Now that the pea pod on the needlebook that I’m making from Carolyn Pearce’s book ‘Home Sweet Home: an embroidered workbox’ is complete, I have moved on to stitching the pea flower.
I stitched this in long and short stitch, in three pale shades of Anchor standed cotton, with dark pink highlights. The subtle shading doesn’t really show up in the pictures, unfortunately, but it’s very pretty.
The sepals behind the flower itself are stitched in two shades of green.
The pea leaf is stitched in two shades of variegated green silk from Gloriana – the outer edge having first been defined in split back stitch in one strand of Anchor cotton, and then the pale shade worked first, with the darker inner shade worked next, leaving a tiny gap along the central vein line of the leaf, for stem stitch in pale tan to be worked. Straight stitches, also in pale tan, define the diagonal leaf veins. Finally, gold highlights using one strand of Kreinik Very Fine Braid alongside of the pale tan stitches are worked.
The instructions for working the snail seemed OK in Carolyn’s book, until I saw the scale at which they were to be done….absolutely tiny! This snail shell is only about 5/8 of an inch across. So, I simplified it a bit, and decided to stitch the snail shell in buttonhole stitch over the felt padding, rather than the much more complicated ladder stitch that Carolyn recommends.
Several rounds of decreasing size made a very successful snail shell, if I do say so myself! A single row of stem stitch in Kreinik braid along the underside of the shell completed this section.
To finish off my snail, I worked the body in raised stem stitch band, and then made two straight stitches for his eye stalks, with tiny size 15 bronze colour beads for the eyes. In real life, I loathe snails, but I actually quite like this one!
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Janet Granger's Blog 
Your work is lovely. I have chosen the fabrics to start mine with a lovely wee stripe for the inside and a linen for the outer. What is the fabric you are using for the house, it has a lovely even weave.
The fabric is a cotton/linen weave, that I bought as a remnant a few years ago, so I don’t know exactly what it is, sorry! But it is lovely to stitch on.
Love your work and I love the colors too.
Very nice. I started the needle book a long time ago, but got stuck before the snail shell. The padding is done. After embroidering a picture for someone else and finishing the French pouch like yours, I am ready to restart the needle book. I have finished the back. I might use buttonhole stitch for the shell, like you. I have read your last two posts with great interest.
Beautiful work here! Thanks for showing your progress here. Loving that little snail there!