This is Ming. She is actually my sister's cat, but she lives in an apartment and can't have pets, so she is with us now. She was a rescue cat, and is the sweetest little thing! We just love her.

She loves to sleep in boxes, and this one just happened to have some flowers in that I had just bought and hadn't had a chance to plant yet. There was just enough room for her. Maybe we should call her Flower?

Wait! There's more. When you turn the Summer Biscornu over, this is what the back looks like. I reversed the hardanger area, cutting and weaving in the larger, diamond shaped areas formed by the klosters. So it really is a reverse of the other side.

I thought I would keep this side a little simpler to show off the Gingham fabric better. So I just stitched some blanket stitch flowers inside the klosters. Oops, I just noticed, I forgot to stitch a Dove's Eye!

I finally finished my Victoria Sampler Summer Biscornu! Wow, those over-one stitches seemed to take forever. Well, I didn't get finished in time to enter the contest, but now I have a great looking biscornu, and the contest was a lot of fun.

It doesn't show up very well in the photo, but I love the way the metallic braid looks in the klosters. The thread was from Needle Necessities, and the color was called Hydrangea, which is where I got the idea to do hydrangeas for my flowers.

My two "sister" cats!

I have four cats. A few days ago I went out on our patio and there were two of them, Brisa and Paisley, sitting side by side on a cushion. I had to take a picture of them because it is rare that they will be together like this. They are sisters, same parents but from two different litters. Brisa is petite and spunky, quite a litte character. Paisley, on the other hand, is larger (and slightly overweight) and very sweet and shy.


Of course, since I got a back view of them, I had to get one from the front too so you could see their faces. Aren't they just too cute?


I will have to post pictures of the other cats too, as soon as I get some good, current photos of them.

VS Biscornu Contest - back side of biscornu

Since a biscornu is 3-dimensional, it needs a reverse side. So for my reverse side, I decided to reverse the pattern so that the cut-out areas on the front are now the plain areas, and the cut-out areas on the back are where the hydrangeas are on the front. For this side, I used two different colors of perle cotton because I did not have enough of the metallic braid. And since the cut-out areas are larger, blanket stitch flowers fit perfectly. Funny how things work out!

This side is not finished yet either, but as soon as I get it all done, I will post a picture or two.

Victoria Sampler Biscornu Contest

Recently I was planning on entering the Victoria Sampler biscornu contest, but was unable to finish my entry in time. Even though I didn't finish, I am so happy with the way it is turning out that I thought I would post a picture of it, along with some of my thoughts.

The idea was to take a Victoria Sampler biscornu design and, using our own colors and stitching ideas, create a biscornu that maybe Thea could show on her website. While looking through my stash to see what colors I wanted to use, I came across a metallic braid from Needle Necessities that I decided to use for the klosters. Since the thread color name is "hydrangea" I decided that the flowers should be hydrangeas. The hydrangeas didn't work well with silk ribbons so I decided to do mine in over-one cross stitch and french knots. But the over-one cross stitch takes so long to do, and I didn't have much time to stitch, so that was the reason why it wasn't ready in time. The metallic threads really do not show up well in the picture, so just imagine a little extra sparkle. The colors are just perfect for what I wanted to do. I also love using the gingham linen from Graziano, so I used the blue/white gingham for my fabric. Very summery and yummy!

Hi! I am Cindy Brown. I am 61 years young (and feel like about 30), mother of two boys, flutist, and needlework artist. My favorite type of needlework is hardanger embroidery, but I also do cross stitch, and a little crochet. I design most of my own hardanger, and eventually plan on publishing my designs under the name of It's A Stitch! Designs.