May Wrap Up

Hello again! I hope you've all had a productive week. :) I'm still a bit scattered (but beginning to find my flow) so I've got a lot to share this week. But first, here's a little story about obsession.

So, have you ever had something kind of on your mind a lot to the point where everything you encounter reminds you of that something? Like if you're thinking about cinnamon rolls, and someone mentions "aluminum foil" and you say, "Yes! I love cinnamon rolls!" Well, that's kinda what happened with me and Louisa Horsey.

So I started Louisa Horsey, another one from Shakespeare's Peddler. After a lot of internal debate, I made this my birthday start, though I've been resisting her since March. I had intended to start Ann Thomas from HATS, but that can wait. Louisa is one of those charts that didn't appeal to me at first, but hearing Theresa Venette extol all her virtues when she was released, I decided to get her anyway. I am a chart collector after all. Then sometime in February, I just got this impulse to pull her out and look at her. I was busy, so I shrugged off that impulse, but then she kept popping up at random places, so I finally gave in and pulled out her chart. And then I fell in love!

Louisa's border is probably one of my favorites. It has a double vine which is very time consuming, but also very beautiful. There are several kinds of flowers with different styles and color palettes, and a few odd bits thrown in for interest. I'm stitching her with dmc on 40ct Vintage Examplar from Lakeside Linen, starting in the bottom right corner:

I'm about 2700 stitches in and loving it so far. I wish I could have splurged on the silks, but I can't always indulge. The dmc colors are really nice though. The white/cream flower does blend into the fabric a lot, but I can't decide if I want to change the colors. Whenever it catches the light, it just seems to glow. There's a little girl in the other corner to mirror the boy, though the french knots I did for his eyes aren't the best. Still, isn't he cute? It's the little details, like the heels of his shoes done over 1, that really draw me to this pattern.

If you're not familiar, Louisa Horsey is a mourning sampler done to commemorate the death of her infant brother. The middle has a ton of over 1 stitching that lists her entire family and a verse, plus various motifs. I'm not the best at over 1, but I'm looking forward to the challenge. But I know it will be a while before I get there. For now, I'll just focus on that lovely pastoral scene. If you want to hear Theresa talk about Louisa, check out her Quicky StitchyTube 2 around 14:05.

Ok, I'll stop gushing about Louisa. For now.

I haven't shown Elizabeth Oliver in a while, but I haven't been neglecting her. It's just taken me a long time to finish off all this grass:

So that's the entire lawn and drive that will eventually lead to a great manor house. It's only about 3000 stitches, but I've been working on it since March. I'm hoping to have the house done by the end of August, but we'll see how long construction takes.

I also got a little addicted to Ginger Nova and managed to finish off page 2 with a little start on page 3:

It's fun to stitch all those bursts of color, though the stars are very confetti heavy. I kind of want to keep going on her, but I have too many other projects calling. *sigh*

I'm still playing catch up with Luna, but I managed 4 columns in May:

I hope I can keep up this pace for a while longer. There's still 17 columns left to finish the row.

Well, that's all for now. It always feels like I have nothing to talk about or everything to talk about. I'll try to work on that. :) Take care of yourselves. Happy stitching!

Feeling Adrift

Well, it finally happened. About two weeks ago I think I lost track of the days. I had planned to do an update, but then suddenly it was Wednesday? And now another week has gone by. *sigh*

Hello everyone! Hope you are all keeping well. I am still off work, and it's been long enough that I'm really enjoying my days. I'm still kitting things up and organizing my stash a bit, but I've also begun knitting again and I did a bit of quilting today. To those who are still working, I do hope you are finding ways to relax stay sane. :)

My stitching was a bit erratic at the beginning of May, mostly because I didn't know if I'd be returning to work and I was starting to stress out a little. But I did start another HAED, rather on impulse, but also because I have so many that I love and want to play with. So this is Secluded Blue, art by Annie Stegg, stitched 1x1 on 25ct Mushroom Lugana:

I managed 1400 stitches on the first page. I really love Annie's work and felt it was a crime not to have anything of hers on my needles. I also want to start Atargatis, named after the mythical first mermaid, but that one has a lot of black and I didn't want to stitch such dark colors when I'm stressed. But I love the brown and blue combination in Secluded Blue (even though there's still a lot of black at the moment) so this is making me pretty happy. I also wanted to try stitching in diagonal blocks since it looks like a lot of fun, but I don't think it meshes with my way of stitching. I start all of my threads on the front, and I just can't figure out how to keep them all organized and out of the way, so I'll probably go back to columns. Of course, I don't have any firm plans for this one. She'll just pop up in rotation every now and then.

I also managed two more columns on Ginger Nova, so I'm getting into some color changes:

I'm hoping to finish off two more columns this year, since that will complete page 2. :)

Part 5 of the Wonders of Space sal was released on the 15th, and it was a really quick stitch:

Looks a little creepy, doesn't it? That is an infrared image of a supermassive black hole. The bright parts represent the super heated material the black hole is "eating". Neat, huh?

Of course, the last week has been dominated by my last new start, Ann Dale 1827 by Shakespeare's Peddler, which I started May 10th. I'd been looking forward to this one all year so I worked on her a lot, starting in the bottom right corner:

I decided to stitch this with the called for silks -- mostly NPI with 2 Gloriana and a Belle Soie -- on 40ct Saltmarsh Green by R&R Reproductions. I don't get to stitch with silks often, but I really love the NPI, which might have motivated me to keep stitching. There is one color used for the leaves in the border that doesn't show up well on this fabric, so I started using another Belle Soie silk called Lily Pad instead. It was in my stash and matches the NPI very well, but has a darker variegation to it that tends toward green. If I had the resources, I might've swapped out the golds for greener colors, but I'm not good at color swapping, and it's really hard to do it from online shopping. Still, I think it'll look great.

I haven't been able to find any pictures of the full finished sampler online, but I did find this one on Kitten Stitcher's website:

This is A Part of Ann Dale, which is it's own separate chart and only has the bottom scene. But these are the same colors, so it gives a pretty good representation of what I'm working toward. A lot of the colors seem pale, but when I stitched the line of white that frames the grass and the tree, I felt like I was stitching sunlight, and that made me smile. The only warning I will give if anyone else decides to stitch this is that the designer left in all of Ann's mistakes, so be careful. The strawberry vine isn't even, and the hills on the grass aren't symmetrical, so just be aware. Still, it's a great chart. My goal is to finish this in May 2027, so it'll be like an anniversary. :)

Well, this is why I need to update more often. Lots of rambling. Hope you enjoyed the pictures at least. Until next time!