Archive for the Category ◊ WIP Progress ◊

*gasp* A WIPocalypse update from me.. and IHSW stitching…

Author: Measi

• Wednesday, April 24th, 2013

So while I haven’t had a lot of time to stitch since Max arrived, I have done a little bit here and there. My life since the beginning of February is a bit of a blur at this point, so it’s likely that it’ll appear I’ve finished a lot more recently than actually has been done (or maybe I’ve done more than I’m aware of in my babified sleepless state).

Hopefully I won’t get a case of frogs with what I’ve stitched!

Blue Jeans and Daisies from Blue Ribbon Designs has been going well. All three parts of this pattern have now been released. What I’ve stitched is the full height of the piece, and most of part one that didn’t carry over into part two width-wise. Since this piece has a combination of framed and unframed motifs, I’m kind of just stitching wherever I feel like going. I loved stitching the tree. It’s a very striking square on the piece so far. I’m really looking forward to placing the large central motif on sometime over the summer.

For now, though I’m taking a brief break from Blue Jeans, since it’s all I’ve really stitched on in 2013. I had a piece kitted over the summer that I’d been itching to start and just didn’t get around to once pregnancy took over my life. And since this past month on the WIPocalypse was the Mirabilia month…

I finally started Shakespeare’s Fairies. This is what I focused on this past weekend for International Hermit and Stitch Weekend – mostly stitched during the Boston Bruins hockey games. So far I’ve only been working on the central lantern carried in the piece, but it absolutely glows on this fabric, which is what I was hoping for. I can’t wait to see how the rest of the piece develops on the dark fabric – ever since I saw the original pattern, I knew I wanted to do it on dark fabric, allowing these bright lanterns to just glow in the dark.

I’m stitching Shakespeare’s Fairies on the remaining fabric from the full yard I had to purchase for my Chatelaine (Deep Blue Sea) piece. For months, I’ve been ID’ing the color as Phantom from Picture This Plus… but this cut still had the label on it… it’s actually Gothic from PTP – which explains why my fabric doesn’t have quite as much purple in it as Phantom does! It’s 28 count, which will play nicely with the beading at the end (this is a Mira, after all… there will be bling!) I’m going to continue playing with this for the next couple of weeks and see how things go.

And the most recent photo of My Biggest WIP:

Max is now 6 weeks old, fast approaching 11 pounds, and already outgrowing his newborn sized clothes. The little outfit he’s wearing today was what Erich and I bought from the gift shop in the hospital. Max isn’t the best at breastfeeding and has been rather chompy since the beginning. When we saw this little jumper, we had to get it. The text on it reads “Hungry for a little attention… chomp chomp, snap snap” (and is decked out with an alligator). We had a lovely day of 70 degrees in the afternoon, so it was just warm enough that I could comfortably keep him in short legged clothes (which is good… because I’m overdue to do some baby laundry!).

It’s amazing how he’s literally a completely different baby day to day. He even looks different. He’s getting stronger – he’s able to lift his head now on his own, although only for a short while (so the Boppy pillow comes in handy for pictures like this one). He isn’t very fond of naps during the day – by the time Erich gets home, I’m generally pretty wiped out because I’m on constant baby focus from the time Erich wakes me up (usually between 4 and 5 am) until he gets home from work (around 6 pm). At night Max will sleep in his swing, but during the day, he’ll only take little five minute cat-naps on top of me while nursing. It’s exhausting, and I’m going a bit crazy by the constant sitting (I’ve tried walks outside… it’s not a pretty scene), but I’m trying to deal as best I can. I know it won’t last that long. He’s a good-natured baby who just really, really wants to be cuddled right now, and I will oblige!

Thanks for stopping by!

Category: Baby, Big Life Events, Misc. Musings, SALs/Challenges, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: blue jeans and daisies, blue ribbon designs, ihsw, max, mirabilia, shakespeare's fairies, wipocalypse | 9 Comments

Stitching progress, pregnancy progress…

Author: Measi

• Saturday, February 23rd, 2013

I’ve had “get a blog post together…” in my head for two weeks now, but got slammed with a nasty cold/bronchitis/plague thing on Superbowl Sunday that has only finally started to release its grip on me in the last couple of days. So I have a LOT of catching up to do, don’t I?

Pregnancy news
All continues to go well. As of Monday, I hit the “one month until due date” mark. My mom and I are both figuring I’ll likely go a little early, and for some reason we’re both in agreement that I’ll deliver sometime around March 8-13th, around my grandparents’ birthdates. We’ll see if that holds true, or not. That would put me safely in the 38 week range.

I’ve had two ultrasounds since early January to verify my due date and check on Max’s progress. Since I’m one of those mamas who flunked the glucose tolerance test AND I’m measuring quite big on the fundal height scale, I’ve been testing my blood sugar 4 times per day since New Year’s Eve, and the ultrasounds were to measure Max’s size and the amount of fluid I have. Thankfully all’s fine. My blood sugar is doing just fine – I’ll go a little high after some meals (we’re talking 130s, maybe 140s), but it always comes back down, and my fasting levels in the morning are nice and steady in the upper 80s/low 90s. The gallstones have been kept under pretty good control, although I have had a couple flare ups – mostly due to eating too big of meals for the amount of space I have available for food in my stomach these days.

I’m just measuring big on my fundal height (which is a low-tech measurement done with a tape measure over your stomach from the top of your uterus to the bottom… almost at the top of the genitals), and really… I pointed out to my OB that I didn’t start this pregnancy as a small woman. A lot of that fundal height measurement has to be due to my obesity to begin with, right? It’s the elephant in the room, but there you go – fat chick is going to measure fat when she’s pregnant. I’m still down nearly 20 pounds from my pre-pregnancy weight, believe it or not – and my current weight includes whatever is in my uterus right now between Max, placenta, and fluid. Apparently pregnancy is my Weight Watchers.

I am having the typical end-of-pregnancy annoyances, and the cold/cough I’ve had this month haven’t helped. One day I’ll feel pretty good, and the next day I’m sore as hell and can barely walk. I tire easily like I did at the beginning of this adventure. I’m trying not to be whiny and cranky and just try to take it easy as best I can. Hard to do while working full-time with my commute from hell, but I’m managing. That’s all I can do.

I will say – Erich’s been amazingly awesome about everything. He’s picking up some extra chores around the house and trying to get me to sit still and be quiet in the evenings and over weekends. If anything, he’s perhaps a little over-protective of me. Right now, I’m loving it. I really am. Although I still have to protest because I feel a little helpless, and that just makes me grumbly. I know it won’t last for long, though – so I should take advantage of it while I can!

Baby Incoming Prep

Erich’s been working on prepping the nursery over the past few weekends. He also was nailed with this cold/cough, and was sidetracked one weekend when our power went out during the massive “Nemo” storm that came through… but he’s getting there. The wallpaper in what used to be my office has been extremely cranky to remove, even with a steamer, and there’s a lot of wall repair to be done due to what I’ve called “load bearing wallpaper” on one wall where the plaster fell off as the paper was removed. He’s hoping to get the walls completely stripped this weekend so he can do the wall repair over the course of the next week. Then it’s just painting.

We had planned to purchase one of the 4-in-1 convertible cribs from Babies R Us and then just use my desk as a changing table/storage hutch… but plans have changed (thankfully before we ordered the crib). We’re getting the nursery furniture via my mom for a great deal. She sells new homes, and the model she’s working out of is about to be sold. Since the buyer doesn’t want the furniture, it has been put up for bids first to employees, and then I guess whatever’s left over will be sold off in some fashion or re-used in other models (maybe?). This particular model was set up with a nursery, so we’re getting the entire room for a great deal. The furniture is all black and comes with a sleigh crib with an understorage drawer, a changing table with a hutch, and a bookcase. It looks like the instructions for the crib are in the drawer from one of the photos Mom sent me – so hopefully I can track down whether it converts into a post-crib bed or not (like so many of them do these days). The furniture will come with all of the bedding and such. It’s adorable bedding but entirely girl (think pink and white 1950′s poodle skirts… seriously, it’s adorable… but girly to the extreme). I’ll store that away for now. It’s never been used, and maybe will make a great gift or hand-me-down to a friend who has a baby girl later. (or who knows… maybe Max will be into pink poodles…). We’re going with the monkey/jungle theme for the nursery – soft greens, yellows, and browns.

Other than the nursery, all of the basics are pretty much together or will be shortly. Last weekend we picked up most of the basics we need to start off. Diapers in both disposable and cloth varieties are ready and waiting. This afternoon I’m going to get the replacement parts for the breast pump, since I do plan on breastfeeding and pumping (partially for when I go back to work, but also so Erich can share with feeding times), covers for the pack-and-play bassinet (since that will serve as a crib until the real one arrives), and a swing (for another sleep option and “mom needs to grab something or rest her arms” option). We’re installing the car seat this weekend. I’m gathering the basics for my hospital bag so it’s ready to go. Tomorrow is the big birthing class event (I’ll try not to think of the Bill Cosby routine when I’m “learning” to breathe). I just have a bunch of baby laundry to finish washing.

But honestly – other than being scared to death of this whole giving birth concept that’s looming, I’m feeling pretty good about where we stand on the supplies for now. I mean – toys aren’t really needed at this point. It’s basically safe sleeping spots, safety for traveling to the doctor, tons of diapers, clothes, and comfy spots for feedings and cuddles. To start out, at least, I think we’re in good shape… and worst comes to worst, Erich has to make a run to grab something.

Stitchy Updates
On the first day of February, I finished Pocketful of Peppermint by Blue Ribbon Designs:

Those who have followed my blog may recall that this was the piece I obtained via my first Stitcher’s Hideaway retreat back in 2010. Belinda Karls-Nace taught an ornament to go with it in class. Mine is stitched on 36 count Legacy linen from Picture This Plus. The only change I made was not using the Kreinik called for in the pattern – the color wasn’t working with my adjusted fabric choice (Belinda’s original was on a darker, raw linen color). I opted to just use the white floss on its own (rather than the Kreinik/white blend).

I realized I never posted my ornaments from the end of 2012, so here are all of my finishes. I was very busy in November! (If you click on the photos, you’ll get a larger image from the page on my Flickr account for a better view)

For the exchange on the Super Serial Starters/Divine Disciplined Divas group on Facebook. This is from the 2012 Just Cross Stitch ornament issue. I stitched with GAST sampler threads and scrap fabric I had in my stash. I twisted the cord out of DMC.

This was a fun, quick stitch… I think I did the entire ornament in a week, which is a record for me.

For the 2012 TWCOE (Teresa Wentzler exchange). This is TW’s Peacock Tapestry ornament. I pulled DMC colors between 792-800, plus a couple other colors to add in greys and such. I really like how this color variation came out… completely unplanned. I would just pull a color and start stitching. I was a bit stupid and forgot to write down the color-to-color conversion, though… so it’s now officially a one-of-a-kind. Cord is again twisted by me in DMC.

This was the ornament I stitched for the exchange for the Teresa Wentzler group on Facebook. It’s TW’s Father Winter ornament in called-for colors, finished as a hanging biscornu. I honestly LOVE how this came out, and I think I may finish my TW ornaments like this from now on, because I just love the three-dimensional finish (and it’s SO EASY).

Twisted cord again in DMC. My mom’s kitchen drawer pulls got a work-out one morning over Thanksgiving weekend with all of these. :)

So these days, I’m stitching on the new Blue Jeans & Daisies sampler from Blue Ribbon Designs… it’s the 3-part mystery that just was released in January. I chose to stitch on 35 ct fabric, which took a bit longer to ship due to a mix-up at some point in the supply chain, so I only received my chart and supplies about 10 days ago. I’m making good progress, though. Photo on the right is where it stood as of my photo yesterday afternoon. This sampler is MUCH bigger than the Pocketful of Peppermint one above. Just as with Peppermint, I’m working Blue Jeans on my 11 inch Q-snaps. Peppermint fit entirely in them. This is just part one of three for Blue Jeans, and the fabric is only a single count “bigger.” The height of the sampler is about the same (I’ve stitched top to bottom to frame the left side already) – but I have a lot of fabric width tucked under the Q’s in this photo.

It’s a nice, easy, relaxing stitch – so I’ll probably stick with this until I give birth. And then we’ll see what I stitch on once I’m functionally able to again. I haven’t made any real goals for 2013… just to stitch when and if I can. Blue Jeans & Daisies was my only splurge purchase for the year. I don’t plan on spending money on stitching supplies at all this year, unless it’s to replace a missing bobbin on one of my many WIPs. I’ve been told by friends that I may have more stitching time than I expect once we have a baby routine down, but for now I know it’s best not to make any plans and to just let life come as it’s going to come.

So phew! Status updated! That took a bit longer than I expected… I’d better get my butt moving and get out to shopping for these supplies I need to buy.

I imagine, with how my updates have gone, that the next one will include Max saying hi in person.

Until then…

Category: Baby, Big Life Events, Finishes, SALs/Challenges, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: babies, blue jeans and daisies, blue ribbon designs, max, ornaments, pocketful of peppermint, wipocalypse | 17 Comments

Finally – a WIPocalypse update!

Author: Measi

• Sunday, November 04th, 2012

I seriously didn’t mean to go so long without updating my own progress. Looking back, I don’t think I’ve done it since July… ouch. Most of the delay is just truly due to the pregnancy chaos, but it also doesn’t help that my MacBook battery decided in the middle of the summer to start splitting itself apart (literally – the casing just started to split). I haven’t gotten around to getting a new battery (and likely won’t any time soon, with more important things to budget now), so Erich’s desktop is my home access to the internet, and it’s been a while since I had to share a computer!

So for now, I’m going to update on the pieces I can recall that have had progress since the end of July. My updates go all the way back to the Stitching Olympics, which now seem like they were years ago! I managed to work on 13 projects in August, each for a time of 2-10 hours, depending on whether I worked them at home or on my commutes.

One piece, Book of Ink Circles, sadly spent its entire time being counted and recounted, only to discover that I have some major stitching errors all over the place. I’m going to have to start over on it (ugh). So no photo updates on that one. Picture a blank canvas.

I managed one finish during the Stitching Olympics. My Mirabilia Round Robin from 2011 is now DONE! I finished her up by adding Enchanted Mermaid to the bottom center square. I intentionally flipped her profile so I now have four faces in either direction (most of the queens, and other profile Miras, seem to face toward the right, interestingly enough). Now I just need to press her and get her framed!

Mirabilia Round Robin – started February 2011 on a Silkweaver 28 ct green solo (pre-takeover). Stitched by fabulous women in the USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and UK. Completed August 17, 2012.

I also put some time into my Floral Bellpull from Teresa Wentzler. Not a lot – I’m confetti stitching at the moment, so it’s a slow process and I need to take breaks fairly often. This is the one TW that I’d like to complete this year. Once my ornaments are done for exchanges, I’m going to focus on this for a while. After this square, I only have one more to do… so it’s still feasible that I could get it done by the end of December.

Photo as of August 10, 2012.

Quaker Compass was a new start for me in July. I picked up the pattern at Celebrations of Needlework in May, falling in love with the model – but I felt it needed just a little more color. I’m stitching this in a lavender to green to purple Threadworx overdye, and I’ll do the alphabet letters in a solid green that matches the darkest green in the variegated floss. I’m stitching this on 36 ct Sterling from Picture This Plus. The photo is my progress as of August 10th.

I continue to be fascinated by Rosewood Manor pieces. I’m firmly in the camp that the photos on the front of the charts by this designer never, ever seem to draw my interest. But oh my gosh, the models. When you actually see these pieces completed and done on the wall, they are astonishing. Really truly. Both years at Celebrations in Nashua, I could have spent hours in the Rosewood booth. Not only are these pieces incredibly intricate, but so many of them are flipping huge – just the type of projects I tend to adore (which is a reason why I seem to never get stuff done!)

My other pretty big progress photo from the Stitching Olympics is of Pocketful of Peppermint by Blue Ribbon Designs. This piece was taught in the first class I ever took at Stitcher’s Hideaway back in October 2010, but I didn’t manage to get the actual piece started until the beginning of this year. I have one more column of squares to stitch, and then filling everything in will take virtually no time at all. I’m expecting to have this done by the end of the year – it’ll probably be my travel piece when I head to my mom’s for Thanksgiving, and it’s also a piece that – once I get the rest of the frames done (since some are in specialty stitches), I’ll be able to stitch during my train commutes.

Photo as of August 31, 2012

The rest of my photos are of progress post-Stitching Olympics. I worked on some of these pieces in August, but didn’t take timely photos… so they’re just up to date as of this past week.

Deep Blue Sea by Chatelaine continues to progress slowly but surely. I’m almost done with part two – I’m adding the red starfish (stitched over one), convinced that I truly am into self-torture by deciding to stitch this piece on dark fabric… and now with stuff over one. But it is coming along. I brought this with me to Stitcher’s Hideaway at the end of October and spent a good chunk of day one doing red stars. I obviously am not anywhere near “on time” with the releases of the mystery, since part eleven was just released on the 1st… but I honestly never expected to be. At this point, I’m hoping to have part two done by the end of the year, and I’ll be happy with that. Over one stitching is probably one of the things I struggle with the most. I do use a magnifier, but it’s just one of those things that I’m incredibly slow at.

Photo progress as of October 28, 2012. Stitched on 28 ct Phantom by Picture This Plus.

It’ll be a slow and steady project, but I’ll have all of the charts, and Deep Blue Sea will get done when it gets done. With the kiddo on the way, I’m estimating… 2015 at this point? Maybe? Needless to say, I won’t be joining the next Mystery, but that’s okay, since I can’t exactly afford another one (or another project) at this point.

Witches Wheel by Glendon Place is also crawling along a little. It was stalled only when I somehow lost ALL of the black bobbins I’d stored with the piece – or I’d have quite a bit more done. I hate it when I get broken out of the zone on a piece for something as silly as missing bobbins. I think I’ll blame my cats! In any case, the star at the top is the top of this piece, with the exception of a large circle two stitches above it that rings the entire design. I’ll add that once I’m done with everything in the center, to make sure I don’t screw up the count. My fabric always seems to photograph very yellow – but it truly is just a perfectly pumpkin orange wherever you see the yellow in the fabric.

Progress photo as of September 5, 2012. Stitched on 32 ct Solar from Picture This Plus (per design specs)

Witchy Washy is the other piece I brought with me to Stitcher’s Hideaway this year – and I spent part of the second day adding the basket. I’m just about done with it, but had to break to get the aforementioned ornaments done. I’m probably about 65% done with the piece. This is another that will likely commute with me in the upcoming months. I hope to get it done sometime in January.

Progress as of November 4, 2012. Stitched on 28 ct Manhattan Mist from Silkweaver (pre-takeover)

The final photo to share is the ornament I did for the 10th anniversary Stitcher’s Hideaway exchange at the retreat. Every retreat, there’s some sort of a handmade exchange. Back in March, it was a scissor fob. For two other Hideaways, it was a Christmas ornament. This October’s retreat was a “Spooky Retreat,” so everything was Halloween themed. I decided to stitch one of the cute designs from last year’s big green Halloween book from Just Cross Stitch. This design is by Blue Ribbon Designs. I stitched it on an unlabeled scrap of neutral linen I had in my stash… it’s either 28 or 30 count. The front is shown here. I labeled it on the back with “2012 Spooky Retreat, Mystic, CT.” I completed this the night before the exchange – on October 25th. :)

I undoubtedly missed some updates from back in August… and I’ll try to pick those up at the end of the month. For now, I’m working on three ornaments for three holiday exchanges. Two are Teresa Wentzler ornaments. I’ve just about completed the stitching on one, and the other will get started tomorrow night. The other exchange is for one of the Facebook groups I’m part of, and the ornament is stitched – I just need to put it together. I’m planning on getting all three ornaments done at the same time. At this rate, hopefully that will be next Sunday.

Since they’re for exchanges, I obviously won’t be able to share them until they’re received. My goal is to get all three sent off just before Thanksgiving, which would make them perfectly timed for my November Wipocalypse update.

It’s been a wacky few months of stitching – but as you can see, I have been busy and making some good progress, despite the challenge of the morning sickness, tons of doctor appointments, and the resulting wacky work schedule.

Happy stitching everyone!

More personal updates in an update later this week. :)

July WIPocalypse Update…

Author: Measi

• Saturday, July 14th, 2012

So I was frantic to try to get a couple pieces done before I did my post for the month. I almost got both done – but a few missing Mill Hill Treasures are thwarting the second finish for another week. Since I’m already late for the month, might as well get it up!

June was a good month for me stitch-wise. I focused the entire month on a few pieces that were close to being finished. I underestimated the amount of stitching required for one of them, but managed to get a long time UFO done, almost finished another, and rewarded myself with a new start that I probably didn’t need – but it’s been screaming since I bought the pattern.

So… the finish first! This is Walk in the Woods by Cricket Collection. Long-time readers of my blog (or friends of mine on Facebook) might recall that this is one of two unfinished piece I found in my mother-in-law’s stash after she passed away five years ago. I vowed to finish both pieces. Garden Sampler was finished in 2010. I finished Walk in the Woods on July 6th.

It’s stitched on 18 ct Aida that’s a very, very light grey. Colors are all DMC as instructed. I freeformed the signature to include both of us. I honestly don’t know when Debbie started this, sadly, so I couldn’t include a start date. The chart was published in 1988. I’m guessing it was after the dye change in DMC, though, because I didn’t have trouble matching new bobbins to what she had originally stitched. When I found it, it only had the top border, the A, the B, and the E completed, including a counting error that even I didn’t catch.
I do have to thank Kris a lot for her help on this. Last year we were involved in a UFO round robin together, and with only one rotation round left, one of my other pieces came home. I had to scramble for something practical to send… and this was really the only thing at the time that I could come up with. She did a tremendous amount of the work to get it going again. When it’s framed, I’ll be adding her name to the description label I’ll place on the backing paper.

Very happy this one’s done. I’m hoping to get it framed and give it to my husband to hang wherever he’d like it placed.

Next up is the almost finished Mirabilia round robin from last year. With some input from fellow stitchers, I decided to swap out Venetian Opulence for Enchanted Mermaid in the bottom central square. I’m glad I did – she looks great. If you’re thinking she looks a bit different, you’re right. I flipped her backwards so she’d be facing toward the left to balance the piece 4 and 4.

I know I ordered and received all of the treasures I needed to complete the piece, but sometime in the last couple weeks, three packs of treasures went wandering and I’ve searched everywhere. So I’ll order again. I have some other beading still to do, but it will be easier and more efficient to just string everything together, so I’ll wait until those treasures come back in to finish it up. I imagine it’ll only take a couple hours at this point.

Of course, that means that the day after I finish the piece, those three packs will turn up, right? :)

Next up is Smoky Mountain Cats from Pegasus Designs (aka “the field of blue”), which also went out for a round robin last year. I thought I could finish this piece last month, but completely underestimated what was left to do. Still, I did about 10 hours on it and got a decent amount done (the super dark colors on the bottom, plus a little extra). As of right now, this is one of the three longest-running UFOs I have. It’s an easy piece to work on the train, so I may start keeping it in my work bag for the train, and just working a little at a time.

It’s one of those pieces that’s a bit frustrating. It came as a kit, and the thread quality is pretty bad. In hindsight, I could have swapped out for DMC and probably would have had this thing done by now. I think this piece is the reason I refuse to buy kits anymore.

Sooner or later, though, it will get done.

Hopefully!

The final piece I worked on in June is Witchy Washy, although I really didn’t do that much on it. I finished the witch hat and started the basket that sits on the ground underneath the clothes line. It’s may be a total of an hour of work. But still – it’s progress, and I expect this piece to be done easily this year. If it’s not done beforehand, I’ll probably bring it to Stitchers’ Hideaway in October, where the 10th anniversary retreat is themed as a Spooky Retreat to work on all things Halloween. :)

This is one of the few pieces that I know where I’m hanging it once it’s completed… the door to the laundry room, of course. :)

So that was it for June. Since I’m a bit into July, I figured I’d also share the two pieces I’ve been working on:

The Inn at Fox Run Mill by Little House Needleworks is my current “travel” piece for my commutes. I’m stitching it on 36ct Shale linen from Picture This Plus with Sullivans threads. It’s the first time I’ve worked on it since February, when it was my piece to kill time while stuck in Rhode Island’s jury duty lounge.

All week, I’ve just had this goofy “Happy Little Trees” going on in my head – in the style of Bob Ross – as I’ve been stitching those branches. No idea why it popped in my head, but apparently Bob Ross influenced my psyche more than I thought during my childhood mornings!

Finally, my start from yesterday afternoon – Quaker Compass by Rosewood Manor. This is the first Rosewood piece I’ve done, and I’m already loving how she does her designs. The charts are great and clear, and there are so many little extras in the booklet, it’s insane. I bought this in April at Celebration of Needlework after seeing the model on the wall (it’s STUNNING), but felt the need to play with color a bit. I’m working this in Threadworx #1157 on Picture This Plus 36 ct Stirling, which is a gorgeous silver with the slightest blue and green tinge to it. I know this photo’s a bit blurry… my cell phone is back on the charger. Will get a better pic up next update.

Anyway, this is my progress since last night. Thanks to the heat and the Game of Thrones marathon on HBO, I stitched most of the day today. :) My plan is to do all of the stitching except the sampler letters in the Threadworx. I’m going to match the greens in the thread to solid DMC shades (one lighter, one darker) to do the letters, since the green is the least apparent color in my particular batch.

This is my first quaker piece, and I think I’m already hooked!

So that’s it for me for WIPocalypse updates. Happy stitching everyone!

Category: Finishes, SALs/Challenges, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: cricket collection, fox run mill, little house needleworks, mira rr, mirabilia, pegasus designs, quaker compass, raise the roof, rosewood manor, smoky mountain cats, walk in the woods, wipocalypse, witchy washy | 13 Comments

Life update (and WIPocalypse update of sorts)

Author: Measi

• Friday, June 22nd, 2012

Good goddess, life’s been busy this year. Work’s been turned upside down due to one of my managers leaving for a new opportunity. My workload has been… excessive. I’m trying to stay on top of it and keep my chin up, but I admit that I’ve moved into the burnout phase and am now mulling what I want to do going further. I know that I can’t keep up at this pace for much longer. Something needs to give, and I want to nip it before I’m forced to make it give in desperate fashion (read: take any old job to get out of here)

I realized this morning that my WIPocalypse post seems to have disappeared into the ether. I know I wrote one and had it scheduled to post on time, but I guess in the strangeness of life these days I must have forgotten that ever-important “save” button or something. I’m forgetting exactly WHAT I wanted to post now that it’s been a bit, though, so I’ll make this a quick one. After all, the next update’s only in a couple weeks, and I should have a couple of great finishes to share then!

So here we go…

I focused on my Theme-a-licious projects for May in this recap post. And back a couple posts from that, I have my most recent photo of Witches Wheel. :)

Floral Bellpull is moving right along. I may have even done a bit more than what’s here, come to think of it, but this is pretty close to where I’m now at. The peonies are developing nicely despite all of the confetti stitching. I’m using the “go by color” method with the pinks, which I know isn’t the safest way to work confetti. It helps me feel like I’m accomplishing a bit more, though, knowing that a color is “done.”

I have to admit that this square seems to be going fairly quickly. I have True Blood to thank for that – lots of reruns recently, plus the episodes from Season 4 have been On Demand, so I’ve spent some time with (thankfully) non-glittery vampires as I work. It definitely helps keep things moving.

I plan on making this a bigger focus piece during my Olympic stitching. Ideally, I’d like to have this square done, plus any backstitching to this point that still needs to be finished, all by the end of August. That way I only have the final square to focus on, and can celebrate a completion sometime in the autumn.

Walk in the Woods is almost done. So, so close. It’s one of my goal pieces to complete this month, and I think I may just get there before the end of the weekend if all goes well.

As longer-time readers of my blog might remember, this piece is the final unfinished stitching piece my mother-in-law left before passing away in 2007. I finished the other one, Garden Sampler, in 2010. I admit that Walk in the Woods is a bit off my taste. I like it, but the colors on it just don’t excite me that much, so it’s been a bit of a slog to get through this one. I did send it out for a round in the UFO RR 2011, and Kris did an amazing job pushing it forward… to the point that I don’t feel right putting only my and my MIL’s initials on the piece when it’s done. I may be tweaking the date line a little bit to fit us on there.

This photo’s as of Monday. I’ve made some more progress since then – finishing the acorn motif where my needle is in this picture, adding the leaf that’s missing between M and N, and putting in some of the missing colors on other motifs. Saturday night may be my big push on it, since Erich will be off doing stuff with the guys.

I can’t seem to find a photo of where I am with my Mira RR, which is my other focus piece for the month. Needless to say, it’s also almost done. I had to do an order for beads and Kreinik last week, and now that those are in, everything else will get wrapped up. Once Walk in the Woods is done, back to the Mira I go, also to be finished before the end of June.

Two finishes in a month. :) I can’t wait!

Category: SALs/Challenges, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: cricket collection, floral bellpull, mira rr, teresa wentzler, walk in the woods, wipocalypse | 11 Comments

Witches Wheel Update & IHSW Plans

Author: Measi

• Tuesday, May 15th, 2012

Lots of folks have been checking in with their Wipocalypse updates for May. Keep them coming! A few people have emailed me theirs, and I’ll be replying this weekend as I add those links to the excel sheet that I’m using to keep track of check-ins.

I’ve finished my stitching for this round on Witches Wheel. Sorry for the slightly blurry photograph – I took it on the Amtrak train home to Providence tonight, and while I shot the photo in a relatively smooth area of the trip, the tracks between Boston and Providence are a bit bumpy.

Next round I think I’ll focus on filling in at least one of the other faces. My original plan was to do a quarter of the pattern at a time, but I think it’s probably a better idea to work out from the center on this one and fill in each similar motif around the circle to ensure that everything’s balanced correctly.

I’m not sure if I’ll bring any pieces with me for my commutes for the rest of the week. The weather has been quite rainy lately and I don’t want to risk getting anything wet during my walks from the train to work. I bought the new Sookie Stackhouse novel last night, so I’ll probably just inhale that by Friday. Next week, though, I’ll bring my Mirabilia round robin with me to attempt to get the rest of the cross stitches complete.

I’ve also been working on Pocketful of Peppermint by Blue Ribbon Designs for the last few days. I’m still in the early stages on the piece, creating some of the border squares. I’d like to do all of the borders first, then fill in each individual square separately. I should have my 10 hours done with that by the end of the week.

This weekend is International Hermit and Stitch weekend. I have a full weekend planned already, so I don’t know if I’ll have much time to stitch. Whatever time I do have, I’ll put into Floral Bellpull and try to push that fifth square forward a bit.

Hope you’re having a great week!

Category: SALs/Challenges, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: blue ribbon designs, floral bellpull, glendon place, ihsw, pocketful of peppermint, teresa wentzler, witches wheel | 9 Comments

My May WIPocalypse Update

Author: Measi

• Sunday, May 06th, 2012

If you’re looking to check in with your WIPocalypse updates, here’s the correct post.

Due to some insanity, I missed my update entirely for April, so my progress is actually two months’ worth of work. I’ve made some good progress on a few different pieces and have finished one WIP. I’m starting to really see some progress in my stitching this year, and that’s making me feel quite happy with what’s going on.

The two pieces that really needed their own posts for updates were my finish – Ye Olde Coffee House by Little House Needleworks and progress on Deep Blue Sea by Chatelaine.

I’ve also done some work on other pieces that don’t need quite as much story telling, but have progressed nicely.

Witchy Washy (Raise the Roof) is coming along nicely. I’m using the original overdyes called for in the pattern, and I’m stitching this on an older piece of Manhattan Mist from Silkweaver. I’ll be working (and hopefully finishing!) this piece in June, but it’s taking a rest for a few weeks. As it stands, it’s probably about 60% done. The hat is the final thing that’s sittig on the clothes line to stitch. Two trees, a couple objects on the “ground” and the Witchy Washy title, and this one’s done. My witchy hat needleminder will NOT be staying on it, despite looking like it should remain on the piece! This is a fun little piece – I don’t know why it’s taking me so long to stitch because I do enjoy stitching on it and absolutely love it. For some reason, it just makes me a bit tired, too. Almost like it’s an intense piece for me, without any real reason that it should be.

Witches Wheel (Glendon Place) is my current commute piece. I grabbed it to take to Celebration of Needlework since it’s one of those easy to transport pieces – only one color of floss needed. It also turned out to be a great identifier for people looking for me. I imagine I was likely the only person there stitching on tie-dyed orange fabric! I spent the first couple days fixing a miscount that I’d needed to frog out – thankfully it was caught early because this piece definitely depends on everything matching up correctly. Unlike so many pieces, I really couldn’t fudge a miscount here. So it was fixed by taking out the central spokes on the left side (both diagonals and the horizontal) and moving them out a square. And then I stitched the two cats on the left. For this week’s commute, I’m going to add the fourth cat, and then I’ll see if I’m still in the mood to keep adding to it. This is one of the pieces I’d like to finish this year, so I don’t plan on putting it aside for too long.

Floral Bellpull is my Teresa Wentzler focus for the year. I’m now on square five of six, and it’s going well. It looks like my stitches are a bit scattered in this square, but this is how I tend to stitch Wentzlers – I try to carry a color as far as I can go to use up my currently needled floss, starting with larger blocks of color so I have something to neatly anchor the confetti stitches onto. Other stitchers who have done this piece may realize that I made a couple of errors. I accidently started the wrong square here – instead of Pansy, which is labeled as Square 5 on the pattern, I grabbed Peony… so my last two squares are going to be in reverse order. It’s not a big deal, as all of the squares are the same size. But I did a bit of an eyeroll when I realized what I’d done.

I also have my standard “Measi makes a mistake in the piece that she’s just going to leave because virtually none of her projects are completely perfect” stitch. Unintentional again – but it’s one of those stitches that just won’t matter in the long run. Can you find it here?

My final piece to update is my Mirabilia Round Robin from last year. I’m stitching the bottom block and will add my name to the bottom of the center block when finished. I’m stitching Enchanted Mermaid, flipped 180 degrees so she’s facing left instead of the originally charted right. It’s a trivial thing, but I just felt that having four faces going left and four facing right may balance the piece a bit better. Whether or not it does, I don’t know… but it was something I just felt I needed to do. I don’t expect this to take me that long to complete. Once I finish that cat on Witches Wheel, I’ll be taking my Mira RR with me on the train until the stitching’s done. I’d hoped to have her done last month. So this month, I’m determined!

Funny that this update wound up being the four pieces that I am gunning to finish this year, but I suppose that’s just how the stitching ended up this month. Hopefully May will be another good month of progress.

Category: Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: floral bellpull, glendon place, mira rr, mirabilia, raise the roof, teresa wentzler, wipocalypse, witches wheel, witchy washy | 15 Comments

Deep Blue Sea update…

Author: Measi

• Thursday, May 03rd, 2012

Deep Blue Sea had a bit of an adventure last month. I’d hoped to finish part one completely, but before I could get those other waves done, I had a catastrophe.

Or properly spelled, a CAT-astrophe. Notably of the “claiming by cat pee” variety. One of the cats did a drive-by on my stitching bag, which I’d stupidly put on the floor, and decided to give it a rinse. It was partially my fault. It’s springtime, and the windows are open for the first time this season, and it tends to make a couple of our cats a bit… antsy, particularly Hoodsie, who was abused when he was a neighborhood cat to the point that we’ve had to put him on medication for anxiety. He goes on a short-term marking tear in the spring as he smells all of the new scents from outdoors, and I’m figuring it was probably him.

The problem in a household of multiple cats, however, is that it’s a bit difficult to pinpoint who did it. In addition to Hoodsie, there’s Colley – who’s now fast approaching age thirteen and getting a bit senile. I don’t want to punish the wrong cat, but it was very tempting to go on a tear around the house when it happened. So rather than do any punishing (which isn’t exactly going to work with a cat anyway), I just worked as quickly as I could to save the things that were hit.

Thankfully I caught it almost immediately, ran it up to the sink and with some careful handwashing of the area hit (plus another washing later, just to make sure), I’ve managed to remove ALL of the smell. The fabric is overdyed, so there’s a slight change to that area’s color due to my spot washing, but it still works fine with everything else on the fabric (it simply turned darker blue). The good thing is that it was several inches away from any completed parts, so I was able to wash the fabric without having to go near what I’ve already stitched.

So crisis averted. Barely.

I’m going to be taking a break from Deep Blue Sea for a couple months. I feel like I’ve been so fixated on getting part one done, and it’s bogging me down when I really do want (and need) to get some work done on the glut of other WIPs and UFOs I wanted to push forward this year. I think I need some time away from it to take a breather and stop stressing about keeping up with all of the parts, which was never going to happen anyway. I need some objectivity on it. Working on some other projects will be just the break I need.

Category: Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: deep blue sea | 8 Comments

Back from Stitcher’s Hideaway / WIPocalypse check-in

Author: Measi

• Monday, March 05th, 2012

Apparently the posts I thought I had saved to publish while I was away not only didn’t publish, but I somehow didn’t save them. Boo. So much for the blogging every day this month thing. (Ah well.)

Good news: my laptop is fixed! Apparently it was the video card. The good news was that said video card was part of a lawsuit Apple had against the manufacturer, so I got the $500 part replaced for free. :) The MacBook – it lives again!

I had a lovely time at Stitcher’s Hideaway this weekend. The winter retreat is organized as an alumni retreat – basically to get together and stitch for two days. No classes, no specified project. Just bring your own stuff and stitch. Some people were stitching previous class projects, but most of the attendees brought a project (or two, or ten) to work on as we chatted, laughed, vented, and ate way, way too much food. It was great to see familiar faces. This was my fourth Stitcher’s Hideaway, so there are a lot of familiar faces now. Some of the women I’m friends with on Facebook, and that’s definitely helped make it easier to jump in and be active. Surprisingly, my social anxiety didn’t kick in much this weekend, although I was absolutely exhausted and hermitish on Sunday when I got home!

While alumni of previous Stitcher’s Hideaway retreats get first dibs for the winter retreat, any space left after January 1st is opened on a space-available basis to whomever is interested, so we had a few newbies among the group. I sat with three of them for the weekend – Janice, Marie, and Lynn, all from Connecticut, for the weekend, and we had a great time. I hope to see them either at another retreat or possibly at a casual stitchy get-together in the future.

My scissor fob for the exchange was finished JUST in time for the exchange (hooray! Finish #2 of the year!) I was frantically finishing it in my hotel room on Thursday night. I’m pleased how it came out, although somehow the fabric still is a little wonky after putting it together. If you think you’ve seen this pattern recently, you’re probably right. I grabbed it from the most recent issue of Just Cross Stitch – it’s the fob that’s part of a sewing box set. I’m hoping to do the entire set for myself later. The cord is storebought from JoAnns. The tassel is simply the ends of the cord, pulled apart into a fray. In return, I received a cute crocheted frog-shaped fob that matches the froggy drink coasters I received at October’s retreat. The body of the frog fob is a sleeve for the scissor shears. I took pictures of it and all of the insanity stash from the retreat and put them on my Flickr Account. Warning – don’t go if you are on a tight budget! I think at least three of my purchases were brand new from Nashville Market releases. Between my purchases and the generous gift bags received by everyone at the retreat, I have definitely had a wonderful weekend of stash enhancement. :) I also won a gift subscription to The Gift of Stitching, which is great – my subscription runs out later this year, so I’ll be happy to jump on for another year.

I didn’t get as much done as I’d hoped, but really – when do I ever? I always misjudge how long it actually takes me to stitch things. Still, I made some nice progress on a couple of pieces. I brought four pieces to work on – Deep Blue Sea, Witchy Washy, my Mirabilia RR, and Four Seasons of Mystic. I threw a few stitches into the Mira and Witchy Washy, but nothing worth nothing into either.

I stitched most of the time on Deep Blue Sea, and finished a good chunk of the Rhodes Stitches in the center (all of the very light blue clusters) and balanced the light aqua cross stitches on the top, bottom, and two sides. I misread the chart and did the rhodes stitches in two strands instead of one. I like the coverage of the two strands, so I’m planning on doing the darker Rhodes squares in the same way, rather than frog everything. I’m planning on working on DBS again tomorrow, and hopefully I’ll have part one done soon. It’s just really, really slow. *sigh* I know I shouldn’t feel pressured with time on this one, but knowing that I’m two parts “behind” on the releases is frustrating me a bit. I know this isn’t a race, yet my brain won’t knock off being idiotic.

The other project I worked on was Jeannette Douglas’ Four Seasons of Mystic, which was the teaching piece for the October retreat. It’s not published yet – I’d expect it will show up in stores probably sometime later this year or early next. It’s a fun sampler full of different specialty stitches and different fibers. The satin stitches of the border are done in wool. Everything else so far is in various blends of silks with a small amount of metallics. I added a couple rows and swore a lot about my french knots, which I despise (I’m no happier with Colonial knots). I’ll likely be taking the blue knots out to redo, although I haven’t decided how I’ll approach it yet. The strand in progress is a basket that’s cross stitched over one. I adore this piece. There are just so many things to do that I can’t be bored. The stitches are intricate, so the bands go slowly. That purple band just above the word “Spring,” for example, are woven bars done with one strand over 3×3 threads. I needed to use my magnifier for them. Someone asked before on my blog, and I’m not sure if I ever answered – but the reason the bottom two rows are done is because I’d never done Jessica stitches before, and I wanted to get them done in the class back in October while I had Jeannette there teaching. So the trees and the Jessica on top of Jessica stars were done months ago. I finished the woven bars, Spring band, and the partial green floral band below it on Saturday afternoon.

It was a great time. I’m still a bit tired from it all, but it was a much needed break. Now I have through Wednesday off at home, so I’ll be splitting my time between some projects and some putterings.

Category: Exchanges & Robins, Finishes, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: chatelaine, deep blue sea, four seasons of mystic, jeannette douglas, scissor fob, stashing, stitcher's hideaway, wipocalypse | 13 Comments

BoInk and Floral Bellpull updates

Author: Measi

• Wednesday, February 22nd, 2012

Just a heads up if you’re trying to reach me – my MacBook decided it wanted to throw me for a loop, and for some reason it won’t reboot. Since I have cash tied up in other commitments, I’m sharing a computer with my husband for a few weeks until I can get it fixed. So please be patient if you email me, etc – I’ll get to responses as I can from my cell phone.

As I mentioned in my TUSAL update last night – I’ve had a good month of stitching. So far this month I’ve touched four projects and made good progress on them. I posted my updates on Inn at Fox Run Mill on my WIPocalypse post earlier this month. Since then, I’ve been working steadily on Book of Ink Circles (BoInk) and Floral Bellpull.

Book of Ink Circles was honestly only supposed to be my focus for a couple of days, starting with Jury Duty on the 9th and going through that weekend. I figured I’d get a couple border lines done and be happy with it, but it just stayed in my work bag, and I’ve been plugging away at lines on it on my train commute ever since. On Friday I finally got the sense that I needed to move on, and it got one final night yesterday on the train ride home before being photographed and put away for a couple weeks. The photo to the left is the result of my work this month. I’m very pleased. I’ve managed to get roughly a third of the edging of all of the squares done, and I’m finding it much easier and faster as I progress because I have reference points for all of the squares(less double-check counting, more stitching). I’m hoping that next month I can finish the edging. Once that’s done, my progress will go much faster for a while because I’ll just be filling in the actual border before moving onto the individual square patterns.

My color scheme for BoInk is a bit of a work in progress. My goal is to have it entirely in autumn tones because I find the original just a little too gaudy for my personal tastes (even if the gaudy is probably more historically authentic), but when I pulled colors at Celebration last year, I somehow managed to pull just about the same colors as it called for. So I have a few more swap-outs to do. I’m doing the edge work in Crescent Color’s “Cinders,” so it’s all a very deep reddish-brown with occasional pops of bright red along the border.

Floral Bellpull is progressing a little slower than I hoped, purely due to me having to pull out the leaves – twice – on the border for square #5. The chart’s to blame on this one, to be honest. The colors are backward of what they really should be. On the chart, the satin stitches that build the leaves in the borders are indicated by grey lines, but not in a logical sense. The lighter grey lines were used to indicate the darker greens, and vice versa. My brain of course sees darker lines = darker colors, and that’s what’s been stitched… for four of six squares. I’m not picking out every border, especially over something that’s completely arbitrary in the scheme of things. Once I figured out what the heck I’d been doing, it was easy to correct to what had been done in the squares before it and get the darker set of leaves done. Tonight I’ll curl up and finish the lighter leaves, the purple flowers, and hopefully the vines. And then I’ll have reached my goal on Floral Bellpull for the month.

I still have backstitching to do on square #4, and on inspection as I moved the piece on my scroll bars, there’s still a little to do on square #3, too. I’m planning on bringing it to Stitcher’s Hideaway with me next weekend. It’s a perfect opportunity to do the backstitching and chat away, making the whole thing less painful, and hey… I’ll get a mini-finish out of the weekend!

The new project for me for my commutes this week is the scissor fob I’m doing for the exchange at Hideaway. I think I may be making my fob a little bigger than most (it’s going to end up around 3 x 3 inches, give or take a little), but I also have the habit of misplacing my scissors, so I’d find a larger fob to be more practical. I found a lovely tonal bluework piece in one of my magazines that reminds me of our Spode dishes a bit. It’s a bit more generic in style, so I think it’s more appropriate and hopefully easier to appeal to the recipient for the blind yankee swap style draw (take a number, pick a bag in number order) we’re having for the exchange.

I’ll post the finished project late next weekend once the exchange is over (and once the piece is stitched!)

Happy stitching all!

Category: Exchanges & Robins, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: boink, exchanges, floral bellpull, ink circles, stitcher's hideaway, teresa wentzler | 9 Comments

My February WIPocalypse Update…

Author: Measi

• Wednesday, February 08th, 2012

Hi to everyone popping on for WIPocalypse browsing! If you read me often, the first half of this post is likely stuff you’ve seen before.

It’s been a good month since my last update. I gave up on Crazy January (and don’t plan on ever attempting it again). I returned instead to a few pieces – some of my new starts for this year, some WIPs, and one traveling pattern (which is my first finish of the year!)

All of these photos “pop” if you select them so you can see larger sizes if you choose.

Here’s my first finish of the year. This is a traveling pattern by Lizzie*Kate that’s now en route to the next person in the Stitcherhood. I pulled random colors for this. The original called-for colors are much, much softer. Blame it on watching the Winter X Games, perhaps – but I wanted to stitch BRIGHT. I’m planning on finishing this into an ornament for my tree, dated with the year and the stitcherhood on the back. I’ll make the backing out of the same fabric and whip-stitch it together, just as I do for most of my ornaments.

Floral Bellpull continues to progress well. I finished all of the cross-stitches in the Morning Glory square and started on the backstitching. That leaves me with two full squares to go before it’s done. My goal this month is to get the border for the next square stitched up so I can start filling it in during Stitcher’s Hideaway next month. This is the big focus Teresa Wentzler piece for me this year – and I’m confident I can get it done. With the glut of TW projects in my WIP/UFO pile, I won’t be starting any more anytime soon. My plan is to start weeding them out one at a time, one year at a time. If I manage to get more done, great… but I really want to get these done and on my walls!

Cowboy Cats is one of the pieces I began for Crazy January. It’s not on any timetable, and since I’m in those starting doldrums, I haven’t quite gotten a rhythm going on it yet. It’s a good commuting piece, but I had it in my bag during a seriously insane portion of last month and just didn’t move it along as I hoped. I made most of my progress on this during one evening when all of the Amtrak and MBTA trains were tied up going out of Boston last month. Three hours of hanging out on a train provides a LOT of stitching opportunity!

Deep Blue Sea continues to progress. This is probably the best color-accurate photo I’ve managed to get of the fabric. I’m still not done with part one, but I’m getting there. I managed to take this on a few commutes in and out of Boston to push it along, and I also focused on it during a stitch-in at Bush Mountain on Superbowl Sunday. I did soooo many eyelets on Sunday that I needed to take a serious break from it and work on light fabric for a while. I’d really like to get all of part one done by the end of the month. It’s definitely possible, although I’ve set it aside for now – I’ll come back to it later once I’ve progressed some of my pre-2012 WIPs! I will admit, it’s getting much easier to stitch as time goes on and I have more reference points to line things up. I did add a little “this way up” arrow to the center of the piece (which will obviously be removed at the end).

I think what I’m surprised about as this center mandala develops is just how BIG the thing is. I’m used to seeing gorgeous centers for all of the Chatelaine designs on other stitchers’ blogs, but photo size doesn’t quite give a good sense of size reference. For some reason, my brain was interpreting the photos I’ve seen as only 4 inches across or so. But no… from the top to the bottom yellow lines is just about the same length as my hand from tips of fingers to the heel of the hand. It fills up a significant chunk of space on my 11″ Q-snaps!

Last but not least, I played a bit with Inn at Fox Run Mill today while hanging out in the jury duty pool. The top border is now at its full width. I report to jury duty again tomorrow, so I’m going to fill in the acorns that are missing, the small leaves that are missing, and then carry down from there if time permits.

It’s definitely been a productive month! And next month promises to be even better, thanks to the three-night retreat (and week of vacation!) I have coming up.

Happy stitching everyone!

Category: SALs/Challenges, WIP Progress Tags: chatelaine, cowboy cats, deep blue sea, dimensions, floral bellpull, fox run mill, little house needleworks, lizzie*kate, stitcherhood, teresa wentzler, traveling pattern, wipocalypse | 21 Comments

TUSAL and IHSW recap…

Author: Measi

• Monday, January 23rd, 2012

It’s the new moon – and it’s the first of the year, so it’s time to empty the jar and start fresh for the Totally Useless Stitch-a-Long. I’d been filling my jar for two years, so to see it this empty is a bit… weird. My orts from the last two years have been put into a baggie – I’ll spread some of them in the yard for the birds in the spring, and others I may use to stuff ornaments or something similar.

My orts this month come from a wide variety of projects. I attempted (and failed) Crazy January. I started my first Chatelaine. I did some work on a couple of my long-neglected WIPs. The pile of orts will only grow from here!

This past weekend was International Hermit and Stitch Weekend, and I decided to focus entirely on Floral Bellpull for the January rendition of IHSW. I had two goals – finish the cross stitches on the Morning Glory square, and get it entirely backstitched.

I completed goal #1 easily. I’m about half-way done with the backstitching. I forgot that the inside of the frame is backstitched, and wound up having to do it twice thanks to a quietly building knot of string that built as I went along (whoops).

In any case, I’m happy with what I got accomplished. Once Castle is done tonight, I’ll get a bit more done tonight before bedtime.

For the rest of this week, I’ll likely split my time between an adorable little Lizzie Kate that wandered into my mailbox from Jo a few days ago (great for my commute) and either Book of Ink Circles or Seasons of Mystic.

Category: SALs/Challenges, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: floral bellpull, ihsw, stitcherhood, teresa wentzler, tusal | 20 Comments

The weekend where ALL of my SALs converge

Author: Measi

• Thursday, January 19th, 2012

This weekend is International Hermit and Stitch Weekend! Grab a project (or two… or four), curl up, get some stitching done, and share with the world.

It’s kind of like WIPocalypse, but much shorter and even more freeform. :)

BUT WAIT – It’s also Jardin January for Theme-a-licious, which means that my selection for this weekend fits all of my ongoing SALS at the same time.

I know – right? It’s epic stitching convergence time. And at the end of the weekend, it’s time for TUSAL to finish it all off.

What piece is so epic in my stash that it can fulfill all of these SAL’s? It’s none other than…

Floral Bellpull!

Yes, the ongoing WIP that has been ongoing for years, gone out on a UFO Round Robin cruise, and still remains an unfinished piece. It’s the one Teresa Wentzler I truly want to complete this year – and completing it is actually possible if I sit my butt down, get the needle going, and get to work.

While yes, it’s only Thursday, I’m getting a start on it tonight for the weekend. My goal is to finish the square you see – which is the 4th of 6 in the bellpull. I don’t have that much actual cross-stitching left to do in the square, so it’s quite possible I can get it and all of the backstitching completed by Sunday night.

*crossing fingers*

Want to join up in one of the non-WIPocalypse SALs this weekend? Click on the appropriate button below to follow to their hosts. :)

Category: SALs/Challenges, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: floral bellpull, ihsw, teresa wentzler, theme-a-licious, wipocalypse | 17 Comments

Deep breath after a long week

Author: Measi

• Sunday, January 15th, 2012

For some reason, life has been absolutely non-stop since about mid-November. I’m thankful I haven’t had any five-day work weeks since Christmas week because honestly, I desperately need the longer weekends right now purely for recovery.

This week was no different in the insanity, although it took a different twist. Erich’s job was transferred to a new hospital as of this past Monday, so both of our commute schedules have changed again. In his case, it’s much, MUCH better. He’s gone from a 1 hour and 20 minute drive to Dorchester, MA to approximately 20 minutes over to Fall River, MA – much, much more tolerable.

In my case, it’s a mixed bag. Technically it’s a bit of a shorter commute for me, but unlike with driving, I now have a very firm schedule as to when I need to leave the house because I’m back on the commuter train. For me it’s about 90 minutes each way to and from Boston. The train is much easier than driving, and once I get used to the train schedule, I’ll be back stitching on my commutes. This week, though, was a bit painful with the adjustment. Hopefully my brain will make the switch soon.

Wednesday was my birthday. Erich and I went out to dinner after work and had a relaxing night. I took Thursday off – I had a scheduled dentist appointment, and decided I’d just take the entire day so I could have some “me” time – I got my nails done and went milling about Thistle Needleworks over in Glastonbury, Connecticut for a couple hours. I didn’t buy much, but did pick up a couple of the colors I still needed for Deep Blue Sea. That evening, Erich and I gathered with friends for a laid-back dinner at one of the centralized hangouts we like to go to.

Yesterday morning I went to my monthly stitchy gathering at the Warwick Public Library – the Rhode Island stitchers gather there every month on the second Saturday morning. It was a quiet month – only four of us this time.

And then last night was the Patriots game – I was relieved they won. Hopefully that will quiet down the Tebow mania for a while!

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I’ve been doing well on stitching this weekend – I’ve become a bit burnt out on new starts, so I’m putting my Crazy January on pause. My current projects are just screaming a bit too loudly for attention! I’ve been focusing on Deep Blue Sea so far this weekend, correcting my miscounts from my January 1st progress and pushing forward on the next two colors. Once that’s done (hopefully this afternoon), I’ll be picking up Floral Bellpull, since it’s the Wentzler I want to complete this year above all others.

Remember that WIPocalypse signups end tonight at midnight my time – so if you’re reading and waffling, jump in and join us!

Category: Birthdays/Anniversaries, Celebrations & Holidays, Erich, Family & Friends, Life, Work, and all the Rest, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: chatelaine, crazy january, deep blue sea, floral bellpull, teresa wentzler, wipocalypse | 11 Comments

WIPocalypse Update #1

Author: Measi

• Monday, January 09th, 2012

I can’t tell you how amazed, fascinated, and excited I am that so many people are stopping by to check in stitching progress. I admit to being a bit like a little kid, stealing peeks at the check-in entry to see how large the number of posts is now – and my goodness, this is happening on my blog!

Blown away. Absolutely blown away.

I can’t wait until this weekend when I’ll have the time to sit back with a cuppa and read what everyone’s been doing. :)

I’ve been immersing myself in new starts via Crazy January, which may seem a bit counter productive when I have all of my WIPs that need work… BUT… there is a reason for this madness. The first is that a lot of my pre-existing projects are a bit tricky to stitch on my commute, and I wanted to have some easier (and smaller) pieces to stitch during my 90 minute train rides. The other is that I just needed to throw some diversity into my WIPs because I have an over-abundance of Wentzlers to work on, and while I love them… I also need a break from them from time to time!

I’m a couple days behind due to some work hours last week, but I’ve still managed to get some nice starts underway… (all of these photos pop larger if you click them) They’re not quite in the order I originally planned due to some misplaced projects, but now I’m back on track… I think. :)

Day One – Chatelaine Mystery XV – Deep Blue Sea. I’m stitching this on 28 ct Phantom by Picture This Plus. Looking forward to some more in-depth time with this over the upcoming holiday weekend. It’s my first Chatelaine, and I’m both nervous and really excited to dive into the insanity of gorgeousness of Chatelaine designs. (thankfully my husband bought himself a new computer, so I could justify the expense on this!) It’s definitely the largest and most complex project I’ve ever started.

Day Two – Why I Love New England by the Sampler Needlework. I’m stitching this on 32 ct white linen. I’ve put a little more time into it since this photo. It’s stitching quickly so far. It’s a large piece but is primarily whole crosses, so it should stitch up pretty quickly. This is one of those pieces I’ve put on my to-start list for YEARS, and just never had gotten around to. It was time to just jump in and get it underway. I’ve never seen another copy of it stitched, other than the sample in the store in Plymouth, Mass where I bought it.

Day Three – TAST (aka Take a Stitch Tuesday) is a year-long weekly specialty stitch project being hosted by PinTangle. I’ll be adding one stitch per week throughout this year onto a practice sampler. I wanted to have at least one thing that was an “educational” piece where I could just do some freestyle doodling, and this project was perfect. This is last week’s stitch. This week’s stitch has now been posted, and I’ll be focusing on the buttonhole stitch this week.

Day Four – Cowboy Cats by Dimensions, stitched on 14 ct Aida (provided in the kit). I don’t generally stitch from Dimensions kits anymore – I’m not a fan of how their chart keys are designed and find them a bit difficult to follow, plus I like to go stash hunting in the store and kit things out myself… BUT… I’ve had this kit in my stash for ages and still think it’s cute. It’s a good, easy piece for the train. What you’re seeing here is a bandana and the ruff of the center cat.

Day Five – Nantucket Sampler by Medeiros Needlecraft. I’m stitching this on 36 ct Legacy from Picture This Plus using Sullivans floss. Not much to see so far (as I’ve just been stitching sky), but I’ll have a gorgeous rigged sailboat on there soon. Nantucket’s not that far from me – only a 20 minute drive followed by a 90-minute fast ferry, and I like seaside scenes, particularly of places local to me. I liked this one so much I bought it twice… so my spare is going into the WIPocalypse stash box.

Day Six – The Inn at Fox Run Mill by Little House Needleworks, stitched on 36 count Shale from Picture This Plus with Sullivans floss. No particular reason why I’m stitching this one first… I adore Little House projects, but only have a few in my stash so far. I did a blind draw for the next one I’d stitch. This stitched up incredibly fast – I did all of this during the last half of the Steelers-Broncos game last night (had to see who will be playing my Patriots on Saturday!)

Day Seven – Pocketful of Peppermint by Blue Ribbon Designs, stitched on 36 count Legacy from Picture This Plus. In October 2010, I had the pleasure of having Belinda of Blue Ribbon Designs teach this piece as a class for Stitcher’s Hideaway (before she released it as a public design). We worked on a complementing ornament in the class, and now I’m hoping to get the full sampler completed for the holidays this coming year.

So that’s my progress so far this year. Once Crazy January is over, I’m going to put some focus work onto the first Wentzler I really want to push towards a finish… Floral Bellpull.

Happy stitching everyone!

Category: SALs/Challenges, Stitching, WIP Progress Tags: blue ribbon designs, chatelaine, cowboy cats, crazy january, deep blue sea, dimensions, fox run mill, little house needleworks, medeiros needlecraft, nantucket sampler, pocketful of peppermint, sampler needlework, tast, why i love new england, wipocalypse | 34 Comments

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