Take a Stitch Tuesday - Stitches 101 and 102

These stitches, Triangular Buttonhole and Beaded Triangular Buttonhole, were relatively easy but I made it more complicated by trying to use the larger beads that fit over my needle so...

Here are five rows of the stitches, four in large size to accommodate the beads and one smaller to show how it would make a border:

I like how it worked up in variegated perle cotton... but I think I'd like the beaded versions better if the beads were smaller and I was using floss or silk.

2014 - Staying Connected, Week Eight

While I got a lot of stitching done over the past week (the first "Roll Your Own" mandala was completed and I made progress on the "Save the Stitches" blackwork SAL), there has been little progress since my International Hermit and Stitch Update. 

I did catch up with the reading on the "Finishing It" (DIY Framing) online class from Funk & Weber. And I have a piece in mind I want to try my own framing on --- just need to get started on it. 

A TAST assignment came in on Tuesday: Stitches #101 and #102 which I have yet to start on.

Tuesday night was Girls Night Out with my papercrafting friends and after driving home from Toledo, I just didn't feel up to stitching... So, while it was a good week, I have nothing to show here in the way of progress.

Oh, by the way, the NW Ohio is now in the tail end of the snowiest winter season ever recorded! And it's still snowing! Darn it, if I'd wanted to live in the far north, I would have picked North Dakota or Minnesota as a place to retire, not NW Ohio. This is downright ridiculous!

International Hermit and Stitch Weekend, February 21 - 23, 2014

I started a new piece just for the weekend (and because I had finished my first  "Roll Your Own" mandala and wasn't ready to start on the second mandala of the series!). My new project is "Save the Stitches", a blackwork sampler SAL from Elizabeth Almond. This how far I got this weekend on parts 1, 2 and 3 for the SAL: the outline and 3.5 of16 fill patterns:

I changed out things a little from the pattern since I wasn't too keen on using DMC metallics and I don't have the colors called for in Kreinik. So... out came the same set of DMC colors I'm using for "Roll Your Own" - two blues (DMC 312 and 798)and a green (DMC 3850). You might be able to see the colors better here in this closeup:

I have to pick out some beads still but the beading will be the last thing I do on this.

Oh, and the last of the indoor Christmas decorations came down on Friday night (yes, I now, a full month and a half late... and the ornaments probably are in the wrong boxes and bins but it is done and back in the storage room!) and the tax booklet for our accountant was completed Sunday afternoon (and copied and FedExed out this morning). So , in all, a good weekend!

The "Roll Your Own" mandala SAL

In this online SAL, organized and moderated by Tracey Horner of InkCircles, there are 9 Roll Your Own mandalas. I decided I would do them all on one piece of fabric ("Iris Garden" by Silkweaver, 32 ct Jobelin) in the "Tropical Ocean" colorway.

There were a number of preset colorways available or one could design one's own (hence the name, "Roll Your Own"). Since I'm not that comfortable with designing color schemes, I opted for one already posted. "Tropical Ocean" consists of 12 DMC threads in four color groupings: Bright Green - 3850, 3851 and 959; Teal Green - 3847, 3848 and 3849; Delft Blue - 798, 809 and 747; and Navy Blue - 823, 311 and 312, all outlined in black - DMC 310.  

Here is what the first mandala, "Roll Your Own", looks like completed. 

I've used both the fabric and similar colorways before - the fabric and a similar color range in sumptuous Surface Embroidery and a similar  colorway  in both Birds of a Feather" and "Kimono - Revisited" (all three shown in my August 2, 2013 post about the County Fair). I'm beginning to think this is my "signature colorway! 

Next up, "Bride of RYO"! But first, I think I'll take a brief break and start on the Elizabeth Almond blackwork SAL, "Save a Stitch" (and guess what, I plan on using the same colorway combination, but this time on a white ground!) Oh, and there is a Christmas tree that needs to be taken down (blushing that it is still up this late in the year) and taxes to be done...

WIPocalypse 2014 - February

Ooops! I missed that this was last Friday! AAARGH!

Anyway, this months' topic is "How many projects do you generally feel comfortable having in progress at a time?  Tell us about your one-at-a-time or rotation habits!"

Well, I'm not comfortable at all with more than one piece in progress, although, of late, that is a rare occurrence. I am doing several online challenges (Bead Journal Project, Crazy Quilt Journal Project, Take a Stitch Tuesday) as well as an online class in finishing. Add to that a BAP, a SAL called "Save the Stitches" which I haven't started yet, and you can see, I tend to take on new things while my "one" project (another BAP, a SAL called "Roll Your Own", which I was late in starting) is still underway. 

In the past, I have done rotations --- a different project each day of the week --- when I was trying to get a lot of UFOs off the deck (back in 2006, for example). But after that experience, which I found less than fulfilling (I'd get on a roll with a piece and have to put it down for a week because the next night was the next piece's turn...), I've tried to avoid have more than one embroidery piece in the works.

This past month, I have stitched on the following:

• Take a Stitch Tuesday: Linked Chain, Beaded Linked Chain, Shell Chain,  Beaded Shell Chain, and Eastern Stitch
• Crazy Quilt Journal Project - February block

Already completed for the next WIPocalpsye report are 

• Take a Stitch Tuesday - Beaded Eastern Stitch 
• Bead Journal Project - February ornament

Not touched were the stitch guide primer and a needlepoint background stitch booklet, both online classes from Janet Perry

In progress are:

• The Finishing Class by Funk & Weber (we are on lesson three of four for framing)
• The "Roll Your Own" mandala SAL by Tracey Horner  

I still have several UFOs in my stash as well as several kitted out pieces that I would dearly love to stitch. but in line with keeping the WIPs under control, I don't think I will undertake any of them this coming month.

2014 - Staying Connected, Week Seven

Well, in addition to completions of TAST Stitch #100 and  my February BJP ornie, I made progress on "Roll Your Own" -  9 full colors and half of a tenth!

February Bead Journal Project ornament

Presenting "Love Birds", in honor of Valentine's Day and the heart-shaped box of chocolates my husband gave me (only the second ever in nearly 50 years of marriage! LOL)...

Take a Stitch Tuesday - Stitch #100!

Stitch 100 is the Beaded Eastern Stitch. Here's my example:

I didn't do many because the thread I pulled form my stash was very short and I was being lazy. Besides, I wanted to start my February Bead Journal piece so I can get THAT out of the way and start planning for March (Crazy Quilt Journal and Bead Journal) and "Save a Stitch" SAL by Elizabeth Almond. Besides, "Roll Your Own" part 1 (of 9)  is nearing the 75% completion point and I want to get that out of the way and start the outline for the second mandala! I feel like I may be setting myself up for another WIP overload...

2014 - Staying Connected, Week Six

Continued progress on "Roll Your Own" --- there are now seven colors completed, an eighth 75% completed out of 12. 

Very slow moving as my eyes and 32 ct aren't getting on. 

It's not looking a lot like "Tropical Seas" on this fabric. More like the fabric's name: "Iris Garden" - as the delft blue sequence of colors are looking more purple than blue! But I like the look...

Two weeks into the Funk & Weber Framing class: lesson one was tips on cleaning and prepping embroidery for framing (some of which I have always done, some of which I have never done and will have to start doing, I think) and lesson two was all about frames, mats and glass. I'm finding this very useful, even if I never do decide to frame my own work...

As for the weather --- we are now ranking # 3 on the list of all-time snowiest winter seasons in NW Ohio! Less than an inch will propel us to # 2 (and we are supposed to get somewhere between 3 and 8 inches Thursday through Saturday!). If we get the high side of this week's forecast snow, we will have broken the record set back in 1977-78, the year of the "Blizzard of '78"! AAARGH!

Take a Stitch Tuesday 2014 and Crazy Quilt Journal Project 2104 - February

Got in some stitching on my Crazy Quilt Journal block for February, where I carried on with some of the Hoffman Challenge fabrics for 2014:

and Sharon B came up with a new stitch for Take a Stitch Tuesday: The Eastern Stitch (or Egyptian Buttonhole Stitch), which I tried stitching three ways:

2014 - Staying Connected, Week Five

The coming two weeks are likely to be good times to stitch: more snow (somewhere around 6 inches) forecast for tonight and yet another storm hovering on the horizon for Sunday. We already had the showiest January on record for this neck of the woods, to say nothing of being at 10th place in snowiest winter season on record. I don't remember it ever being this cold, this snowy this "wintery" before in my life. Good stitching weather! I am trying to fit in annual medical appointments around all that snow and it is also tax time so I will have plenty to keep me occupied off the stitching front.  

This week, after completing the latest TAST stitches, I concentrated on the first "Roll Your Own" mandala this week, completing the outline on February 1 and starting the colors the same day. I have to say, I really liked the look of that outline on the chosen fabric (Iris Garden, 32ct Lugana, from Silkweaver) and was tempted to leave it without the filling color! 

After all, the fabric is gorgeous (OK, my husband HATES that fabric --- he says it looks like someone goofed and dropped bleach on it or something!) and the black really set it off... But I had no desire to stitch all in black for the next several months (it took at least a month to do that outline, and besides, the Elizabeth Almond SAL is blackwork so there will be MORE black to stitch!).  I was curious to see how the Tropical Seas colorway looked, so I began, one color at a time. Here is is with three colors complete and a fourth color one-quarter of the way through:

True, it obscures the fabric but it really does  complement the fabric as well. If I leave appropriate borders, I will get the best of both worlds, I think.

Two hours a night is about all I can handle in Roll Your Own --- I'm finding that 32ct a little hard to focus on and I'm trying to minimize frogging. So this will NOT be a fast piece to be stitched...

I didn't accomplish much else in the way of stitchery this week. I'm still waiting for the fabric for the Elizabeth Almond "Save a Stitch" SAL (three installments are already published!) and there is the Crazy Quilt Journal block and the Bead Journal February ATC/ornament to do, so it's not as though I don't have alternate projects to take the strain off my eyes. It's more like I lack sufficient motivation to take up another piece after those two eye-straining hours...