2012 WIPocalypse

Since this is my last post for the 2012 WIPocalypse, I thought I would share some before and afters of my WIPs.  I didn't get as many finishes as I would have liked, but I did make progress on most of them.

1. Chatelaine's Spring Knotgarden finished 7/3/12

Before:

After:  

2. Chatelaine's Watergarden about half done  

I don't think I even touched it this year.  Here's the top gate.

3. Petit Sampler (with Sticklounge) finished 2/12/12

Before:

After:

4. Bygone Stitches One Nation about half done 

Before:

After:

5. Mirabilia's Garden Verses might have to restart

Didn't even touch this one much less make up my mind what I want to do with it.

6. Chatelaine's Summer Knotgarden part 3,4,5,6 in progress

Before:  There was a little more done, but not much.

After:

7. Stained Glass Window (Sticklounge) finished 12/5/12

Before:

After:

8. Adriana B (Sticklounge) finished 3/20/12

Before:  

After:

9. Christmas tree skirt (kit) approx half done

This one hasn't seen any love either, though I did pull it out of the bag and look at it at one point.

10. Chelsea's block   finished 6/16/12

Before:

After:

11. HAED Lust third row of stitching page 14 completed

Before:

After:

12. Chatelaine's 2012 Mystery Deep Blue Sea part 7complete

This was a new start so there's no before picture.

After: 

13.  1900 ABC (Sticklounge) part 19/24 complete

Before:

After:

So, I didn't make as much progress as I would have liked, but since I'm no longer an OAAT stitcher, I think the progress I did make is pretty darn respectable.

Now on to the 2013 WIPocalypse!  May it bring you many stitchy finishes and may the frog stay far, far away!

Chelsea's Gift and Window

Hi all and welcome to my new followers!  Thanks for the great comments on my last post!

I didn't manage to get a better pic up of my part of Chelsea's Gift last week, but I remembered to take a better pic just now and here it is.  

Ineke asked if we all stitched parts of the same chart and the answer is yes.  Chelsea commissioned the artist Hannah Lynn to paint this picture to commemorate her heart and double lung transplant and asked Heaven and Earth Designs to convert the artwork to cross stitch.  You can see the octopus has them as her gift.  I think she started stitching but Chelsea didn't survive long enough to finish.

I've made pretty good progress with Window.  This is page 9 as of Thursday.  I've gotten all the black done on page 10 and am planning on filling in the red today.  But I need some opinions.  I'm thinking of adding another color for the very center...maybe a bright yellow to be able to stand up against the blue and red?  What do you think?  Leave me a comment.

I'm also contemplating a new start.  So much so that I've kitted her up and dyed some fabric.  Would you imagine that when you go through your stash, you only need to go out and buy 16 colors out of  90?  Amazing!  (note sarcasm)  I really need to pull for stash more often!

Anyway, please meet Nightshade.  I couldn't face stitching 78 (or even 39 since I stitch 1 over 1 on 28 ct) skeins of 310  thus the fabric I hand dyed. 

Here's my floss toss for Nightshade.  It's not all the colors since the wound skeins stayed in their box because I didn't want to have to reorganize them.  I think it will work.  If she doesn't pop enough, I can always go back with some black and stitch one stitch of black all the way around her.  And I cut down the number of pages by about half!  

I'm also contemplating a new start.  

Next month, we're going on vacation.  Yay!  We're going to New Mexico to stay for a week.  Only drawback is DH has invited his mom to come.  Not sure how that's going to play out yet.  But I was wondering if anyone knows of any good LNSs anywhere near Angel Fire.  Let me know!

Now, I've got to hang some laundry and fill in some red.   Later!

Ho hum kind of day

We had some excitement yesterday.  The weather man was putting the mid west in high threat severe weather all day yesterday and into the evening.  Thankfully, we didn't see anything worse than thunderstorms though lots of people did.  As far as I've heard today, no one was injured or killed.  All their "stuff" can be replaced.  Experience talking here folks.

After finishing part 4 of Deep Blue Sea, I pulled Spring Knotgarden back out.  The last time I worked on it, I have finished half of a corner of part 5.  It's not much, but it's progress.  Saturday, I finished the other half of that corner.  Leaving me with this

Then I pulled Chelsea's Gift out for a little while which turned into this afternoon before I put it down.  I'm making pretty good progress every time I work on it.  There is just a huge amount of confetti here.

Then out came Lust.  I put in a couple of strands this afternoon, but I can't seem to get into her again.  I thought if I worked on a block of solid color, I would have an easier go but nothing.  I would like nothing more than to see another page stitched but I guess it's not going to happen...for now.

So, Spring Knotgarden is back and I'm working on part 6 of that same corner which is going well.  With any luck, I'll see part 6 for this corner done and I'll move onto the next corner this week.  

Liebster award and pics

First, I want to thank Pull the Other Thread for awarding me the Liebster award!

Liebster is a German word, meaning favorite, dearest or beloved, and the Liebster is awarded by bloggers to other, newer bloggers who have fewer than 200 followers, to spread the word and help the new(er)bies gain wider recognition. The award comes with four conditions that each recipient must satisfy when accepting:

1. Choose five up-and-coming blogs (with fewer than 200 followers) to award the Liebster to.



I had problems giving this award to just 5 stitchers, so if for some reason you follow this little blog consider yourself awarded the Liebster!

2. Show your thanks to the blogger who gave you the award by linking back to them.

3. Post the award on your blog. List the bloggers you are giving the award to with links to their sites. Leave comments on their blogs so they know about the award.

4. Share five random facts about yourself that people don't know about you.
Five random facts about me:
1,  I've been stitching since I was 7 or eight... and I still have that very first project and remember stitching it and bothering my Mom to help take out the knots!
2.  I've started to get into woodworking.  It's another kind of stash!
3.  I'm better at finishing walls and ceilings (new construction) than my DH!
4.  I'm a huge tomboy.  Who would of thunk it with such a girly hobby!
5.  I really hate to clean.  Not always a good thing living with three boys.

Last weekend we went to see my folks who happen to live on the Platte River in Central Nebraska.  Every spring, they get some really noisy visitors.  For the most part they stay in the corn fields though.

Hopefully you can enlarge these pics so you can see the pretty Sandhill Cranes that are everywhere and you can even hear from inside the house!

While we were there, I finished page 3 of the Coat of Arms sampler.  I've since completed the top band for page 4 but it's going to stay in it's bag for a little while.

I've also made some progress on my piece of the patchwork for Chelsea.  Since this is stitched in tent stitch, it stitches quickly, but I so much prefer 1x1!

Now, I've got a couple of hours until the boys get home from school and 1900 ABC is out.  I finished one letter last night and one today, so far.  Just 10 more to go for page 9.

Procrastination!

I need to be doing our taxes.  What am I doing instead?  I'm talking to you!!

This week I've stitched on several projects.

You saw this one last week.  I am now through page 8.  Maybe next time I have this out, I'll remember to put something on it so you can get an idea of scale.  It's a monster!

Here's page 8 all by it's lonesome.

 Then yesterday, after I finished page 8 of 1900 ABC, I pulled out Chelsea's Gift again.  This one had so many colors of blue in just that little area.  Wowsers!

 Today, I pulled out Watergarden again.  Last time I had it out I was already into the gold of the gate and put it down.  I've gotten a little farther today, but part three of Deep Blue Sea is out.  Looking at the chart, it won't take long, but I've been wrong before!

Happy stitching!

Chelsea's Gift, Adriana and Deep Blue Sea

I got lots of stitching in this week.  

After I finished part 4 of Adriana and while I waited for part 5, I pulled out my block for Chelsea's gift.  This is one block out of 20 for this chart from HAED.  It's being tent stitched on 25 ct Lugana.  I've tried tenting before but didn't really care for it.  This time around I've discovered that while tenting is much faster than completing each little x, I have problems with my counting.  At least more trouble than normal, lol!  

Anyway, I got this far by Thursday night.  Before was only a couple hundred stitches.  It seemed like half of those had to come out though since I had miscounted.  

When this comes back out in mid February, I'm looking forward to some of the bright colors in this piece.

 

Then to take a break from the tenting, I pulled Adriana back out.  I finished part 5 this afternoon.  Would have been done sooner but almost everything in this part has some kind of backstitching.  It definately makes those edges sharper against the fabric though.

 Lastly, by not least, comes Deep Blue Sea again.  Martina released part two today and I printed it off as soon as I saw it.  This is the top edge complete.  From here to the right edge are little over 1 starfish and some beading.  I'm hoping to be able to have this whole part done by the end of the week.  

Wish me luck!