12 Days of Christmas in Beads

I decided to put the yarn down for a while and pick back up a project I have been working on for years.  I think I started these 3 or 4 years ago.  I love working with the Mill Hill Beads.  They are a small glass bead that comes in all sorts of beautiful colors.  You can stitch with them just as you would yarn. 

This project is a set of 12 ornaments.  Each one is based on the 12 Days of Christmas.  Once they are stitched they are cut out and then gold thread is overcast  around the edges.  They are stitched on 14 mesh plastic canvas.  They are very tiny holes.  The beads are stitched on using a continental stitch.  You come up one hole, string the bead on and go back down the hole diagonal and above it. 

A Partridge in a Pear Tree



Two Turtle Doves

Three French Hens



Four Calling Birds



Five Golden Rings



Six Geese a Laying



Seven Swans a Swimming



Here are all the ones I have done so far.  I still need to cut out the last four

and stitch around the edges.  I have started the 8 maids a milking.  I am excited

about this one because it uses the most colors.  Some of these only used 4 or 5

colors which got a little boring.  It is fun to begin stitching and see the

picture unfold as you work up the ornament.  They are stitched in a row starting at the bottom.

They actually work up pretty quickly because you don't have to change thread whenever

you change colors.  You stitch one row at a time and the color changes are done by the

different color beads.   I am hoping to actually finish these this year.  The only thing with this project is it is not portable like yarn.  Beads are hard to do just anywhere.