Thursday, December 23, 2010

I'm DANCIN'!!!!!!!

Medieval Town Mandala is FINISHED!!! I put on the last bead at 10:57 pm last night (12/22/10). I think I've been working on this for about four years. Guestimate I spent 350-400 hours stitching this one. Those towns are some pretty dense stitching. Fabric is 32ct belfast linen in Oyster by Country Stitch. As usual, I converted the NPI's to Eterna minitwist silk for all of the solid shades. Otherwise stitched as designed.

MTM finished 122210 full view
MTM finished 122210 corner
MTM finished 122210 middle
MTM finished 122210 town

I am so unbelievably HAPPY!!!! Now on to NSTR!

Friday, December 17, 2010

What to do, what to do?

As I near completion of two BAP happy dances, my thoughts have inevitably turned to which projects should be my next focus and stitching/crafting goals for next year. I do view year-long goals as somewhat-changeable entities, recognizing that shit happens and sometimes you just want to change your mind. My 2010 goals and their related progress evidenced this quite well:

2010 Stitching Goals
Finish Hanging Gardens of Semiramis - Completed 5/28/10
Start Nativity Story Table Runner and stitch on it every month with the goal of finishing by year end - Stitched on it every month except May
Finish Medieval Town Mandala - On track to finish by Christmas!
Stitch Dragon Dreams' Fantasy Wedding Blessing for my cousin - nope! Decided not to do this
Start one project from my Stitching Bucket List - decided to postpone this until I finish NSTR.
Stitch three ornaments Changing this to three "smalls" - completed one in May - others in process!
Stitch as much from stash as possible If I buy it, then it is part of my stash
Attend Quilt Festival in Houston - Mission accomplished!
Attend bi-monthly Moonlight Stitching 4 of 6 sessions attended Jan. and July. All the other months I had conflicts.

When MTM and NSTR are completed, I will have 8 WIPs remaining. I'd really love to have that number to 5 or less by the end of 2011. But then, there are new things I really want to stitch (that age old dilemma). And, of course, there is the unknown entity of how much client work I will have in 2011, because I finally figured out how to get over my guilt feelings for crafting during the weekday daytime. Yada, yada, yada...

So take a look at the box to the right, and you will see my thoughts for 2011. DH really, really, really wants me to finish Egypt Garden (remember this is a gift for him and take 2 for me as the first one was victim to...well, that occurrence I refuse to remember). I'm going to try to make Egypt my focus. Elizabethan Sweete Bag just has 1 over 1 bugs remaining. I just need to get on it and finish the darn thing already. I don't have a plan for bag-ification, but "I'll think about that tomorrow". I have several ornaments in various stages of completion (lumped them together as one WIP) none of which need much effort (except to overcome inertia) to complete. I've finished 3 of the 16 blocks for Celtic Quilt with a 4th block well underway. I WANT to make progress on this. My other WIPs are languishing. They need some love. Some haven't been touched in the last two years!!! And then, of course, are the new things I want to do. I am listing a few of the big things, but I think there is room in my plan for some smaller projects, too. We shall see. Look for an update to the Stitching Bucket list coming soon.

Sorry for the lack of photos in this post, but if you really want to see my WIPs, click the link to the album in the upper right of this
blog. That's the best I can do today. ;)

Wednesday, December 8, 2010

A Thing of Beauty...

...Is a Joy Forever

flower frog filled

My very happy-making scissors frog filled with my collection of scissors. :D It holds my entire collection and still has THREE slots empty! However, it definitely appears that I suffer from a lack of scissor fobs. Will need to remedy that. Meanwhile, I am enjoying the display which sits on the table next to my stitching chair in my office.

And, there has been progress on Medieval Town since my last blog post.

Medieval Town Mandala as of 120710

It's now about 90% complete. If stitching time happens according to plan, I expect to finish before Christmas. Then I plan to pick up Nativity Story Table Runner and finish it, hopefully by the first of the year. I'd like to start a new rotation with existing WIPs and some new ornament/small starts for 2011. But I'm not ready to think about that just yet.

Remember my last post about taking time off? Well, literally the day after that post, I got a HUGE new client (divorce financial planning) unexpectedly. I think I've worked more in the past three weeks than I have in the past three months! I'm still hoping to be able to take off the week between Christmas and New Year's. But we've got some deadlines looming, so that may not happen. We'll see how efficient I can be.