A New Flower in Brazilian Dimensional Embroidery

This is a sneak peek of my newest rose, Heirloom (truly a lavender rose).

I was playing around with a stitch I developed a while back called the Piggyback Cast-on. I first wrote about it in my book Take A Stitch, and have used it on several of my Millefiori Brazilian dimensional embroidery designs.

This is a variation. I'm making a rose for a Rose Garden design I plan to release next summer, and also to teach at our BDEIG Seminar 2012.  So I'm giving you a preview.

I used a different method to finish the piggyback cast-on stitches and I added more cast-on stitches plus a bead (I like beads!) at the center.
          This is a lavender rose called "Heirloom". I have one growing in my rose garden here at my home, but somehow this one is much prettier.

Do you like it? I was very happy with the way it turned out.  And because I was just stitching a sample to see if the stitches worked, I didn't add any greenery - with floss.

Instead, I pulled out my trusty fabric markers (you remember these - they were on one of my blog pages for most of this summer), and drew some rose leaves.

And since I'm in a flowery mood, here's a photo I took of the Marco Polo Rose (yellow) growing in my garden:

...and my embroidery supervisor, Cuthbert:

...and Cuthbert, looking cute:

Thanks for stopping by!

Rosalie