WIP Wednesday: “Weekend” Edition

 Happy WIP Wednesday!
Today’s weather is glorious! It’s shockingly not hot, and there’s a gorgeous breeze coming along. If this won’t make me pine for Fall, I don’t know what will! 
I’m almost 50% done with “Knee High”! I need to stop my roving eye looking at new patterns though, because I have all of these Christmas ornaments to start (AND finish).

I’ve completed all the detail on the cornstalks, and as you can see in this closeup, the Dog Hair Stitchery is an appropriate name for my blog. 🙂 It would be atrocious if I didn’t love my dog so much. Think of it as the old Victorian hair souvenir art. 😛

Tatting is going along great! I’m learning so much so fast and I couldn’t be happier to find this craft. Shuttle tatting apparently runs in my family, so I can’t wait to find out more about those family members and write about it. The picture above is my practicing of ring joins.

He knows I’m about to go to work.

I’m slowly getting used to my new schedule of working 2nd shift (nights and weekends) at the library. Today is actually my “Friday”, but bear in mind that my Saturday is also my “Monday.” So I’m looking forward to resting and some cross stitching this “weekend”—if catching up on housework doesn’t beat me. 🙂

Happy stitching!

Desert Dreaming

Backstitch time

Hello all! This weekend I started the Cactus project from CrossStitcher magazine as mentioned in a previous post. I’m having so much fun with it; it’s so colorful and so simple (NO confetti stitching for me this time 🙂 which makes this pattern relaxing to stitch)! My cactus obsession continues…. This would look great on the wall next to another pattern I want to do, “What Lies Beneath” by Ink Circles! Anyway after I finish the backstitching on this one, I have three more cacti to go! I have a feeling that this one will go by quick.

I don’t know why I find this picture of him so funny- he just looks so comfy and spoiled.

It’s been too hot and muggy to do anything outside during the day, so Bilbo and I have just been hanging around. Mostly reading– 41% read in Little Dorrit and I am on the second book of the October Daye series. We did have a massive thunderstorm last night which included sparks popping out of outlets and Bilbo needing to get his Thundershirt on. So that was an adventure…. 😉

WIP Wednesday IV

  Stitching while sick is kinda hard. What with dizziness and lack of concentration. Still I’ve been muddling away through these pieces very slowly, and it has served to take my mind off of this and that. The first picture is my progress on the Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery’s Once Upon a Time Sampler. I started January 2014 when it was first released as a subscription. I’ve put it down since moving, but I must pick it up because it is my goal to finish it by my niece’s 6th birthday in September. So that’s the whole border and about 1.5 blocks a month. This is also a very special project to me because it is the first project that I ever stitched on linen. It was odd at the beginning, but I love it now.   Fauna is also going slowly- as I said, sick stitching can be rough, and confetti stitching makes it rougher. Still, I’m enjoying my time on this piece. Pretty Poppies is going FASTER than I thought. The colors are still keeping me cheery. Anyway, I’m off to keep recuperating with help from Bilbo. Happy stitching!

WIP Wednesday III: Snow Day(s) Edition & Kreinik Thread Trouble

Hello stitchers! I hope you all are staying warm and are able to catch up on some projects. We are on day two of NC’s Snowpocalypse with more on the way tonight! Bilbo has been enjoying this round of snow though- he loves eating it: hence his beard. 🙂

I got a little more work done on “Pretty Poppies.” I’m very pleased with my speed of stitching at the moment and hope to keep up the momentum. I’m used to feeling bummed that I stitch very slow. I’m also hoping that it won’t take me forever to do the backstitching. The colors on this project is definitely making it hard to have the winter blues. I haven’t worked on “Fauna” lately (even though I finally got the last of my needed materials in the mail Monday). I’m having trouble using Kreinik #8 braid- what size needle do you recommend using? It won’t fit into the eye of my no. 26 needles. 😦

Also in my Monday’s mail, I received a copy of “Stitchingly Ever After” by Barbara Ann Designs. It is so adorable- so appropriate to our xstitch lifestyle, and I look forward to working on it.

Happy stitching!

Amy

WIP Wednesday II

Finally making progress on Fauna The Fairy Witch. I’m so happy that I started her owl pal- he was the main reason I bought this pattern; however, I cannot finish him until I receive the Kreinik threads I ordered. We got a lot of ice here (and some snow), so I’ve had a nice time cuddled up with my books, cross stitching, and Bilbo!

Happy stitching!

WIP Wednesday

Hello all! Happy New Year’s Eve (and Happy New Year’s Day, in advance)!

I am still stitching away on last week’s WIP Poppies. This week, I also picked up a project that I started last summer (as in 2013). It’s interesting how when you look at a piece you stitched or are stitching, you can recall what was going on in your life at the time. For instance with this piece, I was still in college and living in a dark, damp, cramped, small basement apartment in my hometown. I was nursing extreme anxiety with my nights full of cross stitching and Poirot episodes (and yes I admit, Murder She Wrote; I am complete fan- it doesn’t matter how young or old you are, Angela Lansbury is amazing). I wanted a piece that was bright and cheerful. I saw this pattern in The World of Cross Stitching magazine, and I fell in love with it. I also have never grown out of loving anthropomorphic animals in stories and shows. I will also never grow out of it. So, this was an ode to all of the happiness of nature and of fairy tales.

The original artwork by Helz Cuppleditch has a river flowing alongside the caravan. I’m debating on how to add this detail into my stitched piece as it was not in the pattern itself.

Happy stitching!

WIP

Finally time to relax. WIP: “Pretty Poppies” by Lesley Teare, from The World of Cross Stitching (No. 220). Don’t you just love confetti stitching? I definitely have to be in the mood for a project like this for all that concentration.