My Stitchalong

Can you believe I had two finishes this week?  TWO!!  I don't think that's ever happened in my stitching life time. Welcome to Hogwarts was one of this week's finishes.   This sweet little penguin was a quick start and finish.  A very dear friend of mine was suddenly hospitalized and had to have major surgery.  She loves penguins, and I knew I had a small penguin design...somewhere.  I found it pretty quickly, and decided to make it for her.  This is where having a decent sized stash of supplies comes in handy!! My husband and kids were told not to bother me unless someone had lost a limb, and I sat myself down and got to work.  It was delivered to her in the hospital the next day, and she was so touched that I thought of her.  Her surgery went well (thankfully), and she is on the long road to recovery. So, two finishes deserves a new start, right?  Normally I would say yes, but I'm trying to work on things already s...

Summer has definitely arrived!!  We went on vacation to Florida, and before we left the temperatures here at home were in the 70's.  It was 95 degrees every day we were away.  The heat really makes you tired, but we had a good time.  We seem to have brought the heat home with us, because since we got back it's been over 90 degrees every day!  I like the warmth, but I was not made for this heat!! I got no stitching done while we were away, but I've been trying to get some in since we got home, and I'm proud to see progress. Welcome to Hogwarts is looking great, and since we visited The Wizarding World of Harry Potter while we were away it's been it's been high in my rotation.     I did a little bit on the pandas, but they aren't showing as much progress.  I'll get back to them...eventually. One of the things we were working on before our vacation was having the living room, dining room, and kitchen painted because MJ and...

It was an exciting weekend.  My niece and God-daughter graduated high school!  MJ, Z, and I travelled from New York to Texas so we could be part of the festivities. My sister, Vicki, and I with the graduate.  I'm in the sleeveless brown dress. Z, me, my niece, and MJ. It was HOT in Texas!!  I knew it would be (my sister warned me), but I was definitely not prepared for the heat, although Vicki told me that it's not usually that hot (almost 100 degrees every day we were there) this early.  I guess I'm just lucky like that. Of course, when I travel my stitching goes with me.  I knew which stitching projects I was taking with me before I even knew what clothes I was packing!   Progress has been made on the panda project.  I have to finish the one panda, stitch the piece of bamboo they are each holding, and do the grassy area they are sitting on.  And the backstitching, of course.  Isn't there always backst...

I started stitching when I was a 19 college student on my summer break.  I fell in love with it instantly, and I've been stitching ever since.  Recently, I was looking for something in my craft closet and I found this: It was one of the first kits I ever ordered.  It got stuffed in the UFO pile because there were multiple counting errors, but when I found it I thought I would add it to my work in progress pile. The first thing I needed was more floss.  Did I really store my floss like that?  All rolled up and just thrown in the bag?  In my years since I started stitching I found a better way. The next thing I needed was new fabric. Since I don't really stitch on aida anymore I choose this yummy 28 count evenweave that I dyed myself. And I now have a brand new kit to work on! I love stitching!!

In my last blog post I wrote about buying some new patterns from Etsy, and someone asked which seller I used.  The seller is AwesomePatternStudio, and these are my new patterns: Z has a love of elephants, so for him I'll do a mandala elephant. M loves all things with cats, so I bought a ploygon cat for him. For me I'm sure it's no surprise I found a panda!  And, of course, now that I'm looking I found so many more panda pattern.  What did Yoda say?  "Control!  You must learn control!" I guess it's a good time to practice my Jedi life skills, because I have more patterns than I could reasonably ever hope to get to! Work on Welcome to Hogwarts has been steady.  I finished the second page, so we've officially passed the halfway point.  I have to remember that I made a counting error on page 2 (you would think I could count to 4 after all these years of stitching, right?  Not so!), so I have to make sure everything lines up ...

Since my last post I have worked steadily on Welcome to Hogwarts, so I guess you can say I'm back on track with my Year of the WIP.  I love the way the castle looks so far! Progress has been steady, and I'm looking forward to seeing the rest of it take shape. Can I just say that Etsy has been my downfall lately?  I bought the Harry Potter designs from a shop on there, and a stitching friend introduced me to another shop.  Somehow three new designs are sitting in my inbox.  I think I've reached SABLE: Stash Acquisition Beyond Life Expectancy. I have to work tonight, so I'm off to get a few stitches in before I go.  Have a good week, everyone!

I was working diligently on Barbershop Quartet, and made some good progress. Then I hit a bump in the road of my year of working on previously started projects.  Sigh.  I did try, but a friend of mine posted these awesome Harry Potter designs, and before I knew what was happening I was shopping on Etsy, there were four charts in my cart, and I was on the floor sorting through my stash collection for fabric and floss.   Welcome to Hogwarts is the first one up. As you can see, I got a little bored with stitching the blue sky, so I counted down and started the castle. There are also designs for the Hogwarts Express, Hogsmeade, and one that says "Always", and the A is the symbol of the Deathly Hallows.  For a Harry Potter fan, these are very cool!! A quiet week ahead of me is planned, and I'm looking forward to some stitching time.