June 7, 2008

Part 4 of BoInk is finished, and I'm through stitching on it until the next part is released. A lot of the SAL members have stitched the whole border, but since I have trouble counting past five (and somedays just counting to two seems to be a problem), I'm stitching the border after I stitch the design.

I finished the top of my biscornu yesterday. I think that might have been one of my goals for March. And today I started on the bottom. For the bottom I'm just doing one of the tiny little squares in each corner. Hopefully I'll finish that tomorrow because I want to start this:

This arrived in the mail today. I can't believe I behaved myself and worked on the bottom of the biscornu instead of starting this. Once I get the first row put in I'll be using this as my commercial stitching while I watch So You Think You Can Dance. The commercials are so numerous and long that it wouldn't surprise me if I finish it while only stitching on it during the commercials.

Happy stitching everyone!

June 1st, 2008

BoInk as of 5/18/08. The design for the empty square was released this past Tuesday. I have it all stitched except for the light blue. Haven't found the blue that says 'I'm it!' and after stitching small bits of about a dozen or so different blues I'm about ready to go back to my original pick. Took last week off from BoInk to finally put my first word in on the Lizzie-Kate double flips. Forgot to take a picture, but it looks like all the other dreams, didn't change a thing on it. My goal for this week is to finish the squares and cat on BoInk and then hopefully next week I'll get some work done on Celtic Christmas.

BoInk

Part 3 is finished. I'm finding this piece extremely addicting! It's also making time disappear. I start stitching and all of a sudden it's two hours later and it's every time I work on the piece. This is also the only piece I'm working on (except for when I'm waiting at the doctors, my traveling piece is Damier). Normally I get a little bored with a piece after 5 or 6 days of stitching on it. And then there's the fact that I'm not even sure if I find the piece visually attractive. It's a bit busier and more colorful than what I usually like. BoInk is turning out to be a new stitching experience for me.

Goals?

Well, April's goals sure did fly out the window. My Celtic lady and Circles pieces haven't seen the light of day since the second week of April. As for the tassel, I do peek at it every now and then. It's still in the bottom of the basket, hasn't walked away or jumped into somebody elses hands to be finished.
I spent a week working on pink plaid pear and then switched over to BoInk (Book of Ink Circles, a mystery SAL).







Local fabric selection is limited to what AC Moores and Michaels carries. I had picked up an 18 ct fiddlers and then realized it just wasn't quite large enough and I'd of had to add other fabric around the edges. So I decided to do it on 22 ct hardanger. On the 22nd a friend and I discovered that the needlework store in Stephens City, VA was still open. They had the perfect color fabric for BoInk. Except it was linen and I don't like stitching on linen. I must have went and fondled the fabric 8 or 9 times, my friend eventually said "You better buy it now cause I'm not bringing you back down here". So, I've made a second start on BoInk. It's an absolutely lovely piece of fabric to work on. It's an overdyed and since the threads are packed closer together I'm not having any problem with tension. (I like to pull tight enough that you see holes.) And it's so soft and silky that I love the feel of it. It's washable so I think it might be from L & L, it's 32 ct. Belfast vintage country mocha.

My goal for May is not to start any new projects.

Mini Mystery

April 15th installment is stitched. Next one comes on the 20th. I'm thinking that the small square might be an ant or a ladybug. Do they have ants in France?

Half a Pear

I Have Pictures!

I have a working camera again!

This is January and February on Damier. I started two months behind and I'm still two months behind. I'm pleased that I'm not losing any ground on it. Now if I would stop starting new projects I might possibly get up to date on it.

This is week 5 on Circles. It's taking me forever to decide on colors. For the circles and the border I tried eight different colors that I can remember, possibly a couple more, before on a whim I put a few stitches in with the orange and went THAT'S IT. Four different pinks and right now I'm trying to find the right yellow.

Miss Fil's mini mystery piece for April. Every five days she releases a new section. I'm very pleased to say that I'm staying up to date on this. (Even if it is tiny.)

Pink Plaid Pear by Casey Buonaugurio. This was part of the ABC Stitch order that came in this week. Along with Taco Sampler and Frog Prince sampler by C. B. and the two Sampler of Stitches charts that I was missing. Decided to start PPP Friday evening, I had worked all day on Circles and my eyes were starting to cross from working on the black. Still felt like stitching though, and I thought that since PPP is worked on 14 ct. white Aida that it would be easy enough on the eyes. I think I might be a bad girl this week and ignore my goals and just stitch on this until the pear is done. Haven't decided if I'll put the alphabet on it or not, (I don't like stitching letters).

No picture of Celtic Christmas. She has a lot of dangly threads right now, working and gridding threads, and just doesn't look too pretty.

March Recap and a finish

"Luck O' The Irish" by The Sunflower Seed

28 ct. white jobelan

WDW blue spruce and kudzu

started 3/15, finished 3/24

March Goals were: 1. 2 days a week on Celtic Christmas

managed five and a half good stitching days

2. 2 days a week on Circles

yes

3. finish biscornu or at least the top layer

almost - 92% done (the top layer that is)

4. finish tassel that was started at February's EGA meeting

no this was actually my goal for the week of 3/24 until I looked at

the calendar and realized the meeting was the very next night

Isn't March supposed to have 5 weeks?

New projects started this month: 1. Lizzie-Kate's Double Flips

2. Miss Fil's April mini mystery sampler

http://jebrode.canalblog.com/archives/2008/03/index.html

3. and The luck o' the Irish

April goals are the same as March but with the addition to stay up to date on the mini sampler. It's very small only 30 by 30, so I should be able to accomplish this. I've met the first 2 goals so far.

Stitching Update

Knock on wood, I think the frog has finally left. Ever since discovering the mistake in my celtic lady, I've had to do a lot of ripping. Kind of like seven stitches in, four stitches out. Today the stitching went smoothly.

This is my Damier piece. I started it on Feb. 3. 2008. The picture was taken on March 6th. Since then I've completed the first row and have started the third square on the second row. My camera is broke and I have to remember to ask my friends to take pictures for me.

On my circles piece I've almost completed the large motif in the top left corner and am trying to decide what color I want to do the border and the circles in. As for my celtic lady, that is a very large and long skirt.

Saturday, a week ago I went on a road trip. The LNS is about 70 miles away, and I don't make it there too often. Actually, I've been purposely staying away. I had been doing more beading than stitching lately and I'd been doing fairly well with the resolution that if I felt the need to go shopping I could go shopping in my own personal store. My own personal store got a lot larger last Saturday. And of course with all that new stuff something new had to be started.

I chose the monthly graph. Luck o'the Irish with a border around it. Small, easy, and by Sunday night I realized it had been kitted wrong. Finished the border and Luc and had 2 whole pieces of kudzu left but only one strand of blue spruce to finish the K and Irish. Called the store on Monday and they said they'd send me 2 more pieces. It arrived the following day but by then I needed a whole lot more. When I put the K in I discovered I had made the border narrower than what it should have been and had to rip the lettering back out. So it's now in the waiting pile.

My goal for this week is to finish my tassel. EGA is next Tuesday and I'd really like to take a finished tassel for show and tell.

Pondering

Cirque des Cercles -

If I fell in love with Valerie J.'s piece in the gallery and she was kind enough to provide the color numbers that she stitched it in, why am I trying to change the colors? I can see so many possibilities with the piece, but I think I'll be comparing whatever I do, to her piece. So I just might as well use her colors.

I think it's interesting that when you put something down in black and white and and you think about how you want to word it because others may be reading it, that the solution can pop right out at you.

A Frustrating Stitching Day

Started the day by frogging on my lady. Luckily I only had to take out three strands of floss to fix the mistake. I put the three strands back in and added two more so that a little bit of progress was made on her. This evening I decided to start my cirque piece and boy did I choose the wrong colors. They're just totally washing out. I chose dusty colors and they looked really nice laying on the black fabric but when you take it down to one strand they don't work. Or at least they're not giving the effect I wanted. Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

Goes with previous post.

A Little Background

Late last fall my Celtic lady started calling me, then in January I discovered stitching blogs and the Lavender Angels Sal. Her voice was too loud to ignore at that point. I started stitching her in either 2000 or 2001. The above picture is what she looked like on 1/29/2008. She now looks like this: I can't figure out how to get the picture to show up here in this spot, so I 'll put it in a second post.

I really want to see her hanging on my wall so my goal is to stitch on her two days a week. Hopefully with only two days I won't burn out on her like I've done in the past. And hopefully by looking at the progress on other people's blogs and on my own I'll stay motivated. The only problem with looking at other people's blogs is that burning desire to stitch this and this and this........

I've already started Damier by Maryse, my Cirque des Cercles pattern came Saturday, I've bought the threads for the Lizzie-Kate double flips and I started a biscornu last Thursday. And then there's those three little pieces I picked up at the Scottish/Irish music festival last month. Plus I'm sure my beads will start calling me at some point.

So my goals for this month are:
1. 2 days a week on Celtic Christmas
2. 2 days a week on Circles (have to throw this in here or the friend that I coerced into stitching it with me might get upset)
3. finish biscornu or at least the top layer
4. finish tassel that was started at February's EGA meeting