It's Sweet Pea Time!

Earlier this year I started learning how to crochet....specifically because I saw the lovely afghan my sister was stitching called the "Sweet Pea Afghan" designed by ATTIC24 (pssst: check out ATTIC24's blog for some truly delicious crochet inspiration and designs).  After a long grey winter, I was totally smitten by the colors and pattern, and right away wanted to learn how to make one....

As I was working on this springy afghan, it got me dreaming about a fragrant bouquet of sweet peas, and I realized, "Hey, it's been quite a while since I created a flower collage. Wouldn't a Sweet Pea Collage be fun to stitch?"  YOU BETCHA!!  So I immediately set aside my crochet project, cut a piece of sage green canvas (my favorite for doing floral pieces), pulled out a handful of pastel threads, and started working on a  new floral collage.  And TA DA -- here it is:

Oh, this SWEET PEA COLLAGE was such fun to stitch!  I loved stitching small blocks of different stitches with #5 pearl cottons, adding a few floral ribbons, tent stitching the sweet pea centerpiece in DMC floss, and finally filling in the variegated background with a simple four-way stitch, using a springy ThreadworX Overdyed Floss.  

Working with the variegated Watercolours 270 - "Easter Eggs" was perfect for this piece, since it has the soft pinks, purples, and greens that remind me of a patch of sweet peas.  And the particular challenge of this design was creating small flowers that looked like ruffly sweet peas, which are so different from most symmetrical-petaled flowers.  Here's an up-close look at a few of the stitch patterns I chose:

There are individual sweet pea flowers, bargello flowers, and even twisty sweet pea vines.  Neat, huh??

 So if you too are a fan of sweet peas, and would like to add this design to your stitchy garden, please run through the meadow and over the stream to my website to see more information about this new Spring pattern: SWEET PEA COLLAGE.

And HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY WEEKEND, everyone!  I hope you get a lot of stitching done!!