Missed a week!

Hey-ho!  I've been working on the boys' Halloween costumes.  Squiddle wanted Link's Champion tunic from the video game Breath of the Wild, so I sewed the tunic and Wonderful Husband has been painting the white decoration lines onto it.  Jazzy opted to be a dragon, and the pattern (McCall's 8225) has been giving me a few headaches.

That said, I finished another Christmas stitch!  This one from Crafting Traditions magazine from Nov/Dec 1996!

I did change it slightly from the original:

I felt that since it had Santa in it, "Merry Christmas" was somewhat redundant.  And having Santa's sack being matchy-matchy with the shutters seemed a bit dated, so I took a poll of Jazzy and my mother and they both voted for a green bag instead.

It's not perfect - for part of the border and most of the pine trees, the stitches ended up going in a different direction than the rest of the work.  But by the time I'd realized it, I really didn't want to rip it all out and redo it.  Plus, in my household, no one but me will ever know or notice.  I did end up getting a slightly stronger pair of readers to work on this, because that full coverage midnight blue behind Santa was a bitch to deal with.

Two Finishes!

 Haha!  I am triumphant, and have finished (a) my first all-me major cross stitch project in some time, as opposed to finishing someone else's start, and (b) worked successfully on evenweave linen!

I changed the color of three of the Santas' skins, because my goodness we live in a multicultural and multiracial world, and since I was stitching on an off-white linen, I also changed the color of the snowflakes from gold to white.  Now I just need to wash, press, lace, and frame this.

I also did a quickie project, Little Quaker Pumpkin, which is a freebie on Stitchy Fish Designs' website.  I only had one of the colors recommended, so I subbed in the others as best I could from the box of threads I have on hand.  And I messed up in five separate spots, but as Wonderful Husband always points out, no one but me will ever notice or know.

Wonderful Husband thinks I should cut it out in an oval and sew it into a little pillow so it can be a "pumpkin bomb" to amuse our boys.  Maybe?

And!  We went to the Gig Harbor Quilt Guild's show this weekend.  I got some lovely compliments on Squiddle's Rainbow Quilt, which I entered, but unfortunately both boys were not really wanting to be there, so I didn't get to stay as long or take as many photos as I would've liked. :(  Que sera sera.  I also virtuously went and got my flu and covid shots, which knocked me down yesterday.  Bleh.  Better today!

Almost there....

Posting a day late, but most of yesterday we were up in Seattle, at first the Children's Museum, then at the Space Needle!  Both of which the boys greatly enjoyed.

I've kept working on the Santas cross stitch, and hope to finish it in the next week.

The top two Santas are completely finished.  Bottom right needs his topstitch detail lines.  Bottom right needs Santa's and the doll's skin done, the topstitch details, and the snow in the background.  I did opt to go for four different skin tones instead of all the Santas being lily pale.

Other than that... I've finally sewn the minky binding onto the red/cow print charity quilt.  And I have sworn never to work with minky again.  It is difficult to sew, felt like an oil slick against my hands by the time it was finished, and it will spend its life shedding microplastics into the environment.  Blech.

I also pulled a blouse and a skirt off the mending pile and got them taken care of.  Five minutes to fix, five months to work up to the actual fixing.  Why am I like this sometimes?

Oh, and I took a bit of black I'd gotten from the treasure table at last week's guild meeting and used it to make 6.5" rail fence blocks.  I have more black that I need to find, and a ton more precut strips to use up.  Project, go!

Chugging Along

Took the quilt top for Uncle G. in to the Quilters By the Bay guild meeting this week, as well as the Nutcrackers cross stitch, since I'd bought that at one of the guild sales.  One of the ladies had done a Thimbles quilt top - basically Tumblers, but at a 1" scale.  I suddenly have a mighty need to do one of my own....

This coming week, I'll be turning in Squiddle's rainbow quilt, as well as the red/pink hearts mini, and the turquoise pinwheels mini, to the Gig Harbor Quilters for the quilt show next weekend.

Meanwhile, I've been steadfastly chugging along on the Santas cross stitch.

The pattern, being from 1990, has all four Santas as very definitely white.  I've only stitched the (palest possible pink) facial tone of the upper right one.  I think I'm going to break with the pattern and search through my thread for three different golden or brown tones for the other Santas.  We live in a world of wondrous diversity and potential; I will honor that.

C is for: Cross Stitch, Crowns, Cats

After posting last week, I took a look at the picture of the Santas cross stitch project, said some short words, and pulled out the seam ripper. After removing and restitching several misplaced motifs, I continued on, and here's where that project is to right now:

But that isn't the only thing I've been working on this week!  My uncle, my dad's best friend, has been going through some serious health issues.  We've just gotten the word that it is not cancer, however, which left all of us much relieved.  But I realized I've never made him a quilt.  So I pulled out this stack of blocks I'd made, and set to work.

The block pattern is known as Crown of Thorns, or Single Wedding Ring.  Since 30 blocks was good to make a quilt, I cut muslin and a border fabric and got to stitching.  Currently that project is at this stage:

I plan to baste it tomorrow while the boys are at school.

And!  Since Squiddle is now a double digits age, for his big birthday present we gave him the choice of either a computer or a phone.

He said he wanted a cat.

Okay.  Our cat, Sushi, is very much a me cat and really doesn't let other members of the household interact with him much.  He's 15 and remembers all too well being chased by little boys.  So wanting a pet of his own was a reasonable request for Squiddle to make.  After Wonderful Husband mulled it over for a while and got used to the idea, he agreed.

Last weekend, Squiddle and I went to the Humane Society, but they were having an adoption event that day so it ended being very disappointing for Squiddle.  No kittens left.  I kept an eye on their website, though, and picked up Squiddle after school on Friday.  He had been leaning toward a ginger cat, but this lovely little fellow was meowing his head off and reaching for Squiddle through the bars, so I think they chose each other.

Meet Ramen, our newest family member.

A New Start

Before I put the magazine that the Nutcracker pattern was in away, I decided to make the other pattern I quite fancied in it.  It's smaller!

So I decided to challenge myself and stitch it on even-weave linen. ^_^;;;;

The pattern in question:

How far one week of stitchery has gotten me:

Counting over two threads instead of one has been a bit tricky - especially whenever I'm not doing a long line of the same thing one after another - but surmountable.  It probably helps that I'm working at the same gauge and literally using the same needle as the last project.  Less cognitive dissonance, or something.

Finished! And Birthday #1

I finished the Nutcracker cross stitch!

My sister-in-law, who also does stitchery, shares my first initial.  So I imagine, some centuries down the line, our pieces in museum collections somewhere, getting conflated. :)

I have started on another piece, also Christmas themed, from the same magazine.  After it's done, I can put the magazine away.  And, putting on my Big Girl Panties, I've decided to level up my skills a notch and stitch it on even weave linen.  28-count linen translates to 14-count Aida, though, so it's essentially the same gauge and I'm using the same needle.  I'm 3/4 done with the outermost border, and haven't screwed it up so far.

And we had a birthday in our family this week!  Squiddle is now ten years old, and will be getting a kitten in a week or so, as soon as the rest of the kitten supplies he wanted have arrived.  But he's also very Pokemon obsessed, so I tried my best at decorating a cake for him.

He was so excited and said that a Pikachu cake was even better than the rainbow cake he had requested.  At which point I informed him that his cake was, in fact, both:

His cup, I think, ranneth over.