Finished Cross Stitch Lace Heart Wedding Sampler

Whew, finally finished! I feel like the slowest stitcher on the planet these days. I used to be able to whip out a project like this in a week, but these days it takes me months. Less stitching time and carpel tunnel combined to make stitching a lot slower.

==> Click here to get a copy of the Jeanette Crews Designs Wedding Memories Leaflet, which includes Lace Heart and other designs that you can personalize with the included alphabets.

Notice the date on the sampler – April 3rd of 2010. Yes, I’m over a year late in finishing this gift! I had intended to finish it for the one year anniversary, but my stitching time in March was short and few so it’s running quite behind, and I still need to get a frame! I’m thinking a silver frame or a grey frame, I haven’t looked at matting yet so I’m not sure what to use there.

Here’s the project from early stages to finish….

This is from the Jeanette Crews Designs Wedding Memories Leaflet
, and the design is called Lace Heart. As you can see on the leaflet cover there I am not stitching this as charted, white is just so boring to stitch!

So, I grabbed the save the date card that came in the mail along with my fabric stash and I found the closest possible match to the color of purple that the bride used for the cards and invites and also for her bridesmaid dresses and wedding colors.

The closest match I came out with was Abracadabra from Silkweaver and it’s an opalescent fabric, so there’s pretty sparkles in there! I know they’re hard to see in the photos, but they really do look great in person! The floss colors used were DMC 210 and DMC 553 and the beads are Mill Hill Glass Seed Beads #02010.

and then finished….

Obviously, I did not stitch this design as charted. The original pattern called for white, pink, and Kreinik thread for some of the backstitching and white beads. I used the purple on purple to match the bridal colors and I used clear glass beads for the beaded accents.

The Kreinik threads were meant to backstitch two doves, one on each side of the heart, but after a closer look at them I really didn’t like them at all so I simply didn’t include them. They were very animated and cartoonish and I felt they took away the elegant feeling from the design.

I also used the couple’s initials instead of their first names, because it fit better and the bride actually goes by her middle name and not her first name, and it gave the design a bit more balance to have the three letters on each side of the small heart.

==> Click here to get a copy of the Jeanette Crews Designs Wedding Memories Leaflet, which includes Lace Heart and other designs that you can personalize with the included alphabets.

This leaflet has one other wedding sampler I might use as a gift for a wedding we’ll be attending in January – but in the meantime I need to take a break from wedding stitching and get on to some dragon cross stitching!

Thanks for checking out what I’m stitching this week 🙂 I’d love to hear what you’re working on and comments are always welcome here.