Category Archives: Mirabilia

Year of WIPs Challenge

And we’re off!  I did get brave and created a YouTube photo video.

Here’s what I settled on for stitching, along with the progress photo as of Sep 30.  Click to see full photo.

Scarlet Letter – Gratitude

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Mirabilia – Fairy Moon

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Examplar Dames – And They Sinned

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Carriage House Samplings – Houses of Hawk Run Hollow

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Mirabilia – Garden Verses

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Goode Huswife – Book of Spells

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Blue Ribbon Designs – An Expression of Gratitude

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Plum Street – Hurt Not the Earth

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Scarlett House – Coverlet Candle Mat

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Little House Needleworks – Needleworker

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This was actually my plane project for last week’s trip since it’s on 30 ct.

Mill Hill – Log Cabin Quilt

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This was my first project to work on. I finished 10 hours last night.  Love how it’s turning out but ended up having to unstitch  about 2 hours worth because of mixing up the blues.  Blah!

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For now I’ll focus on Houses of Hawk Run Hollow and stitch it every 4th project.  I’ll be creating a tab at the top to track progress.

Now I need to figure out what I want to stitch on next!

My quilting buddies are returning starting this week and I’m looking forward to returning to sewing with them.  I’ll decide on my quilt/sewing WIPs once I figure out how often I’ll be sewing.

WIP Challenge 2016-2017

I did something that has caused me to dig through this:

I know if I start digging through here I will soon have 50 WIPs.

My BFF mentioned a few days ago that she was going to participate in a WIP Challenge, where you finished 12 or so WIPs.  I didn’t fully understand how it would work since it was starting October 1, plus I have some huge WIPs and know I can’t stitch 12 of them in a year (on top of the sewing I want to get done) so I sort of filed it away in the back of my mind.

I was watching her latest flosstube and she brought it up again so I went hunting for more information and became intrigued.  I think it’s completely doable!  The gist is you stitch 10-15 WIPs by the end of December 2017.  The boss lady of the challenge states that as long as they have 1 stitch in them come October 1, 2016, they’re WIPs.

I wanted to divide my 10 items by older WIPs and newer WIPs, so my list looks like this right now:

  1. Scarlet Letter – Gratitude
  2. Mirabilia – Fairy Moon
  3. Examplar Dames – And They Sinned
  4. Carriage House Samplings – Houses of Hawk Run Hollow
  5. Goode Huswife – Book of Spells
  6. Blue Ribbon Designs – Expressions of Gratitude
  7. Plum Street – Hurt Not the Earth
  8. Scarlett House – Coverlet Candle Mat
  9. LHN – Needleworker
  10. Mill Hill – Log Cabin

Houses of Hawk Run Hollow and And They Sinned are my two largest WIPs.  I had already decided to go back to rotating through 4-5 projects at a time, and now I’m trying to decide if I want to go back to stitching in 10 hour increments on a design and then switching out or stitch for a week on something and switch out on Monday.  Either way I intend to focus on Houses or ATS.  So my weekly rotation may look like this:

  • Oct 1-2 Book of Spells
  • Oct 3-9 HOHRH
  • Oct 10-16 Needleworker
  • Oct 17-23 Expressions of Gratitude
  • Oct 24-30 Book of Spells
  • Oct 31-Nov 6 HOHRH
  • Nov 7-13 Coverlet Candle Mat
  • Nov 14-20 Gratitude
  • Nov 21-27 Fair Moon
  • Nov 28-Dec 4 And They Sinned
  • Dec 5-11 HOHRH
  • and so on until HOHRH is finished, then move ATS into that spot

Now that I have it written out this may be the better way to go.  If I decide to do the time version it’ll be something like

10 hours HOHRH
10 hours Book of Spells
10 hours Needleworker
10 hours Expressions of Gratitude
10 hours HOHRH
10 hours Coverlet Mandle Mat
etc…..

We’ve been paired off with another member of the group and required to send monthly post cards as a way to encourage and get to know each other.  I’m also excited about this as I’ve been sort of considering writing to someone once a month as a way to communicate.

Now I just need to figure in some quilting/sewing time and pull a couple of large WIPs and small WIPs and do my own quilting/sewing challenge during that time too.

And, I need to get this all down in my journal by September 30.

 

Dear Diary

I’m sorry to have been neglecting you.  It’s all this boy’s fault.  I have had an amazing summer hanging out by the pool with a cold beer, going to the movies, out to swanky restaurants, socializing with all the new friends I’ve made, but now he’s gone back to school and I have time to catch up with you and get all my summer secrets down.

Back to my regularly scheduled schedule!  Yay!

Over the past several weeks I have been spending a shit-ton of time in my Lady Lounge, Woman Cave, Sewing Room, whatever the heck everyone’s calling it these days.  Lately I have felt like calling it Dungeon.

Since I moved here almost five years ago, during the summer I normally sew until the air conditioner kicks on then I head downstairs to spend the rest of my day sitting on my rear end stitching and reading.  This summer, nope!  We really have had time out of the house, but the time in has been spent on daily chores, stitching, and reading.  I can’t remember the last time I unpacked my sewing machine.

Because….

I have not been able to settle in since I painted and reorganized!!!  I feel like I have stuff spread out all over the place.  I have tons of shelves and boxes and buckets, so I have plenty of storage space, but I evidently haven’t been using it wisely because I feel like things are lost, forgotten, and hard to put my hands on.

I had all these plans to start selling excess cross stitch over the summer – that I sorted out when I pulled everything for painting – that I know I’ll never get around to stitching because I’ve either lost interest in the item, it’s no longer something I like, the designer pissed me off, etc.  I am my own LNS.  Here’s proof positive of how much I don’t need.  Boxes, boxes, and piles of stuff to be sold.  Trust me when I tell you that is just a drop in the bucket.  😀

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This past weekend I had dinner out with my partner in crime, Annette, and we talked about stash diving because there was something we knew we had but couldn’t find it.  I have started bullet journaling and wanted to add in my WIPs and get back to some type of rotation, and I was sharing with her that I was procrastinating listing them because I couldn’t decide whether to just start writing them down, or to go through each one and sort them by either how old they are, or how close they were to being finished.

When we started talking about retiring I knew I would have no where near the funds I would want to kit up certain things with all the lovely silks there are out there so I gradually began doing that.  I have 2 large fold-back-top Rubbermaid containers that contained some of my WIPs and some of my kitted items (either by myself, or purchased that way).

I finally bit the bullet and started digging through them today.  Here’s what I found in the WIP department

  1. Peacock Tapestry – Teresa Wentzler
  2. Letting Go (Lusk) – HAED
  3. Ann Holewll Sampler – The Examplarery
  4. Quaker RR
  5. Dimples Bugs RR
  6. French Alphabet Sampler (I forgot I put it in there!)
  7. Castle Sampler – Teresa Wentzler
  8. The Fortunate Traveler – Teresa Wentzler
  9. Earthdancer – Butternut Road
  10. Tapestry Cat – Teresa Wentzler
  11. Sleeping Beauty – Mirabilia
  12. Patchwork Pieces – Nutmeg Needle
  13. Asian Garden – Odds n Ins
  14. Lady of the Flag – Mirabilia
  15. Tsunami Sampler – Stickideen von der Wiehenburg
  16. Christmas Elegance – Mirabilia
  17. Peace – The Silver Lining
  18. Christmas Wreath – Teresa Wentzler
  19. Topiary – Teresa Wentzler
  20. Garden Trellis Box – Linda Driskell from Just Cross Stitch magazine.

In one box!  I know there are more because I have a beautiful chest downstairs that my friend Kathy gave me and I’ve started storing some WIPs in there.  In fact, now that I think about it, all of the above 20 may also fit in there!  Oh, and then there’s the ottoman I prop my feet on while stitching…you can store stuff in there and I know I have at least one WIP in there, ’cause I was just looking at it the other day.  Geesh.  Oh wait!  Don’t forget my stitching bag that probably has 2-3 in there, too.

And here’s what was in the kitted box:

  1. Autumn Queen – Mirabilia
  2. Random Thoughts – Drawn Thread
  3. An Expression of Gratitude – Blue Ribbon Designs (which I pulled out)*
  4. Victorian Pearls – Sew to be Seen
  5. Victorian Pearls 2 – Sew to be Seen
  6. A Christmas Sampler – Midsummer Nights
  7. The Book of Spells – The Goode Huswife (which I pulled out)*
  8. The Spot Sampler – Margaret Bendig
  9. Shakespeare’s Garden – LaBroderie
  10. Queens Rule – Enchanting Lair
  11. Castle Ridge – Teresa Wentzler (bought overdyed fabric to exchange)
  12. Damask Rose Scissor Keep – Textile Heritage (gift)
  13. Above the Clouds – Teresa Wentzler (bought overdyed fabric to exchange)
  14. Mermaid of the Pearls – Mirabilia (special overdyed fabric)
  15. Toccata Three – Drawn Thread
  16. Cattleya Orchids – Terrance Nolan
  17. A Token of Friendship – Merry Cox (an OOP which I could probably sell to pay off my house)
  18. This is the Day – La-D-Da
  19. My Son – Indigo Rose (should have pulled this one and may go back and do it)*
  20. The Dreamer – Mirabilia
  21. Quaker Diamonds – Rosewood Manor
  22. Toccata Two – Drawn Thread
  23. Toccata One – Drawn Thread
  24. Quaker Samplings  – With My Needle
  25. My First Sewing Box and Scissor Fob – Stitching Parlor (which uses a Whitman’s Chocolate Tin I’ve tried to throw away a hundred times)
  26. Souvenir Sampler – Drawn Thread
  27. Village of Hawk Run Hollow – Carriage House Samplings
  28. The Song They Sang – Carriage House Samplings (I even bought the frame for this one!!!)
  29. A Parrot, A Leopard, A Lion – Scarlet Letter
  30. Norwich Marianne Wren
  31. James Wilson
  32. Voice of the  Shepherd – Told in a Garden
  33. Teeny Hardanger – Sweetheart Tree
  34. Brilliant Plumage – Teresa Wentzler

So, I evidently have a thing for Teresa Wentzler.

*I will be very unhappy in Heaven if I die and don’t at least start The Book of Spells and An Expression of Gratitude.  Guess they’re getting added to my WIPs list next month.

Now, lest LNSs around the world freak out, all of the above does not mean I won’t be buying more as evidenced by the deliveries my mailman has made since my last post.  I give you Exhibit C:

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A new small portable stitching lamp, and needle organizer (can you say Teresa Wentzler?).

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28ct Brash Jubilee for Ann Pegg 1877.  Yep, I found some.  I emailed the dyer asking advice for a replacement and she told me she had 2 FQs left.  Miss Annette snapped up the other one.  Partner. In. Crime.  I tell ya.

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Pattern, fibers, stretcher bars, and canvas for this lovely.  I have had my eye on it for a bit and found out it was discontinued so I snapped it up.

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I also purchased these cones of DMC from Joanns.com for Death by Cross Stitch by Long Dog Samplers.  I’m leaning toward the copper on the right.  I need to check my fabric stash and do a floss toss.  I’m very tempted by the beautiful turquoise in the back but I’m afraid it’ll burn my eyeballs out stitching on a sampler this large.  I do have a backup plan for it though 😀  If I don’t have a good piece of fabric in my stash for the copper I may use the red and order some 40ct white.  Not to be worried about now though as I cannot start it until next month at the earliest because I am going out of town next week.

I am stalking my postman for Brooke’s Books Wizard of Oz.

So see, shopping when I shouldn’t be, or don’t need to be.

And I have quilt stuff coming in too.

But! This post has gotten so long and my phone is currently charging so I can’t show you what the top of my guest bed looks like.  It’s covered with fabric, patterns, etc., from the quilt side of my room AND fabric, fibers, and fabric from the cross-stitch side of my room while I go through the buckets and baskets mentioned above trying to reorganize and sort into a better working order for me.  I’m slowing myself down because I have to look at it, and touch it, and remember when I bought it, before sorting it into a pile to place it better in my room.  I’m dreading getting to two particular stitching containers because I have lots of already kitted small things that need to be added to that list up there and put into that Rubbermaid container (which is full!).  I know I won’t get it put away any time soon as I still have some excavating to do, so I’ll share a photo next time I post.

I forgot to show you some stitching!

Since my last post I have finished my Sugar Skull by Mill Hill

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And my version of Be Thankful by Country Cottage Needleworks

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and block 7 of Houses of Hawk Run Hollow by Carriage House Samplings (currently working on block 8)

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Now I’m off to write my WIPs in my Journal and do some stitching.  Maybe tomorrow I’ll dig the rest out of their hidey holes.

Boy, oh boy, am I behind!

I finished Rose Quaker last night and the first thought I had was I needed to get it ironed and post a photo to my blog.  When I went to log on this morning imagine my surprise to see how long it’s been since I last posted!  Yikes!

Time flies when you’re having fun, and I’ve been having all kinds of fun redoing my sewing room, working for Arizona Quilters Guild, working for COMICON, and stitching when I can.

I actually have two finishes to share today, since I thought I had posted when I finished Lizzie*Kate’s Unseen Things on February 8.

2015-02-08 18.03.59She’s headed to the framers in a couple of weeks.

I had planned on working on And They Sinned after Unseen Things, but I couldn’t find it!  I started a #MirabiliaMonday on my facebook page and had planned on Fairy Moon since I’m almost finished with it.  I couldn’t find it either!  I knew they were together, though.

So I pulled Rose Quaker out instead of And They Sinned.  I finished Rose Quaker last night.  Here’s a craptastic photo since I still haven’t ironed it. 😀

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I finished the painting in my sewing room and have started putting everything back in its – hopefully – forever place.  And….I found the two missing stitching pieces.  Woohoo!  So now that Quaker Rose is finished And They Sinned is patiently waiting.  I started it January 4, 2013, and here’s where I stopped in August 2013.

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Monday’s dedicated to Mirabilia, and since I couldn’t find Fairy Moon, I pulled Garden Verses.  Here’s where I am on her as of last Monday:

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What else to share?  Oh yeah, I finally ordered, and received, the bell pull hardware for the SamSarah Lagniappe design.  No sewing has been going on so nothing to share there.  I am anxious to get back to it even though I’ve really enjoyed all the stitching I’ve done while not working on other things.

I’ll try not to let it be so long before I post again 😉

BlockSignature

 

More Gratitude

I ended up restitching what I frogged, plus more, on Gratitude yesterday.  The magnifier did help, however, I frogged it out again.  It just looks like awful knots because the fiber is so thick. I was ready to “frisbee” that project across the room after frogging it a second time!  I immediately started working on Fairy Moon while we caught up on Arrow on the DVR and made great progress on it.

I had a nail appointment this morning and drove over to Attic afterward to get some new silks for Gratitude but Jean talked me into doing tent stitch with the silks I have instead of full crosses with new silks.  Now I’m trying to decide if I want to stitch on Gratitude or Fairy Moon tonight.

I don’t know how much I’ll be blogging for the next week or so.  My parents are leaving from Louisiana tomorrow morning and heading this way for a week.  I have no idea what we’ll be doing while they’re here!  😆

TUSAL and framing TaDa!

I am running as fast as I can to catch up! I hope it’s not too late to share my TUSAL for April 3. It totally rocks, and you’ll see why in just a second.

It’s so full because I finished queenie and now she’s back from the framers!

Here’s a closeup of the frame. It has the same deep blue/green colors in it as the mat.

I have absolutely no confidence in myself when it comes to choosing frames so I always drag M along with me because he is so good at it!

I’ve been stitching on my ornaments and Houses of Hawk Run Hollow.

I haven’t posted about my weightloss journey because I haven’t had anything to share. About 6 weeks ago I stalled out. Last Thursday I finally saw the scale start downward again (-1.8#s) and if my home scale is anything to go by this week’s loss will be good, too!

Ta Da!

Started September 6, 2009.  Finished March 21, 2011.  Happy Spring!

The weekend is here!!!

My holiday from work ended up lasting another half day. It was very hard for me to go to work but I did. Of course my desk was a disaster when I got there….notes, scattered papers, new discovery requests, a new case file, all the little things that make me crazy because they all need to be done, all take up time I feel I could be doing BIG things, and all create more work in the end once they make themselves back to me.  It used to not aggravate me like it does now.

My roof has been repaired. The hole inside has been covered with a lovely clear plastic bag surrounded by metallic silver tape, and the tree in my backyard is now minus a huge limb that used to hang over the back roof. No telling when the hole will be properly repaired. We’re still waiting on a bit of drying out, I think.

We also had the cable people out yesterday afternoon. M was home for that though since I don’t understand that type of stuff. We have a new DVR box, and all of our ‘outlets’ and the ‘home port’ has been upgraded. This is supposed to mean faster internet, among other things. I’ve also been added to the account so hopefully I can get our master email account reset and I can get back into A Needle Pulling Thread so I can suck it into this blog.

Today is the first all day stitchy Saturday at Needlepoints, Ltd. It will be so nice to see the girls. There’s always so much going on there and we usually spend the day laughing most of it away. I am going to be working on my needlepoint all day. Hopefully I’ll be able to add some new stitches that have been drawn out.

I’m also going to be spending the night with Melissa. She has graciously agreed to help me with some computer issues. I’m going to take Summer Queen with me — in case there is stitching tinme — since it will be hard for me to work on the needlepoint piece at her place. I am so close to finishing!

I truly have my stitching mojo back. It’s all I think about. It has been about 2 years, if not more, since I’ve felt that way.

I had to *hand* it to her!

Okay, that’s an awful title, but I”m having brain wave issues this morning.

I spent all day long Saturday in a litigation class.  Very long, very interesting, very informative, very long, very tiring, very brain draining, did I mention very long?  😆

Sunday, we made it to the frame shop!  I turned in Longdog’s The Token, Blackbird Designs’ Strawberry Garden, and a Rouge de Rhin design (it’s OOP).  For those of you who I do stitchy Saturday with, they should be ready for me to share at our next get together.

I’ve been dragging my feet on stitching Summer Queen again, but hanging out at the frame shop and looking at moulding and velvet matting possiblities for her put me in a stitchy frame of mind yesterday and so I stitched enough on her to give her some skin!  Her left hand is now complete except for her bling.  I also received another e-mail from the Fair people and the deadline has been moved toward the end of May for entries…which has caused me to procrastinate in getting her finished 😉  I’ve given Kahuna permission to nag me to stitch 😀 

Kahuna’s half-ironman is next Saturday!  I won’t be going 🙁  The litigation class is two sessions long and the second (and most important to me) session is next Saturday.  I have a chance to move it to May, however, our roadtrip and possible surgery may interfere.  Kahuna has told me to take the class now so I can get it over with and use it.  I feel really badly that I won’t be up at 4:30 a.m. for an early morning check in, 7:15 swim wave start, and standing on the side of the road to cheer him on for the next 5 hours and to be there to cowbell him across the finish line.  🙁  At least he won’t have to feel badly that he needs to sleep for several hours afterwards while I sit and wait for him to start recouperation.

As promised, Summer!

I was looking back through my photos in my album and noticed that the first photo I took of Summer Queen was dated September 6, 2009.  Wow, six months between that picture and this next one!  I need to get my stitchie heinie in gear!

Summer Queen

Kahuna’s half ironman is 2 weeks from yesterday.  He seems to be in great training shape.  His attitude is right, too 🙂

I’m off to spend the rest of the day with Star Wars 3-whatever, laundry, and Summer Queen.

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