Flowers for Elizabeth embroidered sweet bag: 8 – stitching the large and small leaves

Now that I’ve stitched all the flowers, buds, and strawberries on the front panel of the ‘Flowers for Elizabeth’ sweet bag (from Issue 51 of Inspirations magazine), I’m ready to start stitching the large and small leaves. And there’s quite a lot of those in this design!

As with all the other elements, I had already outlined each shape with Split Stitch, using one strand of Au Ver a Soie silk thread.

So it was simply a case of working Long and Short Stitch shading over the whole of the large leaves, starting at the outer edges (and covering the Split Stitch as I went, to make sure I got a smooth outline).

I decided to do all the lighter green first on all the large leaves, and then do the darker centres in one go, too. That took quite a long time.

I also stitched the smaller light green leaves as I went over the design. These just needed Satin Stitch to be worked over the whole surface, angling the stitches in to the centre vein of each leaf, so they were quick to do.

The little pansy leaves were worked in the same way, in the lightest grey green.

The single honeysuckle leaf had one small area of the lighter green.

Then I went back to the large leaves, and filled in with the darker green (as in the far right hand large leaf). To complete each one, I stitched a line of Stem Stitch in brown down the centre vein (as on the left hand large leaf). This helped to disguise any scruffy Long and Short Stitch shading that didn’t quite cover the fabric properly!

So, here is my front panel, now that all the embroidery on the main area is completed. I’ve still got the border to do, and the sequins to attach to the background randomly. It’s turning out really lovely, and I’m very pleased with this.

After the border (which shouldn’t take long), I’ll be stitching the initial on the reverse of the bag, too.

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