BFF SAL 4..extra time

 I took my two hours of extra time in two hour long sessions. I did get some more green fill completed but have set up a nice area that I will be able to just filling pretty much without having to do any counting at our next Skype session.

my BFF has put her extra time to good use Click here to see her progress.

You will be able to see that she will be doing a larger section on the original due to the points she had reached before we decided to minimise, so she will have all of the buildings in hers (yes there are some buildings in there) and whilst I am updating to add the link to my BFF's blog Just a little reminder there is no backstitching in this piece, it was one of the points we were thinking was a positive whilst we struggled with it. But that positive was not sufficiently balancing out the negative vibes we were getting.

We still both like the image that we would have ended up with, just not enough to sew it at this time.

BFF Sal 4

 well still plodding along, there was green filling in a bit to the left and there was a lighter blue filling in a bit to the top right.

And as my BFF has noted CLICK HERE for link it still at times feels like the project has stalled.

and if it were not for taking pictures I might think there had been no progress at all. Now there was a chance that tonight's session via Skype might not have been possible and we had agreed were that the case dispensation was given for two hours of non Skype sewing just to keep things moving. 

So as tonight's session was coming to a close and we were both feeling there was a danger we would stall we decided to have that non Skype (no chatting required) two hours, in any combination of time, before next week to get them moved along.

Maybe we can deal with some of the fiddlier bits separately and leave nice soothing filler bits for our next get together.

Dragon mold

 you may recall the little dragon mould my BFF gifted me CLICK HERE for LINK and I used it for chocolate an noted I would like to find something a little more lasting to do with it. 

I have been meaning for a long time to "do" something with the little slivers of soap that are awkwardly small but my parsimonious nature will not let me threw out. I had found one use for them but that did not take much , and I will come back to that later.

So I watched several methods or recycling soap slivers back into usable soap. Being me I chose a bit of advice from one and bits from another and cobbled them together.

So my method..chop the soap up very small (with a knife not scissors as one person suggested) soak over night with a little water. Boil it up in a pan (I did not used a ban marie) and pour into moulds.

I used six cupcake papers (supported in a tin) and a plastic tray from a microwave meal. And at the last moment I had a thought...dragon mould.

I popped the dragon mould into the fridge hoping it would cool down quickly enough that I could get it out of he mould and onto one of the "cup cake" bars of soap.

It came out reasonably well, not that it is going to last a great length of time but perhaps a bit longer then the chocolate one, at the very least I am not going to eat it.

The soap needs to dry out a bit before it can be used (the soap in the tray I popped in the freezer and that made it come out of the tray very easily, and have cut it into six)

Once dry I will wrap them in a little twist of grease proof paper and will use as needed.

So things I have learned, use less water. The boiling direct in a pan takes a lot less time than the You Tube peoples using the ban marie method said it would. Don't use the patterned cake cups the colour comes off onto the soap (well unless that's what you want to happen) and strangely I find finely chopping soap slivers rather therapeutic.

I am restraining myself at the moment from investigating full blown soap making and hope to restrict myself to the recycling only. 

Sunday stitching...been a long time

 since there was my Sunday stitching, not since January 2020, first there was me with a cold and not going to church so as not to share the cough..then there was the no one going to church to avoid something rather more severe than a cough.

So today, things moving towards the way they once were there was some Sunday stitching. This project has been waiting patiently all this time.

It feels fitting that Tom's flower has all its petals now.

I do hope this is not going to have to wait as long this time before it gets worked on again.

BFF Sal 4 feeling cool

about the new size and focus of this project, although certainly not feeling the heat the same way my BFF has been CLICK HERE to link to her blog to see her progress and temperature.

The change to the amount remaining to stitch meant that I approached this week with enthusiasm which was a nice change.

Some new colours added (and some new design variations) and I am tootling along in the BFF SAL groove once more.

Giving some thought to what to do with it once it is completed and there are a few nebulous thoughts flitting about none of which have settled yet however it is fun now...

Gifted gorgeousness Link up July 2020

 The months just fly over and here it is another 15th of the month and the format stays the same, anything connected to the word gift is allowed gifts to or from.

This month I have another bag to share, made from the top section of the curtains I bought for the neutral fabric for my chorley-crossed quilt but the top part certainly was not neutral.

What is was was shades of purple, so it just had to be for my purple loving BFF.

I could not share it till it had been gifted.

Now pop over to this themed link up hosts page and see what she and the other participants have under the gift theme.Click here for serendipitousstitching21/07/gifted-gorgeousness-july-link-up-post.html

BFF Sal 4 It's not you, its me

 a parting of the ways?

Happily not, it's actually both of us .

Let me explain, my BFF and I chose this pattern together, it was supposed to meet our desire for strong colour, no backstitch.  It was supposed to be fun.

This evening as I started with the green and about half an hour into the sewing I had to accept this pattern was not fun, worse than not fun it was becoming a chore. So I had to say to my friend I am not liking this at all, I hoped it would grow on me but the only thing that is growing is my dislike and reluctance to sew!

It was with some relief that she concurred and we realised we were of a like mind. We finished the thread we were on with and then stopped to discuss what to do.

There was a lot of work already done on each project and totally abandoning it felt wrong. However the prospect of finishing it did not appeal to either of us. 

I was trying to decide where I could crop the original pattern to an acceptable completable size.  Then  I fished out a washable marker and drew lines to mark out the edges of a cropped design. I have a curved top which reflects the shape of the original pattern.

This change has such an impact on the rest of the evening, it felt suddenly doable rather than stretching off into a sea of blue and green. The needle moved faster and the prospect of watching the design grow and how the cropped pieces would look and what we might do with them when finished was now interesting.

It was a weight lifted and had me feeling almost giddy and the rest of the sewing session was once more a pleasure and we happily discussed how we each had not been feeling good with this project yet kept going because it was joint project. All the frustrations we had been having and our joint relief that we had accepted than and had a plan, my friend did the numbers, I will leave that to her to tell you about. 

The funny thing is that the cropped size for my piece is slightly smaller the the folded back view my friend had of it last week when she was concerned my material was too small. Perhaps there was something prophetic in that.

So here is tonight's progress.

I allowed myself some of the pink in celebration and because I don't need to save it as relief from all the blue (that I won't now be doing).

And yes we are discussing what we will do when this is finished and whatever that is, its is going to be small!

CLICK HERE to visit my friends blog to see here progress for the evening.

Blackwork more wallpaper

The top section this time, I have modified the pattern I used for the bottom of the wall (which was from The New Anchor Book of Blackwork) into something with a more vertical theme.

Now it is not finished as I have not quite decided on the height of the finished piece. I will settle that once I have the frame picked out.

The gap to the left is for the mirror over the fire place. There was a wall sconce with a candle to the left of the mirror, but both the scale and the design of it did not appeal to me so I have left that off.

Still not settled on the fill for the underskirt. I will mull it over some more then hopefully it will pop into my head what will be suitable.

I will note that soothing as blackwork is, during a football final may not be the best time to try stitching it. I had to take out sections three times whilst doing this. I would otherwise have finished it in the match time (even with out extra time or penalties) but as it was the last two panels and a bit to the right had to wait just that bit longer.

This is cropped roughly where the frame will go. The pattern has a stitched frame, I am not sure I want that I might just have the design go to the edge of the mount and let the mount frame the image.

BFF Sal 4 Start as

 you don't mean to go on and then do!

OK that needs a bit of unravelling.

I started on the blue with no intention of continuing on with it past the bit of thread in that shade which was already cut. The It was to be back onto the green.

Indeed after only a little bit on the blue I was past done with it as it was fighting my ability to see where I was, but I would finish the thread in the needle.

However, by the time that was done I was in a place I could "see" again so I kept going with the blue and I never did get to the green.

At the end of the evening it is traditional for us to hold up our projects for a tanah! moment, my friend held up hers and then I held up mine close to the camera . My friend commented my fireworks were exploding blue, I mentioned the blue stretched almost to a specific clear feature.

We then had a conversation in which my friend appeared concerned that the blue was further over  and I was saying it was ok and we were talking which bit was which for a little when she said.."I don't think that there is enough material left you are so far over."....ah light bulb...I was holding my project up with half of the material folded behind out of the way to make it easier to handle.  My friend did not realise that...the look on her face when I said oh you are worried my material is too small and unfolded it... was a picture and I was not able to stop laughing.

Mind given I have on occasion been rather close to the edge her concern is understandable and we were both a bit more tired than usual having started 15 mins late and overrun by the same so her sudden though of "didn't she have more material" and "oh no its too small how do I tell her!" was also understandable. It is still funny, we normally communicate so much better we oft don't need to finish sentences and other people think that we are talking in code, on this occasion we were in different books never mind a different page..

And the lovely thing to me (if not for my friend) was how very concerned she was that my fabric was messed up when hers was fine. She did see the funny side eventually, about the time I could catch my breath from laughing, then she got the giggles and around the merriment went.

Pop over (click her for link) and see her progress and take on the evening.

Now whilst we were sewing, well for the last hour I could hear the football in the background, and the cheers for the goals..it of course went to extra time and as I have typed this another goal for England and as I type this the match is over and England are in the final.

I only have one football themed cross stitch....LOL perhaps that should change?

BFF SAL 4 sometimes

 you feel like you are whizzing along quite nicely and other times slogging through mud  and mostly it is all in the mind and a reasonable amount of stitches has gone in either way.

Tonight felt like an odd mix of both whilst I was working on my bright lime green, getting it all filled in (for this reachable area at least) and then a new shade of blue it felt like I was doing quite nicely.

Once our two hour plus (we went over a bit as no Sewing Bee to rush off to see) was up and I stopped and took stock it did not look like much had been accomplished.

That's where progress photos come in handy, they help remind me that I have managed to do something in the given time.

I think it is filling into the corner and not reaching fingers out into the white that is doing it, making me feel it is slow progress at the moment.

My BFF is having her own deep contemplations and you can pop on over to her blog and see what they are (click here for link) also as she has zoomed out a bit for her progress picture perhaps you will get more of a hint of the project.

Oh and any followers by e-mail who have not changed how they follow tis is the last month that the digit thingy is going to work.