Woooohooooo! This is me, in a good mood. Why? Not because it’s Tax Day. No, no! It’s better than that!

(Well, that wouldn’t be too difficult, would it?)

Yesterday, I reached a Milestone in the preparation of my Stitch Sampler Alphabet e-book that will launch on the world in the not-too-distant future.

I printed it for proofing. That’s practically Monumental. It means I’m almost there.

Stitch Sampler Alphabet is a hefty little instructional and project e-book, printing at about 120 pages. Lots of detailed stitch instructions! Lots of fun stitch combinations! Lots of color! Lots of samples!

And lots of work!

While it was printing, I was damp stretching this:

The letter above was just an experiment.

I was playing around with variegated embroidery threads. I used the ribbed spider web stitch all the way down one side of the letter, with each little ribby thing (I guess you could call them flowers) being no more than 1/4″ in diameter, and some a bit smaller.

I worked all the foundation stitches in yellow down the side of the V, first. Then I took two pieces of variegated embroidery thread (in this case, coton a broder #25), a pink variegated thread and a purple variegated thread.

Starting at the top of the V with the purple variegated thread, I wrapped the first ribbed spider web. Then I started the pink thread and wrapped the next one (it’s the big pink one you can see at the top in the photo above).

I didn’t end the threads. I just kept working down the line, alternating colors sometimes, but not ending the thread until I was out of thread.

This provided me with a number of shades of the two colors – pink and purple – without having to change my threads out for each flower!

As I moved down the line and realized that some of the shades would be too close to each other, I would skip ahead a couple flowers, and then come back to the skipped one. This way, I would reach new shades on the variegated thread, for flowers situated right next to each other.

You can see my favorite effect with the variegated thread on that larger purple flower right in the middle of the photo above. I love it when the shades change noticeably on this type of stitch. You end up with a little more depth of color and interest, thanks to the slight shift in shades in the thread – and without having to work for it!

You can see the same effect going on in the sample photo above from the woven wheel stitch video.

Never underestimate the power (and convenience) of variegated threads, even when used on the simplest of stitches!

In the meantime, I’m plugging away on the Stitch Sampler Alphabet e-book, and I’ll let you know the release date soon. It’ll certainly be before the end of April.

If you want to see some samples of the letters from the Stitch Sampler Alphabet, you can find plenty of photos in the following articles:

D is for Doing

25 Stitches & Combinations, and a Goal

End of Summer, End of a Project

Buds on a Vine – a Stitch Fun Tutorial

Stitches and Colors and Letters, Oh My!