Ornament of the Month – December 2010

I nearly let this simple ornament defeat me. But here it is:

Five Gold Rings from Flower Thread Company

It is Five Gold Rings from Flower Thread Company/Meg Shinall, from the 2002 Just Cross Stitch Ornament issue. It is stitched with Vicki Clayton silks in colours I happened to like (the greens are from one of her random packs, the red is Gandy Tango), and the gold is PTB 26. The fabric is some white 28 count I had hanging around, probably Lugana.

It doesn’t look very complicated, does it? Well, the design as it is charted has a button hole stitch all the way around it to make it into a bellpull with a pointed end. I have trouble with the button hole stitch, as is apparent in my finishing of Keep a Little Secret. I tried to do the button hole stitch on this ornament no less than five times. I even made it around a couple of corners before I gave up and cut it all off. And then the gold thread I had planned to use went missing. Absolutely disappeared. And it still hasn’t turned up. But I finished it, and I’m glad I stuck with it, since it is beautiful. I don’t know how I will ultimately finish it, but you can be sure it won’t be with the button hole stitch.

Another, bonus, finish is this simple candle design. I’ve done a few others from this series from Bucilla, and still have a few to go. Eventually they will be made into Christmas cards.

Candles from Bucilla