Wild Olive Stitching and How I Need More Practice

Here is another Wild Olive pattern I did. My embroidery never looks smooth, the cloth always looks pulled too tight around the stitches. Maybe my cloth isn't tight enough in the hoop? I have one of those spring hoops I use, but it doesn't keep the fabric stretched tight at all. I think I may graduate to a plastic hoop rather than the spring one.

I don't know if you can tell in the picture, but on the little "shiny" spot, I used silky silver thread so it looked like it was shiny.