Merry Christmas Poinsettia

Today was the day we tackled the poinsettia in the Merry Christmas Mystery Class. We're coming along. When you look at it, we've already completed quite a few squares.

I really like the poinsettia. And not just because there are crystals in the center. While that isn't a bad thing, that's not the only thing I like about it.

We started with T Stitch in Sparkle Braid covering all the petals and allowing just a bit of the shading to show through. Now, here's the cool part. After all the T Stitch was done we filled in some of the open stitches with Tent Stitch in a darker shade of Sparkle Braid. It's just enough to make the shading pop.



This is a great technique for anything that is painted with a lot of shades and tones. One color of one thread across everything in an open stitch and then enhance the dark shadows.

To really bring the Poinsettia to live we added veins in Chain Stitch and Stem Stitch and of course crystals in the center.

We also finished two other small squares in class!

I'm off to start lesson #4. Wonder what fun we can have there.