Beaded Daffodil Embroidery

A while ago, back in April, you  may remember I posted about the daffodil bead embroidery that I attempted.  I think I left the story around about the point where I'd beaded the outline of the daffodil:

Well, I finished it a few days later, but only now have I got around to posting about it!  Here's the completed daffodil before I trimmed and edged it:

 

And here's the almost-finished piece:

As this was very much a learning piece, I'm really pleased with the result, although there are a few things I would change if I did it again.

At first, I really wasn't sure about using the tracing paper template as the backing to the embroidery - convinced it would be visible through the beads and would add a "crinkle" effect to the finished piece.  But it isn't visible, and  you can't really tell it's there, so it works pretty well.  I'd still like to research other "cleaner"

options for transferring patterns and outlines to the backing felt, though.

Adding the beaded edging means that you tend to lose a bit of the definition of the shapes - eg the petals aren't quite as "pointed" anymore.  I've tried to overcome this slightly by edging them in a paler yellow colour, so that you still get the definition from the darker yellow beads, but it's something to bear in mind in the future.

That said, I'm not sure about using translucent beads for the edging - the fact that they're slightly translucent kind of detracts from the whole point of the bead edging technique - ie to hide the edges of the backing felt.  Not a big deal (except see below), but another thing to bear in mind for the future.

The one thing I'm really not happy with is the stem of the daffodil - I learnt that green felt tip pen hides a multitude of sins!  I've actually coloured in the (white) backing felt either side of the single bead stem, between the translucent edging beads, because it was so visible.  With hindsight, a single line of beads isn't very robust, and there's only so much that your edging beads can do.  If I did this again, I'd probably avoid embroidering the stem, and separately weave-stitch a stem instead (ie without the backing felt).

So here's the finished piece, finally completed with a brooch fixing:

A nice spring-like brooch to wear, and a little reminder of Wales to-boot!  More bead embroidery will definitely follow!