Phalaenopsis Orchid

First up, I went to Springwater today and bought some fiber. There's a 3 oz ball of merino that I'll be using for the drafting and plying class. There's a 15 oz ball of painted merino. They are so soft.

Okay, but really, this post is about:


Amber's mom, Anne, was in a really horrible accident at the beginning of January. She is very lucky to be alive and have as few injuries as she did. When I heard, I thought, "She needs flowers!" Then I realized that I don't really give people real flowers so I thought to bead something. When I asked, Amber said her mom likes white orchids. Well, I've been wanting to make a more life like phalaenopsis orchid and well, they don't tend to live at my house. So I've been working on prototype orchids and last week, I found a shape that I really enjoyed. I began working on this plant this past Saturday and assembled the stem and planted Thursday night. The pictures have all been hidden until I was able to give Anne the orchid.

To say that I've been giddy since Thursday night is an understatement. I'll have flowering orchids year round! I am very very happy with this. I've taken many notes on how this was made and I plan on writing up the pattern. I just wanted to get this made, see the final project and present it so that she has something pretty to look at everyday while recovering.

I was able to stop by and visit with her today and she was up an knitting an intarsia sweater. Recovering, but still hurting. She also really loved the plant. At one point, the afternoon sun shone through the window right onto the orchid and Amber was able to get some pictures. These will be in her flickr account.

Technical Details:
All beads in this orchid are from Toho. The petals are white with yellow. But! To really have completed this, the two larger white petals are made with opaque white beads (Toho 41). The 3 back petals are made with frosted white/clear beads (Toho 1F). This subtle difference in beads added depth to each flower. Along these lines, I also used two shades of yellow, even though there really isn't a lot of yellow. I used Toho 175 and 175F. The leaves are made with Toho 1046. There are 8 flowers, 3 on one stem, 5 on the other. There are also buds of different sizes, and 4 leaves.

This last picture, I took Thursday night. I was trying to find a place in the house to pose the orchid for my "portfolio" shot but couldn't think of one. Instead, I found the table with the orchid. Where the beaded one sits usually sits 2 pots of African Violets.