This is where I learn to embroider

I have been doing cross stitch for many years and have decided to jump into embroidering. The first thing I am going to tackle is lettering as that will be a nice stepping stone to incorporate into cross stitch.  Then if all goes well I can transition into some more complicated or fancy embroidering.



First things first is to get the equipment.  I already have the needles, thread, hoop and fabric, but I need a design.  The quickest and simplest methods seem to be the ones that use tracing paper which allows you use any design you want*.  I traced letters (I have zero drawing ability) with a sharpie and then put a scrap piece of white cotton over it and traced once again the pencil outlines.
This was the result:

I was rather proud of it for a first attempt. The letters aren't quite straight but that I will blame on different size letters.  I thought I was on a roll, and decided to try something new.  I used the satin stitch to make an leaf:




Still not too bad, all things considered for a first attempt **.  I wanted to try bigger and better things:



A classic example of you should quit while you are ahead. I'll be doing some practicing.



Husband's Notes:
*The more complicated methods involve bananas, shouting, and tubas.
** If my wife has a fault other than Being British, it's that she's overly critical of herself. She could dive out a 2nd floor window, save a baby falling from a helicopter, bake a delicious cake for thirty people, and be upset that she couldn't whip up a proper butter cream frosting*** while she was at it.
***Butter cream frosting is the finest of all the frostings.