I’ve stitched a little gold star with Madeira Metallic on the top of my Rhodes stitch Christmas tree…….

…… it’s very subtle and may need a bit of tweaking.

Then on to the glueing round the edge, with neat PVA this time. I left it overnight to make sure it was completely dry, and then for the scary bit of cutting it out. The white cut threads of the canvas show up too much…….

……. so I used a damp Inktense pencil in a dark green around the edges, both front and back, a yellow around the star, and left it to dry again. Then I put another layer of PVA, just to make sure.

I cut a slightly smaller triangle of mount board to go in the middle, and found some green felt to stitch on the back. I had stitched another piece of felt to make a pocket for a pencil on the inside, to use as a trunk for it to stand up. I found a wooden reel for a tub, a reel of red, and couldn’t decide which to use. Then I found a dark green Sylco on a wooden reel to stitch the pocket and the front to the back. I realised when I’d stitched across the bottom, up one side and about an inch up the other side, that although it would stand up I’d not put the mount board in the middle! I thought it would be worth undoing that little bit, and managed to wriggle it in.

Now the stitching’s finished.

The pencil’s in place, and I decided that the green reel looked better than the empty wooden reel or the red one. I can easily take the pencil out and use the thread, if I need to use such a dark green for anything else. I think Lorna is right, and the star needs to be more obvious, but I’d not got anything suitable with me.

So it’s not really quite finished…… yet!!!