2026 Year of 100 Starts: Start #66 - Summer Bliss by Cottage Garden Samplings

This might be the last of these patterns for this year of starts! I can't remember if I have any more of the birds, but I do have some of the animals. 

My mom and Grandma both love orioles, and Grandma had this great peony bush near her walkway at her house. This is another one that has some good memories attached, so I'm looking forward to getting back to this one as well. 

Summer Bliss by Cottage Garden Samplings

stitched 2 over 1 on 14ct Aida, unknown name and designer

with WDW 

I really like how this has stitched up so far. It's fun to get to the words first, that's a change from the other designs. Also getting some of the bird started is fun as well. 

I'm looking forward to getting back to these next year. I think I'll try and finish one at a time, because a few of the WDW threads are shared between patterns. The gold colour in this one only uses that colour for the fill in the letter B, otherwise it's not used any more, but it's in at least one of the other patterns I've started. 

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

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch

                                                                                                                                                             

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 #55 - Forever & Ever by Cottage Garden Samplings

I suppose you could call me late to the party on these, as they came out a few years ago and many, many people have stitched them. I couldn't decide if I liked them or not really. Then I decided they'd make good pillows and maybe I could make some for my parents. I picked birds that they see often, and decided to start with this one, mostly because I had it about half-kitted up from the LNS I purchased it from. 

My dad's favourite bird is the female cardinal because of the depth of colour it can have, so I wanted to stitch these with the Weeks Dye Works threads they call for. 

I worked on this for a couple days and I've ordered the other threads I need for this one and a couple others, so I'm looking forward to getting back to this at some point. 

Forever & Ever by Cottage Garden Samplings

stitched 2 over 2 on 32ct Lily of the Valley

with Weeks Dye Works as called for

These are definitely not small projects, but the printed chart is massive, and it's been an easy stitch so far. I managed to get a full threadlength in of 3 different colours, plus a little extra of WDW Ivy. 

I'd like to start the others, but I'd also like to have all the threads that I need on hand, so I can be patient. I think I'll pick up something smaller for now. 

Hope it's been a good few days of stitching for you!

Happy Stitching, 

Tiffstitch