Blackwork progress

Some patterns have been filled in now. Isolated fern stitches in the top cone, long-tailed fly stitches in the lower cone, running stitches in the petals and down the stalk, straight stitches in the right stalk, pattern darning behind the flowers, a basketweave of straight stitches upper left, and crosstitch with some more angles stitched in for shading bottom left.

This is the only thing that has kept me sane this week. I find if I haven't been stitching for a while I find it harder to manage stress and frustration. So I consciously decided to work on my embroidery. Stitching is meditative and calms my busy head. Often I have so many ideas bouncing around it's hard to focus on one task-like reading textbooks.

Had an interesting debate about art for mental health vs. art for aesthetics this week during a critique. Wonder what other opinions are out there.