Finished: August Stitch-a-Long (& a bonus sea star)

I finished this in August, placed it in the hoop, and took a photo for posting to the Flickr group as we watched Irene's progress towards us; I wanted a photo up just in case we lost power! But now I've framed it properly, so here it is again--not photographed on the wall, as I'd hoped, but outside on the deck, where the light was much better.

If you click on that, it should get a little bigger. This was so much fun to stitch, and I have no doubt that these vibrant colors will brighten my wall and my day in the dead of winter.

Also recently finished, another tide pool creature, this time on one of the "flour sack" dishtowels I bought for this reason. I'm not sure how these are going to hold up--it's a really, really loose weave, which you can see in the photo.

He's cute, though, isn't he? I used outline stitch (or maybe stem stitch; I can never keep those two straight) for the outline, seed stitch in both yellow and orange for the inside, backstitch for the contour lines, and a French knot for the madreporite. I think if I ever get around to offering this whole set as a pattern (I'd have to stitch them all first, and get a nice clean copy in PDF format) I'll have to include information about each animal. They're just such cool creatures.

It's not as "clean" as I'd like--the loose weave! It didn't help matters--but I still like it. I haven't decided if I'll continue with my original plan to stitch four animals along the bottom of this dishtowel, or if I'll switch to the napkins, which are a little sturdier, and just do one per napkin.

Happy Labor Day weekend, to those in the US. Enjoy the unofficial last (*sniff!*) weekend of summer!