Celtic Wolf - WIP post 24

Yesterday you *finally* got to see a photo of Wolf without the hoop and rolled up excess fabric in the way. I was planning to finish the braiding in the neck but I changed my mind and decided to see how big he really is, so I started at the bottom with the scroll and worked my way up the almost endless line of black. At one point I really felt I was getting nowhere with it. However I did finally manage to complete the black outlines of the neck - just have the outlines of the braiding left to do!

And here is Wolf with all of the size defining outlines done - this is the full size he will get and I'm sure that if I tell you that the section that ends in the scroll would take 4384 stitches to cover (and 1 1/2 skeins of thread) you would understand why I chose to cover it with beads instead :) Just 276 black stitches left and I can start the filling in of the last sections before beading starts. I can almost smell the end of this project!

For those wondering what size he is: He's 11 3/16" x 8 1/8" /  28.42 cm x 20.64 cm

Stitches done: 625

Total stitches:  10952
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches
Stitches left: 1868

See you tomorrow!

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 23

Sunday's progress can be seen above - the face is finished and the neck getting worked on with the total number of stitches being 9500. The number of stitches I have left that I am going to do (as opposed to what I had originally planned before I decided to also use beads) was 3320. Yesterday's progress put a dent in that. I started stitching the neck area and found working so far to the right to be painful, so I moved the hoop. Once I'd adjusted the placement of the hoops I found that the threads I'd parked were getting in my way so I dealt with those before finishing the reds. I did an additional thread of the middle blue to fill in the area under the ear a bit more and then moved on to stitching with black. As the hoop is again too far too the right for my hand I decided to move it today but first I hung it on the fence outside to take a well lit photo of the completed embroidery so far.

The lower black line at the top will continue down to link up with the black outline of the blue area while the top black line will become the outline of the neck itself. The unstitched grey area on the cheek will be covered with beads so that's why that is still not stitched. I still have 900 black stitches to do most of which will be the neck outline and the bit at the bottom.

And, so you can see the entire piece of fabric, here is a photo with my ugly fence. He currently measures 7" (17.78 cm) across and 8 1/4" (20.95 cm) top to bottom.

Stitches done: 827

Total stitches:  10327
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches
Stitches left: 2493

See you tomorrow!

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 22

Saturday's personal record breaking stitch count is something I'm still amazed I was able to do and certainly don't expect to be able to repeat any time soon. I was very happy to find that my body did not punish me for stitching so much as I didn't have any aches and pains in addition to the usual stuff. Needless to say I didn't stitch as much yesterday, but I did get a nice amount done. I started by continuing with the Kreinik Coptic Copper - such a lovely shiny colour! It reflects green and red sparkles as well as the copper - I love it! I am happy to report that not only was I able to complete ALL of the copper stitches but I still have some Kreinik left too!

Having done that the only area left to do now is the bit where I'd done the frog stitching as the area between the green and the bit I ripped from is going to be beaded. I decided to mentally prepare myself for some more ripping if I didn't like the colours and got out the 2 reds I'd planned to use: 814 dark red and 666 for the lighter red. However when I held the two together on my embroidery it was clear to me, even in artificial light, that the 666 was just too bright and in your face - you can see it to the left in the photo. So I decided to risk it and pulled out my other reds, in the end I went with 816 as it was different enough to hopefully be visible while not being too bright. I did a trial section using up 1 needle full of each colour and decided to leave it till I could evaluate the effect in daylight. In artificial light it looked like I had got it right as I could clearly see a difference. Now that I've seen it in daylight I'm really happy - it's subtle and muted enough not to take centre stage on the wolf too much but still clear enough that there is a pattern going on.

I have taken a moment to add up how many stitches I have left to do after taking off the area's I had initially planned to stitch but am now going to cover with beads instead - according to my calculations I still have 3320 stitches left to do, so if I manage to keep stitching around 500 stitches a day then I'll be finished with the cross stitching early next week. I also have 22 inches of XL backstitch to do and who knows how many beads. I am feeling a LOT more confident that I will be able to have this complete by the end of the month.

Stitches done: 537

Total stitches:  9500
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow, when I will have moved the hoop to do the next section...

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 21

Friday's ripping can be seen above when my stitch count went backwards instead of forwards, which was disappointing however yesterday I was able to make up for it and more! I didn't get to start stitching till the afternoon and it was slow going at first as I kept on getting disruptions and the documentary I was watching in the background was a bit too interesting so I forgot to stitch - not quite the point of background viewing. Once I switched to music in the evening things went better and I soon finished all of the dark green in the face. Next up I started on the lighter green to fill it all in - this was nice high speed stitching as I didn't have to count and could just stitch. I can't really say when the super high speed stitching started but once I'd finished the greens I was at 779 stitches and far too curious to see the colour of the mask next to the eye and face to stop straight away.

The Coptic Copper holographic Kreinik thread had been insisting it got used on this embroidery and so I changed the planned DMC E301 to it and started stitching. Now that I have more or less mastered stitching with Kreinik #4 braid things went smoothly and I was able to stitch about as fast as I do with normal thread. I had started at the bottom and then gone up the right hand side first, when I'd reached the top I stopped to mark where I'd been and see where I was on stitch count - I was at 916 and not really tired so decided to see if I was able to make the 1000 mark - not something I'd ever done in a day and I thought it unlikely that I'd ever get to this point again.

I did 3 more lengths of the Kreinik and decided to stop and check again - I was amazed! I'd reached 1001 stitches and it felt like a lot less hard work than the time I'd done 852 stitches. I am very happy I was able to reach this point, even though it meant going to bed at silly o'clock as it completely made up for the lack of work friday. I have another 23 days left to stitch this and around 9000 stitches left, some of which will be replaced with beads which is probably going to be slower to do.

Stitches done:1001

Total stitches: 8963
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow!

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 20

Yesterday brought you the return of my Celtic Wolf progress reports. I had passed the 8000 stitch mark and things were looking good - apart from the area of copper in the neck. I mentioned yesterday that I wasn't happy with it and while racing about as fast as my dodgy knee let me doing shopping and getting the kids off to ex I decided they had to come out. This was easier said than done as by the time I'd done the shopping etc. and then written the March ornament blogs, the dA uploads of the March ornaments and written about Wolf, it was already dark outside and the ripping had to be done in artificial light.

For many people this wouldn't be an issue but I have a dent in my cornea's that reflects light into one half ( a \ in fact) of that lovely X shape you see candle flames get on Christmas cards and suddenly it's a whole different ball game. I knew I had to get it done or I'd keep putting it off so I gritted my teeth and went on feel about as much as I did on sight.

End result of yesterday's hectic day: -88 stitches

Stitches done: -88

Total stitches: 7962
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow, when I will hopefully have more to show hehe.

Ornament of the Month - March

A bit later in the day than planned but here is the 3rd Ornament of the month - March. The birthstone of March is aquamarine, a stunning blue gem that is so difficult to capture in thread form as there isn't really a thread colour that is close, however I was able to find some blues that do look nice with aquamarine coloured beads.

Ornament of the Month - March

This month's Birthstone is aquamarine which is really difficult to reproduce in DMC as there just aren't the right shades of blue that convey the right bright blue without going too dark. I used the Swarovski beads I was going to use as the decider for the colours in the end after spending a LOT of time trying to get it right without them. I decided to go with a more Art Nouveau feel this month with the back stitching, as the flowers I created reminded me more of the 20's than anything else. My bf commented that he could see the daggers of one of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle's in the stalk and leaves of the flowers and when I looked again I could see he had a point lol.

Above is the garland finish which, once I have completed them all, will make a lovely garland to wrap around the tree or hang elsewhere, not sure yet but it's going to be amazing! It's 2 1/4" square. I used some Swarovski bicones and a heart as the hanger this month - they are the beads I used for colour inspiration and as you can see it really works. The beads I used for the edging are of unknown origin, they have been in my stash "forever". I was glad to finally have a use for this heart as it was part of the baggie of beads Carla had given me some years ago when she sent me one of the prizes I'd won in a competition over on deviant Art.

This is the ornament finish, at 3" square it's a bit bigger as I used the extra border I created for the wall hanging around the main pattern to make it a little bit bigger. I used the same blue beads from unknown origin for the edging as I did for the garland finish and 6 Swarovski bicones for the tassel which I made by splitting up the 2 threads into 6 parts (each thread split into 3)

Both designs are stitched on 16ct antique white Aida with 3 colours of DMC - pattern can be found here: Ornament of the Month - March - and the hanging loops are made with craft thread my dear bf gave me last September.

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 19

After a few days off doing the March ornaments I was finally able to get back to Wolf yesterday! So happy I could as he's been nagging me a for a bit to get his eye completed and some colour on his face. I shall start by showing you a close up of his eye, something Carla asked for so you can see what I was up to with that.

What you see here is the pupil I did on day 18 with the bit of Kreinik blending filament 085 around the edge, then a round of DMC E334 & E825 blended together and finally the rest was filled in with just E334. The white of the eye was done with Kreinik 001J which gives a much whiter colour than the planned DMC metallic white gold. You can already see a bit of the greens I used for the muzzle of the wolf in the image above but the image below will show it all.

As you can see I added some pattern here too - interlocking square loops, another design I found used in illuminated manuscript backgrounds. I used DMC 164 and 910 for this. I also did a bit of stitching in the neck area, I used Kreinik holographic copper thread (Coptic copper I think it's called) 012L between the DMC E301 I had already done but sadly they are too close in colour despite the sparkle of the Kreinik so I will have to re-think that bit. In total I stitched 529 stitches yesterday.

Fortunately I am still on track to finish on time as I'd calculated a week off for the ornaments and they took only 4 days.

Stitches done: 529

Total stitches: 8050
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow!

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 18

Friday saw me to the last of the Kreinik Solar Silver till the next batch arrives so it was time to move the hoop so I could continue stitching. At this point I was at 6840 stitches. Yesterday after moving the hoop I first finished the thread of copper I was working with and then embarked on doing more black outlines. Once I'd closed off the mouth area with black I filled in the last few stitches of the old gold as it still looked odd and annoyed me. I then continued with the black. I finished my first skein of black and will be needing quite a bit more before I finish this project.

Behold the face of the Wolf! The threads you see to the right are the ones that were parked at the top of the frame before, I'm not yet ready to use them as I'll be doing the face first. If you click on the photo to enlarge you will also see that on part of the pupil I used some peacock blending filament to give it a bit of sparkle. In total I ended up stitching 681 stitches yesterday which makes me very happy as I was a bit behind with my average stitch count.

This brings me to 41.783 % completed after just 18 days of stitching!

Stitches done: 681

Total stitches: 7521
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

The next few days I'll be working on my March Ornament of the Month as that needs to be completed in time for my post with the pattern on Friday. As I'm mean I won't be giving any sneak peeks here but If you are lucky you might see a sneak peak on Wednesday on my twitter feed for the weekly #wipwednesday post.

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 17

Thursday my progress got me to 6411 stitches. Yesterday was again a busy day (ugh) - I'd promised the kids a trip to IKEA last week but with the unexpected visit from my bf that got delayed till this weekend. As Saturdays and Sundays are usually seriously busy I decided it would be better to go on the Friday evening instead. Going to IKEA means a 10 minute bicycle ride to the station, a 10 minute train journey and 25 minutes on the bus and then a 10 minute walk, so it's quite the adventure getting there and back. Fortunately I'd taken my embroidery with me with a bunch of pre-threaded needles so I was able to get some work done on the bus, at IKEA and later while waiting for the train home, as the bus back was delayed by 20 minutes (sadly the street lighting was too bad to stitch while waiting for the bus), I was able to get another 20 minutes of stitching in.

Once home my knees and other joints made it clear that moving for a while was not an option so I settled down to stitch once the kids were in bed. I finished the last of the Kreinik I was using and will have to wait for the spools I have ordered to arrive before I can complete the 241 stitches I still need to do, however as most are outside the boundary of the hoop I can't do them yet any way. I did some of the copper stitching on the cheek once I'd finished the silver thread as I could work on that without moving the hoop and I wanted to get today's photo showing all my work before moving the hoop. All of this together meant that despite not being home for hours during my usual stitching times I still managed to get 429 stitches done.

Yes that's right! I am moving the hoop today - this will mean that for a while you won't see all of the stitching I have done, possibly not till I complete the work. As I cannot do the Kreinik Solar Silver stitches now I will not be moving straight up to complete the neck area but instead I will move to the left so I can do the face. Here you will see more copper and some other colours too!

Stitches done: 429

Total stitches: 6840
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow when you can see more of the wolf appear.

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 16

Wednesday's progress got me to a total of 6094 stitches, which you can see above. Yesterday between taking my youngest to see the orthodontist, making Easter care packages and writing 2 blog posts I didn't have much time to stitch. I wanted to finish the thread I was working on and somehow managed to do that more than once resulting in me going to bed a bit too late. Before going to bed I really wanted to know how much Kreinik I had left so I threaded needles till I ran out. It turns out that I have another 8 needles left before I run out, I shall be ordering more as I am pretty sure I don't have enough to complete all of the stitches I need to with this. Fortunately I will be able to move my hoop to do the face and then when I move round to complete the neck area at the top and to the right I will be able to add the bit I wasn't able to do now.

I did take my embroidery with me to the orthodontist but didn't get much time to stitch as it didn't take as long as expected so only managed about 25 or so stitches. I got the bulk done after the kids were in bed. The total stitches I managed yesterday was 317 - quite a bit below my minimum stitch count per day but I'm sure I'll be able to catch up.

My average stitch count at this time is: 400.6875 (yes I know lots of numbers behind the . but I *LOVE* accuracy)

Stitches done: 317

Total stitches: 6411
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow!

SFS - February

For more information as to what Stitch From Stash (SFS) is, please click the button above. Please note that this month some photo's were made with my tablet and are of a lesser quality than usual.

From last month the carry over was € 7.80

This month:

Month: February
Spent: € 44.32
Earned: € 19.66
Carry over: € 44.32 - (€ 19.66 + € 7.80 + € 25.00) = € 8.14

My spending: 

I needed some beads for my February ornament but couldn't really see the colours of the beads properly so decided to get several different ones so I could decide on the final colour once I had received the beads. I also got a string of real amethysts, some rose petal beads and some dragon scale beads. The shop was wonderful and also sent me some matching purple glass facet beads (light purple string) and the purple sachet with some lovely square beads in it as a gift.
The beads cost € 23.45 total.

Getting the beads made me have a look at the mess that was my bead storage - beads were everywhere in all sorts of containers and I didn't really know what I had other than that I had no nice purple beads. I looked around and finally settled on flip top bead boxes with clear cases to keep them in. I ordered 1 pack of 20 of each size knowing I'd have a use for almost all of them and found I was short.

So I ordered a bunch more in the sizes I needed for the big organisation project. Sadly they didn't have any more clear cases and had to order them in from the USA, I'm currently waiting for their stock to arrive so I can order the rest of the cases I need and finish this project.

As all of these cases are for storage they do not count for SFS and I will spare myself the heart attack of seeing the cost for all of this again lol.

Unfortunately this is NOT where my spending stopped as I needed some Kreinik #4 braid for my current project and as I could not get the braid in the Netherlands where I live I had to order from the UK.

What you see here from left to right is: 001J - Japan Silver, 001L - Solar Silver, 021L - Coptic Copper and 021HL - Copper High Lustre. I have used about 2/3 of the spool of solar silver and will need more. Total cost: £ 15.17 which is € 20.87 

My subscription stuff:

As we are encouraged to show off all our stuff I am also including the subscription items that I received. The January batch didn't arrive till after my SFS post so I'm going to included it here.
I have a monthly subscription at Jodyri for the monthly hand dyed fabric, monthly hand dyed thread and a subscription for a set of 5 threads from the standard collection.

 January's theme was winter sunset and we were lucky to be given a winter sunrise thread as well

 February's theme was Lonely Hearts, which you can see below with the threads on the fabric this time.

 

My earnings:

This is the place where I make my over spending somewhat less scary and where you get even more pretty photo's to look at! In February I finished quite a few projects, all small so they don't earn me much but every little bit helps.

First of all my February ornaments:
This month I finished 2 ornaments using the pattern I've made for my Ornament of the Month SAL. The fabric is 16ct antique white Aida that I got last summer when I was in the UK and the threads are from my stash, most of which were collected before 1995 though of course I have since added any new colours and topped up colours I finished. The beads I mentioned above so are new however as they are only used for the finishing I am not going to "count" them. The thread I used for the hanging loops is craft thread my bf gave me last September.

The bigger ornament is 47 stitches square and the smaller one 35 stitches square so each ornament earns me $ 4.00 each for a total of $ 8.00 which according to the currency converter today is € 7.15

This little owl scissor keep and fob were a freebie kit with my February issue of my CrossStitcher magazine subscription.

The scissor keep is 32 x 56 stitches and the fob is double sided and is 20 stitches square. So that's 2 x $ 2.00 for the fob and 1 x $ 4.00 for the scissor keep = $ 8.00 for both, which converts to € 7.15

January's CrossStitcher magazine brought me an alphabet necklace however the hanger on the metal frame was broken so I used some quilt fabric from my stash to back it. I added a line of stitching around the edge and did some backstitching in addition to what the pattern said.

The final size is 22 stitches square which gets me $ 2.00 which converts to € 1.79

Next up is another small project I finished - an owl ornament.

This ornament is done on the black Aida I bought last month but the pattern is free and the thread I already had in my stash and according to the rules this then also counts. It's 42 stitches square so earns me $ 4.00 which converts to € 3.57

This brings my total earnings at: € 7.15 + € 7.15 + € 1.79 + € 3.57 = € 19.66 (YAY!!)

I am so glad I did so many small items over the last month as that really saved my budget.

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 15

I'm seriously late with this but I did get photo's done of yesterday's progress before Real Life (TM) got in the way of posting. Tuesday's progress can be seen above as per usual so you are reminded of where I started that day. Yesterday was a day of stress due to some personal stuff and I didn't really get stitching till the evening after the kids were in bed.

It doesn't look like much but somehow it's 234 stitches, those long lines of stitches really do make it look like not much was done. It's starting to look like I will need more than just one spool of Kreinik to do all of the stitches needed - I have done 609 stitches of this Kreinik and still need to do another 932. I have perhaps 1/3 spool left so will have to order another spool for this project.

Stitches done: 234

Total stitches: 6094
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow, hopefully at an earlier time.

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 14

Monday I had made a bit of headway doing the mouth and ended up on a total of 5340 stitches.. Yesterday regular readers of my blog will have read that the Kreinik #4 very fine braid "finally" arrived. I had been waiting for it so I could do the other part of the braid in the neck before moving my hoop. As metallic thread doesn't like to be squished I am trying to limit the number of times I move the hoop so putting it off as long as possible was high on my list. This was the first time I was going to do any real amount of stitching with Kreinik braid - the last time I'd used it was for an ornament and that was a mere 20 odd stitches, stitching hundreds is a whole different learning curve.

If you don't take your time, let the thread untwist and work with it correctly then the above happens - every time - which wastes many inches of thread. It was quite the learning curve for me.

Thoughts on the use of Kreinik as a result of my first real stitching experience:

• Speciality threads have instructions of use - read them.
• Kreinik suggests threading the needle using a strip of paper - it works brilliantly!
• Threading the needle with the loose end of the spool of thread means you use the thread in the right direction, like sewing thread it twists less like this. I thread the needle first then cut.
• Use short lengths - I measure across the diagonal of my tablet to get the length, which is approx 10,5 inches.
• Like any braid it unravels when cut and not fixed - just think how fast your hair unravels if you don't fix it in place with an elastic or ribbon etc. - a fix is to tie a small knot on both ends (after threading the needle) if you pull the knot tight enough you will barely notice it's there AND you have less issues with it unravelling.
• As Kreinik suggests - use a bigger needle as it results in less wear and tear on the thread, you don't really see the difference afterwards either.
• Drop the needle every 5 - 8 stitches to let the thread unravel. With the little knot in place the needle will not fall off!

Using all of these things I learnt while stitching I have gone from wasting a good 5 -7 inches to as good as no waste at all. This is a good thing as I really hate waste, although I might still have to get a second spool as the waste from my learning curve means I might not make it with the one spool I have.

I was good and finished the gold of the mouth after completing the first section using Krenik 001L. The thread is so sparkly! It's has a full rainbow in the sparkles and is so pretty! While the learning curve did slow me down with stitching I still managed to do 520 stitches yesterday, so I'm pretty pleased with my progress.

Stitches done: 520

Total stitches: 5860
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow!

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 13

Sunday I somehow managed to do quite a bit - probably due to my bf encouraging me to do a bit more every time I wanted to stop. Yesterday was not so productive - it was a busy day for me with bf leaving after his visit and making my fish pie as dinner so he'd not get hungry before he got home after travelling. I didn't really get any stitching time in till after I'd dropped him off at the station.

I did however do 147 stitches in the end in the gold area - bf travelling proved to be a bit of a distraction and I was so very tired.

This morning my SHINY Kreinik thread finally arrived! What you see here from left to right is: 001J - Japan Silver, 001L - Solar Silver, 021L - Coptic Copper and 021HL - Copper High Lustre. It only took a week to get from the UK but when you want something so you can keep stitching it seems to take forever - you can guess where today's progress will be hehe.

Stitches done: 147
Total stitches: 5340
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow!

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 12

Saturday I ended the day having done all of the rest of the blue background that I can do without moving the hoop, which brought the total to 4749. Yesterday I completed all of the available silver area's, then I did the white gold on the tooth and started doing the old gold on the mouth area.

It doesn't sound like much but in total I did 444 stitches yesterday - not so bad really.

Stitches done: 444
Total stitches: 5193
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow!

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 11

Friday I was at 4249 after another slow day. Yesterday I was not so busy with doing stuff but having a down day just chilling and stitching while my bf did his own things resulting in a nice relaxing day for the both of us. I was even able to join Carla and the girls for a bit in our IHSW hangout - always fun to catch up and see what everyone got and has done! As a result I got quite a bit of stitching done and ended up doing 500 stitches AND 9.14 inches of XL back stitching! I finished doing the braided area as much as I could and then did the blue background around and between it all.

Today I shall be doing 2 things: first is choose which colours to use for the stitching of the face as I have not yet decided on that and the second is to do some more of the silver area's to hopefully get a chunk more done of them though today does look like it's going to be busier than yesterday.

Stitches done:500
Backstitches done: 9.14
Total stitches: 4749 (= 26.38%)
Total backstitches: 42.76 inches

See you tomorrow!

Celtic Wolf - WIP post 10

Thursday's progress was minimal but at least you could see it. Yesterday was another busy day and I didn't get any stitching time till after my bf and I had paid my local bar a visit - not the time to be doing anything complicated or at any speed so I did a bit of filling in of the top silver braid. I only got 63 stitches done but that's better than none at all hehe.

Still no Kreinik braid in the post - silly slow international post, but then when you want something *any* post is too slow!

Stitches done: 63
Total stitches: 4249
Total backstitches: 33.62 inches

See you tomorrow!