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!