This week I’ve started stitching the spool holder for the Carolyn Pearce ‘Home Sweet Home’ workbox (the design is from her book) – this is a beautiful little round box with wildflowers around the sides, and oranges stitched on the lid and base.
In her book, Carolyn suggests using a long-armed cross stitch for the oranges. When I tried that, mine came out very untidily, so I unpicked them and instead worked them in satin stitch, with a base layer of satin stitches laid in the opposite direction first, for padding, and a border of split stitch to define the outline (covered over with the final layer of satin stitches). The ‘ends’ of the oranges (is there a proper name for that bit?!) are little cross stitches worked in very dark brown, with one strand of Anchor thread.
This is the base of the spool holder:
The top of the spoolholder has more oranges and leaves than the base, and an eyelet stitched in the centre, for the leading thread from the spool to be fed through, when the holder is completed. The leaves are worked in Vandyke stitch, in a variegated thread.
I’m not sure that I pulled the thread tight enough when I was finishing the eyelet, so the hole isn’t very big, but I think it will work. The spool that I want to keep in this spoolholder is DMC number 12, and that quality of thread is very fine, so I think it will work.
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Janet Granger's Blog 
Love your work .. having spent so many hours working on this project , I completed it earlier this year , house and accessories !! what a marathon it was .. wish I could post some pictures. The end result is well worth the time and effort .. such a beautiful treasure to have and a great sense of achievement . Cheers, Rhonda.
I enjoyed seeing your new item. I had to do a raised cross stitch on the needle book for the anemones, and found it very untidy when I used the suggested two threads. I then used one thread and it worked, although it took longer than using two threads. I find the raised cross stitch fiddly to do. I see that three threads are suggested for the oranges. If I cannot do them with three strands, I will try using one and, if it is still untidy, I will do them in satin stitch like you.