Stitch along Monday – Rhodes and scotch stitches

I’m making it under the wire! It is still Monday and here’s the next installment of Harlequin Dance Redux.

Days when I’m so busy with regular house stuff like laundry and grocery store, it’s really a relief to sit at the end of the day and stitch a little. Even a little goes a long way to putting a cap to a hectic day, with a little relaxation and some pretty threads.

Click here for Harlequin Dance Redux Area D instructions

Originally the design had two different sizes of Rhodes stitches in this area, but I’ve redone it a bit because I wanted to use a particular thread. So I decided to surround the area with scotch stitches, then put one Rhodes square in the center.

I wanted scotch stitches because they’re relatively flat and quick. I chose to do regular scotch stitches and not reverse scotch stitches, because I was using my overdyed bamboo floss and I wanted more emphasis on the big Rhodes square.

Here’s where I started today, right under the reverse waffle stitch.

The scotch stitches went really quickly. I used 3 strands of the Rainbow Gallery Mandarin Floss M927 – can I just say again how much I love stitching with Mandarin Floss? It covers well and lays beautifully. Here’s a close up of the scotch stitches:

By the way, I started with a pin stitch in the shape of a “T” under the first block of scotch stitches. I wanted these stitches to be very flat, and a “T” stitch seemed to be a good choice.

Now to what I really wanted to stitch with today – Flair! Oh, I can hear the groans from here. I love Flair. I especially love it in a Rhodes stitch, because the edges kind of melt together and look like a solid block of color.

Then I decided it looked a little plain, so I outlined all of the scotch stitches with fine metallic braid in Fuchsia.

So that finishes this area, and my stitching for the day. Off to bed and sweet dreams!

Finally I outlined the scotch stitches with the fine metallic braid.

So far I’m pretty happy with how my rework is turning out. I’ll give some thought to the next area before next week, and hopefully will be able to stitch before the very last minute!