2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #50 - Unwrap the Joy by Lizzie Kate

I think this is my 3rd Lizzie Kate design in this year of starts. I have a fair few, since they're usually not too expensive and deceptively small, so it seems like you can stitch lots of them. I probably have more to go in the pile? And here we are at the halfway mark! 

The big 50th start is kind of a milestone, but since I started so many larger projects last month, I decided to just keep going. Maybe the 100th start will be something special? We'll see when we get there. 

Eventually this one will look something like this:

Going through my fabric stash is always interesting, like why do I have so many shades of blue and green and not many neutrals? Obviously I tend to buy those colours because they're my favourites, but there's only so many charts that work on those colours. I did find a scrap of fiddler's cloth (I think) and decided to work one over one since 2 over 2 seemed a little weird. Possibly only because I'm used to evenweave. 

Here's my progress photo:

Unwrap the Joy by Lizzie Kate

stitched 1 over 1 on 20ct? fiddler's cloth

with DMC as charted mostly

The beard is charted in Wisper, but that doesn't really work on this small of a count, so I went with DMC 3865 for the beard and sideburns, then B5200 for the cuffs and faint snowflakes. I worked on this a fair bit and only managed this much of it, but it's a decent start. 

Definitely not my favourite fabric and I should have chosen maybe blue for the snowflakes, but it's fine for now and I'll get it finished some time. 

Hope you've all had a good day or two of stitching!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch

2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #49 - Moose Be Love by Designs by Lisa

What was I saying about more Designs by Lisa charts? :) Here's another one!

I think this might be a gift for my cousin and her spouse. I usually stay with them when I visit my hometown and he loves moose. They even have a big metal moose head sculpture. Much better than an actual moose head. My undergrad had one, so weird. 

My Chromatic Alchemy FOTM stash is pretty vast, and I think I found the perfect outdoor type fabric for this one. Here's my start: 

Moose Be Love by Designs by Lisa

stitched 2 over 2 on 28ct Aventurine by Chromatic Alchemy

with DMC threads as charted

I'm debating about putting their wedding date on this somewhere, but haven't decided if it fits or not. Maybe in tiny backstitch underneath? I like the dimensions of it, so didn't want to expand the border, but haven't decided what I want to do yet. There's still time! 

I hope you've had some good stitching days, and suggestions always welcome!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch

2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #48 - If Nothing Ever Changed by Designs by Lisa

I thought I had already posted about this chart, so sorry there was a longer gap than usual for the smaller starts. I think this is my first Designs by Lisa chart in this group of starts, but I have a few more in the offing. She's got some very fun designs, and they're generally not very big, which is helpful right now. 

Here's the cover of the chart:

And although it has some specialty threads listed for colours, I didn't have any of them, so chose a different variegated thread to work the border and lettering. I managed a decent start so far:

If Nothing Ever Changed by Designs by Lisa

stitched 2 over 2 on 28ct Meredith by Chromatic Alchemy

with Jodyri and DD threads so far

I do have an error I need to pick out. If you're looking closely, the little loops on the right side are not matched on the left. I need to pick out the outermost backstitch row, although I'm fairly sure I was stitching both somewhat together, so probably both vertical rows, and figure out the right placement for the loops. It won't be too much effort to unpick that. That's partly why I left a hanging thread, I realized I'd have to frog a bunch there, so didn't want to stitch any farther with the thread I'd need to remove anyway! 

I made another counting error, but I don't think it will show up, so I won't mention where it is. It was far enough back I wasn't about to undo everything, and I believe I figured out how to make it work without having to frog all the way from the top. 

I'm looking forward to getting back to this and determining what colours I might use for the butterfly. 

Hopefully you've all had good stitching weeks!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch

2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #47 - Love is Best by Lizzie Kate

Time for another Lizzie Kate start! I have several of her patterns, as I'm sure many of us do. Most of them are smallish, although this one had some decent stitching to put into it. 

Here's the cover photo:

And I jumped at another chance to pull out some of my stash threads and fabric. I don't remember what scrap fabric this is, but very likely Chromatic Alchemy since I was in her FOTM club for many years. 

I debated a few colour choices, as well as how long I wanted to have this out. In the end I stuck with it till I had finished it. It was a few nights of stitching to complete and I'm happy with the finish. 

Love is Best by Lizzie Kate

stitched 2 over 2 on 28ct evenweave unk name

with WDW Crepe Myrtle and Cylcamen, Jodyri Over the Rainbow and Carrie's Creations Bliss

I think most of the colours are fairly obvious, but for the CC Bliss, I fussy-stitched and fussy-cut so the colours were more aligned than they are in the actual thread. The swirl near the bottom is stitched with Bliss as it is on the skein, so that's how the colours would normally work together in the variegated thread. 

I didn't intend for the interesting colour pattern that resulted in the largest heart, that just happened as I stitched along in my normal 4x4 way of stitching with variegated thread. 

The end result is 4x6ish inches in size, so a little large for a card, but maybe a box top, etc? I haven't figured out what to do yet, but it's a finish!

I hope you've all been having a good weekend and a good start to the week. 

Happy Stitching!

Tiffstitch

May 2026 Stitching/Crafting Update

Another month, and a bit, has passed us by. It's been a little busy (understatement) and things have been a little off the rails. Everyone in my family is healthy, but a co-worker's spouse was in a terrible car accident and things have been a lot recently. Also DD played at a local baseball team's game with their band and they did a great job with the National Anthem. That took out one day of stitching, although I did get a lot of knitting done at the game. 

Without further ado, my knitting over this past month:

First, a finish!

Fair Winds hat by Celeste Knitwear

knit with 3.5m needles after 3.25mm for ribbing

in Malabrigo Rios Purple Majesty

This was a fairly quick one and I'm not sure if I love the decreases for the crown, but it's complete and I used up about half a ball of DK Rios, so I can make another hat with this really nice colour. 

Next, I managed to almost finish one ball of yarn on the scarf for my mom:

Cold Snap by Angeline Webb 

knit with 3.5mm needles 

using Great Adirondack Yarn Co Cotton DK in Hydrangea

You can see the colour a little more accurately in this photo than the one from last month. I don't know if you can tell, but the edges still curl a bit, so this will need to be blocked, although I think it's more difficult to block cotton yarn maybe? 

Speaking of blocking, I managed that for 2 other projects once I got my blocking pins back from a friend. I'm going to put the unblocked and blocked photo for the first project, so you can see what a difference it can make:

Very Merry KAL by Claire Slade

knit with Fiberstash superwash sock yarn

Please ignore the colour differences, and it's subtle, but the top and bottom edges of the cowl especially needed work, so they're much straighter. The pattern is also easier to see compared to the unblocked version. Possibly it's easier to see in person too. 

I also blocked another project that's been waiting and waiting for blocking so I could finally wear it:

Farpoint by Vanessa Smith Designs

knit with FiberStash fingering weight yarns

Just in time for summer here! So it will wait, but I am looking forward to wearing it. It was a very different project for me with lots of stitch differences, etc. Plus bobbles!

And that's the month. Not too much accomplished, but a lot of time went into the massive cross stitch projects, plus, it felt like the month disappeared fairly quickly. 

I hope you all had a good May and have a good stitching weekend!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch

2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #46 - Book Dragon by EmJayP and Paine Free Crafts

Here it is, the last week of Mega-Maynia! I didn't hit 3500 stitches on this one, but I did manage around 2K, so I'm happy with that. It was quite a busy week, so I'm happy I managed that much. 

To refresh our memories, Book Dragon will look like this eventually:

And here's my progress:

Book Dragon by EmJayP and Paine Free Crafts

stitched 2 over 1 full cross on 25ct Easy Guide

with DMC as charted

If you can tell, that's the top left corner. I'm not sure how many blues I stitched with, but it was a lot! Many different shades, and it looks pretty nice. Good thing it's my favourite colour. 

Back to normal, somewhat smaller starts this week, although it's another busy week. 

If anyone is interested in life/local news, I was in Montreal this past Saturday at the Montreal Victoire Championship Parade! It was amazing. So exciting to see women's hockey do so well and get such a good turnout for their parade. There were 20K+ people there! 

I'm way at the back, but I saw them bringing the Walter cup in, so that was exciting too!

It definitely cut into stitching time though, since it's about 2hrs each way, plus the event was about 4 hours. I got some serious stitching in the next day while resting my feet from all the standing and walking on Saturday. It was a beautiful day, as you can maybe tell from the photos. About 16C, not much breeze there since we're surrounded by buildings, but enough to keep it comfortable with all those people around. 

Hope you've all had a good week, and with more starts I should get back to posting more often as well. 

Happy Stitching!

Tiffstitch

2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #45 - Kirby by Walking Melons and HAED

As I mentioned, I had asked DD which full coverage project they'd like me to start next, and they chose this one:

I took a look through all my easy guide fabric stash, and could only find a piece of 32ct easy guide to fit the size of this project. It's so teeny! I've been using 25 or 28ct on my other full coverage projects. I did manage to get a little over 3500 stitches into this one and I think it will be enjoyable. There's confetti sections of course, but there seems to be some big sections of one colour that help break up all the fiddly bits as well. 

Here's where it's at now:

Kirby by Walking Melons and HAED

stitched 2 over 1 tent stitch on 32ct easy guide

with DMC as charted

You can see the indent where Meta Knight's sword will be, so you can tell I started in the top left corner. It's been enjoyable so far, not too much dithering and works well in Pattern Keeper. I've had to frog maybe 50 stitches or so where I miscounted, yes, despite having easy guide, but that's not too big a deal for me. 

For this week I chose another enormous project, I know, I know. But I've been eyeing this one for a while and can't wait to start, even though it looks more confetti heavy than Kirby. This will be this week's new start:

So cute! I love this one. I think I have a few other charts that have books and dragons in them, so not surprising that I have this one too, but I'm finally starting one! 

I have the kit from Paine Free Crafts and that will help me stay somewhat organized as well. 

I hope you've all had good stitching weeks!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch