Where have I been?

Whew, where have I been?  Well, still stitching - but I have some wonderful good news that explains why I've been MIA.  We found out around the time of my last post that we were expecting our first child in November!  We now know that it's a baby boy, and we've decided on a Star Wars nursery theme - so expect lots of Star Wars stitching in the next few months!  The first trimester I suffered from terrible morning sickness, so I pretty much did no stitching whatsoever.


In addition to my own kid, I have several friends who are also expecting in the next few months.  The current project I'm working on is for one of those couples who are expecting this month.  It's "Mother Nature" by Lesley Teare from Cross Stitcher issue 418.  I've never stitched one of her designs before, though I've admired her various ladies in the British magazines over the years.

I just started it yesterday, and am using the called-for DMC on 28 count white evenweave, though I'm using three strands instead of two.  They're doing the nursery in a woodland theme and aren't finding out the gender beforehand, so I figured this was a nice neutral sampler without being too cutesy.  It's a little more floral, so perhaps a little more girly, but I think it'll also work out if they have a boy.  I'm going to attempt to finish the stitching and beading before the baby is born, pick out a mat and frame, and then all I'll have to do is personalize it once the baby is here.  That's a lot better than the baby sampler I've done for my other friend - the baby was born in May and I've just managed to finish stitching that one!

My first night's work is below. Apologies for the wonky picture.  My scanner has been acting up, so I've been taking photos with my cell phone. If you look closely, you can see that I actually miscounted the "P" and had to rip and restitch it.  Well, technically, I miscounted the little 4-stitch flower below the "P" and then mis-stitched the letter based on that.  Let me just say that I don't recommend taking Tylenol PM and then stitching!  So far it's been a quick and easy stitch (when I'm actually able to count correctly!), so I'm hoping this'll work up quickly and I can move on to the next baby sampler.  My SIL is expecting a baby girl in September, and she hasn't chosen a baby nursery theme, so I'm still mulling my various options.

Here's hoping for lots of stitching in the next few months!

So close!

... and yet, so far!

As you can tell from the picture, I didn't meet my goal of finishing Gather Hearts by Valentine's Day. I motored along and got the backstitching and beading done in record time, and then went to try out my first bit of memory thread.

I settled for a smaller piece to try out first - the little bit of darker green on the left that runs from the checkered heart to the bright pink heart. I eyeballed the piece, cut a little extra and was ready to go! Finagling the thread into the fabric was tricky, but over all, I thought the couching would go quickly.

And then I got to one of the longer pieces. Securing the thread near the hearts was easy, but securing it out in the middle of the open fabric was much trickier. I had trouble straightening out the areas where they had been wound around the plastic bobbin-style holder. Fiddling too much with a certain spot made the thread inclined to fray and look wobbily. Overall, it took most of last night (a good 2-3 hours of stitching while my husband played video games - aren't we romantic ;) ) to do most of the memory thread shown.

So, so far, I'm not sure whether the memory thread is worth the hassle. I'm reserving judgement, however, until the project is finished - which I hope to do tonight!

Sooo close!

Remember this project? I'd really wanted to finish it by Valentine's Day, since, you know, it's a Valentine's Day pattern, so I picked this up after finishing off H on the CHS alphabet sampler last week. I had hoped to finish it this weekend, but well - life happened!

My husband and I went out for a day of fun on Saturday, and then forgot that Sunday was the church's founding anniversary, and one (non-stitching) thing led to another.

Luckily, I had some time Sunday night to finish off all the cross stitches. All I have left is the backstitching, beading, and then couching the memory thread. Think I can finish it all before Valentine's Day is over?

*Crickets*

Whoops, where have I been? Another busy week at work, unfortunately, but I have been cross stitching. I finished up the G block on February 2nd. This one was fun, because the flowers under the goose actually required partial stitches, which are, of course, a bit tricky to do over-one! I attempted to split the threads on the ones under the right side of the goose with not as much success as I'd hoped, so I left off the partial stitches on the left side of the goose. Overall, I do like the block - the little flower poking up through the G is quite cute.

And here's a general overview of what the whole sampler looked like when I finished that block:

I say "looked like" because I'm actually hoping to complete the H block tonight. All I have left is a little bit of the filling in around the word and it'll be time to move on to the next row!

Farm is finished!

I finally got a little time to stitch on my business trip, and I finished off F for Farm last Thursday! I don't particularly like the colors on this block - it's all reds and yellows, except for the little green straight stitches. I do like the imagery, though - the horse weather vane and the little bird perched on the capital F.

As you can see, I stitched ahead while I was waiting to get my missing floss. I've done most of the outlining and black floss required for Goose, Horse, and Inn, and just started outlining Jump.

I've actually gotten quite a bit done on Goose over the weekend, but didn't manage to take a picture yet. I'm hoping to finish it off in the next day or two, and then move on and complete Horse before going back to the Gather Hearts project. My calendar says I should be completing H by February 2nd to stay on target - boy am I behind!

All work and no stitching makes me an unhappy princess!

Where have I been? Well - I'm away for business meetings this week, and although I brought the CHS alphabet sampler with me, I haven't had more than 5 minutes to stitch on it.

I did manage to hit the LNS on the way over, and picked up the remaining floss to finish the CHS sampler. I also picked up Sergei and a Noah's Ark sampler from the Stitching Parlor - I'll share photos once I have the time!

What I really wanted to gush about, though, was the new DMC variations colors. I love using overdyed thread, and I'm excited that DMC is bringing out more - look at that pretty Christmas-y color on the right. I've used the existing DMC variations before and liked them, but there's not quite enough variety as you can get from Gentle Arts Sample Threads or Weeks Dye Works threads.

If you click on the picture, you can go through to the DMC blog entry on the new floss!

New start!

Well, since I'm stalled out on the alphabet sampler for now, I decided to start something new. This is "Gather Hearts" from the latest issue of Cross Stitch & Needlework. I'm doing it on 28ct white evenweave with DMC floss.

Apologies for the weird photo - I've been taking these at night using my iPhone as I've just been too lazy to either find the nice camera or take it out of its Q-snaps to be scanned.

I'm liking this so far, though I'm worried that it's hard to tell between the two colors of pink - a darker pink is used for the checkerboard and solid hearts, and a lighter pink is used for the polka dot heart and striped heart. Hopefully, once the other colors are added in (and I take a better photo!) it'll be more obvious.

I originally decided to do this project because I wanted something springy (the temps here have been hitting the 60s!), and also because it uses DMC's new memory thread. If you look at the picture from the magazine to the right, the green curly stems and the little ties around them are done in memory thread. What I didn't also realize before I started stitching was that this called for perle 8 and not normal stranded cotton. Since I was already planning on buying the memory thread (and probably the beads for the flower centers, unless I decide to just do french knots), I decided to just sub in 3 strands of stranded cotton. It seems to be working out well so far!

I have high hopes of making two craft store trips this weekend - one to AC Moore or Hobby Lobby to pick up the memory thread I need for this project, and another to the LNS to pick up the floss I need for the alphabet sampler. I hope you get to go do some stitchy shopping also!

Setback!

Well, I was chugging along on the Alphabet Sampler this weekend, and I had high hopes of getting the F and G blocks finished. And then, I went to pick out the last color of floss to finish off Farm.... and I didn't have it! When picking up all the floss the last time I was my (not so) LNS, I'd only stocked up on the floss through Elephant. Ooops... Luckily, I need to travel for work next week, and I can detour to the LNS this weekend, hopefully.

I did get Elephant finished - I love the upper border on this one! The colors aren't very true to life in this picture - I'd unplugged my Ott Lite by the time I took the picture. The elephant is quite cute, but the color of the tusks and his eye unfortunately fades into the background. I haven't decided if I'm going to leave it like it is or rip it out and use another color.

I'm not as happy with the Farm block - the colors are all yellows, reds, and blacks, and I'm not as much a fan of that. I'm reserving judgement until I get the last color in!

I actually went ahead and did the borders and lettering for H, I and part of J, but I think I'm going to put this one aside until I get a chance to pick up the floss to finish Farm.

Learning me some ABC's

I enter at least one project in the State Fair every year, and this year I've decided to do Carriage House Sampling's Alphabet Sampler. I'm doing it over 1 on 40ct linen (err, I've forgotten what type...) mostly using the called for GAST. I'm using WDW Whiskey for the letter boxes, and I'm making a few other changes, like redesigning the cats in the C block to look like two of my cats.

My current goal is one block a week - at that rate, I should be finishing this up by July, just in time to send off to the framer's!

Happy stitching!

Hello World!

I'm creating a blog so that I can participate in a number of SALs this year. I'm thinking of joining the WIPocalypse and the Star Wars stitching SAL.