We begin this house at the door. (I think I was afraid of the roof.) So first the bushes. Open buttonhole stitch the pots and then add 2 long straight stitches for a ribbon on the pots.

The bushes are closed fly stitches somewhat randomly on the green wool. This image shows the fly stitches I made, beginning at the base of the arrow and going to the point. When you are finished add some french knot berries. Check the pattern for # of wraps.

The door is 4 pieces of red licorice. backstitch around the door and 3 lines dividing the door vertically into stripes. Straight stitch slanted stitches to add to the licorice detail.

Add bullion knots to create the bow on the door and a bullion loop for the doorknob.

Backstitch around each shutter — the side away from the window and the top and bottom edges. Then make the hearts: two detached chain stitches with the bases sharing the same hole, then fill each chain stitch with a bullion knot.

Add colonial knots and detached chain stitches for leaf detail. Fill in the detached chain stitches with a short straight stitch.

For the windows, mark off a grid at 1/4 inch intervals near the edges of the wool. Then make long straight stitches, edge to edge. See how my lines are wonky to begin with?

Use gold sparkle to tack down each intersection (vertical stitch) taking care to straighten the grid as you go. In this photo I have tacked down the right half of the window. At the bottom I circled a few so you could easily spot them. Notice how even that right side is becoming.

Wrap each segment with gold sparkle to add sparkle. A segment is each short length of thread between the tack down stitches. Go down each line in both directions (yellow AND purple, but over the whole thing)

Backstitch around the outside with pearl cotton & wrap each stitch with gold sparkle.

Straight stitch to add stripes to the chimney (like fruit striped gum). 3 stitches next to one another, then two stitches at a distance the same as a single thread, then a gap the equivalent of the three stitches. And repeat. See photo.

Mark out the scallops. 3/4 inch wide, 1/2 inch tall (approx. make 4 rows fit).

Whipped Chain along the scallops. Add single wrap french knots along the white ‘frosting’ scallops.

Mark ¼ inch 5 spoke circles in each of the scallops.  Stitch the 5 spoke with either green or red as the design indicates. I stitched all of the green ones with the same thread. It doesn’t matter, the spoke stitch most likely won’t show.

Make frosting “ricrac” by stitching two adjacent rows of zigzag chain stitches.  The first pic is the first row of zigzag chain. The zig stitches are on the gingerbread house and the zag stitches are off.

The second row of stitches ON THIS SECTION are outside the first row:

Wrap each “segment” with 3 or 4 wraps (all 4 threads together)

On the eaves, the first zigzag is in the same place (half on, half off) but the second row is INSIDE the first. Note how I finished the top peak (two stitches side by side straight up):

Chain stitch side walls and bottom edges of house. Whip every other chain stitch (from the last step) of the walls with Light and Dark green.

Can you believe we’ve finished all 3 houses? Now let’s make the rest come to life!