Best of Teresa Wentzler: Sampler Collection

Teresa Wentzler has been one of my favourite cross stitch designers almost from the moment I picked up a needle. She designs absolutely beautiful pieces, full of fabulous colour choices and careful details. She is known as the queen of the blended needle, a simple technique that gives great results.This book collects together nine of her sampler designs, ranging in complexity from fairly simple to expert. Some are nearly all full cross stitch, some include over one stitching, and many include a smattering of specialty stitches. But all can be conquered by stitchers willing to take their time and follow Teresa's meticulous directions. All the charts are computer generated black and white with some colour accents to highlight backstitching or specialty stitches. Each sampler is also showing in a full colour photograph.The included samplers are:- Birth Announcement- Camelot Sampler- Christmas Sampler- Heart Sampler- Harvest Sampler- English Cottage Sampler- English Garden Sampler- Fantasy Sampler- Wedding SamplerI highly recommend this book, especially to stitchers looking for a challenge.

This book contains the following sampler patterns:1.) Harvest Sampler2.) Camelot Sampler3.) Fantasy Sampler4.) English Cottage Sampler5.) English Garden Sampler6.) Birth Announcement7.) Christmas Sampler8.) Wedding Sampler9.) Heart SamplerThe thing I like about this book in particular is that the charts are two-colored (black-and-white with red details). This makes them much easier to read than some of Ms. Wentzler's other patterns. The designs are very intricate and will probably take some time to complete, but they will be worth the effort!This book is discontinued and has been for quite some time, so if you are set on stitching one of the patterns in it and would like it in a book form (individual patterns are still available for download and print-at-home through Ms. Wentzler's website), then you should probably buy this book sooner rather than later.

EDIT: ON JUNE 26--just 2 days after I posted the scans from the book--AMAZON REMOVED CUSTOMER-UPLOADED IMAGES. Sorry....(You can still see the projects if you click on the links below.)Teresa Wentzler is such a prolific designer that she has a number of Collections of works like this book. It's out of print and may be getting more expensive as time passes. These are the links to Amazon's offerings of the individual samplers (2 are not even offered at this time):Camelot Sampler (Item #2236)English Garden Sampler by Teresa Wentzler Counted Cross Stitch Kit With BeadsFantasy Sampler (Cross Stitch Chart) (Dreamscape, #97)Wedding Sampler - Just CrossStitch - Item # 2085The English Cottage Sampler (102)Christmas Sampler (Cross Stitch, 2216)Even though I own a lot of her patterns, I've never done one of her designs because they're so darn complicated; I swear--every time I see one of the color charts I call out in my head: PICK A COLOR! The most tedious thing when stitching is threading the needle: when there are over 400 DMC colors, I can think of no reason why SO many blended needles are necessary. I counted each color/combo of cross stitches in the English Garden Sampler and there are 97! And some of them combine 3 or 4 different color floss strands in 1 needle!! This sampler is 194 x 272 stitches. In addition to the standard cross stitches, you need to attach 6 different color Mill Hill seed beads. Oh, and 52 different combos of colors for outline stitches, satin, lazy daisy and eyelet, herringbone and scotch stitches. And don't get me started on the cutwork border....While these designs are beautiful to be sure...LIFE IS TOO SHORT!

ABSOLUTELY BEAUTIFUL WORKS! I BELIEVE THEY ARE FOR ANYONE FROM BEGINNER/INTERMEDIATE - ADVANCED TO ENJOY. CAN'T SAY ENOUGH ABOUT THE EXQUISITE DESIGNS IN THIS BOOKLET OF HERS! I KNOW I WILL BE WORKING ON AT LEAST 4 OF THEM THIS YEAR.

This book is a masterpiece but not for anyone who is not extremely skilled in cross stich and with all the time in the world to work on a project. There are no easy or quick works here but if you do take on one of these projects you will have a work of heirloom quility in the end.