Latest Finish (And It’s Even Framed!)

We were just in Walt Disney World for a week and since we drive down, I have a lot of time to think read stitch and sleep. Heavy on the sleeping part. I must have been one of those babies that you could take for a car ride to get to sleep because time on the road does it to me every time. It’s approximately a 16 hour drive for us. A lot of people might think that we are crazy, but honestly, with the Civic hybrid, we spend less in gas than it would typically cost one of us to fly down. Add that to the fact that I hate dealing with PHL and the TSA, plus Terry doesn’t mind driving and we have a (nearly) win-win situation. I say nearly because I have problems with my left hip that cause me to be in significant pain after about 3 hours of sitting in a car. Large amounts of ibuprofen on a regular basis are necessary to help lessen the pain, but it’s still not bad. Besides, we can take all of the luggage that we want without dealing with baggage fees. For us, that would be quite significant, because we pack a lot for one week in a studio that has a kitchenette – food, pillows, etc. – that would just not be possible if we flew.

Anyway… the end result of all of that driving (at least on the way down) was a finish for me on Blossom. I took pictures of it a few days later in full sunlight on our hotel balcony, but again I have found that the colors are not quite accurate and the picture was kind of crummy. Thursday night, I did a dry run of putting it into the frame that I bought for it. Unfortunately, the mat that I thought was going to work for it did not. 🙁 I was very disappointed and actually went out and ordered a mat cutter to be able to cut a new one. I checked to see if I could mount it without a mat, but the fabric was just this much too short. Boo. Hiss. I took it upon myself to try and stretch the piece to see if I could get the additional 1/8 inch or so that I could frame it without a mat. Unfortunately, that didn’t work. Drat! Foiled again! Or so I thought. However, when I removed it this morning from where I had blocked it out, it turns out I was just able to make it after all. And I mean just able to make it. I had no room to spare at all; not even one single thread at the top or bottom. Fortunately, I can use the mat cutter anyway and I bought the lowest end cutter that made sense for my use, so I am one step closer to doing more of my own framing without being significantly out of pocket. So, I went ahead and mounted and framed it today. Yes, I used the dreaded adhesive board, but I pretty much had to and it’s at least acid-free and produced by the same manufacturer that makes the mat board that I use, so it’s not as bad as it could be.

I snapped some pictures of the mounted piece in the frame before I pulled it back out and put in the glass and spacers. I had to take it outside and grab the pictures in direct sunlight in order to try to get the best representation of the colors in the piece. I think that this is the closest that I’m going to get, as it has turned out to be ridiculously difficult to take accurate pictures of this! I assume it’s the fabric that I hand-dyed which is causing some of the difficulties.

So, here are a couple of pictures of the finished and framed piece. First, a couple of snippets, a la Anne:


I’m not sure that I captured it adequately, but this piece has quite a 3D feel to the cross stitched portions because it called for 3 strands. Not to mention that I can’t take pictures that anywhere near as nice as Anne’s. 😉

Finally, here is the fully framed piece, in all of its sunlit glory. It’s slightly washed out, but I seriously don’t care:

I’m not sure that I’ll actually manage to get anything finished after this for a little while, as I have started kitting up Christmas presents. Neither of the major recipients read this blog, so I’ll be able to post when I get them stitched up, fortunately. Otherwise, I’d really not have much to write about. 😆