2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #64 - Have Courage by Cottage Garden Samplings

Another familiar pattern for most of you probably, back to Cottage Garden Samplings bird patterns! This is one of the more striking birds that will show up at the feeders in my parents backyard, the rose-breasted grosbeak. My grandma also used to grow beautiful gladiolas, so it's fun to have these two things together in this chart. 

I did manage to get two threadlengths into this one as well, and I feel like that's a decent start for these. There's so much stitching, but not too many colour changes, so you can get decent progress 

Have Courage by Cottage Garden Samplings

stitched 2 over 2 on 32ct Weeping Wisteria limited edition, unknown dyer

with WDW as charted

I had a fat quarter of this fabric, but half of it had dye spots, so I'm thinking I can use that part on a different chart that has more coverage. I think I picked this up in a destash, so I don't remember where it came from. This piece didn't seem to have any of the dye spots, but does have a nice area of green coming in on the right, so it should fit this chart well. 

The next start will be a different designer, but I might have another Cottage Garden one after that. I think I have enough threads that they're all separated out, but possibly not, so I might need to borrow from one project to another. 

They're very fun to work on, and I can see why they became so popular. Now that I've stitched a couple, I understand. I wasn't sure on the art style initially. I have a few of the next series, the woodland animals, so not sure if they'll come out this year or not. We'll see how we go. 

I hope you've all had some good stitching days!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch

2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #63 - Promise of Spring by Cottage Garden Samplings

My Weeks Dye Works order from 123 Stitch came in, so it was time to start another one of the Cottage Garden Samplings birds. If you want to see another stitcher working on it, Stitching Noni has put some stitches in hers recently. She mostly shows her progress on her FlossTube. 

I'm still sticking with birds that appear in my parents back garden/yard, and this is a common one:

I managed to put 2 full thread lengths of 2 different colours into this over the past few days. As always, stitching time can be hard to come by, but I'm happy with this start:

Promise of Spring by Cottage Garden Samplings

stitched 2 over 1 on 18ct Polynesium by Chromatic Alchemy

with WDW as charted

I like the idea of sort of outlining the tulips with WDW Charcoal, and hopefully it won't be too difficult to do some fill-in when I get back to this. It's a very fun design; these are really growing on me now. 

Hope you've all had some good stitching time!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch

2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #62 - Day 5 Dragonlet by Dragon Dreams

After making Day 3 for Clare, I decided to dig out my old 12 Days of Dragonlets project and started and finished Day 5. I still don't love working on afghan fabric and I'm definitely done for a while again, but it was nice to get another day completed. 

Day 5 Dragonlet by Dragon Dreams

stitched 4 over 2 on afghan fabric

with DMC as charted and Kreinik for the 5

This is a very cute one, and the pattern calls for some Kreinik in the rings, but because I'm using blending filament for the dragon, I decided to keep it simple with DMC as well. 

I'm not sure if I'll pull this out again for Day 6 for another of my 100 starts this year, but it's a possibility. How the afghan works there's a section on the top of the main panel and I'm stitching the first 6 across the top, then the last six will be across the bottom. I don't think I've touched this in over 5 years though, so definitely nice to get some work on it. 

There's a kind of sneak-peek for the end of the month summary too. Day 4 wasn't complete until a few days ago, so that's another finish for this year, but it had been started years ago, so doesn't count for a new start this year. 

I still love how fun these are, but still don't love my fabric choice. However, it will be really cool when it's complete. Some day!

Hope you've all had some good stitching days!

Happy Stitching,

Tiffstitch

2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #61 - Day 3 Dragonlet by Dragon Dreams

Time for some deja vu! I stitched this pattern way back in 2016 and had planned to stitch all 12 for one of the Crazy January Challenges. I had this idea to stitch them on afghan fabric and turns out I didn't enjoy that much at the time. However, Clare from Aimetu's is working on some 12 Days of Christmas trees this year, and I thought I'd try and get one stitched up for her. So far this one is my favourite, so I thought I'd stitch it up again. 

Day 3 Dragonlet by Dragon Dreams

stitched 2 over 2 on 28ct scrap white Monaco

with DMC as charted

Now I just need to get it mailed in time, so I'm hoping to get that done ASAP. 

This was a fun one, I managed to stitch it up this evening and it was pretty quick. I'm debating about picking up the afghan to work on the other patterns. Maybe just to see if I can get a few of them done despite the fabric. It's one of those UFOs that I'm still a little annoyed about, so it might feel nice to get some of it accomplished! 

Hope you've all had a good weekend!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch

2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #60 - Bigfoot Bunch by Plum Street Samplers

I was searching my blog and I think this is the first Plum Street Sampler design I've stitched! That seems odd since she has so many fun patterns, but I suppose the more primitive style isn't my favourite in general, so maybe I just haven't been inspired to start one until now. 

This one is really, really fun. I have a person in mind to gift it too when it's complete, so hopefully that will happen some day. 

This is part of her "stacks" style series and some of them are so creative. This has been my favourite though, so we'll start here. I even bought the CC colours on 123stitch for this one. I debated, but decided I hadn't had to buy anything yet this year for all of these starts, so why not go for it? 

I had a decent start after 2 days of stitching as well:

Bigfoot Bunch by Plum Street Samplers

stitched 2 over 2 on 28ct experimental dye by Chromatic Alchemy

with CC colours as charted

There's an interesting aspect to this one, which I'm not sure is visible in the chart photo. You have to stitch some of the Bigfoot faces one over one. The little bigfoot baby on the right side is all one over one. That will be a bit tricky when I get there. There's a separate chart for those parts, plus different faces for the larger sasquatch in the central area. 

I chose this fabric because it reminded me of an X-files episode where Mulder and Scully seemed to have found evidence of Bigfoot/Sasquatch that had such good camouflage they would disappear in the forest. The colours will still stand out enough, but the background reminded me of the ending of that episode. 

Hope you've all had some good stitching days!

Happy Stitching,

Tiffstitch

2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #59 - Mini Among the Cherry Blossoms by Kirstin Mills and HAED

If you've been following me for a while, you may have seen other charts by this artist that I've started, Mini Winter Magic and Mini Autumn's Promise. Both are still unfinished and Mini Winter Magic has a decent amount, so that might be in the plans for next year. 

Autumn's Promise is barely started, so not even worth showing a photo of that one. Today's new start will look something like this eventually:

My plan on this one and Autumn's Promise was to not stitch the background and only stitch the actual dragon and tree branch. We'll see how it goes. I was able to block it off in Pattern Keeper, so I think it could work well. And my very small start:

Mini Among the Cherry Blossoms by Kirstin Mills and HAED

stitched 1 over 1 full cross on 27ct Valkyrie by BeStitchMe

with DMC as charted

I have a plan in mind to get more work on my full coverage designs next year, but I'll wait until I've actually sorted that idea out. 

I hope you've all had good stitching days!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch

June 2026 Stitching/Crafting Update

Things have been a little busy life-wise, but there is still stitching and knitting happening! In fact, there's been a knitting finish. 

Cold Snap by Angeline Webb 

knit with 3.5mm needles 

using Great Adirondack Yarn Co Cotton DK in Hydrangea

I realize I gave no perspective on this one, but it's a little over a meter long. There's a buttonhole so you can sew on a button and use it as a shawl instead of a scarf. I haven't done that yet, since I think my Mom would like it if I could use one of her mother's button collection for it. It's a late birthday present for Mom, her birthday was in June, but I didn't finish it in time. 

I also managed a couple dishcloths. I'm still keeping to my "finish one project, make a dishcloth" idea since I have so much dishcloth yarn to use up. It's an easy gift, and I managed to get two out of the leftover red yarn I had, and passed those on to friends. 

Seed Stitch dishcloth

Cotton yarn, not sure which brand

I have some ideas for my next knitting project, but haven't started anything new yet. There's a few WIPs hanging around that I've worked on, one is a sock tube, so it just needs more and more knitting until the tube is complete. I think I'd like to get my swift and winder out to make a cake instead of winding my yarn my hand. Sometimes I'm too impatient or not at home, so I have to wind it myself because I don't want to wait. But the yarn twists less in a cake, so it is a good idea to take the time. 

Hope it's been a good month for everyone!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch