Fi-neigh-ly Done

What can I say? I have a weakness for awful puns ;)

There are lots of changes in this, and I can't remember most of them because this was before I made extensive notes. I know that I made some change in the border somewhere and had to shorten the tree. The moon is not made of Caron Waterlily, it's made of DMC 745. The metallics are not what are called for. The bottom of the jacket is purple instead of green. There's only one bead colour instead of two. I'm sure there are more things *shrug*

Title	Sleepy Hollow
Designer	Glendon Place
Start date	August 30, 2010
Finish date	July 27, 2012
Total time	130.25 hours
Fabric	32 ct Thunderstorm linen
Floss	I used the provided DMC conversion

A Long Overdue Winner

This weekend was devoted to getting all the backstitch in Sleepy Hollow done. Now I've just got all the beading in the border to go.
Sleepy Hollow
32 ct Thunderstorm
And the end of the backstitch means it's time to announce the winner from my 2010 contest to guess the hours of backstitch! It took me 28.5 hours to finish all the backstitch: 7 hours in 2010, 8.5 hours in 2011 and 13 hours this year. Which means the closest guess was Annie with 25 hours (the highest guess). Apparently folks were somewhat optimistic about how fast I could stitch. Of course, considering I promised to send the winnings out by Halloween 2011 I was clearly the delusional one LOL! Drop me a line Annie and we'll see about those winnings...

A Brief Glimpse

of the headless horseman.

So I tend to save the backstitch till the very end and then show a before and after picture because I like seeing the difference the backstitch makes. I even did this for Dragon Ride which is a Teresa Wentzler, but that was before I started blogging (or taking pictures). I wasn't too bothered by that. So of course it would be soomething like this that makes me contemplate backstitching as I go!

I think it's the border. It's just repetitive and boring. Upon reflection I should have just left the border without backstitch and just done the horse and man.


Sleepy Hollow
32 ct Thunderstorm
He's now going back into storage since the light at night is too lousy for me to work on such a dark(ish) fabric. Next up is something bright.

A Contest?

How many hours to finish all the backstitching on Sleepy Hollow?

This is what it looks like at 96.5 hours (before any backstitching):


Sleepy Hollow
32 ct Thunderstorm
Rules of the contest:
You can narrow your guess to the nearest quarter hour.
Comments will lock in one week.
The closest guess will win something Halloween related (or Fall if the winner isn't a fan).
The prize will be sent out sometime next year since the rest of the year is no-new-starts. The prize will arrive before Halloween.

Random helpful/useless information

What is backstitched?
The text
Every motif in the border
The outermost part and the innermost part of the border
The trees, the grass, the gravestones, the pumpkin, the horse and the man
If it looks like there's a major colour change, then there's backstitching there
The moon is not backstitched

My record of backstitching:
Legends of Dragons border: 11.5 hours
Weekend in Paris: 6.75 hours.
Christmas Angel:13.75 hours.

A Day With Sleepy Hollow

Rachel is hosting her all-day Halloween SAL, and since the only Halloween piece I have going is Sleepy Hollow that's what I'll be working on.

This is Sleepy Hollow as I start today.

After 3.5 hours:

I changed my mind about using a metallic after about 40 stitches. While I still think a shiny moon would be fun it's a bit too much of a pain. (Also I don't have a suitable yellow-gold colour).

And at the end of the day:

Past the Frame

Success! I've gotten past the frame. One small fix which I'm sure no one can tell and it's all good. It only lacks the beads which'll be added at the end.

Being very frugal (so much nicer sounding than cheap!) when I have a new start I only buy colours I don't have or if I think I don't have enough in my stash. This means that I occassionally run out because I think I have enough but I really don't. I'm probably going to need more of one of the browns in the tree.

Sleepy Hollow
32 ct Thunderstorm

Otherwise progress is pretty good. Thanks to everyone for the different suggestions on what to do on the moon. I think every option was championed and new ones introduced!

I went by my LNS and took a look at the called for Waterlily, which is a green/yellow that I don't care for. I think I'm going to go with a Kreinik for a sparkly moon. It will be the biggest block of metallic stitching I've done, so hopefully it'll go well.

Halloween being a week away I'm pretty sure this isn't going to be over, but I'm going to head for a HD. Plus, I have 5 new starts waiting in the wings. And I mean 5 big ones (I've given up counting smalls since I just stitch those whenever the muse hits). I think I'm going to have a No-Start-November and a Wrap-It-Up-December so that I can be ready for Guilt-Free-January. Anyone want to take bets on whether I succeed? ;)

Asymmetry Induced Resentment

Symmetry: beauty based on proportionate arrangements
Asymmetry: a gross violation of symmetry

The sheer amount of resent I feel towards Sleepy Hollow's frame cannot be expressed in mere words. (But I'm still going to give it a shot). When I looked at the frame I assumed that the spaces between the pumpkin-skull-pumpkin-bat was the same everywhere. Except the horizontal middle where it's clearly different. So I counted the repetition once and stitched one entire side of the frame and was most of the way through the second when I just traced over to check if it matched the horse.

It did not. There are two extra spaces after the second vertical bat.

I am not a happy camper. I'm not frogging and am just going to shorten the tree somehow.

But I'm still very, very resentful. Both at the border for not being consistant and at myself for assuming the pattern held.

A Horse! A Horse!

My kingdom for a horse! (Richard III, 5.4.7)

So spurred on by several people I decided to give Sleepy Hollow my best shot. So I stitch happily until this:

Sleepy Hollow
32 ct Thunderstorm
Swore profusely when I realized that I'd made a counting mistake and frogged 45 minutes until this:

And then I pushed on until: :


I've actually gotten a bit more of the grass done than in the picture. The plan is to finish the grass, then get back to the border, stitch the tree and gravestone, the moon, the clothes and finish it off with the pumpkin.

As far as the moon goes I haven't decided if I want to use the Waterlily. The model moon has a stripy look (which I've mentioned a billion times that I don't care for in non-geometric designs). The question is whether I want to use a yellowish DMC, or go with a metallic for a sparkly moon. So what are the suggestions? Stitch with Waterlily, go with DMC, or go sparkly?

The Galloping Hessian!

Today is the new moon. Unfortunately I lack a camera, and therefore no picture of my TUSAL jar.

In apology I offer this (atrocious) scan of my newest project: Glendon Place's Sleepy Hollow. His Headlessness is from Washington Irving's "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" available for free since it passed out of copyright ages ago. A very enjoyable story but be warned that Irving is a flowery & descriptive writer.

My computer is on it's last legs and simply can't run any photo editing software. My camera died in the move and my brother took his camera when he went back to university. So until my new camera arrives (hopefully in a week) we'll all have to cringe through truly bad scans.


Sleepy Hollow
32 ct Thunderstorm
This picture in no way resembles what's sitting before me. Sadly it's the best I can do. The fabric is 32ct Thunderstorm linen, a very nice splotchy grey.

The scan actually cuts off a bit more of the border. I've reached the top and finished the rightmost pumpkin & bat. The border actually isn't too bad, but I'm alternating it & the horse so I don't get too bored.