Ready for the New Year

I received the chart I chose for the HAED 2026 SAL a couple of days ago, which is called Fairytale:

The reason I joined the SAL was because if I could complete one page of the chart, I would receive Aimee Stewart's Sanctuary of Stitching, and I figured one page was definitely doable. Then, when I got the email with the chart, the organizers announced that everyone who participated in the SAL would get that chart, page finish or not. Here's the design, which I've already downloaded:

How fun is that?! Now I'm torn about starting Fairytale, since my main motivation has been removed. But I do already have it kitted, so at some point I'll probably pull it out and at least try working on my first HAED.

Last week I finished Tiny Modernist's Winter Forest Ornaments SAL, which was a very enjoyable stitch:

I think it would be fun to stitch one or more ornaments solo and finish them as ornaments, though who knows when I would actually get around to that!

Part 10 of the Jardin Prive sheep SAL was released last Wednesday, but I barely made a start on it before I received a Heart in Hand model, so I'll need to stitch two parts to catch up by the time the model is done, hopefully later this week.

I did finish The Christmas Beetle by Hands on Design on Christmas Day:

I changed the top border from brown to purple because of the fabric I used, and I used a metallic thread for the Smyrna crosses, but otherwise it's stitched as charted. Now I need to figure out a design to stitch for the back of the ornament, stitch it and then get it fully finished.

I also made a bit more progress on Purrfect Christmas Santa, on Christmas Day once the beetle was done:

I had thought I might finish this before the new year, but then the model came in so it's not going to happen.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week, and wishing you all the best in 2026! 🍾🥂🎉

Christmas stitching

It struck me this morning that it's kind of strange that I'm currently working on three Christmas/holiday pieces, because I'm not normally very big into Christmas stitching. However, I am enjoying all three projects, and I think two of them will be done before or shortly after Christmas--then maybe I can have them fully finished before next Christmas!

Yesterday I received the final part of the Tiny Modernist Winter Forest Ornaments SAL; this is up to part 4:

This is my progress on part 5:

There is going to be an adorable little hedgehog in the final ornament. 🦔 I'm hoping to finish this up either by tonight or tomorrow, depending on how my day goes.

Last week also saw the release of part 9 of Jardin Prive's Sheep in Winter SAL; there are five parts remaining, so this one will go into January:

I had a couple of days at the end of last week where the SALs were both up to date and I used them to work on The Christmas Beetle by Hands on Design. I'm using Seraphim Fabric's Aurora on opal Belfast for this one, and so far I'm really happy with the way it looks:

If I finish the ornament SAL and the beetle I'll have 35 finishes for the year, unless I can sneak in one more little one...

Hope those that celebrate it have a wonderful Christmas! 🎅🏻🦌🎄

Keeping up so far

I'm current with both of the SALs that I'm working on and they're keeping me pretty busy. The Tiny Modernist piece had releases last Tuesday and Saturday and I was able to finish each part by the second day after it dropped:

Part 4 comes out this Wednesday and the last part will come out on Sunday, so this should be done before Christmas. I'm doing it on 36ct linen so it will be fairly small, and I'm thinking it might be a good one to try to do an easel finish on (though not right away).

Wednesday is also the day part 9 of the Jardin Prive SAL gets released, so it might be a little tough to get it done before the following Wednesday since I'll be trying to finish the other design in the same period, but it might be doable depending on the size of the next installment. I stitched part 8 last week, and I "knitted" hats for the sheep in colors of some sports teams that I follow:

I spent several hours dog-sitting for a friend on Saturday, so I took a Mill Hill kit along because it's easy to work on even without my normal stitchy setup; this is my start on Jim Shore's Purrfect Christmas Santa:

I'm doing this one on 18ct perforated paper, because I really like the smaller finish on that size.

I did spend a little more time on HOD's Christmas Beetle after I finished the TM SAL yesterday; this is being stitched on Seraphim Fabric's Aurora opal Belfast:

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Yet another SAL? Absolutely!

That's right, I signed up for another SAL at this past weekend's Jingle Ball, this one by Tiny Modernist. It's called Winter Forest Ornaments and it only has five small parts, the last of which comes out on December 21st (one part every four days, so part 2 tomorrow). I started part 1 yesterday and almost finished it, so this should be very easy to keep up with:

I thought this darker fabric (I think it's PTP Crystal Dusk Edinburgh) would look good with the colors, but I think the opalescence is a bit too much. However, it's not like I'm going to do anything with the finished piece, so I'm just going to go ahead and stitch the whole thing--maybe by the time it's all filled in I will like it better!

I did buy The Christmas Beetle by Hands on Design and stitched a bit of it on Saturday:

I think it's a beautiful design and I'll be working on it in between SAL parts from Tiny Modernist and Jardin Prive. I did manage to catch up with the Jardin Prive SAL before part 7 dropped; this is up to part 6:

This part included a couple of bars of Jingle Bells, though it didn't include the words. I charted those myself because I wanted to use little jingle bells as an embellishment but thought they seemed kind of random if you didn't know what the music was!

This is up to part 7 completed, the halfway point:

There was also a bonus ornament included with the SAL, which I finished this past Saturday:

I think the whole design cost around $15, which seems like a lot of value for a good, multi-part SAL these days.

I have to say that I don't think I would attend the Jingle Ball again unless there is a pattern or a class that I really wanted, and I didn't want to wait a year or more to get it. The most interactive parts are probably the stitching lounge, with "tables" of stitchers, and WIP speed dating (you spend 6 minutes with a random stitcher, then either decide to stay with that person or go to a new one), neither of which I even wanted to try (it didn't help that I got sick last Friday, and felt even worse on Saturday) as that's just not my thing. I did enjoy watching several of the meet-&-greets with the designers, and they all offered a freebie chart in their shops (except for Teresa Kogut), so between that, being able to get the Christmas Beetle chart right away and the Stand Up for Santa class with Cathy Habermann I feel like it was worth the $15 entry fee. I also bought a chart from Jeannette Douglas that I've had my eye on for a while; she did a set of 12 Christmas Dots designs this year, but at $6 each I couldn't quite make myself order them (123Stitch has them for $5.39 each, which would still be almost $65), but she had a special offer for the pdf of the entire set for $49, so I bought it:

I want to stitch them all together, so maybe I'll try to do a couple each month, as that's how they were released this year. I will say that printing out 13 color pages sucked my color ink cartridge down pretty fast, so maybe not quite as good a deal as I thought... 🤣

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Almost caught up

I had a low-key Thanksgiving here at home with my husband and son, which was very comforting. My mom passed away on the 27th last year, so Thursday was the final "first" that I had to get through. It wasn't as bad as some others have been, like Mother's Day or her birthday, and my hope is that going forward I can shake off a lot of the depression that has bogged me down at times this past year.

I spent the long weekend eating, watching football (go Bears!) and hockey (go Wild!) and stitching until my hands got tired--in other words, it was a really good weekend. I am about halfway done with part 6 of the Jardin Prive SAL, so I should get it finished today, in plenty of time for the release of part 7 on Wednesday. Here are the five completed parts:

And here's where I left it last night:

I'm stitching it on Zweigart Lavender Edinburgh, and I am making changes and additions as I go. I've added a few colors, including a gold metallic and white, gray and black Wisper, and I'm adding some JABCO buttons. Here are a few more photos:

I loved the snowman's heart-shaped hat, and it was the perfect spot for a little red heart button. ❤️

I'll be attending my first Jingle Ball this weekend, mostly because Cathy Habermann teased her Christmas Beetle chart a few days ago and I knew I didn't want to wait a year for its general release. It looks like a companion to her Ladybug Picnic and Botanical Bee, and I always love a good series!

And as long as I was "attending" this virtual retreat, I also signed up for Cathy's Stand Up for Santa finishing class:

I really liked this design when she shared it a while back, but it wasn't enough by itself to make me sign up for the Ball, but between the two designs I couldn't resist anymore. I obviously won't have the Santa stitched in time to actually participate in the finishing class, but Cathy's written instructions are so good that I know I'll be glad I added them to my "finishing" binder. I'm also curious about the Ball, so I'll try it out this year and see if it's something I would want to do again.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Another SAL? Sure!

I've been a member of Jardin Prive's FB group for several years, ever since I took part in her Au Fil des Nichoirs mystery SAL:

Her latest mystery SAL is called Histoires du Moutons en Hiver (Stories of Sheep in Winter) and I've been seeing people post their progress for a month. By the time they got to part 4, I couldn't resist anymore and I signed up for it, even though I certainly didn't need another project. Part 5 was released last Wednesday, with nine more parts to go that will be released every Wednesday, so it will take me a little while to get caught up, but since I started it last Thursday night I've finished part 1 and am making good progress on part 2:

I've added a few colors and switched some around, I'll be adding some embellishments, like the sheep's pom-pom, and I'm using Rainbow Gallery Wisper for the sheep so they'll be wooly:

Before I started this, I did finish the second model and am waiting to hear it's been approved, and I spent last Thursday finishing Pepper's ornament for my friend:

And here's the real Pepper in action:

For now, my plan is to keep working on Histoires; part 6 will come out in a couple of days and depending on how large it is I'm thinking I might be able to get caught up with the SAL before part 7 is released.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week, and wishing a wonderful Thanksgiving to those who celebrate it! 🦃

A HAED SAL?!

I did a thing--I signed up for a HAED SAL for next year. While I am 99.99% certain I will not finish it in a year (or, perhaps, ever), the main reason I signed up is because if I can finish just one page, I will get a new Aimee Stewart chart at the end of the year. Aimee is my favorite HAED artist, so it just seemed like a fun way to get one of her charts. If I could finish six pages, I would get all 12 of the exclusive SAL charts, and if I finish the whole piece, I could also choose one of three exclusive charts (though none of these appeals to me, so I feel no pressure to finish). There are also free milestone charts for reaching participant goals of 1000, 2000, 3000 and 4000 by December 14; so far, we've already reached over 1000, so we will all get this chart:

Fairytale was my pick, as I just thought it was really pretty and looked like it would be easier to see progress and stay motivated to work on it:

It's nice that they show you the page layout, so you can see how much you'll have to do to reach the goals:

I went through my stash and found fabric and all but one of the floss colors, so it basically cost me nothing to kit up, which is a nice bonus!

So that's one goal already set for next year, to finish a minimum of one page--I think I can do it! 😅

I ended up getting a reply to my question about the Nora Corbett model late last week and was able to complete the first of two models on Friday, and I just received an approval this morning, so it's good to go. I've already made pretty good progress on the second one, so I should be able to finish it within the next couple of weeks if all goes well. I might try to do that before I work on finishing my friend's ornament, unless that suddenly appeals to me more.

I also forgot to share that I was able to buy a couple of Nora's concept paintings for her Seven Seas Mermaids at the Mirabilia retreat. While I have quite a few of her pieces, these are the first I've gotten that were turned into designs, so I was excited about that. The two I bought were North Pacific Mermaid (which should have been South Pacific Mermaid), for which I stitched the model:

And Indian Ocean Mermaid:

It's interesting to me that one design ended up almost the same as the original painting, and one ended up pretty different. I'm going to stitch North Pacific again for myself, then I'll be able to hang the paintings next to the stitched pieces, which I am looking forward to seeing.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

A change of plans

I am very happy to say that after working in the yard for several hours each day last Wednesday through Saturday, the bushes are ready for winter! I might still trim some of the trees if the weather stays nice, but the worst part is over. There were four bushes that I didn't get around to last year when my mom's health failed, and one of those is a bush with the worst thorns I've ever felt, so I was really dreading that one. But my husband stepped up, bought a hedge trimmer and got it whipped into shape in a relatively short time--if he hadn't, it would have taken me most of a day to get it done, so that was a huge relief.

I am mostly done with one of the Nora Corbett models, but I'm waiting to hear back about a question so I couldn't work on it after last Tuesday. I hate to take it off the Qsnaps, which I need for the next one, so I decided to start the lab puppy ornament for my friend while I wait for a reply from Wichelt. I was going to stitch the one standing in the water here:

Then last week I went over to her house, and she was telling me that they have to keep their toilet paper on the bathroom counters because Pepper likes to paw the rolls all the way down to the cardboard; of course, I had to stitch the other design instead! I finished the stitching this morning:

Now I just need to finish it so it's ready for their Christmas tree this year, so I'll do that when the mood strikes--it's nice to have the stitching done because that's the part that takes the most time.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do next; I'll either work on Red for a couple of days while I wait for Wichelt to get back to me, or I'll cave and take the almost finished model off the Qsnaps and start the next one. Decisions, decisions...

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!