Next step...framing!

OK...here's the next step in getting a design from my original scribbles to published leaflet. Before we move on...I realized that in my original post, I forgot to put a photo of my original sketches. Here is my notebook page of sketches for the new Boxer series.  Scary, right? Before I start graphing using my cross stitch software, I do a quick sketch in my notebook (or napkin or post-it or whatever is handy!).  Observe my desktop terrarium in the back of the photo. I bought this in Franklin, TN while we were at market and schlepped it home. It is so cute...full of tiny ferns and moss and who knows what...it makes me smile!

I'm working on these 3 Boxer kits as a group, so I stitched all of them in the past 10 days.  The colors are all compatible but not identical.  I had so much fun choosing a lovely palette for these...here is a photo of the threads I used and many I didn't end up using.  Aren't they a pretty sight?

Back to my topic for the day...the next step is to choose FINISHING!  If I want a pillow or something soft, I mail the model to my finisher Mona in Tulsa. It magically returns a few days later looking much better than when it left home. But I want to do frames on these Boxer models, so it's off to Heart's Desire (my local needlework shop extraordinaire) to select frames.  I have a lot of frame moulding samples in my office, but I prefer chatting with Debbie and the gals and looking at EVERYTHING before making up my mind.

Here are the models on my desk, ready to leave home! I just got a giant sack of beautiful hand-dyed buttons I ordered for one model - more buttons are coming from Hill Creek this week.  I give them the DMC color I want, and like magic (in about a week) the buttons appear perfectly dyed in whatever size and shape I request. Clipped behind each model is my working chart, printed from my cross stitch software. Here I keep notes about which threads and fabric I used, stitch count, etc...alot of the info that will appear later on the published chart. It's SO important to write this stuff down, because sometimes it's a long time between stitching a model and publishing it! Oh, how quickly we forget...

Next post...my field trip to the needlework shop!