Gatsby Done

It turned out to be more difficult than I imagined, judging by how many times I had to rip and re-stitch a section. It turned out well; I prefer not adding most of the outlines as specified by the instructions. Here's the original for comparison.
As usual I'll sit on it and see if it needs "enhancements". I'm considering adding a color backing behind the eyelet stitches - but the rest of the piece needs to be backed with white. I'll see if I can make that work. Considering a frame now.

More Gatsby, Tools

Getting closer to done!

Let me talk about tools that I usually use, and especially for this piece:

I will use the circle template to re-draw the circles with the Pilot Frixion Pen. When I finish stitching, the outline is erasable using the Clover mini iron. If I accidentally erased the outline with the iron, I can bring it back by sticking the whole piece in the freezer for a couple of hours. Pretty neat!

Before:

 Outline gone:

Wishing You a Happy New Year from Gatsby

The new stitch I learned for Whitework is the eyelet stitch - it's a lot of fun poking a large hole in the fabric, except I have to re-stretch the fabric to be drum tight after that. Well there are a lot of eyelet stitches coming.

I tried using a lighter color for the beads background but it turns out the black looks the best, and balances the eye lashes,

The floche which are the padded work in progress is difficult to lay smooth; it is not tightly twisted so the stitches can turn out different.