Take a Stitch Tuesday - Fly Stitch - Week 1

For Take a Stitch Tuesday, there is a different embroidery stitch to learn each week. This week's stitch is the fly stitch. I had never heard of it until now.

According to Stitch-opedia, the "fly stitch is an isolated stitch that can be arranged in a number of ways to give different overall patterns."

I decided to keep a book that includes several different components:
- the tactile stitch with its name;
- a short journal hand-written journal entry; and
- a list of a few things for which I'm grateful.

In the weeks ahead, I'll also add any natural element that I find during the course of a week (e.g., feather, pressed flower or leaf). I didn't find anything this week because I spent most of the time indoors (not to mention that there is snow covering the ground now...a change from just a week ago).

Rather than going out and purchasing supplies, I use what I had on hand: a lined composition  book, scrapbooking paper, linen fabric, and cotton embroidery floss.

For the first week, my journal entry focuses on the fact that my father died on Thursday, January 5, 2012....just a day shy of his 80th birthday. It's not the cheerful journal entry that perhaps some other weeks during the upcoming year will hold...but it is a reality of what happened this week.

I tried a few different variations of the fly stitch in different shades of blue and green. Blue was Dad's favorite color...and both blue and green remind me of the outdoors which he loved.

The last part of this week's page included five items for which I am grateful. I think it will be particularly important this year to keep these things in mind...and remind myself what is truly important.