Took a small break

I've been focusing on the model lately but this past Thursday through Sunday I took some time off from it to catch up on the two SALs I've been doing; I thought if I get behind on them now it will be that much harder to get and stay caught up again, and they would probably eventually disappear into the WIP bin so it was now or never. First I did part 17 of The Rooky Wood, which is now in the final row:

The border along the bottom is really pretty so far, though it doesn't show up particularly well here--I'll have to take a closer photo next time.

Then I worked on part 11 of Dragon's Blood Mystery Mandala, which is the first part of the middle row of this chart. This time part of the design reminded me of dragon scales so I pulled out some Kreinik to add some sparkle to them:

I am still a bit concerned about having enough floss of the same dye lot to finish this piece as well, so adding some Kreinik and using beads as I can might help me squeak through.

I finished that up late Saturday afternoon so I decided to take the rest of the evening to make a start on Heart in Hand's Round Red Sampler. This will be displayed in the red Heartware bowl that Cecilia offered at Market this year, so I went through my stash looking for a red floss that went well with the bowl. I landed on Forest Berries Silk'n Colors, which is one of my favorite "Christmas" flosses. I made good progress on Saturday, and then I couldn't sleep after about 4 on Sunday morning so I picked it up again and had a quiet few hours to work on it before the critters got up and needed to be fed and walked. By that time I realized that I could finish it that day if I kept at it so that's what I did, and now it's ready to send to the finisher whenever I get one more piece stitched:

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!