up with a cellophane wrapper

Jo

Hmm, it does look a bit thin on the outer edges
I'm afraid I "decanted" mine onto a plastic card bobbin when I got it years ago so I can't remember how it came; I've had things on bobbins with plastic but also (like the flat silk I bought recently) without any further packaging.
If you are really concerned you could wind it onto a card while measuring to see whether you've got the right amount.

Kreinik doesn't come with a plastic wrapper anymore (I'm pretty sure). I checked with some spools I have, and I figure you should have about 2mm of plastic spool showing on the flange end for a new spool. Looks to me as if the braid is almost down to the base of the spool in one section! Where did you buy it -- was it supposed to be new and unused? (great colour though)

I need to get on and use this thread so I am going to pretend someone unwound a bit then dropped it on the floor and more unwound, then they rewound it and put it back on Lakeside's shelf and tried to look innocent.

I have decided that my dragon looks like a "Nori".



The gold colour around the head reminds me of hair rollers and the position of the arms reminds me of Nora Batty (with hair rollers in) standing glaring at Compo, so converting Nora to the male version of the name we get Nori UK members will know what I mean

Jo

Are you perhaps referring to Days of Summer Wine? Shown on Public Television here many years ago and also available on DVD (or maybe it was videotape?). My DH and I watched every episode. I have to admit that "Nora" might not by itself have jogged my memory but there aren't many other, if any other, Campos around. Nori is definitely a good name for the dragon.

Carole

Nori

I've just started playing with the Dinky Dies Silk. My initial concern was to make sure that when I got to the end of a piece of stitching thread that the colour on the new bit I was joining on was the same. To do this I unwound the Silk and looped it same colour to same colour. The resulting loop length was about the same as my normal sewing thread length so I snipped it on the same colour as the start of the thread.

I will have to make sure I start each thread "the right way round" as the thread goes blue-pink-gold-white-blue-pink-gold-white-blue. We don't want it to go blue-pink-gold-white-blue-white-gold-pink-blue



The next challenge I was worried about was to make sure I stitch along the chain pattern and not be tempted to stitch along the horizontal but that is actually easy

Jo

Very meticulous!