Friday, May 9, 2014

In Honor of Miss Elizabeth Mary Garbutt

First, I can't thank you all enough for your well wishes.  It means a great deal to me.  Progress on the knee is slow but steady.  I have good news.  Yesterday I finished my copy of the antique sampler.  It was an honor to stitch this sampler once stitched by a little 10 year old girl in England. If you read my blog , you know that I did change colors. Her colors would have not looked at all good in my home and I am a color picky person!!( Sorry Elizabeth) I will explain the only other change we made. 

 Here are the two side by side. 

 On the right side, Elizabeth ran several motifs into each other.  I can't help but wonder why she did this.

 On the left side all was well.

 Here is another close up of the right side.  We ( if you remember, the DH charted this sampler for me on some long cold winter nights 2 years ago) had to decided whether or not to make this an exact copy, to this point we had tried to remain true to her design, mistakes and all.  We decided to separate them just a bit.

 While doing research we found the names of all the children whose initials appear here.  Only one child was born after she stitched this sampler in 1887.

 All Done!!!

 I read somewhere that to age a new house grow vines.  I love old houses so vines were planted.  Here is the Wisteria over the garage.

 Dew on a Hosta leaf.

 This will bloom more than once if you cut it back.  It is called Euphorbia Polychroma.

I hope spring has finally come to everyone!! Have a wonderful week-end! Thanks so much for joining me!

25 comments:

  1. Oh Barb, I think Elizabeth would be really pleased with your stitched tribute to her! The colors are lovely. Good work and kudos to you and your DH for charting it.

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  2. summer has come to us. we skipped spring this year! we have had 85 degree scorching sunny days with at least a week more of it. all i do is water! i am over summer already!

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  3. Wow, that sampler is amazing!!! You made Elizabeth happy to be sure. Glad to hear the healing is coming along. Keep on healing! Summer has yet to reach us. Cold, windy, nothing really blooming. But we are to get warmth this weekend only to go cold again Monday. We can't win!

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  4. Love the colors you chose and the sampler overall. Great job ....I would love to stitch it too!

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  5. Congrats on having completed your sampler. It sounds like you've been stitching up a storm during your recovery period.

    Hope you have a great weekend.

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  6. Your sampler is beautiful. I love the colours you chose.

    What will you do with the original now? Will you frame it side by side with your version?

    By the way, your DH is a keeper charting Elizabeth's sampler for you. It must be true love! :-) (My DH helps me with the math for fabric and choosing colours when I'm being indecisive, so he's not all bad. lol).

    I love old houses too. Our first home was a villa built in the 1920s.

    I'm glad your knee is on the mend.

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  7. The sampler is beautiful! I love the colors you chose.

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  8. Your sampler is fantastic Barb.The colours are beautiful,not too modern looking.
    The garden photos are pretty.I love Wisteria.

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  9. Your sampler is beautiful and how amazing that you were able to track the history for all the family members! Laura

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  10. I'm sure E;izabeth would have felt flattered and honored that you thought enough of her work to reproduce it for yourself Both pieces are treasures!

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  11. WOOHOO!!! Congrats on a GORGEOUS finish!
    It's really something to see the original and yours side by side. Beautiful! Sending you more well wishes.
    love Annette

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  12. Congratulations on your sampler finish! It's gorgeous!

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  13. It looks so good. Congratulations on finishing it. Will you have them both framed and hung together?

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  14. Amazing Barb!! I love this sampler so much. Big congrats to you. Sending you a speedy knee recovery!

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  15. Your sampler is beautiful ! I can't wait to see your next project :) Love the wisteria !

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  16. Barb!! The sampler came out so lovely. What a special journey this stitch was, don't you feel like it added so much more to your stitching and how you feel every time that you look at this sampler. The colors are lovely.
    So glad that you continue to heal!
    Hugs and well wishes!

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  17. What a good steward you are to keep Elizabeth's history alive. Lovely garden pics; can't wait for my lovelies to show through. Long cool spring making it hard for the plants to stretch out their leaves.

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  18. Congratulations on your sampler finish, it is beautiful.

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  19. Good to hear your knee is improving, Barb--don't rush things! And congratulations on that lovely sampler finish--a real team effort between you and your husband :)

    The wisteria is so beautiful. We used to have a huge trellis of it over out patio, but when we remodeled 18 years ago, we had to tear it out. I really miss it!

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  20. Your sampler is great! I'm happy to hear that you're recovering. Lovely flowers too.

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  21. You can really see the detail of the work in the brighter colors of you piece. Beautiful sampler!

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  22. That is just amazing and what tribute you have done to that piece!!!!

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  23. It's so beautiful with the colours you chose. And so wonderful to keep the memory of 10 year old Elizabeth.

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  24. Beautifully done! Pretty vine-age, too! :-)

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