Mae - (m)orning cd cover cross stitch (picture chunky)

[cchellez]

I confess, I'm literally in love with a band named Mae.

For those of you that don't know much about them, they are a band from the Norfolk, VA area that takes part in a lot of community projects, helping those in need. Earlier this year they raised money by offering their songs to download online for a donation each month to help build a house with Habitat for Humanity for a family in Newport News, VA. Now they've moved on to raising money for Donorschoose.org in an attempt to help one school in each state of the US.

After a concert in Richmond last month, I talked to Dave Elkins, the lead singer about a project I wanted to do in recreating the three CD covers that are being released this year: (m)orning, (a)fternoon & (e)vening. My plan was to cross stitch all three of the covers and have them framed, then once the band signed the matting, an auction would be created for Mae fans to bid on the completed piece... with all proceeds donated to Donors Choose. He liked the idea so I started my stitching journey on September 28th, 2009.

Here are my results:








In total, it took me 15 (non-consecutive) days of work. I haven't ever completed a full cross stitch project prior to this though I've started many before. I made the pattern based on a tutorial online in photoshop; simply scanning the cover and getting it nice and pixelated. I only used 10 colors in the whole project, and only cross stitched then couched the lettering and tree on top.

I'm still debating on stitching a border around the cover before I have it framed. Opinions? 

Check out my project progress pics @ my flickr.

Thanks for looking! 

[craftydebs]

Great work for a wonderful cause!  I like the band too, sounds nice.  Thanks so much for sharing!  This ROCKS for so many reasons!

[mellyp]

beautiful job! i love when music and crafting meet, and your idea to continue this for the other two albums is awesome. can't wait to see the rest of the project!

[kittykill]

Wow! Awesome work!

[lisalady161]

Holy cats!  You've never finished a cross stitch before and then produced this?? WOW!  That's so beautiful.

I would put a matte around it and ask the band to sign the matte, then frame it! It will increase the value of the piece for auction.

Good for you, that's an awesome piece!

[nodakbex]

That's really gorgeous!

[cchellez]

Thanks for the compliments

I'm taking it up to Michael's tonight for a framing quote, hopefully they don't try and take my paycheck for it!

I decided against adding a border around the design, I think it looks better as is.

[musicaddict05]

Great work. And for such an awesome cause. Good job!

[SanDorfALot]

Gorgeous! Nice stitching!