Master Needlepointer Program of ANG - Stage 2 - 6/26/23

June 26, 2023--I just received the results of my Stage 2 project for ANG's Master Needlepointer Program.  This one was a doozy and required lots of planning on my part.   I am pleased to have received 118 points out of the 120 available.   Here is the end result.....

Some of the requirements for this stage were:

• Shapes other than square or rectangular are required.
• Design must have at least 12 stitch areas, half of which are bounded by at least one curved edge.
• eight of the 12 supplied stitches must be used and must include at least one diaper pattern.
• Color scheme must be either complementary or split complementary.

For the shape, I chose to use Friendship Circles designed by Carol Algie Higginbotham which had to be enlarged to fit the required dimensions on Congress Cloth (commercial designs are allowed).   This appealed to me because of its symmetry.

Then I chose the split-complementary aqua blue colors from Joen Wolfrom's Color Tool.  This was after using my iPad to place various color schemes on the chosen design as drafted (again on my iPad).

The stitches used had to be compensated on all edges since there isn't a straight line anywhere on the project.   Again, I used my iPad to draft out some of the more complex stitches, especially for the Jessica and Waffle stitches used in the center.   In the example below, I was able to draw in the full design, then "erase" the areas not to be stitched.

The diaper pattern used in the center of the outer four circles was from Ann Strite-Kurz's Diaper Patterns book.   It may not be obvious, but the centers of the four outer circles all have the same pattern, but the four colors are used differently.  Again, I used my iPad to draw the various colors on my graph to see if I liked the outcome.  

A darning stitch was one of the requirements and I chose to place it along the outside edge.  Again, I graphed the "donut" darning pattern on my iPad to make sure I liked the scale and pattern.  Can you tell that the threads are all stitched in the same horizontal direction?

That's pretty much it.  A serious challenge for me and I may have been a bit over ambitious in my choice of stitches, but it all worked in the end.

Master Needlepointer Program of ANG - Stage 1 - 6/30/22

June 30, 2022--Last year I signed up to participate in ANG's Master Needlepointer Program (MNP) and mailed my completed project in time to be judged in May of this year.  I recently learned I passed by receiving 99 out of 100 points.  There was also a long critique which was most helpful. 

Here's my completed project.  One thing noticed by those reviewing my piece was the fact the thread used in the left "ray" seemed to have dye issues or was very old.  They are right--by the time I noticed it, I decided it wasn't worth redoing since I didn't have more of the color used.  I'll have to be aware of this issue when using older threads.

I do love the colors though--I chose mostly DMC floss in the blue-green color range; the variegated thread was from ThreadworX; and all were from my stash.

ANG Master Needlepointer Program Stage 1 Completed

I learned about this program from an article written in ANG's January 2021 issue of Needle Pointers Magazine where a description of the four stages was given.  Stage 1 involved the use of certain stitches on one of two designs supplied (I chose the "ray" design).  Below is a photo of the design basted and drawn on 24 count Congress Cloth.  

MNP Stage 1 Basted Design on 24 count Congress Cloth

I had to pencil in most of the ray's lines since they did not fall on the diagonal which made for some interesting stitch compensation issues