Good Bye 2017

2017 was a year of big occasions in my family.  The year started with a surgery (my gallbladder removal) and ended with one (The Hubs had his rotator cuff repaired on Thursday).  In between, my parents celebrated their 59th wedding anniversary, DSon moved from Vermont to Michigan and started a new job, DNephew and DNiece were both married, DSis and DBIL celebrated their 30th wedding anniversary and The Hubs' niece announced her engagement.  Phew! I'm ready for a bit of a rest.

As it's the end of December as well as the end of the year, it's time for the final  check-in for 2017.  WIPocalypse is hosted by Melissa at Measi's Musings and is a personal challenge, not a contest, to stay on goal and finish some of those WIPs that most of us have hanging around.  She gives us topics each month for discussion and December's is to recap what we've done through the year.  This is going to be long and picture heavy.  

So for 2017....  I had the same number of finishes, 12, that I had last year.  You can see all my finishes in the tab labeled "Finishes" but I am going to show them here too.  You can see all my small finishes in my last post those I'm not going to reshow.

So first up was wedding samplers. I finished To Have and To Hold Bridal Sampler and Sentimental Hearts both by The Sweetheart Tree.  There are changes made to both samplers - mostly color changes on To Have and To Hold  but a little bit of chart reworking as the names were a bit longer than would fit.  A verse and names were added to Sentimental Hearts.



To Have and To Hold

Sentimental Hearts



After the wedding samplers, I moved onto a Christmas stocking, A Glimpse of Santa from Stoney Creek:

And around those finishes, I also had Winter Wonderland from The Silver Needle which was my first finish of the year and Snowgirls from Country Garden Stitchery:

Winter Wonderland

Snowgirls

I had progress on my Heaven and Earth Design projects.

Shakespearean Fantasy

January 1, 2017

December 31, 2017

Santa and the Mouse

January 1, 2017

December 31, 2017

and It's About Time

January 1, 2017

December 31, 2017

The Enchantment of Winter was a new start:

And Santa's Magic made an unexpected appearance in December.

January 1, 2017

December 31, 2017

I finished his beard with about 5" of Wisper thread left - if anybody is keeping track it will take more than two cards of Wisper White to finish this piece.  Rather than put in another order for a thread that I didn't really like stitching with, I made an executive decision that any other areas that were charted for Wisper would be done in plain old DMC white.  If I were to do it again, I would probably use B5200 for the charted white and white for the charted Wisper.  I think that would give just enough shade difference to keep it from looking flat.  I got my order of Kreinik in today's mail, but I won't be pulling this one out until I finish my two obligation pieces.

After putting Santa away, I pulled out Japanese Zen Garden.  Yes, it's a little early to start my 2018 rotation, but it kept calling.  It went from here:

To here:

I needed the green border to hold those gold swirls in place.  As they are off center I kept thinking I was off on my count.  Now that everything is neatly contained it is going much better.  I had planned to work on this all day today, but my phone's battery has been acting up (not holding a charge, heating up while charging, etc.) and today was the first appointment I could get.  Word of advice - do NOT go to an Apple store at anytime around Christmas - it was mobbed.  Between the waiting and the fixing and the grocery store my afternoon was shot. I am not planning on going anywhere tomorrow so there should be more swirly bits by tomorrow night.

So those are my finishes and progress for 2017.  I will be participating in WIPocalypse in 2018 and will be back in a week or so to post my goals and hopefully show some progress on Zen and Goldie.

A start, a finish and other stuff

Another finish!  I am as shocked as you!  Sentimental Heart is now hanging on the "Admire Me" curtain and will be off to the framer sometime this week. 

It took a while to get the beads figured out on the modified areas, but I am happy with how it turned out.

With that finish, I have one commitment piece to go.  A Glimpse of Santa is one the frame now and looks like this:

Someday this will be a Christmas stocking.  The pattern is from the Stoney Creek Collection and is done on antique white 28-count Monaco with DMC.  There will be a few modifications for this one also as the pattern is so old (I just found it but the copyright is 2001) that most of the called for bits and bobs are no longer available.  I see some time at the jewelry/bead sections of the big box stores in my future and am looking forward to seeing what I can find.

I also got some time in on Santa and the Mouse and Shakespearean Fantasy this week.

Started his glove and did a bit of a curtain.

More black here, but I should be back into the greens when I pull it back out Friday evening.

And last for this week:

Gold and Purple Corner by Scarlet Suen for The Sampler Life SAL.  I have a couple more gold motifs to add and then onto the purple.  I am fairly confident I will finish this one this month. I do need to unroll this so I can get a photo of the whole thing and remind myself what it looks like.

I should pull It's About Time out and get a few stitches into it this evening, but I am beat.  I had some minor surgery last Wednesday.  Few days off work and, because of my killer commute, a couple weeks of telework just to be sure everything stays together and where it's supposed to be.  I had no trouble getting up and getting going this morning, but around 2:30 this afternoon my energy level fell through the floor and I almost fell asleep on my computer.  Granted the project I'm working on isn't the most exciting thing ever dreamed up, but it isn't something that normally puts me to sleep.  All that round about to say, I don't think I will be doing any stitching tonight.  But as I have two weeks of evenings ahead of me, I'm not going to be too upset about losing tonight.

March's Gifted Gorgeousness

I'm sure I mentioned that we recently had 80 F temperatures here in central Virginia.  WELL, we are paying for it in spades.  If you're on the East Coast of the US you know what I am talking about, if you're not, there is a major storm moving up the coast with lots of snow, ridiculously cold temperatures and strong winds.  In other words, it's a good ol' Nor'easter and we should have had it in January or February, not the middle of March. We missed the snow at my house, but when I got up this morning, there was a coating of ice on everything.  They called a 3-hour delay into work or unscheduled telework.  As that kind of delay doesn't fit in the train schedules even on a good day, I teleworked again today.  It was nice to be inside and warm (except for that 10 minutes at lunch when I went out to fill the bird feeders).

DSon lives in Vermont and his last text to me was that he can't remember a storm like this one. At the time it had been snowing several hours and he had 7" with up to 20" predicted (just got another text and there is just under 12" right now). Before it got too bad, he went out and made

Yep, snow angles.  He figured this was so much better than getting snow down the back of his jacket and besides as you can probably tell, there wasn't that much snow at the time, so falling into it would have meant a painful thunk on the frozen ground.  

Any way, onto stitching and March's .  Jo at Serendipitous Stitching hosts this SAL to give us a way to say thank you to everyone that has gifted us stitching goodness or to show off pieces that we are doing as gifts or anything you can shoehorn into the term "gift".  The link will take you to the Gifted Gorgeousness page where you can find all the information you need to participate.  While you're there, click around Jo has a wonderful blog and lots of beautiful stitching.

I actually have quite a lot to show so this will be picture heavy.  First up is Santa and the Mouse.  This is a retired freebie from Heaven and Earth Designs.  It's taken from a Scott Gustafson work.

I finished two columns and another 300 or so stitches into the new one.  As this was a freebie, I count it as a gift from the company/designer.

Also from Heaven and Earth Designs is Shakespearean Fantasy.  This one is an adaptation of a James C. Christensen work.  

I have almost finished another column.  I should be able to finish the last couple of blocks and maybe start a new column on Friday.  The pattern for this piece was a gift from Pull the Other Thread.

And my last HaED is It's About Time by Ciro Marchetti.  

I got another 100 stitch block done.  Don't know what is going on with the lines, they don't show on the piece. Oh well.  The pattern for this one was gifted to me by Kate at Needles and Haystacks.  If you haven't seen any of her stitching you need to check out her blog.  She does the most amazing redesigns and her stitching is gorgeous.  Oh and she's started designing too.

This piece is a gift to DNiece and her husband (well he will be when they open the gift).  It's Sentimental Hearts from The Sweetheart Tree with one modification so far:

It's a craptastic photo as usual.  The area where the saying is was lengthened a bit and the saying replaced an alphabet.  I am going to replace a section a little further down with their names and the date of the wedding. Lots of beads, paillettes and heart beads finish it.  Mostly DMC, but some perle coton and one Needle Necessities that was converted to a ThreadworX color.

And finally another piece that was a freebie:

This is the block from Golden Circle Designs for The Sampler Life SAL.  22 designers donated squares to the SAL, so like the HaED's freebie, I am counting it as a gift.  I am aiming for a finish this month, but it seems to have taken forever to get it just this far.

More than a bit late this time

Once again, I had post ideas running through my head and photos downloaded and all I had to do was sit down and put it all here.  It just didn't happen (obviously).  No reason other than time got away from me again.  So without further ado, here is:

,  Heather at Stitching Lotus hosts this SAL.  No strange rules or special patterns to purchase for this SAL.  Just stitch a small  and post your finishes on the last Friday of each month.  Simple right?  The rules are simple, actually finishing something has been the challenge for me, but I finally had a finish in February. You've seen it before but as it took me sooooo long to finish it I am showing it off again.

The more I look at it, the more it looks like it's been sucking lemons or forgot to put its dentures back but something just looks off about the mouth.  I think I'll stop looking at it too hard and just move onto the next small. 

Not close to a finish, but a little more progress.  You can really see where I frogged in this picture.  I need to invest in a lint roller to get all those bits of frog fuzz off the piece.

The second SAL I am late for is .  Melissa at Measi's Musings hosts this SAL.  Not only does this SAL help me focus on finishing up those pesky WIPs, but Melissa provides prompts for us in the event we can't figure out what to blog about.  This month's is:  What is your favorite stitch other than the standard cross stitch?  That is easy.  I love doing Rhodes stitch in all its variations.  Squares, circles, rectangles, hearts - the more the merrier.  This http://www.needlework-tips-and-techniques.com/rhodes-stitch.html will take you to a site that has instructions on square, heart and a few variations on the Rhodes stitch.  I like it because it adds a bit of texture to a piece without being too bulky that and I LOVED doing string art pieces when I was a kid and it seems to have stuck.

I had progress on three of the projects on my WIPocalypse list this month.

First It's About Time went from here:

to here:

It's only 200 stitches, but it was a hard won 200 stitches.

Shakespearean Fantasy was here  at last month's check in.  Today, it's here:    I had more progress on this one than I thought as there is a column finish and about 400 stitches into a new one.

Santa and the Mouse went from here  to here 

I finished two columns and got a bit of a start on the next one.  I'm still not completely settled in with this one.  I am not used to starting in the center and I feel all discombobulated.  

And Sentimental Heart looked like this in January  and today it looks like this  While I like doing Rhodes stitch, those little spiderweb roses are a very close second.  I finally, finally, finally, have the wording changes all figured out and drafted.  I should get to them this weekend. So all that muttering and swearing you hear on the wind is me.

I am not sure how much stitching I will get done in the foreseeable future like so much stitching has been getting done anyway as my telework schedule was changed from Thursday and Friday to Friday and Monday.  Same number of days but not the same amount of time.  I can stay up later on Thursday knowing I don't have to get up at 4:00 Friday morning.  Unfortunately, I do have to get up at 4:00 on Tuesday morning, so it's an early night on Monday.  I think I'm going to lose two or three hours of stitching time while this is going on.  I'm very happy to pass along my knowledge but ugh. Oh well, at least they didn't take the telework day away.

A Finish

This finish gets...

Yes, I finally finished

Tiny Tiger by Artecy Cross Stitch counts as the longest it has taken me to stitch something this small. The piece is 50X50 stitches and I started it in June 2016 and just dragged and dragged. I decided that it had sat around long enough and was determined to finish it. I finished the majority of the stitching yesterday and spent a good chunk of today filling in missing stitches.  

I have progress on a few of my other WIPs too.

It's About Time was pulled out after a few month's hiatus:

It has 100 new stitches and I was able to get a little bit of a rhythm going.  That rhythm passed over to Shakespearean Fantasy

I finished one column and started another.  Lots of black for the next few stitching rounds, but I am getting close to a page finish.

After I finished Tiny Tiger, I put Sentimental Hearts back on the frame and got it to here:

The little spider web rose was fun to do.  After looking at the picture, I think I need to redo the eyelet on the left as the center hole isn't the same size as the one on the right.  I still haven't made any progress on the name/saying decision, but need to do it soon as the vine on the right is close to the beginning of the alphabet section that I want to replace.

SAL check-ins

I'm home!  The training I did last week went well (or at least I think it went well, haven't seen the evaluations yet).  There were only two problem "children" but my training partner and I figured them out pretty quick and kept them under control.

As I mentioned in my last post, no new stitching happened this week, but I do have four SALs that have check-ins this weekend, so new words, old pictures.

The first is .  Sharon at It's Daffycat hosts TUSAL and everyone is welcome to participate. TUSAL is not your usual SAL.  SAL typically means "stitch along" whereas TUSAL is a "save along".   All those end bits of thread, dogears from quilting and whatever other loose bits you have when crafting get saved in a container of some sort, you take a photo and post about it on the new moon. Super simple and it doesn't really take any special preparation or supplies either.

A chunk of this is frog fuzz from Sentimental Hearts but the majority is bits from Winter Wonderland. 

And speaking of Winter Wonderland,  it is my finish for the .  The 2017 Smalls SAL is hosted by Heather at Stitching Lotus.  This is another straight forward SAL - stitch a small piece and post a picture of your finish on the last Friday of the month.  You get to define small and you just have to finish the stitching not finish-finish it.

Here's my January small finish again:

This is Winter Wonderland from The Silver Needle's Secret Needle Night.

The third check-in is for .  Melissa at Measi's Musings hosts this SAL.  It focuses on finishing some of those works-in-progress that you may have sittings around.  Up there at the top you can find a tab that lists out my WIPocalypse projects.  I worked on three of them this month.

Santa and the Mouse started the new year here:

and went to here in January:

Enchantment of Winter was a blank piece of fabric on January 1st.  It ended the month here:

And here are Shakespearean Fantasy's before and after photos:

Melissa also gives us conversation starters each month.  This month's is:  What SALs are you participating in this year?  I am currently doing the three that are in this post, WIPocalypse, TUSAL and Smalls as well as Gifted Gorgeousness.  IHSW (International Hermit and Stitch Weekend) is on the list, when I can remember and I am doing (so far unsuccessfully) Stitch From Stash on Facebook.  I am always open to new SALs, but have cut back drastically from years past as I tend to over-commit myself.

Speaking of Stitch from Stash, here's my report on that.

Budget:   $10.00
Purchase:  15.50 - The 12 Berries of Christmas (colly birds, golden rings and geese a-laying)
Balance: ($ 5.50)

Not a good month.  $10 USD would normally be plenty, but when I set my budget amount I forgot about the auto-ship for the berries.  Fortunately, the balances, good and bad, carry forward so on February 1st I will be back in the black.  There is a provision to give yourself credit for finishes and if I did that, I think I would have been even for the month, but as the finishes don't generate real money, it really doesn't balance out the real money I am spending.