Step three - Scott Lee

Last night I picked up Scott Lee, a counted needlepoint by the late Jean Hilton. I haven't worked on this since August of 2010! Not sure why I put it down never to be seen until now because I really enjoy counted needlepoint. I think it was of course because of all the "have to" needlepoint I was doing at the time. Then this just got pushed to the background. I also found the note attached to it saying "don't forget to pay Kelly for the chart"! Sorry for being such a schmuck Kelly. But I totally forgot. I'll made good asap. :-)

Anyway the photo is of the completed part three. Hopefully this week I'll start and complete part four. It's another round of smyrnas in a lighter color inside the round I just finished. Not my favorite stitch but they always like nice when completed. This needlepoint has to be done at home because it's huge! Way to large to tote onto the train.

good housy weekend

I didn't get as much done on Frederick as I was hoping because I spent most of the weekend on doing stuff for the house. I like to get at least one thing done every weekend. This weekend it was all about curtains for the kitchen and dinning room. The rooms are next to each other in my open floor house. And they both have sliding glass doors. I really debated for months on what to do because I don't like the wide vertical blinds that most people use but couldn't figure out another plan. I usually go to a big box hardware store at least at some point every weekend see what I can buy on sale (since I still need one of everything) and Saturday I went to my local Lowe's. I found some really nice shears in a warm cream color that have a contrasting plaid strip on them. I only bought one set for the dining room but when I got them up I could not believe how nice they looked. The light is as bright but so much softer. So I went back and bought four more panels for the kitchen. Then I figured I might as well work on the valances I have been planning on sewing since I moved it. So five hours later (and one more trip to the hardware store for rods) I had one slider almost finished. It still needs the brick colored gimp that I had to order online but I'm so happy with how they turned out. I'm going to raise the rod a couple of inches - I don't want to see the top of the shears. The valance is a toile in a reddish brick color on cream with a cream lining. I used Simplicity 5696. Perfect for my house.

On Sunday morning I met up with a friend at an off leash dog park about three miles from my house. It was too cold for the pugs (around 27 and snowing) but perfect for Isibeal. My friend has three big dogs and the newly formed pack ran around for an hour or so. She was wiped! Hardly stirred all day. :-)

It's much warmer today (45 right now!) and I'm working from home so I took my pack back to the park for my lunch hour. All you can hear now in the house is the sounds of pugs snoring. :-)

day three into the plan

and I'm still stitching! I've managed to stitch everyday which kinda is the long term goal. And I'm enjoying it. I was getting into bad routine where I was just channel surfing all evening long. And I really don't even like what's on TV! This is much better. And I've been stitching on the train and not sleeping. I sure can feel that though, I'm much more tired during the day but I'm sure I'll get used to it again.

a new plan

I've picked up Frederick again from Carriage House Samplings (do they have a new blog or website? I still have the jewelery one bookmarked with no new stitchy stuff on it). I started him in May of 2010. Wow. I'm almost regretting putting Frederick and Frederika on the same piece of linen. Only time will tell how it will look finished. I'll have to make the same adjustment I made on Frederika on the top row of the bottom border. It was designed to be folkartie off by one row but that sort of thing drives me crazy so I fixed it - this one is off also and I'll have to adjust it too. I'll also need to decide if I should make the boxes inside the border the same as Frederika. There is a slight difference in the colors - I'm not sure if it would look better in the same color style or have it different as charted.


I've also come up with a stitching plan for the time being. I looked back over my past two years of finishes and tried to figure out why my stitching came to an abrupt halt. It was a combination of a couple of things but mostly two - my bought my house and second I noticed a real drop off in stitching hours as soon as I started working on my families Christmas gifts for 2010. I don't do so well when I "have" to do something. I think I totally lost focus when I was faced with months of "have" to do. I did take breaks between each one but they were short and in the end I almost didn't finish the gifts I had started to drag my feet so much. So I'm hoping the new plan will get me back in the groove. I haven't purchased much new stuff in over a year now. But rather than go shopping for new and improved I'm going to shop my stash. I have dozens and dozens of charts, hundreds of skeins of floss and more linen than I can count. Plus at least a dozen plus (I didn't even count) of started or totally kitted projects.


So here it goes - I'm going to work on a random WIP until it's finished. Or if I get totally bored and really am faced with not stitching or moving away from boredom for a while by stitching something different, pick up a kitted project that requires no new purchases. But I'm going to try not to start something kitted until I get at least two or three WIPs finished. That's the plan away. :-)


I've made a change to my blog - all part of the new plan. I'm planning on putting a nice photo mosaic on the top banner but so far I've been struggling with getting it to look right.


Last weekend was the first anniversary of meeting Isibeal. I can't believe it's been a year! And we are still trying to figure out our relationship. Both of us think we are in charge! We are restarting agility in a month. We lost so much time with my move and her being in a cast for two months. We are basically back to the beginning. The other in my class are already starting to trial. We most likely won't until late fall/early winter. That is if all goes well.
Here she is the day I picked her up from O'Hare on behalf of my sister.


And her beautiful self last weekend.

Joy finis

Joy - design by Blackbird Designs

recommended silk floss and linen

I finished up Joy last night. And tossed Frederic in my bag for the train this week. As in the past couple of months, stitching on the train is hard because all I want to do is sleep! Maybe I need vitamins. I never used to have this trouble. :-)

Nothing new on the home front. Just working on the house with my limited time and resources. I'm hoping for a nice income tax check to at least help me get my bedroom redone started. I've been finding time to quilt on the weekends and I have several tops completed to share in the next week. I'm loving the French General lines and completed two tops while on vacation over Christmas. I purchased the latest and it's on my table ready to be cut up.

I finally registered Isabelle with the AKC - her official name is: Isibeal Siofra. In Gaelic I've read that siofra means changeling. It really fits. :-)

Have a great week!