oddly as I had been stitching on my designated Sunday project during the week, and pretty much swooshing along at pace filling in easy to see sections come Sunday and nope.
It was as if I had come to a stop sign and needed to start something new, something small and give the kittens/cats a rest.
but a distraction from thinking stitch whilst the filling in was easy as not much else feels that way at the moment.
So things have moved on quite a bit with the black and white cat.
a few ninjas and I think it will be time to go back to the tabby.
BFF once more a journeying so as planned a RAL. Although not quite as originally planned for either of us .
Roni had intended to sew (on what she may or may not tell you in her blog) but the call of the wool overtook her instead.
I thought to try the wool option myself, but two rows in and it was squeaky and annoying, so it went back into its bag, sans picture and will have to wait once more for Fidgety Fingers and TV loud enough to counter the squeak.
Hmm so then what to do.
Card up some kits ready to start when I feel like it. This kit has one design in it.
Both are seasonal and I think this will be the last I share of them until that season is upon us, all of a sudden and quite a surprise as usual.
.CLICK HERE to see what my BFF did for her RAL
If you saw the last update on this project you will notice a lot of progress. That is not due to a super fast session of stitching today,
Nope, there has been some during the week on the basis of not wanting to start something new until the Dragons are completed and they are waiting on the backstitch.
So more shades of grey
On to the next part and this went very quickly. This time I remembered to pause and take a picture before starting the backstitch.
This is one of those designs that the backstitching has a massive impact.
Both stitching parts completed.
and a pause.
Let me explain. All of the cross stitch is I think finished. There may be some ninjas hiding on the edges that will make themselves known when I am Backstitching.
Ah and that is the reason for the pause the backstitching, I am contemplating what to use.
The pattern of course recommends one strand of 310. However, it also recommended two strands on 14 count Aida and I have not done that. My Dragons are one over one on linen. So small stitches.
I think backstitching with one strand of DMC might be too wide and impact on the detail. I am not sure if my usual solution to this issue is going to work. Both on the basis of darkness and availability. I don't think mid to dark brown will do. I do know someone with the right shade and a decent length but I have only met her a few times, and I am not sure how comfortable I would feel about asking?
So a ? raised on Facebook cross stitching groups to see if anyone has any ideas of what would be suitable. I little space from it might be good anyways.
Stake conference, so more stitching time than a normal Sunday but not quite as much as a General Conference. Watching via You Tube this week and nit via Zoom, I do prefer the former but being able to "attend " remotely via either remains a blessing.
Still stitching with the light grey. I think there will be a change in shade if not in colour for next week.
There is still a paw on the left kitten to do in both white and grey but it just does not feel like a good jumping off point at the moment.
and yet so far!
I have not forgotten the dragons. I have been on a ninja hunt, here a stitch there a stitch, two the same shade at the same time bliss.
I think I have under thirty stitches to go, all on the wing struts.
I hope I have spotted all the stitches around the edges. If not well backstitching will no doubt serve its dual purpose and not only add clarity to the design but flush out any lingering ninja stitches.
and the stitching is completed.
I am happy with the variegated thread replacing the intended thread from the cover kit.
I am also happy with the result of my initial error. You can play spot the difference between my BFF's version (she followed the pattern except for the variegated swop)
next week we move to the stitching on SAL 23 part two.
Oh Click Here for my BFF's blog and that spot the difference game.
I have been framing today, after the Sunday stitching and before ninja hunting on the dragons.
As the framed items are gifts can't post them just yet. However, when holding finished stitches up for my BFF to see over Messenger she oft asks me to put something behind to stop the light coming through and distorting the image she can see.
That reminded me of the unplanned result of adding yellow paper behind the design on a birth sampler because there were cut out Ducks in the mount I wanted to emphasise. The result was a subtle warming of the cross stitched piece.
So in this instance I thought something much more intentional and reflective of the colours I would want as the subtle shade.
So it does not look like much but here it is.
I was going to say it was a bit like the weather, more grey but today there is actually some Sunshine.
The kitten however still with the grey stuff.
Blogger stats tell me a lot of views this past week or so are from Germany so Hallo und willkommen, bitte hinterlassen Sie einen Kommentar, wenn Sie eine Person sind. Eigentlich können Sie einen hinterlassen, wenn Sie ein Roboter sind, beides wäre interessant.
for a wedding.
I will decide to do these things at the last moment. In this instance inspired by hearing two days before that the decorations for the wedding would include balloons.
It is from a cover kit, but I made some modifications in particular adding the gold blending filament, to the cross stitched balloon hearts and adding the backstitched gold hearts.
I have a little bit of gold blending thread as regular visitors will be aware.
A quick trip to the loft the morning of the wedding and it was all ready to go.
I have crossed out part of the details for the couples privacy.
I rather like how it turned out.
Little bit of tissue paper and some wool and all set.
well unless we get fed up with it and there is no part two. It could happen.
I have already deviated from the original design on this cover kit, I miss counted so there will be optional spot the difference opportunity with this SAL
As usual we have approached the stitching differently, although we were both agreed that the edge would be variegated threads and not dotty stitching of three shades of green and a white.
My BFF chose her variegated on the night, I had a post session hunt for suitable so I can try it out next week.
So this is the position I reached with our seasonal stitch as my BFF calls it.
CLICK HERE to see her progress. Now before deciding on the double kit as SAL 23 we had discussed moving onto something a bit bigger afterwards, we do like to vary the size and style. We had decided on a designer and a few potential images. However, when mentioning it towards the end of the stitching session neither of us could recall what it was. None of it, source image designer theme! We looked at each other aghast. Minds blank we scrabbled for anything to jog our memory. Mmm errm oh it was something she had not something I had. It was a bit bigger than a kit but not massive? It was ?? An then suddenly she remembered and we laughed so hard we were in tears at the madness of it. And then sent a message in messenger saying what it is just in case we forget again!
I am a bit late posting, too tired on Wednesday evening and other things on Thursday (more on that later) so my BFF was first to it this week.
and did not want to start anything new or work on anything complicated.
Needed a something.
So, well knitting, no not That cable project but another long term project that was once intended to be a waistcoat but is no longer.
It is wool from my BFF, a big ball of wool (dress making scissors for size reference) and after a few rows the fidgets were gone.
Then back into the bag it went, project hibernation once more.
I did sew last week, just white and I did not post as the picture was not that different from the week before as the white is not easy to see.
This week I finished the "reachable" and "easy to see" white. Rewarded my self with a few stitches of pink in a central spot and a shape that would have been suitable for a post yesterday. I then moved onto a very pale grey.
Hm so pale it is not that easy to see even next to the white.
on a close up ? Maybe a bit better.
but not a final finish. Backstitch completed, with some individualisation to compensate for the skinny head of my cow.
made for an interesting expression.
We had a slightly different stitching arrangement for the night, Roni can tell you about that. And we both felt perhaps a pointy needle would have made the backstitch easier.
Then thinking of the differences between out finished stitches I suggested they would make a good spot the difference game which lead to our attempts to take pictures of both together. Mine in hand and Roni's on screen.
I think Roni's picture of hers in hand and mine on her screen will have worked better once she posts it.
We have plans for SAL 23, which makes a change.
In 2022 I burned a dragon on a box the dragon was holding a sphere and I thought I would make it look like it was holding the world.
Except when I took a picture of it, well to me it looked like the head of a bear and my BFF thought it looked like a wolf.
In an attempt to make it look like the world I coloured it blue and green. That did not work, just made the creature, whichever you saw look mouldy.
A re think was required, and whilst I did that it went up into the loft as I had a stand or perhaps mount thought going on in my head.
That got paused, I think I wanted to do some extreme sanding and then could not be quite bothered.
So, whilst I was in the loft over Christmas and working on something else up there (expect that something to get a post of its own later when it hopefully gets to its intended placement) I came across the box whilst looking for a pencil.
Down from the loft it came. I am not sure what I intended to do with it. It sat, and I looked at it and it sat.
Then I thought I would just go over the sphere with a white marker pen. A few times, until the blue and green went away. I did, it sort of did and I wondered "would it look better if the background was all dark". Getting out the pyrography stuff takes a bit of time, and preparation and organising ventilation, its winter and cold. There just happened to be a black marker pen in arms reach.
"just to get an feel of how it would look" I tell myself.
"Hmm not bad" was quickly followed by "people sometimes colour the pyrography perhaps?"
The metallic watercolour paints also happened to be within arms reach and one thing leading to another..
...painted dragon, it even has metallic blue over the black, just to see how it looked, background.
The question of if it is progress or not, I do wonder what was the point of doing the woodburn in the first place if I was just going to paint it?
It is not even finished. The sides need something doing to them, and the inside of course and that mount/stand whatever may need a rethink.
At least I have a new Forestella Song to add to the musical background of my ongoing contemplation.
I have mentioned that finding square frames is quite tricky so if I see some then I buy them.
Of course most of the time they are then not the right size for anything for ages however, I digress.
I bought two identical square frames from the charity shop, still in their original wrapper with the original price on there. The charity shop price was half the original and about normal charity shop pricing.
I had nothing in mind for them until in our last BFF session my friend and I were chatting and a particular Christmas themed piece I had completed was mentioned. The thought came to me later that it might fit one of the new frames.
And you know it did!
It stayed in the "mount" I made from an old Christmas card which I thought might have just been for display purposes when it was my day in the Advent link up. in 2022, so it has been waiting for a frame.
Although it will have to wait till Christmas 2026 to be displayed.
Pleased as I am with that I am even happier the whilst getting out the Robin I also found The windmill and thought this too is of a size for the little frame.
Wow you think that has been waiting since 2013, erm no that is the year I started blogging and did a post about it. It was started and finished in a year that started with 19??
However, its wait is over and it went up on the wall immediately.
And for the Forestella song ? Nocturne and words from the Wind
I think that this January has had more posts than any previous January, which is strange as I don't feel like I have been getting that much done.
There is an odd sense of achievement in having got from one end of this month to the other this year.
about our cross stitches, generated by me making a mistake that has resulted in my figure having a thinner head that the pattern intended.
"Skinny Cow" my friend said "Fat Head" I replied and we both giggled at the descriptions of our stitching that sounded distinctly insulting and yet are true.
So here is my skinny cow
I finished the cross stitching, my BFF has dispensation to complete hers off screen so we can both backstitch next week, Roni did loose some time showing me a suggestion for a future "big" BFF SAL, not the next one as we have a plan for that but a next, next erm possibly next one when we are set to upsize from cover kits a bit. Oh and I have dragons finished, I feel the need to have them finished before adding something new to the collection of WIPs.
CLICK HERE to see the cow with the right sized head.
with the filling in and the single stitches here, there and everywhere.
Although it is very satisfying when a section gets that last stitch.
I consol myself that there is less still to stitch than has already been done.
I was doing a lot of that to get the threads into my new box.
Something I usually find soothing, but then usually I am not doing this many at once.
Or thinking " I could be stitching dragons" , it needed doing, so do it I did.
They look pretty sideways in and thread showing.
And just in randomly as they were wound.
However, I do prefer them stored in number order and thought I might try them numbers up to see if I like it that way.
It is not the full set of numbers and the gaps in the sections are reflective of that.
Still it will be a good basis for any patterns I chose to use this thread for, repeats of cover kits or cards that much as I might hope otherwise might not be kept. That sort of thing.
I have shared this Forestella link before, the title fits and I am rather fond of this one
Last week I finished having unpicked everything and restitched it and with some off screen get back to where I would have been time.
at the mid point of this evening my BFF said she was taking a picture as hers looked oddly invisible. So I stopped and took a midway picture as well.
At this point I had just finished stitching the small section of green. Roni having finished the larger lower section spotted there was more green but oddly small upper and lower larger had different symbols but only one green identified as green in the kit!
So with the reason for that discovered I proceeded to the large green before I forgot and followed suit. Then the sections the pattern calls grey but the thread looks more like an oily green.
The eyes are in the same odd shade and at this point I realise I have made an ohps with the nose. I am not fixing it I am going to work around it.
As for the purple and green item, at the moment, without its backstitching the thing it most looks like to me is a K-Pop / Korean Group style light stick. The purple makes me think of BTS whilst the green of the most delightful Forestella and they are both expecting to release new albums this year.
If you have visited with me before (or looked at the labels list) you know which I will most likely be buying.
CLICK HERE to see my BFF's progress and play spot the difference.
which is of course short for approximately meaning in English not completely accurate but close.
But first the dragons update
All went smoothly with the zoom link to the Church meeting.
I filled in a little bit of red, spotted one stitch of white needed in the left kittens whisker and then well I had white loaded into my needle!
hmm perhaps a close up.
Lots of jumping off places for other colours. However, also still sections of reachable white so options for next time.
New Forestella song to enjoy.
I am not sure at this stage if the originator of this particular themed link up will be hosting it this year. Due to circumstances certain hops and linkups had to be paused last year.
I did note however that more than one blogger still posted on the 15th of the month any items either gifted to them or intended as gifts even without the link being available.
I expect we all received something craft or stitching related last month so January might produce a few posts in the blog world on this theme.
For me, a gift from my father, one he spotted and chose himself for me.
I am fond of a box
This is a very nice box. And what will I put in it? Well I will put in it those numbered threads I was previously gifted inside a very nice cardboard box. I made a few cardboard bobbins, but that was irksome so I bought 100, that should do the trick .
And the drawer at the bottom, variegated threads may well find a home there.
I have plans for the top but after the dragons and the All our Yesterdays projects I think.
Click here to pop over to jocondine for her GG2026
.
and another cover kit, we looked at the pattern before we settled on this one. It met out current criteria for a SAl.
Not too big, not to much dotting about and not too much backstitch, even if it isn't just outlining backstitch.
Added to all that we had previously considered a Toffee Cow (they will always be that to me because of the Highland Toffee from my childhood with a picture of this breed of bovine on the wrapper) of much greater complexity.
I had already sorted the thread for this so I did a bit of bobbinating, well one skeins worth whilst Roni sorted hers then we made a start.
Just not my night for it, I made a single stitch mistake on the bit in the middle. I was going to leave it and just work around it. Then I realised I had my thread card turned around and ended up using the wrong brown. So out it had to come, back to the point I went wrong.
and then start stitching again. To finish the night here.
As per our ohps agreement I can have the time that did not equal productive stitching back off camera.
So about 1:20. .
CLICK HERE to see my BFF's much smoother start.
well sort of, worked up from the tail and met up with the working down from the head and it joined in the right place.
Still some dotty filling in to do on the tail and the wing struts. This is confetti filling in and so will be quite slow.
wondering about the backstitch now, not sure if the one strand of normal DMC will be too thick and I think there is maybe a bit much to do with my usual alternative. Plus the availability of the darker strands is reducing and even if I do find sufficient not sure dark brown will be dark enough.
the second of two booklets with threads I bought longer ago than my brain is willing to acknowledge.
The first was a booklet of Country Companions Designs and I discovered quite quickly that not all of the shades of threads in the keys for the patterns were in the kit. I reiterate I had no expectations that the thread that came with it would be sufficient to stitch all of the designs in the booklet. I had however thought that there would be at least a length of each shade needed.
As noted that was not the case so I approach this one with greatly lowered expectations and the assumption I will need to dip into the thread stash.
Here is a picture of the booklet, which as you can see is All Our Yesterdays.
And the thread bundles, and there is quite a lot of thread there just a question mark over what might not be there when I need it.
It is making an appearance as I have something specific to stitch for. But the specific something will be a gift so it won't get any updates at all till it is all finished and gifted. I don't think the intended recipient is a visitor to the blog but just to be on the safe side.
