Embroidery

I haven't done any sort of embroidery apart from blanket stitch around applique since I was about 10 years old, when we had to do simple embroidered stitches on a tray cloth in Sewing class.  Some of the other members of the group are using photos from their trips as their inspiration, but I just can't think of how to translate my photos into the stitches for this blanket, so I'm just letting the circles dictate to me.  I find hand stitching to be very soothing, so I'm enjoying this.

Here's the first one:

 And here's a gratuitous cute animal photo of the poodles reclining on my bed.  No, they don't sleep with me at night!