Tuesday Stitchers import: April reveal and early May progress

Oh dear. Another week slipped by!
Okay, so I did a bunch more work on April before deciding that I needed to set April aside and move on to May.
Here's my reveal for April:

And some detail shots:

A modified wheatear made with fly and chain stitches. The thread is a hand-dyed silk carried with a thread of irridescent Sulky thread.

The hibiscus outlined in buttonhole and chainstitch with a stamen of cast-on stitch and French knots.

From left to right: 

Row 1 --(in the upper left corner)  a row of cast-on stitch flowers with french knot centers, augmented with green lazy daisy stitch leaves.

Row 2 --The purple row is TAST stitch crossed blanket (crossed buttonhole to some)

Row 3 --A row of metallic threads in feather stitch augmented with french knots. The thread that looks bright white in the photo looks like subtle grey  under most viewing conditions, but it is reflective and so in low light conditions it bounces back available light and gleams. In this picture, it is bouncing back the light of the flash. Come to think of it, this would be a great thread to use for angels' wings or halos. :)

Row 4-- whipped chain stich with the purple whipping couched down at the points.

Row 5-- tatting made of silk 100/3 thread that I picked up at Threadneedle needlework shop. I've been spending a lot of time tatting while I drive back and forth to visit family. It is easier to carry than my needlework, easier to work on under distracting conditions, and less heartbreaking should I forget it somewhere or spill something on it. hence, you will probably see a lot of tatting show up in my CQJP wedges over the next few months!

I added gold French knots to my original wheatear seam. The thread I used is Sulky's holographic gold machine embroidery thread.

More of the Sulky holographic gold machine embroidery thread, this time used as staggered running stitches to give one of the larger patches a more dynamic feel.

I'd like to add more to April (and March) but time keeps slipping forward, so I'll settle for just chipping away each month in its own time right now and maybe adding filler when I get all caught up or at the end of the year . o O (whichever comes first. Yeah, right.)

Four seams so far on my May block:

A row of boullion roses in a Caron Impressions (half silk, half wool). It's a lovely thread to work with! So soft and enjoyable to the fingers. I think I'm going to get more of this thread in various colors and run some overdye experiments at some point. . o O (like I need another project!)

This line of lollipop trees is what happens when I remember that the TAST stitch of the week is half-chevron, but I don't recall what chevron was, nor do I recall the instructions for halving it. I made a long backstitch, came up in the center of the stitch and created a perpendicular line terminating in a French knot (three wraps). I used a variegated thread, working the short lollipops in one direction, and the taller lollipops on the return to intersperse the colors.

The top line (peach color) is a stitch I like to call "Fleur-de-lis" when it's done in a thread and to a proportion that will hold a nice curve. In this case the thread was much softer, so I got sharp angles instead of the circular look that made me call it Fleur-de-lis to begin with. I still like it in this form, though. Again, I terminated the ends of the tallest stitches with French knots. That was one of the TAST stitches recently, and since I haven't been able to work on my postcards, I seem to have gone overboard with including them on my CQJP this week!

The purple line is a weird little experimental line of stitching that I can't recall how I did. I'm going to need to look at it in full sunlight with a magnifier and see if I can figure it out again or trigger my memory. It involved some interesting wrapping and knotting of the light purple thread (somewhat inspired by Palestrina and Basque knotted stitches, but worked completely differently ) and then some whipping and couching and knotting with the darker purple thread. I put it in that location because there was a deep wrinkle in the cloth that I could not press out. That's the beauty of crazy quilting! You can hide wrinkles and mis-joins and fray spots in the fabric, and all sorts of things by clever embellishment!

Well, that's it for this week. May your needles always be smooth and your scissors always sharp. :)