Bittersweet finish

I finished Amy Bruecken's Warm Wooly Welcomes last Friday night, and while it has some very sad memories attached to it, I still really love it. The adorable sheep and bright, happy colors really appeal to me, and even the back stitching was fun because it brought each design to life. Here are the final progress photos and the big finish:

I took the final photo under my OttLite, so the fabric color is pretty true in it; it was a piece of Belfast from Nicholas Flamel Designs in his Fragrant Lilac Collection. There were two pieces in the set, and I used the other piece for Amy's A Little Batty SAL:

I think purple lends itself well to designs with bright, primary colors as it seems to mesh with any of them. I'm going to send the sheep to Rensel Studio to be framed, since they did such an amazing job with Batty, and since they take over a year to get to a project, by the time I get it back from them the worst of the sadness should be past and the happy should come to the forefront again.

I recently went on a bit of a spree and picked up five of Amy's SALs that I didn't already have (I've had Lucky 13 for quite a while now), so once I get some other stitching done, I'll have the pleasure of choosing which one to work on next. I'm leaning towards Lucky 13, and I have a piece of PTP Crystal DaVinci (purple, of course!) that might work really well for it.

Murphy's movement has been improving, but he's still on a pain med and a muscle relaxer for a few more days, so I don't want him trying to go up and down the stairs to my craft room because the meds make him a bit woozy for a few hours after he takes them. So, since I'm still "stitchin' in the kitchen" I pulled out Heart in Hand's More Any Town Tiny Town yesterday and worked on it for a while. I had started this last May at the same time I started Warm Wooly Welcomes with the intention of switching between the two, but I loved the sheep so much that I just stayed with that one. I had stitched just the cloud back then, and here it is as of last night:

Last year I was almost caught up with all of the Tiny Towns, but now I am woefully behind. I have both of the Any Towns to do, as well as Thankful, and Nativity Tiny Town is being released at Market very soon. Cecilia has also released Frills for the Christmas and Big Hearted towns, and a Frill for Blooming is also coming out at Market; this means that I want to stitch all three of those again so I can add the Frills to each one, so I now have seven to do to get caught up again!

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Dreaming of sheep

I finished Quaker Impressions by Smitten by Stitches on February 4, so I'm going to call it a blessings sampler because I could really use some good vibes these days!

This was my first time working with threads from Cottage Garden Threads, and while I love the colors and the rapid color changes in the variegated skeins, I do wish they would cut the threads longer than they currently do. They come pre-cut at about 20" long and I usually use lengths of at least 30", so it feels like a lot of extra starting and ending threads. But I'm very happy with the finished piece, as it's like a little bit of spring in the midst of a cold, snowy winter.

I also finally got around to adding a beaded hanger to The Giving Season by Val's Stuff, so it will be ready for my Christmas tree this year:

I would love to be working on Merry Merry by Mirabilia but my Murphy hurt his back on February 7 and is supposed to be resting, so he can't do the stairs to my craft room (and absolutely HATES to be carried!) and I don't really have a good spot upstairs for working on a design the size of a Mirabilia. I spent a couple of days just snuggling with him and not stitching at all, but as he started to feel better I brought out Amy Bruecken's 365 Days of Warm Wooly Welcomes, which I can work on while sitting at my kitchen counter. This is where I had left off last September:

This is a difficult one to work on, as I spent a lot of time with it while sitting with my mom in ERs and during her procedures last year; she even said how it would have a lot of "stuff" stitched into it, so it was hard to start on it again now. But it really made me happy last year, and I'm hoping that it will again as I get closer to a finish. Here are some progress photos from the past week:

The fabric looks weird in the last five photos, because they were taken in my kitchen instead of under my OttLite, which gives a truer color. I should be able to finish this one this week, which will be a bittersweet accomplishment. Murphy is on the doggy equivalent of bed rest for another week and a half, so I'll have to find another project I can work on upstairs after this one. Here's my little guy following doctor's orders:

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Almost a blessings sampler...?

When I started Quaker Impressions from Smitten By Stitches I thought it was too late to make it a blessings sampler, which is supposed to be started and completed in January, but as I stitched I started to think that maybe I could get it done in time even with a really late start. It might have happened, but then I got sick, so that put paid to that idea! I'm still not feeling great, but well enough to stitch yesterday, so here is where I am right now:

I need to finish four and a half flowers along the edges and then I'm going to use some beads to add just a bit of sparkle. I probably won't have a lot of stitching time today, but this should be done by tomorrow at the latest.

Back in September I was getting ready for the Friendstitch Gathering, which was a very fun event. It is put on by the designers from Heart in Hand Needleart and Bent Creek, and this time they had the ladies behind Primrose Cottage Stitches as guests. I stitched three of the models for the box of goodies, including the drum design from Primrose Cottage:

I haven't taken any pictures of the box contents yet, and at this point it will be like discovering them anew as I have very little recollection of what was in there. Maybe this week I'll work up the ambition to pull it out and take some photos. I don't think they've released any details for this year's event yet; maybe after Market has taken place.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!