Year of Starts #3

Last week I decided to carry on with Unusual Specimens since four days really doesn't satisfy for a rotation. I'm actually using this piece for the Stitch by the Numbers SAL in Full Coverage Fanatics on facebook, so I need to get to 2400 stitches this month. I haven't made an exact count, but I know I'm still a couple hundred short. But I am making some good progress:

Those wings are a confetti nightmare! I'm probably making it harder on myself trying to stitch pages one and two together, but page one is like 500 stitches, so whatever. I think I just started getting the hang of things on Friday, but now I'm putting it away for a while. I think I'll bring it out again in a week though, we'll see. It is kind of addictive. :)

I had a lot going on this week, including some cooking I did for a party at work (my first time doing that!) so I didn't give as much attention to Cassiopeia as I would have liked, but then I never do. I might have gotten more done, but stitching when I was too tired resulted in frogging about 50 stitches, and after that I had to go to bed. But here's my progress for this week:

Her dress (in this quadrant at least) is almost done. I've just got one more darker green and a little black motif, and voila! All those other gaps are for beads. Seriously. I've also gotten more done on the couch; that's the dark brown and the vertical part. It seems there's still so much to do on her, but I'm still hoping to finish this section this month. Wish me luck!

And yes, today is the 18th, so here is my new start for March:

This is the Virtue Sampler by Little House Needleworks. I think this chart is adorable! I like stitching houses, and trees, and words, and it's not too big, so maybe I can finish it this decade. I'm working on Limestone Belfast with all the called for threads, and there's only 9 colors. Just simple and sweet. :)

Okay, it's that time again:

This week we had our warmest day so far, 76°, so I got to stitch with my darker yellow, 742. That's just one shade away from my first orange. *sigh* I'll get there soon enough I suppose, and then I'll be whining for those greens again. :)

Next week  I'll keep working on my Virtue Sampler in the mornings and Luna in the evenings. I want to make some good progress on her this year, so that means working on her more than just on Sundays. So until next time, happy stitching! :)

New Start, Meager Progress

Hello again! I'm back with a new start (like I don't have enough) and some meager progress. This week I have the excuse of a minor cold though. I can't really stitch at all when I'm sick. I just sleep or stare at my computer for a few hours. I'm feeling better now though, so next week should be better. (Optimism! Yay!)

In the evenings, I've been stitching away on Cassiopeia, and I am totally in love with her! I have a new phone with a new camera that can't really capture her colors, but she is looking quite gorgeous, I must say:

So that's six days worth of stitching, though I was kind of sick for four of them. The chart is actually divided into quadrants, so I've decided to focus on the lower right quadrant and hopefully finish it this month. It's kind of tricky stitching as there are lots and lots of beads and a bit of confetti, but I'm getting through it. I've started stitching in some of those golden leaves she's holding, but most of those are actually beads as well. Hopefully next week I will start on the skin and stitch her arm. Can you kind of see the outline of her hand? :)

And yes, I had a new start as well, and of course, it's another HAED. This is actually the 18th HAED I've started, and I haven't finished any of them yet. :) I started it on the 6th because I have a thing with dates and I liked how March 6th is written out: 3-6-18 (cuz that's how we write it in America). Anyway, this is called Unusual Specimens, by Stephanie Law:

I've loved this design since I first saw it, but I almost talked myself out of starting it. I really really don't like insects of any type, and I'm actually afraid of bees (or anything that bites or stings) so it's kind of weird for me to want to stitch a giant bee. But those flowers at the bottom are so pretty, even if they're generating giant mutant bees, so I thought I'd give it a go. And so far, I'm really pleased with how the blues are stitching up.

This is my first project on Easy Count fabric (this is 25ct) and it took some getting used to. Those gray lines are tricky since they don't outline a 10x10 stitching square, just 10 threads on the fabric. That means that two sides of your 10x10 square are stitched along the gray thread, and two sides are stitched just inside those lines. So count carefully if you decide to use this fabric! Otherwise, I do like it. It's a bit stiffer than my usual evenweave, but not as stiff as the DMC Magic Guide. I picked this piece up from HAED as a remnant, but 123 Stitch has also started selling it, just fyi. :)

And now my Temperature charts! I think if I didn't post these every week, I would be tempted to stitch on something else and fall way behind. So here they are:

I got to stitch some nice blues and teals this week, very nice relaxing colors. This was also the first week I haven't used 959 since early January. That ornament stitches up super fast since it's just a repeating pattern. I've been toying with the idea of stitching that again for next year, but having a more limited palette, like all blues or something. Just an idea.

Ok, gotta get back to stitching. Until next time! ;)

Moon Indigo, page 11

Finally! I have a whole page finish on Moon Indigo:

This is page 11, totally complete. It has taken me an age to slog through all the confetti, but it's finally done, and she looks fabulous. :) Honestly, I started this page on June 11th last year and just finished it Feb. 28th! I don't know how many hours it took, but I did spend 30 days on this page when my usual is 20-25. Anyway, it's done, she's gorgeous, and I'm on to page 12!

Last week I spent my mornings on the Stitchrovia Quotes SAL, but all I've managed so far are a bunch of borders:

So I've got the main outer border stitched as far as I can within the q-snap, plus the border for my next quote, which is #8 in the series. I did manage a tiny start on the interior banner, but all the fun stuff will have to wait til next time.

As I mentioned, I'm digging Cassiopeia out of hiding this month. I only worked on her for 4 days in 2017, and never took a picture, but I did remember to take a pic after I'd worked on her a bit last Friday:

I'm into the tricky bit around her arm, by those golden leafy things she's holding. There are lots of beads in that area as well, so it's going to be full of gaps for a while, but I'm really happy to have her out again. Hopefully I can make a good bit of progress on her this month, despite the fact that overtime already seems to be happening. (ugh!)

I also had a happy surprise on my Temperature charts this week:

See it? It's yellow! And it's so bright! On Feb. 27th (my best friend's birthday) we hit 71° so I was finally able to stitch with 725, my first yellow. It seems we're finally moving away from all those purples and dark blues and into the teals and darker greens. Now I'm waiting for the first appearance of orange. :)

Well, the year seems to be zooming by but I'm still managing to stitch every day, even if only for 20 minutes. But every stitch counts! For February, I managed 11,146 stitches, so I'm up to 23,895 stitches for the year so far. I'm aiming for 10,000 a month, though I think I'd have to stitch 3 times that to make my crazy goals. :)

Hope you all are having a wonderful stitchy time, wherever you are and whatever you're working on. Until next time!

My (Belated) 2016 Review, Part One

Whew! I had a lot going on in 2016, including a lot of stitchy stuff. Moving took up a big chunk of my year, (which is why this is a bit late), and there've been some family issues as well, though nothing too serious. It's just been a lot of a lot. I'm still trying to get things back to "normal," which at the moment means getting totally unpacked. Plans kind of fell apart mid December, so it'll be a while. Plus, I'd rather stitch than organize, so all those boxes will just have to wait. :)

So at last, here is my review! It's going to be a long one -- so long I've broken it up into two parts. I had 30 active projects last year, including 19 new starts (went a little crazy), but also 3 finishes! I am a notorious list maker and stitch counter, so I'll start off by dazzling you with my stitchy stats for last year. Ready? Ok!

All told, I did 131,496 stitches last year. Can you believe it? I can't. I never thought I'd do over 100k. I've had a busy needle, I guess. Part of that is doing lots of tent stitches instead of full crosses. Part is also due to my early morning stitching before work. Usually I only get an hour in the mornings, but I guess I'm a fast stitcher (?) as I can usually do 200 to 250 stitches in that hour, so even a few days a week can really add up.

I also know I've stitched about 623.85 hours last year, so my average is 210.8 stitches per hour. Sounds about right. I didn't manage to stitch every day (only managed 10 days in December) but for the year, I stitched 303 days. I would like to stitch every day this year, but over 300 is still pretty good.

I've got more detailed lists and spreadsheets with even more stats, but I don't think any normal people care about all that. You want pictures, right? Right! So here's all my wips carried over from 2015:

First is Pavonia. I had hoped to do so much more on her, but I got kind of overwhelmed by the confetti and had to set her aside. I did manage to get one section done though, and was very happy to get one of her eyes done:

Moon Indigo was a focus piece this year, so I tried to work on her every month. I really wanted to get that last column finished in 2016, but just couldn't make it. Still, I pretty much met my goal with her, finishing up pages 6, 7 and 8, and starting page 9:

Scale is a lot of fun, but can also be a lot of work with all that white! In the end I just powered through it and finished off two more pages this year. My mother now calls this one "Big Nose":

Euphoria is one of my easiest wips, with just 3 colors in the skin, plus she's tent stitched. I finally got part of that flower stitched this year, so it's not quite so boring to look at:

Wisdom is one of my favorites, but I just can't seem to get going on her. I did manage to finish page 1, but not the page beneath it. Halfway is still good though:

Madchen is nothing but sky at the moment, but there's more of it now than in 2015:

Flora saw a good deal of progress this year as I finished off 3 more pages (one was really small though). The bottom two rows are now complete:

Kabuki was kind of forgotten about halfway through the year. I had hoped to get her face done, but the chart is tricky to read, and she's not always fun to work on. But she will be back in 2017:

Favorite Bird is my biggest wip, so I should really try for more progress. But 3 pages last year is good enough for now. But I'm going to be stitching floor for a while:

Cassiopeia is another that wasn't picked up as much as I wanted. She is so easy and relaxing to work on, and I love those colors. Managed to get the bottom border done, and have just started working on her couch:

Tigers was my oldest wip, an old kit from Nature's Window. I was so happy to finally get it finished last year! Yes, it's still sitting in a drawer, but it is still a finish:

So that's it for all my older wips. The only wip that did not see progress was White Queen, which is a little sad. But I will try again this year.

All my other projects were new starts last year, which I'll save for part two of this post, in a day or three. Hope everyone is having a good stitchy year so far! Until next time! :)

June WIPocalypse

Hi there!

Today is officially the first day of summer, but it's been over 90 degrees (F) here for about two weeks.Ugh! Looking over the projects I've worked on in the last month, it seems like a lot more time has passed since I stitched on them. I've been sooo busy at work, stuff I worked on four weeks ago feels more like two or three months ago. It kind of gives me that surreal feeling like time is going both really fast and really slow. But I guess the year is half over, or just about.

Let's see... I worked on Cass for a while, as she's nice easy stitching when I'm feeling stressed. Here's where I left her in March:

I managed to finish the bottom border and get to the edge of her dress plus the end of her couch, then I rolled her up and stitched a bit more:

I got some more green done on my Tigers, but couldn't quite finish all the leaves. It's pretty close though:

Flora started a new page, which is off to a good start:

I added a couple columns on Moon Indigo (I also did a parking demo with her if you're interested, just click the tab at the top):

I figure if I do just two columns a month on Luna, I'll get another 11,400 stitches done by the end of the year, which is about a page and a half. Not a bad total for just a little attention each month. :)

I also finally pulled out Scale for the first time this year, but only for  a few days so far. Last year I managed to get her massive eye done. This year, it'll be her massive nose:

And last but not least, I had a new start for my birthday (can't believe that was less than 4 weeks ago!). This is Ginger Nova from HAED:

I've got four columns of page one done (large format). Just a few more columns to finish the page (and my goal for the year) but I doubt I'll put her away after that. I really love stitching on her and watching those colors take shape into stars and light and space. I'd love to get into the orange of her inner halo, but we'll see. :)

Phew! Didn't realize I'd touched so many projects since last time. No wonder it feels like more than a month. My stitch total for May was 8,918 stitches, my lowest for the year, but I'm still really happy with that. For the year, I'm up to 67,475 stitches, which I think is awesome! My original goal was 90,000 stitches for the year, but now I want to see if I can break 100,000, which is something I always thought would be impossible. But I am definitely going to give it a try. :)

This month's question is: Do you find yourself more productive with stitching in summer or winter?

I am definitely a winter stitcher. I know in January, I'm all excited about the new year and new goals, which always motivates me well into February. Then in late March, the seasons change, I start my spring cleaning, work gets busier, I go out shopping more, etc., and my stitching mojo gradually diminishes. Usually by May, I'm lucky to be doing any stitching at all (though this year might have turned the tide on that). June and July are usually so hot and awful, everything takes so much more energy and time gets away from me. Then by August, I'm trying to play catch up, and by September I settle down and try to finish up my more important goals. I usually hit my stride by October, then stitch like mad 'til the end of the year to finish as much as possible, then start the whole thing over again.

 I know most people like stitching when the sun is bright, but there's something about stitching when it's dark out that makes it seem more cozy, like there's nothing else in the world outside my lamp and my stitching. It makes it easier to focus. I guess that's why I prefer stitching on a winter evening to summer. :)