Something Old, Something New

Well guys, the honeymoon is over. I have to report back to work on Monday. :/

I shouldn't complain since I've had 11 weeks off, but a girl gets used to things, you know? I'm trying to anticipate all the overtime and plan out what I'll be stitching and when, but my plans always seem to change. Hopefully I can go with the flow and find time for what I love. It's going to be a lot of adjustment though. We have to wear masks all day, and foot traffic has to move in certain directions? I'll find out when I get there. But Missouri is one of the states with lots of new cases, so I'm hoping we don't just get shut down again. The work has to get done at some point.

Okay, enough of that. I know I've had a bunch of new starts recently, but I've actually been trying to focus on a few wips to get some good progress in. My success is dubious at best, and everything is taking longer than I'd hoped, but slow progress is better than no progress. So here is Ann Barson Loughbro from Plum Street:

I think this is one of the wips that got skipped last year. I loved her when I first started, but I couldn't really get motivated on her this rotation and I really don't know why. I still love the verse, and the lacy border. Maybe because there's a lot of color changes? I'm gonna try to pick her up again next month and hopefully get the bottom left corner done. She is super small. Wish me luck!

I also picked up my 12 Days of Christmas by Jim Shore and managed to (finally!) finish the stitching on 5 Gold Rings:

I thought this would be such a quick block, but nope! I made two very bad counting errors that resulted in frogging about 2 hours of work, so that killed a lot of the impetus I had going. Plus there is a surprising amount of fiddly confetti scattered around this one. The leaves took a bit of patience, but the real culprit was "GOLD". There are three shades of gold there, and a lot of one or two stitch bits where I didn't want to carry my floss. I do love the end effect though, since it does seem to shimmer like gold.

I really wish I could do the beads as I go, but I know they have to wait. But next month I get to start on the giant goose laying eggs! :)

And, yeah, I have another new start. This one was a spontaneous stress start though, and I think it did help a bit. However, I spent so much time getting things together, I barely had any stitching time. Still, the process helped me deal with some pent up anxiety, and it was a good end to the day.

I actually just purchased this chart a few days ago and got it in the mail Saturday morning. I wanted to start it immediately and almost put off my morning plans to do so, but I thought I'd be sensible and do my adult things, so I set it aside. But the day ended up being so stressful at the end of a pretty trying week, I decided to go for it. So this is Passion by Reflets de Soie:

I knew it was meant to be because I already had the fabric and thread in my stash. The chart is huge, 557x410, so it requires a fat half even on 40ct. This is 40ct Espresso by R&R and the thread is a hank from Silks4U, PR034. The chart suggests a darker red, but I wanted to use what I had, and I like this red just fine. It's a good match for DMC 498, with maybe some hints of 816 and 815, a very subtle variegation. I had been thinking about trying a Bristol sampler, but I like this one much better, probably because of the sense of space. Also, there are 26 alphabets in 26 fonts, the first one starting at 4 stitches high (for the a) and gradually increasing. Something about that really appeals to the OCD nerd inside me.

I guess that's all I'll ramble about for today. Hopefully I'll be back in a couple weeks with more awesome progress. (ha!) Until then, hope you are enjoying your free time. Happy stitching!