Thread Painted Royal Blue Bird: Lots of Progress!

I have made some needed fixes and quite a bit of progress on Royal Blue, the thread painted blue bird designed by Trish Burr for Inspirations. I corrected the direction of the feathers under the head (and found some better lighting for taking photos). I hope it's obvious that before is on the left and after is on the right!

Blame the Cat

The shadows and leaf veins are in on Royal Blue's branch and it's looking better. I'm almost to the part where I get to stitch with bright pretty blues!

Royal Blue Burr-dy Time

I need some mindless, relaxing embroidery and I have a burr-ning desire to stitch a Trish Burr-d. (Sorry, I couldn't resist!)

A Fan-tastic Old Kit

I learned to embroider by working commercial kits. I have a few favourites and I recently saw one of them come up for sale on ebay.

The Chocolate Trellis

There are three main elements left to stitch on Melbury Hill's Galanthus Collector: two 'caps' (sepals?) on the flower tops and the bulb at the bottom. They will all involve trellises. I don't have a lot of experience stitching freehand trellises. I prefer having helper marks along the sides of a trellised area so there's no guesswork. However, the three elements will all be filled, so there's no place for helper marks. It'll be good experience to work the trellises freehand.