New Years Day Stitching

Started stitching yesterday after a hiatus. I started this project last summer, hated the coverage on the window panes and just put it away. I think I was burned out after my last finish!

Pulled it out again today and have done all if the blue color shown. This is LHN Home of a Needleworker (too). If I didn’t already have this in my stash, I would pick the original (more of a Sampler style) one over this one. I guess my tastes have changed since I purchased this many years ago! I still like it though!

The odd blue light is the tv as seen through the fabric.

Once I finish this up I may tackle one of my long neglected chatelaines!

Happy New Year to all!

A TW Finish!!

I’m really happy with this finish.  I’ve done several TWs but honesty didn’t think I would do another until I was talking with Will about his Masters degree in Religion.  He basically studied ALL of them and I asked him if there was one that was his favorite (he is a multi-faith reverend).  When he said Egyptian mythology, an idea was born!

I knew of Teresa Wentzler’s Egyptian Sampler and I knew that I would stitch it for him.  That was 2.5 years ago and its finally done!  I’ve found some errors in this, but I’m choosing to consider them “unintentional personalization.”  I had trouble tacking the rays down and keeping them straight.. but considering that I spent about 8 hours fiddling with them, they are as good as they are going to get!

This hasn’t been washed yet. My giant tub of orvus was tossed when I moved and had to order some that should be here early next week.  I’ve found a local framer and picked out where this will hang in our home… right above his statues of Anubis and Wapawhets and other Egyptian objects.

TWs are certainly a lot of work and of all of them that I’ve stitched (non fantasy and no dragons) this is quickly turning into my favorite!

Now… what to stitch next?  I’ve got some ideas, but whatever I pick up will be smaller and less complicated!!

Almost Finished!!!!

Here is my latest progress on Egyptian Sampler!  I feel like I can say it’s almost finished!!! Since this picture was taken, I’ve stitched the color block border and the corner block and am just backstitching  those before I finish the papyrus in the center part of the border.

Most of my stitching is done over the weekends, but with the advent of spring, we’ve been busy doing Expos to support my husband’s business. My last finish, the butterfly, was stitched in a car and hotel room.  This is the busy season for expos with another really huge show this weekend. 

I haven’t decided whether I’ll take this with me this weekend for stitching in the evening or if I’ll take another small kit that fits in my purse.

 

Snack Stitching

A friend of mine coined the term Snack Stitching to be small project to as a break from stitching on larger pieces. Even though my Egyptian Sampler is nearly finished, I was traveling a couple of weeks ago and grabbed this little mill hill kit and brought it with me. The kit came with a magnet that I hot glued to the back and stuck on my fridge 

I ran out of 931 while stitching (my own fault) and my husband, who understands my goal-oriented nature, stopped at a Michaels while we were out of town to  get a single skein so I could finish up the cross stitching.   He is the best!

I love it and beads used are very sparkly in real life. 🦋

Vacation Stitching!

It’s amazing what a person can accomplish when you don’t have to go to work!  I took this before moving the Q snaps over to the right hand border to finish that. I love it!  I hadn’t realized how BIG it is!

i had hoped to finish this by the end of the year, but with only a couple of days left I doubt that will happen!  It’s ok…  I’m happy with the progress I’m making. 😍

Egyptian Sampler Latest Update…

I’ve moved the Qs and am working in the bottom border. I’ll do the eagle next, then remaining side borders and Pharoahs. This year maybe???

Beaded Stocking

So over a year ago I was in Nashville and some friends took me to visit their LNS The Stitchin Post. I saw models of a set of 6 Mill Hill beaded stockings. Alas, they no longer had the kits stocked. 

A few months later I thought about them and did a web search and found them on Amazon!  Two days later they arrived at my door step. 

I grabbed one as a travel project for a trip over Fourth of July weekend. I finished the stitching during the trip and did the beading when I got home.  It’s so cute!

At some point I need to get some felt to add a backing to this as well as The Mittens! I did several years ago. 

I’m committed to finishing my TW Egyptian Sampler this year so maybe working in the rest will be “easy” stitching after finishing the complexity (and dreaded back stitching) of a TW. 

Granny Square Afghan

My sister is still in the hospital, but is now working with physical therapists to learn to walk, use utensils, swallow, get dressed, open toothpaste, etc. Just recently she has become “herself” again and is making lots of progress. She is now able to eat real food and hopefully will have the feeding tube out soon. She is still dependent upon supplemental oxygen. 

Early on, when we realized that this was going to be a long term illness, we had the idea to make her an afghan. We put a call out for granny squares and soon packages started arriving at my home filled with all different colored grannys. Some people who couldn’t crochet asked others to make a square for them. They were all beautiful!

I had a surgery in mid May and was off work for 6 weeks so had time to start assembling the afghan. I looked up joining and finishing instructions online and got to work. It was challenging because they were all slightly different sizes and different types of yarn.  I ended up adding an extra row of white to each square, which helped them become more uniform. I then joined the white edges together and finished off with a verigated border. I delivered it to her in late June. She couldn’t talk at that time but mouthed “thank you” and “I love it.”  I read off the list of all who had contributed and both she and I are thankful to everyone who participated.  

It turned out to be 5 x 7 feet and consisted of 130 individual granny squares. I’m somewhat proud of myself and this accomplishment because I didn’t know what I was doing when I got started.  I also didn’t realize how much work it would be. I started to think about how much cross stitching I could be doing in that time off. 

In the end I realized that since I cannot visit her very often (she is a 5 hour drive away), this was my way of being there. 

Flu Shot PSA

I wish to implore everyone who has not had a flu shot to go to your doctor or a pharmacy and get one.

    My sister who was in perfect health 10 days ago and rarely gets sick, has contracted H1N1 influenza and is literally fighting for her life against this potentially deadly flu strain. She leads a healthy lifestyle (doesn’t smoke or drink), has no condition that would have reduced her immunity, and doesn’t work outside the home or come into contact with a lot of people. She recently had a perfect physical.

If it happened to her, it could happen to me or you or someone in your family who is also generally healthy. I don’t mean to be alarmist and I’m not looking for sympathy or attention… I just don’t want anyone else to deal with what my family is going through when it is easily preventable.

She did not get a flu shot this year and the doctors firmly believe that if she had, she might have still gotten sick but wouldn’t be in the ICU with a 50% chance of survival.  This strain of flu is included in this year’s flu shot. I know that vaccination is a personal choice but please consider this unthinkable consequence that my family is facing.

Ornament and TW Updates

HI…  Even though I’ve been quiet on the blog, I have been doing quite a bit of stitching!

Here is my progress through yesterday on my Teresa Wentzler Egyptian Sampler.  I think my husband, who I’m stitching this for is finally starting to get what goes into cross stitch!  I’ve been working on this, on and off, for about a year and a half.  I’m happy to say that I’m more than halfway through with a long way to go!  I’m happy to have finished the frame all the way around and the background in the arch.  A little tedious but not as bad as I thought it would be.  When I started doing the background I had to pull out the staff and the flail on the middle figure but it shouldn’t take much to add those back in now.  I’m loving stitching this!

I spend the week of Christmas with some family and kitted up a Victoria Sampler ornament from the 2015 Just Cross Stitch Ornament Edition to take with me.  When I travel I like to take something small.  There were some errors in the pattern as published, so for some of this I was just on my own.  Plus the accessory pack that I ordered had two different sized stars!  I contacted Thea at Victoria Sampler and she sent me the correct button size.  I love the little gingerbread man buttons!

So for now, I’m just going to keep on working on Egyptian Sampler and ignore all of my other WIPs.  I’d love to finish it up this year.  🙂