A 3-fer post

I'm late, I'm late for three SAL posts.  Not sure where the time has gone - I'm blaming allergy brain for the fogginess.  We're well into "yellow car season" here in central Virginia.  If you happen to live in an area that doesn't experience this, thank your lucky stars.  EVERYTHING is coated in a layer of pollen right now.  I was driving the other day and noticed a hazy look up the road, it took me a bit to realize it was pollen blowing across the fields and road.  We've turned on the air conditioning, not because it's hot (yet, we're supposed to be close to 90 by the end of the week) but to filter out the pollen.  We have such a short period of time when we can comfortably leave the windows open and I hate that it gets shortened even more with the pollen.

So the three SALs I'm late for are ,  and . 

International Hermit and Stitch Weekend was last weekend.  I did stitch but I didn't post here.  I did post on the Facebook Page, so I counted as completed on my check-in list but didn't seem right to not post here too.  If you're interested in participating in next month's, May's, weekend, click here to be taken to the direction page (direction sounds so much better than rules doesn't it?).  I worked on Japanese Zen (or Moss) Garden.  It went from here: 

to here:

I would have gotten more done, but I started playing around with my Cricuit (a Christmas gift from the whole family) and made these:

Aren't they the cutest?  There are small, 3" square, and were really fun to make.  I found the frames at Michael's for about $3 USD each (not including the coupon).

The Smalls SAL is the easiest post as I didn't complete it this month (maybe I could count the shells as a small finish?).  I am a few hours away from a finish, but didn't get there.  Just Nan's Pearl Orchids is here right now.

I do have to work on color balance in my pictures.  The fabric is Cameo Rose Cashel and it's a dusky peachy/coral/rose color, not purple or lilac.  Anyway, the two corners, an inner boarder and an outer area of stitching are all that's left.

This last weekend was .  Melissa at Measi's Musings hosts WIPocalypse.  In a nutshell, you give your already started pieces some lovin'.  Given all the folks I've heard that are taking part in Stitch Maynia, we may have a lot of new people participating in the near future.   Melissa gives us blog ques each month and this month's is:  Talk to us about your longest running WIP or UFO.  I honestly don't know.  Most of my long term WIPs were started right around the time my first husband died (stashing and starting were my therapy) and that was 20 years ago.  I have three pieces I know were started before that:  Crossed Wing Collection's Flower Power ; Floral Welcome ; and Rebecca de la Tour's The Heavenly Kiss .  Flower Power is about 1/3 done, Floral Welcome is about 1/2 done and The Heavenly Kiss is barely started.  Yes, I do have plans to finish them all (as well as the other 14 on my WIP list) just don't now when.


For current pieces, I have two that are on my WIPocalypse list this year.  Zen Garden (pictures above) and Goldie.  Goldie is a custom chart from Heaven and Earth Designs and will be my In-Law's Christmas gift some year.  She went from here: 

to here:

Goldie was on the frame this weekend, but I didn't put any new stitches into it.  I spent most of the weekend on card making fun, the Just Nan and one of my secret pieces so nothing more to show.  Except for a picture of Salem (the other two have had their pictures, so it's his turn)

If you look very closely, you'll see that while doing his yoga he's scratching the base of the scratching post - he's lazy but efficient. 

Gifted Gorgeousness for April

WOW! half way through April already.  The weather is behaving much more like mid-March with all the crazy temperature ups and downs.  We had snow a week ago, it was 82 F on Saturday and it's 40 F something today. 

I got sidetracked tonight so this will be short.  Yesterday was the official check-in day for .  Gifted Gorgeousness is hosted by the lovely Jo at Serendipitous Stitching and is designed for us to thank those wonderful folks that have gifted us with stitch things or show the things we're stitching for gifts or anything else we can shoehorn into the theme.  Except for my Small SAL piece, all of my pieces this year are gifts (all two of them) - I've just recently added three more projects but I can't show any of them right now as they are surprises.

Goldie is a gift for my in-laws.  It's a stocking that was charted by Heaven and Earth Designs of their German Shepherd puppy Goldie she has some really long registration name that I can't remember but her call name is Goldie.  Last month she was here:

and yesterday she was here:

I will withhold judgment for a while but the blue in her nose is a major distraction for me.  I am happy with my progress on this one. 

My other piece is Japanese Zen Garden by Chatelaine.  This is a gift for my son.  At last month's check-in it was here:

and when it went on the frame last night it was here:

I finally figured out that the corner is a water feature splashing around the rocks.

Not included in Gifted Gorgeousness is Just Nan's Pearl Orchid which went from here:

to here:

The colors are much truer in the top picture - amazing what lighting will do as they were both taken with the same camera.

It is too early in the month to report, but I have officially blown my Stich from Stash budget.  I had patterns but not fabric for the projects I need to start, so while only a bit over, I went over.  Oh well, it could have been much worse.

And before I forget, it's also TUSAL time.  Sharon at It's Daffycat hosts this SAL.  Click on the link for all the rules, but they can be summed up as: Save your bits and scraps, put them in a jar, take a picture and post.  This is a "because we can" type SAL.

Spot is not as enthused about being the model cat as Trouble was last month.

An April Weekend

At least that's what the calendar says.  We woke up to snow on the ground this morning, so it is not a normal April so far.  It is supposed to warm up by the end of the week so maybe we will actually have spring before summer hits.

Not a very exciting week here - work was unnervingly quiet normally I like quiet but given the weird, craziness that we've been living through, quiet is scary.  I ran over to King's Dominion on Friday  we only live about 6 miles away so we have season tickets and rode Twisted Timbers their new roller coaster.  It is a wooden coaster with steel tracks.  It was a good ride, lots of air time, but other than looking like a wooden coaster it didn't have the feel of a wooden coaster - it was too quiet.  I'll definitely ride it again, but prefer the two wooden ones.

The rest of the weekend was stitching - or should have been - I did the usual "oh I can do XXXX because I have two whole days for stitching so a few hours won't matter" and frittered away a lot of the weekend.  I had a small start on Just Nan's Pearl Orchid

This is stitched on 28 count Cameo Rose Cashel with DMC.  The fabric, pattern, beads and a length of overdyed silk came in a "Pattern Pack" so I just had to pull the DMC.  I'll hold my opinion on the fabric until I've finished the stitching, but as of right now, I would not have picked it as the light pink thread (DMC 225) is getting lost.

I spent the majority of my stitching time this weekend working on Chatelaine's Japanese Zen Garden.  It went from here:

to here:

Stitched on 32-count Summer Sky Jobelan with DMC conversion

I didn't think I'd had much progress, but looking at the before and after, I'm pretty happy.  I'm still aiming for a finish this year, but I don't think that's terribly realistic.  I have a few other crafting things that I need to do and they'll take one or two weekends each, so that's almost a month of stitching time that I won't have.  This whole working for a living is getting really old.  Why was I born beautiful instead of rich?

An eyelet, a dog and a chart

Despite a bit more housework than usual and trying to get settled back into a routine before I head into the office I worked from home today it was a good stitching weekend.

The missing eyelet on Happy Bluebird from Just Nan is now in place, so I have a finish.  I picked Pearl Orchid by Just Nan as my small for April.  I didn't get any stitching time on it, but the threads are pulled and it's ready to start - maybe later this evening.

Lots of progress on Goldie.  On Friday, she was here:

and last night when I put her up for the week, she was here:

I think I finished four colors and yes, if you're looking closely that's blue on her muzzle. There is also some green that will go in later.  I don't know how those colors work, and I have learned not to question them as I'm stitching, but it is always a surprise when you come across something like that.  The lighter brown you see is more a mauve color - again how your eye makes it brown, I don't know, but it does.

I also finished the main stitching on Forever Love:

I've put this up for a while as I am deciding whether to stitch the band with the bride and groom's initials like this:  , or leave the block off and stitch their names and the date just underneath or have their names and date painted on the mat when it's framed.  I'm leaning towards stitching their names, but have until December 2019 to decide. 

Japanese Zen Garden is on the frame for this week.