Ruffles and Flourishes

That's the trumpet fanfare that goes before Hail to the Chief and various other ceremonial appearances.

Elton thought it was a good idea today, as we unveiled the Needlepointed Thing!  and the Dollivers are campaigning to have it as a rug in their clubhouse.  But I think, though it was originally designed as a pillow top, it will most probably be the side of a fancy totebag.  I'm thinking of weaving the other side on my teeny potholder loom, using more of the same yarn.

This was a huge undertaking in terms of the hours spent.  Yesterday I did little else but the basketweave border while I  listened to Boomerang, my current book club selection, on CD. Multiply that out by the rest of the piece, and it comes to I dunamany hours. Nice day. 

The project was a new adventure for me:  following someone else's instructions to the letter, well, almost, except for choosing the colors.  It was meant to be a different sort of brain exercise, totally the opposite of my usual approach where I create all the stuff that goes on.  It was meditative and irritating and all kinds of things, like the time I took a workshop in botanical illustration, again, the opposite of my usual approach.  That was similarly meditative, agonizingly slow, six hours on one flowerhead, but in the end I was glad I did it.  Like climbing a long slow mountain!

The up side of it is that you really improve your skills, here stitching skills, good tension, evenness, all that. And that I now can go back to my freeform piece with a clear mind and better stitching skills.