All Ruffled Up

I ran out one of the beads for Mill Hill Mandolin, so I started a ruffle scarf.
I bought this yarn ages ago with the idea that I would crochet a ruffle scarf. That turned out to be trickier than I thought and I had trouble following the crochetting instructions, so I put it aside. I wanted to try something simple for my first knitted project and this was a good one. The ruffles mean that my few mistakes are well hidden:)
The yarn has tiny sequins on the bottom. They aren't very visible. And the yarn isn't grey. That' just all the artificial light and flash. The first picture is accurate for colour. It's solid black :)

I picked up the beads, so I should have mandolin finished by Thursday at the latest. And I have plans for my next knitting project: a slightly more ambitious scarf with cables!

Title	Ruffle Scarf
Yarn	Red Heart Boutique Sashay Sequins
Start date	April 4, 2015
Finish date	April 5, 2015
Total time	4 hours

I Have Made A Terrible Mistake

On the 31st of March I was looking at random videos on the internet and on impulse clicked on a knitting one. It was a very complicated looking shawl and I was all set to admire it and move on when I saw one of the videos on the sidebar was how to do a beginner knit stitch. So I watched it.

The next day I went out and picked up a pair of bamboo knitting needles so I could just "try it out". My test sampler looks like this now:
I can knit and purl, which is apparently all there is to knitting. Why didn't someone tell me this before? And why did the last person who tried to teach me make it seem so complicated? Clearly they were a terrible teacher and I should have tried again!

I got bored of the knit stitch (called the garter stitch when it's multiple rows), so I moved on to try combinations of knit and purl. I'm going to try a cable next and then increasing and decreasing. I'm pretty sure I'll be able to knit just about anything after that. Oh, and maybe figure out how to do a gauge properly.

It's kind of hilarious and kind of terrifying because I started out with the wooden straight needles because everything I read said that they were the easiest for beginners. I'm finding that they grip the yarn a bit too much for my liking and that casting even 30 stitches in difficult to manage. I guess I'm going to pick up some circular metal needles soon lol

But fear not, readers who are here for my stitching. I have in no way lost my love for that. In fact, I'm starting a Mill Hill ornie today since my left thumb knuckle is hurting. I think I knitted too much last night.

March Achievements and April Goals

Goals for March:
1. Finish a Mill Hill ornie. I finished French Horn and even cut it out.
2. Finish the castle and trees in Cinderella. I ended up frogging the metallic backstitch (and then frogging and stitching all the surrounding DMC since it got fluffy and shredded) so that I could couch it. Despite all that work it was probably faster than struggling to backstitch with the Kreinik. I'm never doing that again!
3. Put 20 hours into Autumn Winds. I put in exactly 20 hours.

Unexpectedly This Month:
1. Stitched a lunch bag.

Goals for April:
1. Finish a Mill Hill ornie.
2. Finish-finish a small from the Drawer Where Things Go To Wait (Forever).
3. 20 hours of Autumn Winds.

Carry Lunch In Style

I made a lunchbag! I followed this tutorial from Pink Penguin. This was a request but I'm really tempted to keep it for myself!
It looks huge in this picture but it's only about 12x12x6 and that 12 inches is with the handles included. It's not insulated, but it is lined with the same fabric as the brim. There's also a cover that pulls together as a drawstring. It's the first time I've done anything like that, so I didn't fiddle with the pattern but followed it exactly.

A terrible shot of the inside, but it gives you an idea of what it looks like.
I was initially going to add the recipients initials but I decided to just go with a detachable flower instead. It's a kanzashi style flower based on this tutorial. It took me a lot longer than necessary because I kept missing the folded in bits when I stitched it together. But now that I have the hang of it I can see myself making them when I need a pretty embellishment. The flower is just tackled on for the photo. I need to find a pin of some kind for it.
Because I wouldn't be me if something didn't go wrong: I ran out of black thread and I have no orange, so I had to do all the stitching in white. The topstitching was a nerve-wracking job since mistakes were going to be incredibly obvious. I cut the outside in the wrong size, but was able to repurpose it for the cover which is an inch smaller. I forgot to change my needle position from my last project so the seams were 3/8 instead of 1/4 inch. And I already mentioned the flower issues.

But all in all, it was an evening well spent and I'm very pleased with myself!

And in case anyone is thinking of making this themselves, the tutorial is very easy to follow, except that her instructions on boxing corners aren't very clear.

Third Instrument

I still haven't figured out how to take good pictures with my phone, so it's a truly terrible picture of French Horn for the Smalls SAL.

Title	French Horn
Designer	Mill Hill
Start date	March 2, 2015
Finish date	March 25, 2015
Total time	3.75 hours
Fabric	14 ct white perforated paper
Floss	As charted
Beads	MH 252, 2011, 2055, 3043

Stitch From Stash - March

Month: March
Spent: 3.32

Carryover: 35.80

I picked up some DMC that I ran out of, and some fabric and interfacing for finishing (which thankfully doesn't count for SFS because it would've put me way over budget!).

In frustrating news, I'm unable to use my camera for the foreseeable future. I'm going to have to use my phone, which as nice as it is, is very annoying to take pictures with.

Onto The Dress

I took a brief break from struggling with the Kreinik to stitch a bit of the skirt. I'm loving it so far.

Cinderella
32 ct Charcoal Lugana
I also got a new sewing machine and have been playing around with it. I keep forgetting to take a picture of it. This weekend, I promise.

Starting Over

When I last posted about Autumn Winds she looked like this:

Autumn Winds
28ct antique white Lugana
Since then I've managed to lose my original working copy, been unable to work backwards to figure out which parts I've stitched, kept it hidden, and finally restarted it.

I'm going with a block by block method, and now she looks like this:

Autumn Winds
25ct white Lugana

Castle And Shrubbery

I'm almost done the non-dress bits of Cinderella. I just have the metallic parts of the castle left since I'm not going to stitch the frame. Unfortunately the metallic I have is a bit thick so it's not much fun to stitch with. I'm really really looking forward to getting back to the dress!

Cinderella
32 ct Charcoal Lugana

February Achievements and March Goals

Goals for Febuary:
1. Finish Mill Hill Harp. Done.
2. Finish the castle and trees in Cinderella. So close. I have two colours and the backstitching to go. Apparently the castle and grounds are a lot bigger than I thought.
3. Finish Celtic Autumn if the Kreinik comes in. It didn't come in, and so I haven't finished it.

Unexpectedly This Month:
1. Turned Cool Christmas into a journal cover.
2. Started and finished Chocolate Needleroll.

Goals for March:
1. Finish a Mill Hill ornie.
2. Finish the castle and trees in Cinderella.
3. Put 20 hours into Autumn Winds.

Harping On

I stitched Harp from Mill Hill's Harmonic Holiday series. Unlike last month, I actually cut it out this month. It's missing the harp-strings, but that's because I ran out of the gold Kreinik. Maybe next month I'll have something completely stitched and cut out and ready to hang? One can only hope!

Title	Harp
Designer	Mill Hill
Start date	January 31, 2015
Finish date	February 1, 2015
Total time	4.25hours
Fabric	14 ct white perforated paper
Floss	As charted
Beads	MH 2011, 2022, 2055, 3043

Stitch From Stash - February

Month: February
Spent: 20.93

Carryover: 14.12

When I signed up for this year I kept thinking that I wouldn't use the bonuses because it sounded like too much work. What do you know I was right! I did it last month because it was easy. I took one look at what I stitched this month, tried to remember whether I had bought the chart more than six months ago, and just gave up.


As planned last month, I bought Canadian Hearts by The Victoria Sampler. It has all 10 provinces and the 3 territories. It also has the city of Victoria (because the company is based there, I guess), but I won't be stitching that. What it doesn't have is the one for the country. That's in the International Hearts I leaflet, along with a bunch of other countries that I have no plans to stitch. I don't think the kits are being made anymore, so the next part of this project is figuring out how to get my hands on the Canada chart.

So, er. Is there anyone out there who has the chart and is willing to lend it to me? I promise to stitch it asap and return it. *winsome smile*

I plan on starting these after I finish the Mill Hill Holiday Series as part of the Small SAL. So, in July :)

Taking My Own Sweet Time

Four years ago I made a "temporary" cover for my stitching journal. Today I finally made a new cover for it. I used Cool Christmas, which I also stitched four years ago. I really take my time finishing things lol
It was a bit of an adventure because I got the margins wrong, had to improvise and then got confused about the actual assembly. But all's well that ends well and this is so much cuter in person!

Pink For Valentine's Day

My attitude towards Valentine's is a resounding "meh". I think it's a ridiculously commercialized occasion but if people want to celebrate it then more power to them. It makes no difference to me (other than the post-Valentine chocolate sales, which are an excellent thing).

So of course I had to stitch hohla's latest freebie SAL "Chocolate" in pink.
It's stitched on 28ct lugana in various pinks from my stash. It feels like I've been using these threads forever in the attempt to use them up, but there's always plenty leftover!
I don't have a lot of pink beads. The first ones I found were giant ones that didn't fit into the spots at all. I was so pleased to find a ton of these smaller pink ones. In fact, as I type I have a horrible suspicion that these beads are not leftover from some other project but are meant for Cinderella. I'm too afraid to go look o_O
I feel like I'm becoming an old hand at these specialty stitches. I've done all of them before. But they're still so much fun!

Title	Chocolate Needleroll
Designer	hohla design
Start date	February 5, 2015
Finish date	February 12, 2015
Total time	8.75 hours
Fabric	28 ct white lugana
Floss	CC Carrie Berry, CC Goldfish, GA Cranberry, WDW Peony
Beads	MH 2004

A Frustrating Lack of Symmetry

I've been working on getting the castle and trees in the background. It's frustrating because there's an annoying lack of symmetry in some parts. You would think that the brown chimneys that are next to each other would be charted the same, or be mirror images, but they aren't. There's a random stitch that different. The ledge isn't uniform either. I've been fixing it as I go but it's annoying. I'll be very happy when I can finish this bit and get back to the dress!

Cinderella
32 ct Charcoal Lugana

January Achievements and February Goals

Goals for January:
1. Finish a Mill Hill ornie. Yes!
2. Finish all DMC stitching on Celtic Autumn. Yes. And I was about halfway through the Kreinik when I ran out and my LNS is out of stock, so I need to wait for it to be ordered in.

Unexpectedly This Month:
1. Started and finished Midnight.
2. Started Cinderella.
3. Started Mill Hill Harp.

Goals for February:
1. Finish Mill Hill Harp.
2. Finish the castle and trees in Cinderella.
3. Finish Celtic Autumn if the Kreinik comes in.

January Smalls SAL

I'm not taking part in many SALs this year, mostly because I'm getting too lazy. But I am sticking with Smalls SAL since it encourages me to dig out my smaller projects that I could normally ignore.

This month's finish is Mill Hill's Drum. This is a series of six and I'm planning on stitching all of them. Hopefully by July I'll have some idea of what to stitch for the second half of the year.

Stitch From Stash - January

Month: January
Spent: 14.95
Earned: 6

Carryover: 16.05

I bought one fat quarter of 25ct white lugana, so I'm not bothering with a picture.

I'm not quite sure I've got the calculations for my "Earned" amount right, but this is how I counted it:
$2: Mill Hill
$4: Midnight. The actual stitch count is 66x192 which would be ~113x113 if it was a square. But since there has to be at least 75% coverage and I don't think this design was 75% I downgraded it to the next lowest category.

In something that bodes ill for the rest of the year, I've already picked out my February purchase. Did you know that The Victoria Sampler Hearts series is now available as a chart instead of as kits? I've been holding off on buying the kits since I wasn't willing to spend that much money on something so tiny. But I spotted the International Hearts chart at my LNS when I went to buy the fabric. The owner actually told me that there wasn't one for the Canadian provinces and territories but I checked online on a hunch and it does exist! I'm a bit surprised she didn't check herself. Lost that sale since I'll be getting it online now :)

Cindy

It's still January. There's still time for a big start :) This is my start on Mirabilia's Cinderella. (I didn't realize that her website had been updated! It's so much easier to navigate now. And there's a search function!) I plan on heading up to the manor and trees because that looks like the most boring part.

Cinderella
32 ct Charcoal Lugana

Midnight Ends

I've been listening to some very good audiobooks lately so I raced through Midnight at a ridiculous pace.
The border was an absolute pain to stitch. Most of the flowers are composed of 2 colours and then there are all those random single stitches. But it was a small border and I still have memories of Teresa Wentzler borders, so it wasn't the worst one I've ever stitched.
I love the sun. It's so cheery and those eyebrows are fantastic.
Probably one of the best things about this is that as it's a bellpull I know exactly how to finish it! Now I just need to dig out my finishing fabrics to find something suitable.
All in all this was different from most of the things I've stitched recently and it was a very nice change. Now I'm returning to ladies in extravagant dresses :D

Title	Midnight
Designer	Lavender Wings
Start date	January 5, 2015
Finish date	January 14, 2015
Total time	39 hours
Fabric	28 ct purple lugana
Floss	As charted

Impulse Start

I was digging through my stash looking for the fabric for Tradewinds when I came across this light purple fabric and thought that it might be perfect for Midnight by Lavender Wings.

It's the perfect size, so I started it. It's so full of confetti that I have to change my needle every three stitches. It's stitching up pretty fast though, so I haven't got tired of it yet.

Midnight
28 ct unknown purple LuganaI can't find the designer's website (I think she's retired) and all the pictures online are tiny, so here's a quick picture of the cover.

Beat The Drums

First start and finish of the year!
I'd been mentioning here and there that my New Year's Start was going to be Alphabetissimo by Papillon-Creations. I hadn't bought the fabric or floss because I was waiting for the Stitch From Stash break week. Due to various reasons I didn't get to the store in 2014. And when I saw that I had worked on only one WIP last year I couldn't start something huge. I felt too guilty.

So I started and finished one of the Mill Hill kits I was planning on stitching. I actually have only the charts which were generously donated by someone whose name I've forgotten because I'm forgetful like that. That lovely angel sent me all six charts in this series because she was done with it. (If that was you please speak up so that I can feel less ashamed!)

ETA: While randomly clicking though my blog I've discovered that these were gifted to me by Berit (who sadly is not blogging anymore) five years ago! And that I had planned to finish them as a cube. I can't believe I've had these charts for five years!

The kits use DMC so the floss wasn't an issue. As for the beads, I only had the gold, so I substituted a random green, blue and red. I'm going to wait until I can't fit any more on the paper before I start cutting. And yes, I stitched it way too close to the edge. My miserly tendencies caused me to briefly lose my mind :)

Title	Drum
Designer	Mill Hill
Start date	January 1, 2015
Finish date	January 2, 2015
Total time	6.5 hours
Fabric	14 ct white perforated paper
Floss	As charted
Beads	2011, 2055, 3002, 3043

Year End Wrap Up

Now in it's second year! 2010, 2011, 2012 (on hiatus), 2013

This year's finishes:

And a look at numbers:
Total finishes: 18
New starts: 20
Pieces started and finished in 2014: 17
WIPs at the start of the year: 9
WIPs at the end of the year: 11
WIPs that didn't see a single stitch last year: 8
Oldest WIPs: From 2009
WIPs to discard: 4

Fastest finish: 3.5 hours (Pearls & Rosebuds Biscornu)
Most time consuming piece: 231.75 hours (Egyptian Sampler)
Pieces that took 10 hours or less: 7
Pieces that took between 10 & 50 hours: 8
Pieces that took over 100 hours: 3
Total hours stitched in 2014(approximately): 646

Previous years
2010: 825
2011: 635.5
2012: 687
2013: 731.5
2014: 646

Looking at the numbers I'm shocked to realize that almost everything I stitched this year was a new start. The only pre-existing WIP I worked on was Deco Spirits. I kept thinking that surely Egyptian Sampler, at least, must be an oldie, but it was my New Year's Day start. I've also decided that there are some WIPs that I just hate working on and it's time to accept that I will never finish them. As such 4 projects will be exiting the house with today's trash. Farewell Hardanger Angel, Blue Moon (2nd try! It's just not meant to be), Sampler Bookmark and Ocean Biscornu.

Looking forward: I'm going to start making monthly goals again since I think it does help me have a better idea of what I'm working on. I really, really, really want to start finishing up my old WIPs and assembling some of the smaller finishes languising in my Finished Drawer.

General Goals for 2015:
1. Finish Celtic Autumn
2. Finish at least one page of Autumn Winds
3. Start and finish one of the following: Cirque des Cadeaux, Cinderella or Tradewinds
4. Finish-finish at least 6 smalls

Goals for January:
1. Finish a Mill Hill ornie
2. Finish all DMC stitching on Celtic Autumn

I hope everyone has a great stitching/knitting/crocheting/crafting year next year!

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

Purple Sheep

On impulse I joined hohla's latest freebie SAL. Since next year is the Year of the Sheep/Goat/Ram in the Chinese Zodiac she designed this cute needleroll in celebration. It was one of those SALs where you have to send a picture of each part before a deadline to receive the next part. It was pretty fun even though Christmas almost made me miss a deadline.
I used leftover floss from Shepherd's Purse by Shepherd's Bush, which I finished back in 2011! Why yes, I am a packrat, however did you guess ;)
There were tons of specialty stitches but none were new to me. Satin Stitch, Straight Stitch, Double Herringbone and Rhodes Circles in the bottom.
The sheep is composed of lots of little Jessica Stitches and one big modified Jessica.
The bottom is Double Herringbone, Norwich, and partial Rhodes Stitches.

I've never made a needleroll before, but there are so many good tutorials so I think I'll be fine. Admittedly, this is me, so it's probably going to wait for ten years before it actually gets assembled lol

Title	Sheep Needleroll
Designer	hohla design
Start date	December 17, 2014
Finish date	December 27, 2014
Total time	11.5 hours
Fabric	28 ct black lugana

December SFS

Wrapping up this year's SFS, I didn't buy anything this month.

My spending for the year was $83.03. I bought 1 chart and fabric for that chart. The rest was all floss that I ran out of.

It was very helpful in keeping track of what exactly I was buying. I was pretty focused on finishing off old WIPs so I didn't spend as much this year. If I'd tried SFS two years ago I'm sure I would've failed immediately. I was a bit of a spendthrift that year. This year was focused on starting/finishing some of the things I bought then. I'm planning on doing this again next year. There are bonuses based on the size of finishes but since that sounds like too much work to figure out I'm just going to stick with the $25/month and use the freebie month.

More about Stitch From Stash here:

More Skirt

Continuing on with Celtic Autumn's skirt. I'm enjoying the orange and bored by the cream/white.

Celtic Autumn
32 ct Antique White LuganaI also want to start something new, but I'm trying to satisfy the need with a biscornu and hold off until the new year. I want to stitch something almost violently colourful but I can't think of any design that fits.

Ladies Take A Bow

Deco Spirits are done! As seen in this terrible terrible photo. They look a lot more vibrant in person.
I made some changes. I switched out the DMC metallic for Kreinik. Some of the metallics are supposed to be blended with regular DMC but the first time I tried it the cotton kept fraying madly so I just gave up. Instead I just stitched the metallic and added a top half-cross in the cotton.

Title	Deco Spirits
Designer	Mirabilia
Start date	October 6, 2013
Finish date	December 9, 2014
Total time	202 hours
Fabric	32 ct white lugana

Orange and Green

I finished a bit more of Celtic Autumn's dress. I've been switching between this and Deco Spirits and the next colour to stitch is white for both. I'm not really feeling like it. Maybe I'll start this month's biscornu instead.

Celtic Autumn
32 ct Antique White Lugana

November SFS

Squeaking this in 20 minutes before midnight!

A bit of spending this month as I picked up $9.55 worth of DMC.

Spending so far is $83.03
I have $191.97 banked.

I guess technically speaking I could use December as my freebie month and go crazy...

More about Stitch From Stash here:

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

November TUSAL

It's the New Moon and so it's TUSAL time.

This month's TUSAL has oranges and cream from frogging Celtic Autumn.