UFO #11 Finished! - Introducing the 8th Century floor tile embroidery

At long last this project is complete! I have to admit that I was rather sick and tired of doing it - the repeat pattern was simple enough but over time it got incredibly boring. I'm pretty sure that without the daily updates and all the encouragement I got from all of you it would still be a UFO.

This is made using a pattern from "Mosaic Masterpieces in Needlework and Handicraft based on motifs from The Holy Land" by Ann Roth (from a translated copy in Dutch printed in 1975) that I picked up in a wonderful dusty/musty/old book smell filled old book shop a long time ago. I'm not really sure when I started this BUT I know I did when I was married and mostly likely early on in the marriage as that was when I was doing embroidery, so probably around 1996 or 1997. The pattern was inspired by the tile floors that were excavated in Beit-sje'an in the convent of Mary: church of Sja Wee Zion

 

 This is what it looked like in the beginning of January 2013 - it's a short side and a small piece of the long side by late September when I last updated the project It looked like this:

I had only filled in a couple of loops after that before it was set aside again for me to work on other things. Everything else was completed after I picked it up again on the 1st of February.

I'm not yet certain what I'm going to turn it into - I'm torn between just framing it, turning it into a pillow cover and making it into a file cover.

The all important stats:
Stitches: 238 x 190
Size: 11 7/8" x 9 3/8"
Fabric: 20ct Aida
Colours: 10
Number of stitches: 22,364

UFO #11: Darkest green complete!

The trip to the dentist with youngest proved interesting - his filling was fixed and then the dentist noticed that one of the 3 baby teeth that is "locked" in place so it can't fall out was loose so he decided to "help" it come out by extracting it as that's the only way these 3 teeth can get removed. While he was having a closer look he also noticed that the second of the 2 was causing an infection so that one was also removed - the good thing about baby teeth is that it barely hurts and kids bounce back fast. Youngest wanted to go back to school before the 20 minutes with the gauze in the mouth time was up - he couldn't wait to show off his weird shaped tooth!

Of course I'd run out of painkillers last night so I also had to go to the shops again and that did me in completely. For most people yesterday and today would be all in a day's work and they would probably do more, for me it's pushed me over the edge of what I can do in a day and it's going to take me tomorrow and probably a chunk of Saturday too to recover.

However I did manage to complete all of the green stitches and a few of the light gold too. Hopefully while I rest up I can get more stitching done tomorrow.

UFO #11: The centre diamonds are closer to completion

As predicted I didn't get all that much done today - between appointments, going to town for more thread + a little box to put my ECS threads in, a trip to the post office and grocery shopping I was pretty knackered afterwards. Fortunately it's oldest's turn to cook today so I didn't have to worry about that as well. Tomorrow am will start with a call to the dentist because youngest's filling has fallen out :(

UFO #11: blue lines complete!

Today I completed the blue lines. Then I marked a + in the centres of the lattice work so I'd know where to do the central square thingy’s. There are 36 to do and so far I've done the dark green for 11 and a bit of them. I will continue with the dark green tomorrow and once that colour is completely finished I'll do the blues, lighter greens and light gold (in no particular order - just whatever strikes my fancy at the time).

I've got an early start tomorrow and a couple of appointments, so I probably won't manage as much as I'd like.

UFO #11: Blue advances even more

Another day and another update shows you that I have managed to do all but the longest 3 lines of blue. I spent the evening catching up on Sleepy Hollow and may have been so riveted once or twice that stitching was forgotten. Despite that I feel that quite a bit of progress was achieved and I have just 12 sections of 5 arrows to do (+ a few end bits but we won't speak about them) before I can do the centre bits and work towards completion.

I am so glad that I asked my oldest son to also buy more of the blue when he was getting me the green I needed as I have run out of blue and now I don't need to race to the shops in the morning to get more blue.

UFO #11: The end of the green lines

For those of you wondering what happened to the numbering all I can say is that today while looking for Mike's Mushrooms last post I discovered that I'd got the numbering mixed up and was saying it was UFO #12 instead of UFO #11 - I'll be changing the numbering on the other posts too so as to reduce confusion (hopefully)

Any way... today's progress has seen me to the end of the green lines - and tomorrow will see the start of the second half of the blue - only time will tell how far I'll get.

UFO #11: A little more green...

I didn't get so much done today what with sleeping late, going shopping and playing around with threads for both the ECS and PT - the post with the ECS colours can be seen here. The PT colours will be re-photographed tomorrow as either the images I had made were of all of the colours and out of focus/blurred or they didn't show all the colours. It's a shame I can't re-use time as then this project would already be finished! For now I bid you all goodnight and will let you see what my progress is tomorrow.

UFO #11: Almost half way!

Just one more "row" of the centre squares / circles / whatchamacallits and I'll be exactly half way with the centre of the embroidery. I decided to take a photo of the complete work as it was time to re-hoop and it's easier to see how much has really been done when you can see it all than when you can only see a section in a hoop. You can really start to imagine how it will look when completed now.

It's late - silly o'clock even - so I'm off to bed now,  I'll be back tomorrow with the day's update.

UFO #11: Turquoise advances!

I finished all but one needle full of the dark green grey (3051) thread before deciding it was time to do another colour as it was starting to get uncomfortable working so high up in the hooped area before filling all the little squares with very light old gold (677) which is not very visible in the photo I'm afraid. I then moved on to do more of the turquoise (597) arrows. I plan on doing a few more needlesful of the turquoise before going on to do all the little filler squares, which require a lot of starting and ending of threads to avoid long jumps between areas.

Oldest had forgotten to take money for my thread to school so had to go back to get it - much grumbling occurred but he can't go tomorrow so it had to be today, he made the most of it and stocked up on his favourite chocolate bar from the Dutch equivalent of a dollar store/pound shop just round the corner from the sewing shop so he was happy in the end.

For those wondering - All the extra sleep I've been having lately (12 hour + nights) has been doing me the world of good and I'm feeling better overall, though I still have a nasty cough and sneeze a bit it's not as bad as it was.