Flower of the East - 2016 #1

So I chose my lovely adopted 'Flower of the East' to work on next - this one I am very, very slow with because she is on the worst, floppiest linen ever and yet I can't put her in a hoop or frame.  I have to work with her in hand - it is the only way I can make my stitches look the same as the ones already done.  I suspect they were stitched in hand, as well.

Anyway, here's where she was:

And here's where she is:

I finished all the cross stitches for the tree branch, all the flowers on the right, all the missing peach shades of half cross stitch in the 'sky', and all the backstitch on the right.  There are still french knots to do, but I'm going to finish the left side flowers and backstitch them, then put her in a Q-snap for the french knots.  There's no way I'm trying to get those done in hand.

As I work on her this year, I'm going to continue working from the top down, filling in all the random missing bits - the lady who gave her to me stopped working in the weirdest places on her!  After I get the tree branch done, there are random missing bits in the parasol to do.

For now, though, she's put away and I'm off to choose my next rotation piece!

Happy Stitching!!!

Tama