Ann Medd Finish - Five Years in the Making (Lots of Pics)

WOO HOO!  There is some happy dancing going on around here!!  Ann Medd is finally finished - after five years!  I started her on January 1, 2006 and finished her March 30, 2011.  Better late than never, right?  I would have posted this yesterday, but I was down for the count with a cold/flu/general feeling of crappiness, so here she is!  This qualifies for Finish #2 in the Crazy January Challenge!  Hopefully, I never pick anything this big ever again!  Yeah, like that's going to happen!!  I love me those BAPs!!  I've been eyeballing Dutch Beauty!    Anyway, here she is in all her glory.  Sorry that some of the pictures are not the best, but the light just isn't cooperating and she hasn't been ironed:

Ann Medd

The Scarlett Letter

35 count Elegant Bean and DMC Threads

My daughter (who wished not to have her picture shown due to hair issues, etc. - you know those teens) is about 5'4", so this shows you the size of dear Ann.  Ann Medd has been described as the "Mother of all Samplers" and I would think that description aptly applies.  She's a big one!!  What amazes me is that Ann Medd was 10 years old when this sampler was finished.  If she finished it when she was 10 years old, when exactly did she start it? I'm sure that she wasn't a slacker like I was in stitching this, but I wonder when she did start it.   The whole sampler consists of basically four samplers - each different in their own ways.

Anyway, here are more pictures - I'll let them do most of the talking:

In this first portion there was eyelet stitch, over one, four sided back and a couple other stitches.  I took some creative license and put in the initials of my family in place of Ann's.

In the second section, we have my two favorite people - Adam and Eve:

The next section is described as whimsical with stylized flower-trees and a very fashionably attired couple with their pet, dog, squirrel and deer.

And the last section is considered non-traditional and curious.  A fisherman engaged in hooking a large fish (looks like a salmon to me) while a shepherdess/mermaid tends a flock of sheep.

I liked the notation that Ann made about her teacher, Ann Smith, at the bottom.

All the verses were done in back stitch starting with the letter A and working down through Z.  Although Ann added a little surprise and decided to add in an extra Y.  You probably heard a loud groan in your part of the world when I thought I was going to be stitching the Z and ended up stitching another "Y".

There were a few changes I made to the sampler.  I guess you would call them cheating.  There was a lot of tent stitching done on the faces and a few other places - like the animals.  Most of that I did as charted, but when it came to the last portion, I ended up doing them in regular cross stitch just because I liked the look better.  The gold satin stitch border I also cheated on.  Laying two threads in a satin stitch is hard when on scroll rods, so I substituted a pearl cotton for those stitches and it worked out well.

So there you have her - five years in the making and a labor of love - I think.  Actually, this was a very easy sampler to work on - just very time consuming.

Now, I have no idea what I want to work on now.  Isn't that the way?  We get so caught up in working on something that when it's over - like a really good book - we don't know what direction to go.  So I think that I'm going to take my sniffly self into the craft room and see what else I can come up with.  Just something a little smaller - at least for now!!!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope that you have a great weekend!