AFRICANA….The Beginning
I attended a class taught by Lorene Salt on Tuesday and Wednesday. It was fun to be in a class again. The class was small, only 8 students. AFRICANA is a four day class that we squeezed into two days. All of the students are experienced stitchers so it worked out well. If you have ever attended a class you know that not a lot of stitching actually gets done but a lot of discussion and note taking is the rule.
The first challenge was a 57 hole Jessica….just let that sink in…. Instructions called for 3 1/2 yards of Vineyard Silk….unless you wanted to stop and start on the Jessica. If you have done Jessicas you know it’s best to have one continuous strand of thread. The enlarged chart included in the instructions was excellent. BUT I spent hours stitching and ripping 🤪 I just couldn’t get the rhythm and the count was a little crazy in order to create a circle. You will note in the photo below that mine still isn’t perfect and my thread was getting very thin at the end. There is stitching that goes in the circle and I think it will disguise the slight problem…..I really don’t want to rip the whole thing out. There is another one in the design so I hope to have better success with that one.
The second day I had better success with the areas we worked on. I actually did a stitch that I had never done before. It called a Chilly Hollow and was first designed by Jane Wood. It is the stitch in the brown and gold. Not a big stitch but a different stitch in that the stitching is on the top of the canvas wrapping around anchor stitches.
The long days of sitting and the hour and a half drive each way took a toll on my back. I rested most of Thursday. Yesterday I got back to the project. The photo below shows where I am as of tonite. The 5 Fleur-de-Lis Flowers took time. Once I got the count memorized it went faster. They are still not perfect but I think only I know where a stitch it two is off.
As you can see by the partial chart in the photo that the Lorene’s charts are excellent. This will be a challenging project so I plan to take it slow and be sure to read all the instructions and make sure I understand them for each area.
Here is the complete design
STITCHLADY'S ADVENTURES 
AFRICANA …beautiful and will be lots ❤ and enjoyment!Donna LSent via the Samsung Galaxy S9, an AT&T 5G Evolution capable smartphone
Sadly, I can’t claim to have invented the Chilly Hollow stitch. It’s a Jean Hilton creation. Looks like you are doing one quarter of a side in this piece. You can see the full Chilly Hollow stitch diagrammed by the late Carole Lake here–http://stitchplay.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/10/Berryville.pdf
Opps…I thought the stitch came from you…I must have misunderstood class info. Thanks for the reply. I will check out the full stitch.
It’s a wonderful stitch. I’ve seen it done as a triangle, oval, and square, and with centers full of beads, a shisha mirror or bullions made from ThreadworX’s overdyed metallics. All are lovely. Have fun playing with it.
Beautiful