IHSW, Ornament Check-In, WIPocalypse, and a Win

My only stitching goal this year was to keep up with the postings for all the SALs that I joined, I was keeping up just fine until this month.  Lots of life got in the way of just about everything not work related this month. I hope April's posting schedule is not indicitive of the rest of the year.

I am also way behind on my blog reading and commenting.  Please don't give up on me, I am trying to catch up on my reading, at least, and hopefully will be caught up by the end of this weekend.  I may not comment, but I am reading!!

So first up is my International Hermit and Stitch Weekend progress.  I worked on Kayann's Kreations' Elegant Doily.  Once again I stitched lots and lots of eyelets and while it's hard to see, there was definite progress:

Before:

And after:

I finished the eyelets around the diamond on the left and the row above the cut-out heart.  I have finally finished doing the pulled work around the prematurely cut sections so the stitching is going much faster as I don't have to worry about pulling too hard and pulling out the cut ends.

Next up is my April ornament check-in.  All of my ornaments can be seen in the 2013 Ornament tab above, but here is my April finish:

It is Cardinal Winter from Little House Needleworks' 2011 Ornament Series.  The word "tweet" didn't do too much for me, so I stitched a few more snowflakes instead.  I'm not thrilled with the spacing, so will probably add a couple more. 

April's WIPocalypse can be seen in the very imaginatively named "April WIPocalypse" tab above. There is not as much to show this month, but every stitch done is a stitch closer to a finish.

And last but definitely not least, Thank You, Julie!!!!  Julie the Red Couch Stitcher had a fabric give-away and I won this beautiful piece of 40-count Witch's Brew Newcastle linen from Silkweaver's.  It arrived in today's mail and I love it.  Here's the photo from Julie's blog the one I took, as usual, is bad:

I have a couple of ideas for projects on this but will have to think long and hard before starting one as frogging on 40-count is not fun!!  Thank you again, Julie.

Spring has definitely sprung here in central Virginia.  Our cherry tree was completely covered in blooms this year, it looked like a huge cone of pink cotton candy! The dogwoods are in full bloom, the hummingbirds are back and I have mowed the lawn for the first time with all the onions in the yard it smelled like I was mowing a salad actually some of the things I was mowing did look like greens that I had in a salad recently...

I am starting my new ornament today, a freebie from Waxing Moon designs called Summer Sparrow.  No, it's not a Christmas ornament but I'm stretching "ornament" to cover everything in my box of smalls which includes lots of things.  My stitch for next week is 99 from Ink Circles.

Little Progress and a Late TUSAL

You know the whole best laid plans thing?  Well, that's what happened to me last week.  I did very little of what I had planned stitching wise, most of my "gardening" consisted of planting an elephant ear bulb, sunflowers, basil and parsley and transplanting some daylilies, lots of unplanned reading and finished painting the kitchen island.  At least it was semi-relaxing.

Here is the bit of progress on Just Nan's Enchanted Swans:

Before:

and After:

Try as I might, I could not get the algerian eyelets to pull correctly.  I restitched them a number of times but finally gave it "done enough" and moved on.  I suspect I will be going back and trying again later.

I am almost a week late in posting my TUSAL photo, fortunately this is another stress-free SAL.

I will admit to having a thing for pink flamingos, I don't have them all over the yard yet but do have several stuffed ones, a papier mache one and several items of clothing with them.  DSon sent the following to me for my birthday:

Why yes they are Halloween decorations, but I like them so they are out now I'll probably pull them in before the worst of the summer sun hits so that they don't get too faded and yes the "bones" do glow in the dark.  Yes, most people would say that my garden is full of weeds, I actually prefer the term "wildflowers".  I like the little purple flowers  - they'll get pulled when they stop flowering leaving the bed free for the daylilies.

YOTA Check-In

Another fun SAL check-in!   All you have to do is stitch on a WIP.  You can focus on one, or like me, lots and post once a month - easy.  It's fun to see what everyone is working on and, of course, cheer them on.

I worked on several pieces this month, but will show Dimple Designs' Twilight of the Tsars.

Here's where I was when I started:

And here's where I left off:

Not a lot of cross stitch left, but there is quite a bit of backstitching and some beading so one, maybe two rounds in the rotation before a finish.

If you'd like to participate in the YOTA SAL, you can sign up here. 

I have taken next week off from work and have put a very old WIP on the frame.  The weather is supposed to be beautiful so there probably won't be as much stitching as I had planned when I first decided to take the week off, but some is better than none - especially when this what you are starting with:

This is as far as I got on Just Nan's Enchanted Swans when I started it in 1999!  The project is one of Just Nan's class project series and is one of many that I took as an on-line class through Tapestry of Dreams in Rhode Island a quick search did not find a listing for the store, so I suspect it is closed now.  Each week Kelly emailed you the directions for a different band and in a few months you had a completed sampler or at least that was the idea.  This is one of the few WIPs I can actually date with any precision as I have a copy of the email that was sent on March 4, 1999 with the directions for band 5.  Please do not post comments saying it is older than you are, the poor thing has a very bad complex as it has been sitting with other, younger, WIPs that are much further along!!