Last Biscornu Of The Year

This is not actually the last finish for the year. That was Sheep Needleroll. I finished Winter Biscornu by last week but didn't post it.
It's a bit plain since I didn't stitch the second side. I realized 90% in that I had gotten mixed up and the tops of half the stitches were in a different direction than the other half. And the berries all face the same direction instead of being symmetrical. I thought about frogging; then I though about who would actually be looking that closely; then I thought about my perfectionist streak; then I gave up. I still finished assembling it, but it's going to be the black sheep of my biscornu collection.
Speaking of my collection. These are all twelve biscornus I stitched this year for the Smalls SAL. I won't be stitching biscornus next year. I have some Mill Hill ornies to knock off and then I'm not sure :)
My yearly stats post will be up later tonight.

Title	Winter Biscornu
Designer	Ancsanapló
Start date	December 15, 2014
Finish date	December 20, 2014
Total time	8 hours
Fabric	28 ct black lugana
Floss	As charted

Red And White (And With A Button)

This month's finish is an Aurelle biscornu, but I don't know which one and I can't find a link to it.
I'm determined to use up this piece of red aida and I just use white because it's such a lovely contrast and I never have to think hard about colours.
Both sides are the same but with the bottom lacking the giant motif at the centre.

Title	Unknown Aurelle Biscornu
Designer	Aurelle
Start date	November 2, 2014
Finish date	November 5, 2014
Total time	11 hours
Fabric	16 ct red aida
Floss	DMC B5200

Squeezing In

Unlike my usual habit of finishing a biscornu a few days before posting I finished this two weeks ago, and almost forgot to post it today.

This is Papillon Creation's Magic Carpet freebie.
I like it, but I still feel like the colours all bleed into each other too much. You can barely tell that there's orange and blue in the flowers.
The overlapping fly stitches were pretty fun.

Title	Magic Carpet
Designer	Papillon Creations
Start date	September 27, 2014
Finish date	October 14, 2014
Total time	18.5 hours
Fabric	28 ct black lugana
Floss	Dinky Dyes Aquamarine, DD Cloudy Sky, DD Desert Sands, DMC White
Beads	MH 2002

Late Biscornu Finish

I'm so happy this one is done!
I was so sure that I was going to run out of red before the end. There turned out to be just enough for one side so I had to use a different darker red for the bottom. I think it gives the sides a gradient look so I'm happy with it.
The colour variation in the green is a bit more noticeable in person.
I haven't been able to figure out the name or the designer, so this will just have to be the Unknown Biscornu ;(

Title	Unknown
Designer	Unknown
Start date	September 18, 2014
Finish date	September 27, 2014
Total time	17 hours
Fabric	28 ct black lugana
Floss	Dinky Dyes Aquamarine, WDW Cherry Tomato, Gentle Arts Cranberry

Winter in August

This month's biscornu for the:
Winter Petersburg is done! It's by Olga, who has a lot of very pretty freebies. The blog is in Russian but pictures are a universal language :)

The three squares that repeat. I love the pattern and the combination of stitches. I really enjoyed stitching the squares and it didn't get boring even though I had to do each five times.
Assembly was tricky since 5 corners come together at the top and bottom and 4 at each side. I went across and back and forth to narrow the gap. There was still a pretty big gap at the top and bottom so I put a bunch of beads to cover that up.
It's actually pretty massive and I had to hunt for ages to find a needle that could reach from the bottom to the top and still go through a bead. The beads are giant so it wasn't too bad.
I'm not sure if it's something that happens with all 15-sided biscornus or if it's because I used aida but the corners aren't smooth and stuffed. They are even more pointy in person.
I really enjoyed working on this. I'll probably do a few more if I can find any nice 15-sided patterns.

Title	Winter Petersburg
Designer	Olga
Start date	August 8, 2014
Finish date	August 24, 2014
Total time	23.75 hours
Fabric	16 ct red aida
Floss & Bead	DMC B5200, MH 16603

Oh Canada

I'm late posting this for the Smalls SAL, but everything about this project is late. Oh well.

This was my project for Canada Day. (For the non-Canadians in the crowd that's July 1st which celebrates the British North America Act of 1867 which united the then-existing colonies into a country). I started it on June 30 and had no hope of finishing it by the next day, and I actually did finish it by the last Wednesday but then I didn't post it. I'm just late everywhere.

And assembled:

I had to restart this because I ran out of floss and the second skein didn't match the first. I was particularly shocked because it was DMC! And then the leftover fabric wasn't enough to stitch the whole thing so I had to leave out the border.

Title	Canada Biscornu
Designer	Antonia
Start date	June 30, 2014
Finish date	July 30, 2014
Total time	10.25 hours
Fabric	32 ct white lugana
Floss	DMC 321

End of June Wrap-Up

Can you believe that the year is half over? I certainly can't. It's just ridiculous how time flies!

First, a quick look at SFS: I didn't spend a penny this month.

Spending so far is $69.63
I have $80.37 banked

More about Stitch From Stash here:

And the biscornu of the month for

And assembled:

I really enjoyed stitching the first side so I went ahead and did the second one too. But with a small colour difference. I think this is called Carrés Entrelacés but my French is too poor for me to be certain. Any Francophones want to set me straight? (Yes, I'm Canadian. Yes, I've forgotten what meagre French I studied in days gone. Mi español es un poco mejor.)

Title	Carres Entrelaces Biscornu
Designer	Julie Gladieux
Start date	June 7, 2014
Finish date	June 11, 2014
Total time	7.75 hours
Fabric	25 ct black lugana
Floss	CC Cherry Tomato, CC Goldfish, CC Ruby Slippers

Twofer

Two things in one post!


The blues and greens from this month's Smalls.




Stitch Sampler I, which was posted yesterday, and Round Bargello Biscornu:
I was halfway through assembly when I realized that I had forgotten my usual flat view.

Properly speaking there isn't an actual pattern for this. I used the stitch shown in the last image here, added Rhodes stitches in the middle, half eyelets along the sides and quarter eyelets in the corners. I actually stitched both sides for this because I was having so much fun. It's the exact same pattern and colour scheme.

Title	Round Bargello Biscornu
Designer	Therapy by Thread
Start date	April 22, 2014
Finish date	April 26, 2014
Total time	9.5 hours
Fabric	28 ct unknown brown fabric
Floss	Waterlily Seaglass, Waterlily Oasis

A Very Citrusy Biscornu

A couple of days late, but worth it I think.
I started a blackwork biscornu for this month but it was taking a lot longer than I thought so I started something else. This is Morocco by Olga. She has a bunch of gorgeous freebies if you want to take a look.

I wasn't sure what colours to use and decided to go with one side in spring colours and the other in wintery colours (yes I was going to stitch both sides since I like the design). But I impulsively went with an almost neon orange. I'm so glad I did! Combined with the green and yellow which make me think of a cut lemon it's so sunny and bright. And the contrast with the blues would've been too much so I just went with the citrus theme.
Since I was keeping the same colour scheme I didn't end up stitching the entire second side. So one of the things I'm trying with these smalls is to use up left over floss. I had a bit of a panic at the end when I thought I was about to run out of the orange and green and that I would have to buy more, thus defeating the "use up old floss" part of the plan. It turned out that I had another skein of the orange lying around but I did run out of the green and had to make a change.
The Jessica Stitch in the middle was so much fun. The fabric ended up puckering a little but it disappeared after assembly so it's all good.
I think the middle of the green circles was supposed to by an eyelet but I went with a Rhodes stitch instead. And I have no idea what that arrow-like stitch is called, but it was fun too.
I just really like that arrow.
I had this lovely orange button I was planning on using for the middle but it would've covered up most of the Jessica so I went with some beads instead.
Whenever I stitch something with specialty stitches I remember how fun they are. Sometimes I think I should take up canvaswork since those designs use so many. But then I remember that they also use all sorts of specialty threads that are outside my budget and I come back down to earth. Still I think I'm going to stitch some more of Olga's freebies to satisfy my yen.

Title	Morocco
Designer	Olga
Start date	March 26, 2014
Finish date	March 27, 2014
Total time	10.75 hours
Fabric	25 ct antique white lugana
Floss	Crescent Colours Lobster Claw, Dinky Dyes Lemon Lime, Weeks Dye Works Emerald
Beads	Mill Hill 2002

A Little Bit of Fall

Melissa mentioned that she likes fall colours. So I took that theme and went with it. (Which was kinda funny when I realized that she had sent me a fall-themed piece too).

The pattern is a modification from this freebie from Tantes zolder. It ended up as quite the giant biscornu. And I was so tempted to keep that bag. I didn't get much of that fabric and I really wish I had!

Jolly Good

Finals are over, it's winter break and maybe I'll get some stitching done? But first:

Flashback to, oh maybe, about a week ago? So I open my mailbox and there's a pretty light blue box. With a Royal crest. My first thought was the Queen was sending me mail!!! Then I realized that instead of being called British Mail it's actually called Royal Mail. A slight disappointment (I like the idea of royalty) but I recovered very quick when I saw what Lindsay had sent as part of our exchange.
A lovely purple and green biscornu which now holds court as the largest in my collection, fabric with the cutest stitchy print, and an ornament!

Purple is the September Celtic Knot and green is the October Celtic Knot. Both from Ink Circles. I've been planning to stitch some of Tracy's squares up as a biscornus, so this was just serendipity.

The snowflake (a green one?) was apparently sent because the mail went out late. Ummm. Am I a bad/greedy person if I say I'm glad for Lindsay's over developed sense of guilt? Now I've spent a great deal of time drooling over her beaded works so it gives me great pleasure to hang this pretty up beside the other ornie I won from her last year.

Butterflies in the Stomach

While it's as fun to give as to receive, they never mention that the giving part comes with a truckload of nervous butterflies!

A while back I put out a shout for anyone who wanted to swap a biscornu and Lindsay agreed to be my guinea pig. She already put up pictures ages ago, and I'm finally getting to mine.

A lot of nerves and indecision later I send this off to her:

Which unwrapped to


Should I admit that I entirely unsure of sending the box and put it away a dozen times and hesitated at the post office with a desperate need to rip apart the package and toss it out?
The prize at the bottom of the pile
The design is a freebie from here. It's actually from a set for the four seasons.

Since no mail-related post is complete without CP bashing, this took about 3 weeks to get there. Can we make it official? 3 weeks to send or receive mail from Canada?

In more mundane news, work is going pretty well. It's the exact same thing I was doing over the summer so no learning curve or anything. BUT I get home pretty late and therefore no stitching AT ALL.

I'm pretty sure everyone (and their dog) knows about the Crazy January Challenge and the spinoff Flip'n Crazy January Challenge. I will not be joining either of these. Mostly since I'm not that crazy! But best of luck to everyone playing.