Unexpected Relaxation

This week I’ve been in training for work. Due to a tanker truck overturning and closing a major highway (which I would have needed to drive on to get the the training center), I decided to use the work from home option on Friday. The training wrapped up around 3:30, so I spent a little bit of that remaining time before N got home like this:

Enjoying a beautiful afternoon on the deck while embroidering.

Doesn’t embroidering on the deck sound simply fantastic? Cause I sure thought it was 🙂 Best end to a training week ever!

Now some of you may be thinking (or not…), I know you knit and I know you quilt, but embroider? Is this new?

Actually, it’s old. I use to embroider a lot in high school. Then there was an unfortunate counting issue on a counted cross stitch pattern and I put it away and haven’t touched it again for XX years (Yes, it double digits, and no I won’t say how many…).

Then I stumbled on two blogs &Stitches and Needle ‘n Thread. The embroidery was so fun and pretty! I honestly admit that I had a style in my mind for what embroidery was and it wasn’t all that flattering. Not sure why, since I use to do it and all. I think that when I did embroidery before, even as I was enjoying the process of embroidering, I didn’t really like the style of what I had. Mostly because I was using left overs and patterns from my grandmother. Hey, it’s what I had.

Fast forward to now and Mary Corbet at Needle ‘n Thread offered a free pattern that, for whatever reason, I fell completely into infatuation with and had to try. Right. Now. It’s her Czech Inspired Folk Flowers pattern.

Czech Inspired Folk Flowers pattern

Since I wasn’t sure if I would be able to revive my interest in embroidery, I didn’t want to invest much into in case I took 12 stitches and then quit. So, I dug through my stash of fabric and my embroidery thread (which I had held on to all this time. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Not really sure….) and found a combination that I liked so I could give it a shot.

My original plan was to do satin stitching over the outside of the flowers and all the little circles. Right now I’m kind of liking the simple outline. What do you think?

So, what’s my conclusion on picking up embroidery again?  Yes, please, I love it! I’m already trying to dream up more ways to use this wonderful pattern (pillow shams keep coming to mind, we’ll have to see).

Thank goodness for relaxing afternoons that allow us to rediscover craft love and finish up new creations.

Embroidery details