Little samplers

Camera is temporarily back in service, thanks to a paperclip!

I've been picking some of the stitches from the (very good) Stitch Dictionary book by Lucinda Ganderton that I bought recently for a bargain £3.99 from the Book People and trying them out on small areas.



It's made me realise that even some easy stitches are very irritating to do so I'll make a note as a reminder about which I should avoid on larger projects...



First sampler, from the bottom left:
Beige - "Double brick" - easy and I like the finished effect
Purply - "Tent" - boring to use all one colour even on a small area like this (about 1 inch x 1.25 inches), but a good tough finish. In future would add another colour or shade in any block.
Blue and coral - "Hungarian" - easy and I like it.
Dark Green - "Byzantine" - described as easy but I found it quite irritating and difficult as I kept miscounting or struggling to find the right hole. Will probably avoid this one.
Pink and aqua - "Long and short brick" - easy but the long stitches are quite long and might catch if used on something like a specs case that would be in among keys etc in a bag.
Pale green - "Reversed sloping gobelin" - I really like this - gives a bit of extra interest to a plain area.
Maroon - "Double twill" - OK, think the texture would show up better in a pale colour. Bit fiddly to fill in the edges where there isn't room for a full stitch.
Purple and lilac - "Chequer" - I quite like this for small areas but wouldn't contemplate it for anything big.
Yellow - "Upright cross" - I hated doing this, and it doesn't look like a cross. It was a very squashed stitch to do.
Greyey colour - 2 rows of tent stitch - if this becomes a specs case, I figured it would give a tough edge.



Second sampler from top left:
Yellow - "Brick filling" - OK to do, looks quite nice but best suited to small areas I think.
Grey - "Basket filling" - It was a bit of a fiddle to do, with some of the ends of stitches being underneath the adjoining ones that run in the opposite direction - not one I'd make much use of I think.
Blue and light green - "Straight Milanese" - easy, and looks quite jolly. One to use again.
Beige/Maroon/Coral - "Diamond" flanked by "Single twill" - easy and probably useful for borders.
Purply - "Parisian" - I really like the effect of this - probably my favourite "discovery" of this exercise so far. The long stitches are fairly long but don't look too vulnerable to catching on things. Would be good for filling quite big areas - indeed the book describes it as being for textured fillings and large background areas.
Green - "Scottish" (with diagonal stitches still to be filled in). The squares to fill in look very small, so I think this will be quite fiddly!

Now what shall I pick next for this sampler? I wondered about the one called knitting that looks quite easy - but knowing my lack of knitting prowess I think I'd be bound to make a mess of it!