Finish it in 2013 Update blog and WIP update post

It's been a while since I last made an update post like this so here is an overview of where everything is:

New Projects:

I started a "large" and complicated new cross stitch project this year based on a photograph by a really talented Alaskan photographer who was incredibly kind and said I could make a cross stitch of it. The photographer is Mike Gates, go check out his site - his work is amazing!

The pattern was made for me as a prize for winning a competition on dA. It's 10 inches wide  x 14 1/2 inches high = 180 x 261 stitches on 18 ct Aida and it uses 147 colours. I am truly intimidated but I did ask for the pattern to be as close to the photo as possible and didn't limit size or colours and I certainly got what I asked for!

In February I dyed the fabric for this using coffee. I started stitching in March

 Update: The first 3 sections are complete and part of the 4th section has also been done.

Mystery project A and B:

New completed projects:

See the Finished in 2013 tab of the blog for my finishes :)

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The Current WIP's:

8th century tile floor embroidery in greens and blues. 

 Update: I have finished the outlines for the border and done quite a bit of the filling in.

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The UFO's:

2 sleeping bunnies - a Priscilla babyland embroidery - about half done but I *so* hate doing 1/4 and 3/4 cross stitches.

Dog embroidery (portrait) made from a photo years ago by a company - about 1/5th done.

Dog embroidery (standing) made from a photo years ago by a company - barely started.

Autumn leaves needle book WIP - embroidery is 1/2 finished.

Sampler - started
Update: I am behind with the TAST (see side bar) and haven't worked on it since the last update so added to UFO list.

Sagittarius star sign by Lanarte - central area complete
Update: No progress made on this.

IHSW and UFO #11 The 8th century floor tile

It's IHSW weekend! I again have a child free weekend and hope to get quite a bit of stitching done.

Things I'm going to work on are:
1. Awning for the neighbour that I started last autumn and MUST finish soon.
2. Mike's Mushrooms as it's high time I picked that up again.
3. Possibly also do a bit more of the floor tile.

Speaking of the floor tile it's probably a good idea to show you where I am with it now.  Above you see where it was last time I updated you. I managed to get more of the brown (3021) thread that I needed Tuesday afternoon and I completed the framework stitching. I have also just about reached the corner with the colours as I only have 18 stitches left to do on the last dark green loop and then the little bit in the corner before I've reached the half way point with filling in colours.

While working my mind has been busy thinking about the centre area. I'm not so sure I want to go head and do the tile floor filling I had planned as I keep thinking of just using this as a frame for another embroidery - but I'm not sure what to do yet.  I keep thinking of doing something in blackwork, possibly an owl or a bit inspired by the floor tile I saw in Maastricht in the St. Servaas church last week when I was there with my bf. Time will tell what I end up doing as right now I have plenty of time to think about it :)

Finish it in 2013 project: April overview and WIP update post

Non UFO Project:

I started a "large" and complicated new cross stitch project this year based on a photograph by a really talented Alaskan photographer who was incredibly kind and said I could make a cross stitch of it. The photographer is Mike Gates, go check out his site - his work is amazing!

The pattern was made for me as a prize for winning a competition on dA. It's 10 inches wide  x 14 1/2 inches high = 180 x 261 stitches on 18 ct Aida and it uses 147 colours. I am truly intimidated but I did ask for the pattern to be as close to the photo as possible and didn't limit size or colours and I certainly got what I asked for!

In February I dyed the fabric for this using coffee. I started stitching in March and completed the first 3 sections.

Update: I didn't work on this during April.

The Current WIP's:

   

8th century tile floor embroidery in greens and blues. 

 Update: I have added a bit more to the top border.

Sampler - started
Update: I am behind with the TAST (see side bar) and haven't worked on it this month.

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The UFO's:

Sagittarius star sign by Lanarte - central area complete
Update: No progress made on this, so I've returned it to the UFO section.
 

2 sleeping bunnies - a Priscilla babyland embroidery - about half done but I *so* hate doing 1/4 and 3/4 cross stitches.

Dog embroidery (portrait) made from a photo years ago by a company - about 1/5th done.

Dog embroidery (standing) made from a photo years ago by a company - barely started.

Autumn leaves needle book WIP - embroidery is 1/2 finished.

The Mystery Project Completed

This is what it looked like last time I posted about it and this is what it looks like now:

I completed it while on holiday in the UK last week. The pattern for the flowers and vase is from the magazine cutting I'd stuck into a scrapbook many many years ago so I'm not entirely sure which magazine it came from other than that it's almost certainly a Dutch ladies magazine so probably Libelle or Margriet. I changed the colour of the shadow of the jug from the green that it was to a grey as I'd stripped out the background and border that the magazine pattern had. I added the butterflies from the "yellow butterflies biscornu" pattern by Rainburst Embroidery as I knew they were going to look just right with it. Once I'd completed it I realised that I'd made the lines around the edges of the space with ballpoint pen (how silly can one get?!) so I decided to hide the lines with 3 lines of backstitching, 2 in DMC colour variations 4045 and the middle one in 4150. I still have a small section of ballpoint pen to remove but I am planning on trying out ballpoint pen remover on it.

Stats:
Size of embroidery: 7 3/4" inches square / 19.6 cm square
Fabric: 24 ct evenweave
Number of colours used: 21
Number of cross stitches: 4737
Number of backstitches: far too many!
Time needed: 2 weeks

The Mystery Project - part 7, the central part is complete.

Now it's time to spot the difference - can you see where the backstitching is? If you can't see it all don't be sad, I had a devil of a job seeing where I was working when I was adding them and I kept track with the pattern lol.

Not much else to say today, so I'll just go on and work on the next bits.

The Mystery Project part 6

As you may remember this is where I started yesterday and despite the appointments (the one with the specialist in the hospital was cancelled but I only found out when i got there - yay!) I got so much done that I actually finished the main piece of embroidery! All I have to do now is do the backstitching and then I can get onto the second element of this project.

Just one appointment today so I ought to be able to complete the back stitching in between cleaning the kitchen.

The Mystery Project part 5 & IHSW update

I'm starting with a picture of yesterdays progress as I have from the beginning or the project so that it's easier for you to compare progress :) Yesterday I got quite a bit more done, having no kids certainly helped a bit but as they were returned in the evening not completely hehe. I was also feeling the after effects of Friday's sink emptying fun a lot less. What didn't help was that I had to remove a section of leaf as I'd mixed up colours and used the wrong one which looked like the right colour in the artificial light. It was just the one thread length so it wasn't all that bad.

I have finished with 3 of the yellows now and don't have that many flowers left to do before this part is completed up to the back stitch phase (ugh). When this is done I have a few more elements to add to complete this embroidery.

I have a bunch of appointments today so won't have as much stitching time as I'd normally have.

IHSW update: I got a lot of stitching done - this project was barely started when I picked it up again on Thursday as can be seen here: The Mystery Project & IHSW and now it's 75% complete.

The Mystery Project part 4

As you may remember this is where I stopped yesterday. I didn't get so much done as my body was firmly telling me that all the bailing I had done was "A Bad Thing" and shouldn't be repeated. It also made getting up and moving very painful so I didn't move all that much as a result either.

I managed to do some more of the leaves, the snowdrop and most of a lily. You will also notice that I have more colours in the sidelines waiting to be used as all of time continued outside the area the ring was in and I didn't want to cut the thread when all I had to do were a couple more stitches with that colour. With all the greens and creams it would be very easy to confuse them so I have added a little tab to each with the colour symbol so I know which is which.

I'm not so sore today so I hope to be able to get a bit more done.

The Mystery Project part 3 and a bit more

This was where I was yesterday when I made the last update. I didn't get as much done as I would have liked but I was slightly distracted by the rather unexpected results of a downpour. I had been raining for a while and then the rainfall intensified to the extent when the sewers couldn't cope with the results and water started coming UP my sink drain and filling my sink. To avoid getting a flooded kitchen I had to act quickly and I started bailing out the sink and throwing the resulting water out into my back garden through the open back door. I spent over 20 minutes racing the water level in my sink and managed to avoid it overflowing, though a few times it got pretty close. However the last thing I needed was sewer water all over my counter tops and in my cupboards, though admittedly some got on the tile floor but that was easy enough to clean. Then once the rain had stopped there was the fun task of disinfecting all area's that had come in contact with the sewer water - good fun that lol.

After all that I was in quite a bit of pain so wasn't really much to much else, including going collecting for the heart foundation which I was supposed to do. I feel quite bad about that but it's not really something I can do much about really. I did however get some of the green done and I finished all of the greys and I completed the bottom half of the embroidery.

The "bit more" I promised in the header is a little bit of news about my blog - nothing exciting mind, just 2 new pages in the bar at the top. I made one page where I put my WIPs and one page where I put my UFOs to make it easier for anyone who is curious to find them.

Finish it in 2013 project: March overview and WIP update post + TUSAL

New Project:

I started a "large" and complicated new cross stitch project this year based on a photograph by a really talented Alaskan photographer who was incredibly kind and said I could make a cross stitch of it. The photographer is Mike Gates, go check out his site - his work is amazing!

The pattern was made for me as a prize for winning a competition on dA. It's 10 inches wide  x 14 1/2 inches high = 180 x 261 stitches on 18 ct Aida and it uses 147 colours. I am truly intimidated but I did ask for the pattern to be as close to the photo as possible and didn't limit size or colours and I certainly got what I asked for!

In February I dyed the fabric for this using coffee. I started stitching in March

Update: The first 3 sections are complete 

New completed project:

 I made a cover for my diary using 25 different embroidery stitches - a new post with this will follow soon as it's worthy of it's own post.

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The Current WIP's:

Sagittarius star sign by Lanarte - central area complete
Update: No progress made on this.

   

8th century tile floor embroidery in greens and blues. 

 Update: I have added a bit more to the top border.

Sampler - started
Update: I am behind with the TAST (see side bar) and haven't worked on it this month.

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The UFO's:

2 sleeping bunnies - a Priscilla babyland embroidery - about half done but I *so* hate doing 1/4 and 3/4 cross stitches.

Dog embroidery (portrait) made from a photo years ago by a company - about 1/5th done.

Dog embroidery (standing) made from a photo years ago by a company - barely started.

Autumn leaves needle book WIP - embroidery is 1/2 finished.

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Tusal:

This month I only worked on Mike's Mushrooms so all the threads in the jar are from that.

Mike's Mushrooms - Update 5

I completed the 3rd section the other day but I've been a bit busy and haven't updated my blog.

I have completed a section of 80 x 80 stitches (-/- a corner of 40 x 40 stitches to be completely exact) now = 5400 stitches
The size of this section is 4,5 inches square (-/- a corner of 2 3/16 inch square) / 11,5 square (-/- a corner of 5,5 cm)

About this project:
This is a "large" and complicated cross stitch project based on a photograph by a really talented Alaskan photographer who was incredibly kind and said I could make a cross stitch of it. The photographer is Mike Gates, go check out his site - his work is amazing!

The pattern was made for me as a prize for winning a competition on dA. It's 10 inches wide  x 14 1/2 inches high = 180 x 261 stitches on 18 ct coffee dyed Aida and it uses 147 colours. I am truly intimidated but I did ask for the pattern to be as close to the photo as possible and didn't limit size or colours and I certainly got what I asked for!

Mike's Mushrooms - Update 2

I finished the first section of the embroidery and spent quite a bit of time cursing the 1 and 2 stitch's I had to do for some colours as I did so. While I could have left them till I needed the colours later on in the project I really want to just do one section completely before moving on to the next. What can be seen in the completed section is how real it looks - even in such a small section. What you can also see is how odd the next section looks right now - almost as if I've completely ruined things. I certainly hope this isn't the case and have put my trust in the pattern.

You may notice that the colour of my lines are different - this is because someone reminded me that pencil isn't all that easy to remove, especially from between lines of stitching so I've changed to the water soluble pen I had forgotten I had.

About this project:
This is a "large" and complicated cross stitch project based on a photograph by a really talented Alaskan photographer who was incredibly kind and said I could make a cross stitch of it. The photographer is Mike Gates, go check out his site - his work is amazing!

The pattern was made for me as a prize for winning a competition on dA. It's 10 inches wide  x 14 1/2 inches high = 180 x 261 stitches on 18 ct coffee dyed Aida and it uses 147 colours. I am truly intimidated but I did ask for the pattern to be as close to the photo as possible and didn't limit size or colours and I certainly got what I asked for