October and November Update

Finally a chance to update everything! Hope everyone had a good last couple months. I ended up catching something again near the end of October and was out of commission for the first few weeks of November as well. 

I didn't get much done on Starry Night because a friend lost their beloved cat and I decided to try and start a memorial project for her. Eventually it will look like this:

And I managed a few days on it, so it looks like this so far:

Orange Cat by BananiStitchery (Etsy)

stitched 2 over 2 as charted with DMC on Galaxy 28ct by BeStitchMe

I was able to upload this into Pattern Keeper with a little finangling, and that made it a lot easier. Apparently I'm not great with paper patterns any more for anything larger than a Mill Hill. ;)

I didn't bring this when we went on vacation over US Thanksgiving week, so it hasn't been touched in a while. I had an urgent knitting project to finish, so I worked on that instead. I mentioned in my last post I wanted to make some socks for my brother, and I didn't have that much time to work on them before I saw him over the last full week of November. He lives out west, so I don't see him that often. He had a big birthday this year, so I had a few other little gifts I'd found, but I really wanted to get these socks completed. 

I finished them on the day before he had to fly back home, so that was good timing! I had one sock mostly done, but needed to make sure the toe fit well, so had waited to close it up until I could try it on his foot. So it wasn't a surprise after that, but I did get them finished!

Vanilla sock pattern with WYS Holly Berry, about size 11 men's

Since we've been back, things have been a little busy with band concerts, etc., so I decided to pick up Animal Parade again and maybe get it finished if I can stick with it. Here's where it's at right now:

Animal Parade by Lanarte

stitched 1 over 1 with included threads on kit fabric

I'm also debating about starting Wisteria Garden by Chatelaine. I have some fabric I think will work, and I ordered the threads from European Cross Stitch. They took a while, apparently Gloriana takes forever to get threads to them, but I have everything now. Here's the floss toss:

I tried to set up the fabric in my scroll frame, but it's not tight enough, so I ordered some larger Qsnaps to try. Hopefully that will work. Everything I've read about Chatelaines recommends keeping the fabric tight for the specialty stitches, so we'll see how it goes. 

I think that's it for me for now, I'll keep working on finishing Animal Parade for now and maybe can get a few other little projects completed before the end of this year. 

Happy Stitching!

Tiffstitch

June? Where Did You Go?

Wow.. end of the month and this is my first post. Maybe it's the multiple posts from last month, but I just never seemed to have time. Even now I'm trying to get this done at work before the next thing happens. 

I do have a sort of plan for blogging when September comes. I'm adjusting my schedule again, this time I'll be working a set Tuesday through Saturday schedule and I'm thinking Mondays will be blogging days. We're hoping DD will be back in school, so that might be the perfect time to have a little time on my own to keep up with blogging again. We'll see how it goes since there always seems to be something that eats away at my time. I'm also wondering if I could attempt a fully finished object on Mondays, which would help with the fullness of the drawer of shame with all these smaller projects I'm going to have. 

Enough chit-chat though, here's where the month of stitching has landed me:

Universal Monsters SAL B&W version by The Witchy Stitcher

stitched as charted on 28ct Trick or Treat by BeStitchMe

There's still a long way to go on this one, but I'm starting to get close to one of the rooms. I think I was working on a FB challenge, so stitched a lot of black on this one to get some stitches in. It shows up in Pattern Keeper, so that's a nice bonus. 

Shamrock by Erica Michaels, found on Rainbow Gallery freebies

stitched 2 over 2 with Morning Glory (forget which company)

on 28ct white Monaco

And it's a finish! I ran out of the Morning Glory thread, so decided to add a little text on the top to finish it off and my initials. 

Easter Bunny and Moon by Chatelaine

stitched 2 over 1 with called for DMC 310 and subbed DMC 726 for 727

on 14ct Aida (Realgar I think) by Chromatic Alchemy

Another finish! This was an enjoyable stitch as well. I added the whiskers just for fun. I know it makes no logical sense to see white whiskers and a white tail on a silhouette, but the tail was charted, so I went with it. 

Patch Christmas Tree 1 by Angie Designer

stitched 1 over 1 on 28ct white Monaco with stash threads

 unknown Dinky Dyes, Caron Waterlilies parrot, Dinky Dyes Down Under Blues and Jodyri Oz the Great and Powerful, another unknown Dinky Dyes, DMC 3799 and Kreinik gold start, Etoile 699 for the lines

3 finishes, what? :) This one was pretty close, so just took a night to finish up the purple and the lines around the tree, the pot and star. Another fun one I'd like to try and fully finish before Christmas if possible. 

Christmas Assisi Sampler by Kincavel Krosses

stitched 1 over 1 with Crescent Colors Bejeweled

on 22ct white hardanger

There was quite a lot of stitching left on this one and it took 3 nights to finish I think, getting 400+ stitches in per night. I do really love the finish and I don't think the photo really captures how pretty that thread really is. I'm looking forward to finishing this one into an ornament I think. 

Halloween Freebie by Passione Ricamo

stitched 2 over 2 with DMC 310 

on 28ct Brittney evenweave Aries by Sparklies

I spent 2 nights on this one I think and got the moon complete in DMC Etoile white and added more of the haunted house and bats. I haven't decided about the word "BOO" near the bottom if I'll stitch that or leave it out, plus there's a witch's hat I'll probably leave out. Maybe BOO should be in Etoile as well, if they have a good orange one? Or purple? What would look good with this fabric I wonder?

Stormlight Archive quotes by Taylor and Cromwell

stitched 2 over 2 on 28ct black Monaco

with DMC as charted

You may notice there's quite a lot done on this one. It's almost 50% complete according to Pattern Keeper and it was a little hard to put down for the last WIP I'm going to show, but I did manage it. I really love how it's coming together and how fantastic each section looks once I finish it. So excited about this one! Maybe it will be a birthday or Christmas present for the end of the year. 

Amazing Animal Kingdom by Aimee Stewart charted by HAED

stitched 2 over 1 tent stitch on 32ct Experiment by Chromatic Alchemy

I'm at 31,000+ stitches on this one, which is 2 full pages complete, plus almost 2 more pages done. I joined a Full Coverage Fanatics group for the Tour de France which has you adding 3400 stitches to your chosen project. I have a long way to go on this one, but I'll try and keep adding at least a few stitches per day for the Tour challenge. 

I hope you've all had a good month! I'm sorry I was so silent all month, it wasn't intentional and next month I'll be working on the Olympics at least half of the month, so it won't be so long again. 

Happy Stitching!

Tiffstitch

Stitch Maynia 2021 Start #13

Lucky number 13 today! I had no particular plans for May 13, although maybe this should have been another Halloween-themed project. I think it's technically an Easter project, although it's weird because it's a bunny silhouette against the moon. Here's what it will look like once completed:

This was once a free design, but is now 4 euros here. 

I managed a bit of a start on this one and adjusted the colours to fit my fabric. It may look more like a sunset on my choice, but that's okay. I had a black and white photo of it, so wasn't sure what colour they had chosen for the background until I just found this photo. 

Here's my start:

Easter Bunny and Moon by Chatelaine

stitched 2 over 1 with called for DMC 310 and subbed DMC 726 for 727

on 14ct Aida (Realgar I think) by Chromatic Alchemy

It's a decent start and the border matched up again, so I'm on a roll with borders so far this month. Again, a few more days of stitching and this will be finished. I think I've said that for most of the designs this month. :)

I hope you're all having a good day and enjoying some sunshine like we have here. It almost hit 23C/73F today! A beautiful sunny day after a fair amount of rain last week. We did need the rain though, so that was okay. Although my allergies have kicked in pretty hard over the past few days. 

Happy Stitching!

Tiffstitch