Sugar Skull by Mill Hill - Fini!

Unfortunately, the Partner and I ran amok of a little norovirus this past weekend.
The upside was a lot of audiobook listening and a bit of stitching while I was burning the house down washing a whole lot of loads of laundry to make sure it didn't come back.  Luckily we have a three day norovirus policy at work, so at least I didn't use my PTO for it.

But I finished the Mill Hill Skull!   I would have finished it three days earlier if I'd found the posy button sooner.  It went missing in one of my bags and it took me a bit to find.  I was actually trying to order a new one when I finally ran across it (in my Freshwater Pearls project bag).

I stitched it on 28ct white lugana rather than the perforated paper that came in the kit.  I love the effect with all of the beads, I enjoyed doing it a lot less (haha).

Sugar Skull by Mill Hill, Finished 9 Apr 2018

There was definitely more than enough beads and threads for this kit.  I'll have to give it away because I don't want to waste (not enough to do it entirely a second time, but probably enough where it won't cost too much).

I started working on Deco Spirits, hopefully the Air block will be my next mini-finish before I move onto something else... or maybe onto the next block.  :D

March 2018 WIPocalypse

Not a whole lotta WIPocalypse progress to report.    I was busy either not crafting, or just working on my two Brooke's Books Ornaments.

I did decide to pick up my Mill Hill Sugar Skull.  I've decided to do it a little different than the instructions strictly call for (other than stitching it on evenweave instead of the perforated paper).  I like the support that beads get when they're part of the stitching (vs being added later), so I'm finishing up the stitching with the final two floss colors that are not used for beads (light red and dark magenta) and I will start beading/stitching at the same time.

I'm just going to go down the list of colors and get it over with.   I am in both the "not wanting to wor on this piece" and in the "I want this piece over, so I want to work on it" mode, haha.

Here's where it was:

And here's where it is now:

I anticipate having it done by the next WIPocalypse (*yay*)

#TBT - Mirabilia Holiday Fairies

Way back in the day, when they first started coming out and were really hard to get a hold of, I started collecting (and stitching!) the Holiday Fairies by Nora Corbett (for Hoffman Distributing).  They were Limited Edition (I wonder if that's still true?  I see a number of them for sale new?).  These were kits that came with 32 Zweigart linen, Kreiniks, Crescent Colours threads, and any of the beads you would need.    Initially they seemed to sell out really fast, but I had a local needlework shop (Judy's Stitchery in Harlingen) that ordered them for me, so I managed to snag them all pretty easily.

I tried to stitch them in order of the holidays to start, but burnt out after the third one.

The first one I completed was also #1 in the collection - the Christmas Elf Fairy.   I do love the little Christmas tree that she was carrying.   The only issue I had with it (and I had this issue with all of the kits) is that the Bella Rosa thread used for the skin was super pink.   Because all of the kits came with full skeins of all needed colors, and I didn't need very much, I took the lightest of the skeins and tried to use that for all of the fairies.

I really also like the reds in the dress.  It's just so freakin' sweet.

I finished this one on December 10, 2006, nearly 10 years ago!

Miss Valentine Fairy is probably my least favorite, but I'm not much of a pink person, and I"m not a huge fan of her ratty looking skirt.  I do think it's cute how she's holding what I think of as a giant heart box of chocolates, but so much pink!

I finished her second on February 8, 2007

I love the Easter Fairy because of the adorable robin's egg blue actual egg she's holding.  I think this one is probably the twee-est of the whole series.

She was finished on April 28, 2007

And of course, I actually have already blogged about the others in the series I most recently finished:

• Halloween Fairy, July 28, 2014
• Miss New Year Fairy, October 13, 2014
• Thanksgiving Fairy February 14, 2016

I haven't decided how I want to finish them yet.  Because of their size, I think a simple frame would work, but flat folds would also work.  I'm a little worried about flat folding these, though, because they were a bit costly and I do really like them.   It'll eventually, maybe, end up as framing, but for now they live in a portfolio book, which I can leaf through to look at my finished and unframed pieces:

Thanksgiving Harvest Fairy!

I finished it!  And she was "only" a little over a year old.

Thanksgiving Harvest Fairy by Mirabilia (Nora Corbett); Fairy Holiday Collection #6 for Hoffman Distributing Co.

Started 1.15.2015
Finished 2.14.2016

On the kit fabric, and my only "beef" with that is that this kit fabric is different from all of the others, and one of the things I liked was the consistency between the pieces (but I clearly didn't care enough to sub out the other fabric).

This is a kit I bought way back in the day (from Judy's Stitchery Nook in Harlingen, TX - one of the best stitching stores I've ever been to, staffed and owned by the most awesome ladies).   I only bought this one as an act of completionism, as  I really didn't like this fairy, but I grew to like her.  My least favorite part of her is the purple dress, but I don't mind it or anything.  I do love the bundle she's carrying.

There were a couple of errors in the chart (like a bead placed near her elbow that made no sense).   So I did some intentional fudging.  I was looking online and couldn't find very many pictures to see if other people subbed out the bead and the other areas I thought were wrong.

I am not the biggest fan of the pink bead choice, but again, it wasn't that big of a deal and worked out OK.

I love the wreath and feather

I lost the Black Coffee for the shoes, but all of the other kits used it as well, so I had enough left over.

I loved the vines, but I was worried for a bit I would run out of beads - I think I ended up with about 15 left over.

And here, have a fun gif because I kind of love gifs that show progress... A couple of them were distorted because not all of my pics could be cropped to 1:1 and I was too lazy to throw in some white space to balance it out ;)

No I'm going to try to decide what to stitch on next.  Ferret Knot is next on the rotation, but WWKCD is already in snaps.

February TUSAL

I joined the Totally Useless SAL hosted by Daffycat again this year. I think it makes the perfect companion to WIPocalypse. To find out more info click here (or, you know, the button in the sidebar).

After my "emptying of the ort jar", I've already started refilling my juice jar! (although with my decluttering going on, I'm hoping to make a snazzier Ort container soon).

Here are my orts!

And here is a little bit more progress on Thanksgiving Fairy. With my not-quite-gone head cold, I'm just feeling too gross to go out in public, so cleaning and stitching it is. She grew a little hair and her wings are filling in :)

On a Roll!

With this irritating cold, I've been such a bum, just binge-watching Netflix and stitching.

I finished another RoundRobin piece, which means once I stop by the PO tonight, I'll finally be down to one in my possession!  YAY!  And I know what I want to stitch on the last one, I just need to chart it out.  I'm going to give myself a week or two before I get back to that one (unless the next one gets mailed to me, in which case I'll have to hurry again ;) )

I did a band from Esther's Waves by Northern Expressions.  I picked a band I liked, and I chose colors from fibres in my collection.

I used a Needle Necessities I originally acquired for a custom piece I did (of my uncle's artwork), Sassy Brass (by Crescent Colours), and Bark (WDW).

I love how it came out - it looks SO MUCH like Tiger's Eye, which is my favorite semi-precious gemstone.  I kind of hated to give the Round Robin back, because I loved it that much.

Here's my band (colors are a bit off, it was late when I took the picture):

Here's the whole piece:

And here's Mona, "helping" me.

I also stitched on Thanksgiving Fairy while hanging out with some friends while watching the SuperBowl (poor Panthers, oh well).

WIPocalypse - January

So I'm a week late... oops ;)

My main goal for this year is to start as few projects as possible.  At first I was on a total "new project ban", but then I realized that there were a few small things I'd like to start/finish and I didn't want to guilt myself.

But in the meantime, I'm still trying to plug away at WIPs/WIsPs/UFOs.

So far this/last month, I put a few stitches in my WWCKD and Thanksgiving Fairy by Mirabilia, as well as the Round Robin that I've fallen so far behind on.

I have already chosen what I want to do on the next RR (I have two more in my possession), and I know what I want to do on the last one, but I have to design it first, so I'll be doing my RRs slightly out of order.

Here is Thanksgiving Fairy!  I finished her skirt and started in on her wings.  I was out of town when I was working on her, and somehow the Black Coffee that is used for her boots was MIA, so I'll get to that later.   Because she's so small, I bead as I go.

Here is my contribution to Kay's RR.   I used the octopuses from Hands On Design's "Octopus Dance" from their Square*ology "Ahoy" series.   I stripped everything down to one octopus and then flipped it and placed them next to each other.  I used Weeks Dye Works Bethlehem for the main color, and Argyle Socks for the other shade.  I reversed the angle of the stitching so that the varigation came out opposite on each octopus (does that even make sense?  Well, you can see!)

Here is the whole RR:

January 24- Topic: Introduce yourself, your projects, and any goals you have for the year!

Hallo!  I think this is the third? year I've tried to participate in WIPocalypse.  In 2014, I was off to a great stitching start.  I got a little derailed last year, right around March, but now I'm trying to get back to it, and my only real competition is that I got a PS4 for Christmas, and boy do I love me some videogames. :)   I am still plugging away at PS3 games (most notably the Assassin's Creed series), and I fell into Diablo III on the PS4 (I had never played before).  I really want to play Grim Fandango again, though - I had that back when I was a PC gamer ;)

I have all of my WIPocalypse goals listed here, and most of my pictures of pieces here.

I'm going to try to get back on "schedule" with Zodiac Mystery.   It's a 12 month mystery, and I stopped stitching on it after February, so I will try to pick it back up in March.

As far as non-stitching goals, I do have two quilts I started last year that I'd like to go ahead and finish, one is Bonnie Hunter's Allietare mystery quilt, and the other is a bloomin' 9 patch that I started at my quilting store.  That's about it, which isn't too bad..

#WIPWednesday

Last time, Thanksgiving Fairy looked like this:

And then #MirabiliaMonday happened and another thread or two was added.

And here she is for #WIPWednesday (I stitched another thread or two before crashing last night).

#WIPWednesday

A couple of weeks-ish ago, Terri suggested Mirabilia Mondays, and I was not going to take part initially, but then I figured that I could at least go ahead and add just one thread on Mondays to a Mirabilia (as I always seem to have at least two Mira WIPs at any given time).   In the name of laziness I'll cheat and give out my #MirabiliaMonday picture as #WIPWednesday

I also told myself that I'd work on Deco Spirits as that one-thread Mira... and so here's Thanksgiving Harvest Fairy.

Before

One Two threads at a time.  I actually managed another length last night, but didn't take a pic.

IHSW, Post-holiday&friends weekend

 I know a number of people used the 10th as their YOTA weekend, since the first of the year gets a bit crazy for most people... and since I was working that weekend, I thought I would belated-YOTA-it (I think only one of my SALs is strict, and it's a FB one, so that didn't matter as much for blog posting).    But it was definitely IHSW, and I failed in that hanging out with a bunch of people wasn't necessarily hermiting, it was all about stitching, so I hermited from non-stitching.

I met with a few friends and did a bit of stitching & shopping this past weekend, and I'm happy to say that I'm here with plenty of not-quite-in-focus camera-phone pics to show for it ;)

First, let's get the stitching out of the way:

I wanted to start on Steampunk Angler Fish (technically the Steampunk Sea Serpent, but, well I'm a trained zoologist, I just can't) by SamSarah Designs, but it was late and I wanted something easy, so I started on Mirabilia's Thanksgiving Fairy instead (large blocks of color, yayz).

So that was my first night of stitching (after a day of other stuff).   This is the last of the Holiday "LE" (are they really LE?  I mean, they sold out initially, but I don't see a shortage of them now or anything) kits that I have not stitched, and I have to say that when I started working with it, I got a bit miffed.   I did not change the kit fabric (which I would have enjoyed doing), because I wanted to keep consistency between the pieces (consistency being a bugaboo of mine for series), but this particular kit has different fabric than the rest!
Nicer fabric, for sure, but still, it's still totally different.

This is the "natural" linen by Zweigart, and all of the other fairies came with "natural" linen, but I swear, all of that was the same fabric, and this one is utterly, utterly different.  Annoyances.  Oh well, at least this particular linen is a lot softer and nicer to work with.  Still.  Feh (and now that I've gotten that out, I'm over it).  I do note that this is #6 in the series, and I bought them as they came out - I don't know if all of the fairies are on this linen now, or what.  I do think I'm the only one I know that actually has been using the kit fabrics.   So that's the start on her.

rawr!

The next night, I broke out the Steampunk Angler Fish, and I stitched the scales along the back first, and as an avid Dune fan, of course my brain went to "sandworm" as I finished my second night of stitching.

The color of the linen in this picture is much more true than the next one.   I did a floss toss to pick this fabric, but I'm suddenly not quite sure about it.  I'm hoping I like it when it's all said and done, but right now, I'm feeling nervous.

This piece does crack me up, though, because I am once again running into the disconnect I have sometimes when hand dyed flosses are involved with the model stitch on the front of the chart and the actual threads not matching.  That "Daffodil" is really bright (and not so much on the stitched model on the front of the chart).    I'm fine with the colors working together, I just think it's funny how that happens.

And after another night of stitching (plus stitching on half of my flight, which seemed to fascinate my seatmate, who watched, but didn't ask), this is where I am with this piece.

The fabric in this pic looks way more tan than the purple it is - it's actually Shale, by Picture This Plus.  I originally looked at Ancient, but when I saw it in person, floss tossing, I hated it.

The inner bits will all be stitched in a dark color, so all of those bits and gears will pop more when I get back to it.  So far, it's been a thoroughly enjoyable stitch.

I think changing between all of the gears and little bits are keeping it fun - frequent swapping, but no confetti, so it's not like I'm struggling with each piece.  I just pick a color and go.    I keep thinking, though, that the fabric I picked up is entirely too large (fat quarter), but this is just part of the body (I just hate wasting fabric).  And of course as I'm stitching it, I realize that I didn't need more fabric, I had some fabric in my stash that would have worked quite well.   And I wonder why I end up with so much extra fabric.




And finally, I wanted to stitch all day yesterday, but I was actually quite productive, doing all of my laundry and putting this away (I'm usually a total slacker that takes a week or two to get everything put up, tripping over that luggage for the two weeks before I finally get around to it).  Heck, I even folded all three loads of laundry!

I wanted to stitch on Fantasy Sampler, but I discovered that I didn't want to use the working copies I had made, and figured that since I have the Best of TW books, I would just write on the original, but I couldn't find that either, so I'll have to make new working copies out of the Best of book.   The symbols are the same, but they're typed (vs the handwritten original), so it will at least be easier for me to read.   I actually briefly pondered buying the pattern on PatternsOnline, and then realized that would be foolish as I have no (working) printer at home.   So my January YOTA goal is shot, but that's cool, I'll catch it next month.

So I decided to work on Celtic Ferret Knot instead; this one will probably get finished first, as it seems to be my "go to" for "oh dear, I can't stitch on what I want for _____ reason."

It calls for DMC, and I decided to go with overdyes, and the hand/overdyes go together, but aren't really anything like what the DMC color is, but I'm OK with that, though every once in a while, I feel like I should have gone with a darker tan (there's a "chocolate" somethingerother Crescent Colour that I think I might have liked better, but when I look at the colors I did choose, I'm still content).

But I got a good chunk of those sections done while watching Godzilla, so yay for progress (I like it so much better filled out - the linen annoys me less)

Other than stitching, I went on a bit of a shopping binge or three.

First up, are most of the goodies I bought at the stitching shop.  I am so utterly happy to have 1.  A brick-and-mortar shop to visit and 2.  Friends and people to help me figure out and decide fabric colors.

I picked up Growth Rings by Ink Circles, even though I have the magazine, because I just hate having an entire magazine hanging out when it's not really necessary.  I really want to get to that one sooner rather than later, and of course I'll be changing the colors.

Red Riding Hood is a piece I've been looking at a *lot* on Etsy from Primitive Hare.  I just adore it.   Without any kind of frame of reference, the finished photo makes it look a lot smaller than it is - when I opened the chart I was a bit shocked at how huge it really is, not that I love it any less.

The two Glendon Place Baroque Beauties are Millicent and Elizabeth.   I think there are 4 or 5? of those floral pieces out now, but these are the only two I like I didn't see Isabel which is the other one from the series I quite like, and I not only like them, but I adore them, especially Elizabeth (the bottom flower).  They use a lot of kreinik, so someday when I'm at an LNS again I'll have to work on conversions to Petite Treasure Braids.

And finally, Cherry Wine from Keslyn's.  I actually saw it as I was sauntering my way to the check out counter - I just love all of the specialty stitches.   I really want to do more canvas work or samplers, because I really miss all of the specialty stitches I used to do.  As much as I love my little xes, I need a bit more sometimes.

And of course, when I saw the Margaret Sherry box (well, there was more than one, but I didn't want to hold anyone up), I had to look for some adorable mice, and there they are.   I especially love the dandelion one.

And here's where my trip got expensive ;)

I really, really, really, really, really, really (no really) want Tiramisu by Glendon Place, but I have been resisting.   But I hate buying fabric online, so since they had the threadpack (which I was not going to buy, oops),  I did a bit of floss tossing (I don't like the peachy fabric it calls for), or at least the lady at the shop did a little floss tossing, and I really liked this "Bone" color.   Because of the piece, I didn't really want or need any kind of mottled fabric, and I was quite happy with this.

So now I have the threads and the fabric, and no chart, which I admit, isn't the kind of situation that I usually find myself in (they were sold out of the chart, or I would have it, and probably would have started it).

The other picture shows the two Nora alphabet fairies charts and the fabric I picked out for them, though honestly, that fabric has to be one of my all time favorites, and as I'm stitching the letters for others, I might try to weasel different fabric in there from my stash so I can keep that Queen Anne's Lace for myself.  For heaven only knows what, but it will be mine!  It's just so pretty (and OMG, so soft!), but really, I think that fabric is great for those letters.

The last of the stitching trip acquisitions was this piece of fabric.     Once upon a time, I saw Mirabilia's Red (gods I hate the Mirabilia web re-design) and I thought it was pretty but not for me (red being my favorite color, but Mira's ladies not being my favorite subjects), but when I read the story that Susan wrote for it, I fell in love with the piece.   So now I have to stitch it because of the story.    And because of the story, I want Red to be on a dark fabric, like she's walking at night or in the forest.

I expressed this to the very patient woman who was helping me with my fabric and she immediately pulled this fabric.  Apparently someone who frequents the shop wanted the same kind of feel to the piece and this is the fabric she used, and they said it was absolutely stunning.   I've tried to color correct for the fabric, but it's a deliciously stormy forest color.   I think I'm pretty on board with this color, but I was also thinking of Bayou from Sparklies, though I might chat with Kate about it, because I'm not sure I'm ok with the yellow accents (though the fabric is definitely killer, just not quite perfect for Red, I had purchased a swatch during my great search).

And just when you think it was done, more shopping happened.

I got this from the quilt store - I'm not a heavy quilter, but I have some ideas and picked out some pretty fabrics.   The three fat quarters of pretty horses is so I can make a stitching bag (pattern in the photo), and a couple of the other fabrics are because I have pairs of fat quarters at home and these round it out in case I want to make the case (and if not, there are other cases I'm thinking of making, which I needed a third fabric for anyway).

And finally, I fell into a Vera Bradley sale.  I'm not a Vera fangirl, but I had gotten a wristlet-wallet thing and it has taken a serious beating, and it's holding up like a champ.    And stitching friends taught me the value of the Miller bag and how it's perfect for storing and traveling with stitching, so I bought one of those.   And because those pieces have both proven to be really sturdy, I've been looking for a work bag... and then we went to the outlet store where everything was on super sale.  And then (there are a lot of  'ands' and 'and thens' in this whole story), a friend who quilts convinced me of the practicality of a hanging organizer for quilting stuff, and since I am taking my second quilt class in a month or so, it made perfect sense (I struggled with dragging things back and forth and keeping them organized), so I ended up with a Miller, a hanging thing, and a small-ish tote bag (Villager?) for work.  At least they were all in the same pattern?  I do find most of the patterns hideous, but black and white should work pretty well (and show all of my dirt - hah!).

This is my current magical Vera, in the only pattern that I actually like (well, almost the only pattern I like), and it traveled with me on the plane.  I removed the several projects and books from the bag and put them in my checked bag so I'd have less to carry on the way bag home - I knew what I'd be doing on the plane on the way home so I needed less stuff, on the way out, I had everything in there, because I'm always so excited I can't just focus one one or two things.

But OMG, the POCKETS!  they have so many pockets!

Here are the Veras I managed to purchase.   I'm really torn, because now I want a Miller for "active" projects and a Miller for "on deck" projects... but I am thinking I should save the new one for the quilting class.  I probably will just switch usage, but geez, I love these bags.

So matchy-matchy

So after all of that, the only things I managed to NOT buy that I was hoping for were more qsnaps (mine are getting so old they're cracking or just won't work well, even using the dishwasher trick) and Tiramisu.   I ordered Qs from Amazon, but I'm avoiding the purchase of Tiramisu (even though it kinda hurts ;) ), because I know if I get it I will immediately start it, and I'd like to think I have some semblance of self control.

Christmas Ornaments by Nora Corbett

Well, I finished the piece I'd started over the "sick" weekend :)  Luckily I'm doing much better, even if not at 100% yet.

Someone posted a finished piece on a Facebook group and mentioned that it was from the 2012 Keepsake Cross-Stitch Calendar, but is now available through Herrschner's as a pdf download.

I thought I would just take a couple of hours to bead it this morning (I started at 9 or so?), but 12 hours later I'm finally done!   The beading on this was intense, but I think the beading also took a little longer, because I made sure the beads were good and secure since the beading on this is so heavy.

I really liked the picture I saw on Facebook, so I went with that idea on the fabric I had.  I  have a lot of grey(ish) fabric, so I did a floss toss and pulled the one I liked the best (some of them were too green or blue for what I wanted).   I think I ended up with a pewter lugana.  I'm pretty sure it's 28 count because the stitches were so huge (can you tell I don't keep all of my fabric as labelled as I should? haha!)

Anyway, it's been rainy and miserable all day here, and should be for a few days, so no awesome pictures, I'll probably update it later.

Here's the before with no beads/kreiniks - I actually stayed up late last night to finish it and considered WIPWednesday-ing it.

And the after! - I really couldn't get the shots I wanted - it's been rather dreary here all day, so pretty much just artificial lighting, slightly different shots show off the beads differently.

                

And a whole bunch of bonus shots (sans my initials, I had to ponder that for a bit).

         

                  

I'm pretty sure it's the last finish for the year, but at least this piece will stop screaming at me every time I see a posted finish. I can't wait to get it framed!