March IHSW

Hi all! It feels like ages since I've updated, but March has been a busy (and unfortunately, not very stitchy) month so far. But now Spring is here, and I've got a new start to celebrate! It was a perfect way to spend my IHSW.

My new start is a HAED chart called Euphoria, by artist Melanie Delon, whose work I've come to admire. She seems to specialize in ethereal, fantasy portraits of ladies (my favorite subject) and I'm hoping several more of her works get charted.

I'm stitching this one on 28ct Baby Pink Cashel linen, 2 over 1, using tent stitch. Here are pics of what she'll look like finished, plus my progress so far.

Don't she look sweet?

Progress as of March 22

I've started on the bottom right, so I'll be sewing nothing but skin for a while. I was hoping for a page finish this weekend, but couldn't quite manage. But thanks to the tent stitching and a mere 3 colors on this page, I did manage about 2,150 stitches. Not bad for three days work. :)

I'll be continuing on this one through the end of the month, and possibly until I finish this page and the next. She's 96 pages total, so it'll be a while before I get to those gorgeous eyes of hers. Something to look forward to, I guess.

Wishing everyone good luck and good progress. Until next time!

New Stash!!

Now we come to my greatest weakness... Buying stash! I know I have too much already, but dangit, these were pretty!

First, some lovlies from Golden Kite. They were having another category sale last week, and it was on my favorite subject: ladies! By the way, for all those wanting to take the GK plunge but hesitant about the price, here's a tip: Save up, make a wish list and buy 3 charts at once. I know it's a lot, but it's the bestest way since you get 30% off when you do that. Plus, if they're already on sale (as my lovlies were) you can save a total of 55%! So it's like getting 3 charts for the price of 2. :) Ok, enough rambling about that (no, I didn't get paid for saying it). Here's the pics!

Portrait of a Young Woman

Lilacs

The Interruption

The first two were "surprise" purchases, meaning they haven't been on my wishlist for very long, but were screaming quite loudly to join my hoard collection. On Portrait, I just couldn't resist those deep blues set against the cream, plus her expression. She seems so naughty and sweet! She must be up to mischief. Lilacs is a calmer picture that makes me think of summer and more refined times, like drinking cold tea in the shade of a tree, or fresh sheets hanging outside to dry. It's that green-purple-yellow combination that got me. The Interruption just makes me laugh. I don't think she minds it much. Probably a boring book anyway. :)

The others you may recognize from my last post. After rhapsodizing about all those samplers, I ended up buying a few, and they just arrived today.

Inspiration

Museum Celle 1826

Dutch Beauty

St. Reatham

These are by Rosewood Manor, Permin, and Long Dog respectively. I would not be surprised if I try to buy all of Long Dog's designs, which is silly. I should save up for thread to stitch one instead. But they all fascinate me. Out of this lot, I will probably tackle Museum Celle first. I love all those intricate motifs and the subtle shading with the red.

Well, that's all for now. Progress has been slow on Scale, as I just realized I had sewn a section wrong and had to frog about 100 stitches. I guess I'm just looking forward to my new start on the 20th. :)

Until next time!

March WIPocalypse

As usual, I'm a bit late to join the party, but here is my first WIPocalypse update! I know I've got lots of wips and lots of goals, but for WIPocalypse, I'm focusing on the two I want to make the most progress on: Pavonia and Moon Indigo. These will be with me throughout the year, so a monthly update is perfect to show progress.

First up is Pavonia. I posted a page finish a few weeks ago, but have made a bit more progress since then.

Pavonia, March 4

Since I tend to track goals as stitches rather than pages sewn, here are the stats for Pavonia:
February Goal: 1,240 stitches. Actual progress: 1,464 stitches. (Yay!)
Target Total: 2,480 stitches. Actual total: 2,709 stitches. (Double yay!)
So far, my weekend rotation seems to be working for this one. I'm hoping I can keep up the pace.

Unfortunately, I'm still behind on Moon Indigo despite stitching like crazy last month, but I'm not stressing about that yet. I spent a little too much time working on Green Fern Fairy (no regrets there) but the year is young. I finished page three about a week ago, and have made the tiniest bit of progress since then.

Moon Indigo, March 1

This one has been an easy stitch so far, but page 4 will be a bit more challenging. There are actually more colors in the moon than the background sky, and it keeps getting bigger. I guess that'll make a more interesting progress pic tho.
February Goal: 2,616 stitches. Actual progress: 3,530 stitches.
Target Total: 5,886 stitches. Actual total: 4,925 stitches.
Hopefully I can close this gap by the half year mark.

And of course, this month's topic!
If money - and time - were not limiters, what projects would be on your stitching bucket list?

Well, the obvious answer to that is, my entire stash! But moving away from the obvious answer... Lately, I've been drooling over various sampler designs produced by several companies like Long Dog, Permin, Ink Circles, The Drawn Thread, etc. etc. These designs are not what I usually stitch, but not because I don't like them. I just feel like they require a lot of time and attention, and I'd rather lose myself in something big and more straightforward. And of course, money is an issue. Lots of smaller projects means lots of thread and fabric, and I would want to use linen and hand dyed silk for most of these projects, which gets pretty pricey. Hopefully I can get a few of them done in my lifetime.

Here's a few on my wish list from 123Stitch.com:

Until next time. Happy stitching!

It's a Finish!!

Managed to finish this a couple days ago actually, but I've been too busy to post. So without further ado, here is my Green Fern Fairy, all finished!

All done!

For the beads I used Sulky invisible nylon thread, which was a trial to get used to, but once I got the hang of it, I really liked it. The hardest part was actually seeing where the thread was on the fabric, and counting across the appropriate number of threads to secure the bead. Guess I'm still not entirely comfortable with evenweave, but I'll definitely use it again. The clusters by her wings were actually the toughest, as I couldn't see the holes next to all those beads. But she still looks fabulous. :)

Here is a slanted close up to showcase the beads. You can also see that subtle sparkle in her wings.

Mood lighting to show off her bling

Looking at my notes, I was surprised to see this only took me 20 days of actual stitching to finish. Guess my stitching mojo is pretty strong this year. :) Next I'll be putting Scale on the frame, trying to get another page done on that.

Until next time, happy stitching!