My First HAED FINISH!

I'm pretty excited to have finished SK Dragon Soul. Especially since my stitching mojo has gone AWOL a few times in the last week or two.

Here is a picture.

 I have since washed it and just begun the drying process. I can tell you that I won't use pencil again since not all of the grid marks came out. This is odd since I have used pencil before with no problem. I will have to wait for the drying and pressing to see if it removed the page line. So not perfect but it is my first HAED finish and I'm pleased with myself. It was a nice treat amidst all of the resume writing and job hunting while still working at my present job until my layoff kicks in at the end of the month.

Another nice thing, HAED 2013 SAL supply sheet arrived today so I can hopefully begin pulling threads tonight or tomorrow night.

Yet another cheerful thought today. A post on FB reminded of the HAED Rewards program, which begins Dec. 30th. Since I actually bought this chart and it wasn't an RAK, I think I will be eligible. That will be exciting and fun if I am. It makes me want to go and look at QS patterns. lol.

I'm pretty tired and my back is hurting a bit because I picked up something too heavy for me yesterday so I doubt there will be stitching tonight. Seems like a good time to day dream though.

Happy stitching this week everyone!

A proper Thank You to Sharine

As I mentioned, Sharine from Charbella has awarded me a Leibster Award.

Here are the rules:
You must thank the person who awarded it to you, paste the Liebster Award on your blog, pick 5 blogs with less than 200 followers, and leave them each a comment on their blogs letting them know the good news!

These are my choices. They are not in any particular order.

OctoberLace
Stitching Cats
Family Business
Nothing but Cross Stitch
Intricate Stitches

These are all really fun blogs that I think you will enjoy.

In other news, I will be stitching  QS Mystic Garden in the HAED 2013 SAL. It was a really difficult decision this time around as all the choices were tempting, and there were 3 that I needed to stitch. I had told DH that if the tigers were there I'd definitely join the SAL and they were so. There are so many people this year and I really can't wait to see the wip's.

Now I'm off to figure out how to paste the Leibster Award on here.

Happy Stitching everyone.

On Receiving a Gift this Morning and being nominated for a blog award

I have been having a little trouble sleeping this week, waking up earlier each day. I was trying to be quiet and not wake DH so I was checking out stitching things and perusing Facebook this morning. Well, the Thanksgiving Faery has sent me a chart! I was so surprised as it was completely unexpected. Someone had asked for my E-mail address, but as I have gotten several really kind E-mails since Friday and it just didn't occur to me to think of being RAK'd.

I won't keep you in suspense. Here is the lovely Mini Cheshire Cat.

Isn't it the loveliest thing? It has been on my wishlist for some time. It reminds so much of the stray cat that sits in my tree out front.

It also presents a bit of a dilemma. When QS Dragon Soul is finished I had planned to make Mini The Black my next black and white project. I really enjoy stitching them. But now there is this and I will have to decide. I've compared and Cheshire cat is smaller and takes only 22 skeins of floss which is much less than The Black. Decisions Decisions. Why must we always choose?

In other exciting news Sharine, over on Charbella Stitching has nominated me for a Leibster Award. The rules are pretty simple and I'm going to give that its very own post as I haven't finished picking out the 5 blogs I want to share it with, there are so many good ones. Thank you so much Sharine. I fell really blessed to have such wonderful stitching friends.

Now, I don't know how to do a one of those things where you can vote. I guess I need to figure that out when I'm off work for the holiday, but if you'd like to, feel free to tell me which you think I should try to kit up next. Mini Cheshire Cat above, or Mini The Black, below?

It will be a bit of fun to see what everyone chooses!

Well, Happy Thanksgiving Stitching everyone. I know I'll be stitching on QS Dragon Soul so that I can be that much closer to starting my next black and white.

A Difficult Week, and stitching

Last week was definitely one I will always remember.
On Tuesday I was nearly mugged or something in a local parking lot. I was able to run and lock myself in my car and security appeared like magic just as I did and the guy ran away. Pretty upsetting I can tell you.

On Friday morning I was called into my office and got my lay-off notice along with a lot of others. I will be ending employment at the end of December. I found out today another local hospital laid-off 200 people Friday. It is happening at all the hospitals from what people are telling me, apparently actions that have been planned for months and put into effect based on the presidential election. At any rate, finding something else in system or in the medical field isn't looking too good in my city right now. I confess I am more than a little worried about finding any other job right now.

On to stitching.
I confess I missed a night or two this week. I was feeling pretty traumatized after the parking lot incident and well, life gets busy sometimes.

I did get a bit done though. I stitched on some ornaments and on those little Bucilla kits like they sell at Walmart and such for 97 cents.

Here is the one I took a pic of.

My camera seems to have trouble picking up small objects. I also left some of the greenery off of this one as it looked better without it. I'm glad I decided to pull these out as a little instant gratification was in order. Still have one or two but I don't know when I'll do those. Also, those little plastic frames are fussy. Don't like those. Lots of floss included though.

The only other thing I really worked on this week was Mini Soul Mates. I was able to finish the row and I'm looking forward to the next one. Wings!  lol.
Note to the person who asked me if Mini's have a lot less confetti.  No, they have just as much as any other HAED so far as I can tell. Just compacted down.

Mini Soul Mates:

And that is pretty much it for last week. I did have a panicky moment or two wondering if I'd made a mistake joining the 2013 HAED SAL last week but I've settled down since. I 'think' I have fabric that will do and I will borrow floss from other projects and pick up a few skeins before I run out of cash completely, and I will stitch what I can as I can. I'm looking forward to it actually. I love the tigers and I know I'll enjoy stitching that chart.

That's all for now folks.
Happy Stitching to you all through out the coming week.

Just stitching. And yay, more than 20 followers!

Work and home, work and home. Not doing much else, finally recovering and back to my slow but steady stitching routine when I can. I'm looking forward to the Holidays. I thought I would update a with a few pics. I haven't been working to rotation while I've been feeling so ill.

I've done a little on Mini Eternal Promise. It got two days in Oct. and so far only 2 days in Nov. so there isn't much to show and I didn't take another picture yet.

Here is Mini Soul Mates. I'm still enjoying stitching this one and it is the piece my DH likes best at the moment and I am making sure to give it time each week so it will be ready in a year or so for his man cave, should it ever get made.

The loss of detail is surely noticeable but not as bad as I'd feared and so far I am encouraged to continue as I am really enjoying it. What I've seen of other mini's has been really encouraging, for those who have asked. I've seen some good work on them on Facebook and I'm looking forward to seeing more of these finished so we can have some viable comparisons.


I'm hoping to finish QS Dragon Soul sometime in the next 2-3 months so it is rotating in more frequently.  Here is the latest update pic.

So in my slow and steady way I am making progress and I'm happy with the results. Sometimes I do envy those who stitch faster, or who can stitch for several hours a day. I wouldn't be able to stitch for long periods anyway with the pain, so it works out, but sometimes I'm still envious. lol.

I can't really begin kitting up the next thing yet because A. I can't spend the money right now, and B. I have no idea what the next thing is going to be. There are too many choices. Also, there is that HAED BB SAL to be thought about. Really looking forward to see what the charts are this year, and then I can decide if I want to take part. I barely managed to resist last year. They do have a tendency to give a good choice of charts.

Happy Stitching this week while we are all preparing to get ready for the Holidays.

Slightly weird but sweet or Christmas in November

So last week we found out we would have to do some repairs on our house asap got a new crack in our foundation from a little quake, found out there was no way we could afford health insurance for both of us at the new rate, had a few other things come up, and just generally got overwhelmed.
Yesterday, after trying repeatedly to juggle the budget and realizing we just can't get that many balls in the air I sat down to relax by looking at stitchy stuff on the comp.

I was intent on narrowing my wishlist back down to 10 charts as I was feeling embarrassed by having 2 pages on there when DH came up and asked what I was doing. We chatted for a bit about various things while I was doing that, about not having money for Christmas presents this year, about working on the house, about how I was so lucky to have been given a gift certificate to finish kitting mini Eternal Promise. About how we only had about 20 dollars we could spend in the next few months. DH said I should order a chart as a Christmas gift to myself, since it would be about all we could afford.

Long story short I let myself get talked into it, since the charts were half price. But I asked him to pick the chart so it would be more like present. (Yes, we both know I have plenty of stitching and don't need another chart. You sort of had to be there.)

Anyway, he picked 2 from my wishlist and we blew our little bit of money. DH picked these.

Gothic Cross.

And Woodland Guardian:

I'm a little suspicious of Woodland Guardian since he has always love that chart. lol

Things are tough all over, and this bit of silliness was unexpected and, well, silly. But I think we both needed something frivolous just now. And sweet. Sometimes he does something that reminds me of why I fell for him in the first place.

So there you have my Christmas in November. I can't think of any gift that he could come up with that would touch my heart more, all things considered.

Love you babe.

A quick floss and assorted junk post

I can't believe it but my order from 123 stitch was in my mailbox this evening! I e-mailed them on Wed. morning. Got a confirmation, then a notice that they had sent the order on Thursday. I was expecting it would arrive next Tues. or Wed. so I was thrilled that it was here on Sat. I can't thank Stitching Sister enough. Some people are so kind and seem to know just when to pass that kindness along to others.
On the same subject, this was my first time ordering from 123 Stitch and I was very pleased with their service.
Quite a few people have bought the mini Eternal Promise so I'm in good company and can't wait to see others stitching it up.
It's been a badly stressful week, ending with yet another flare-up, but I am still able to stitch a little so it is all good. A few hours of work tomorrow and hopefully some stitching after that.
My eyes are a little better, but I've cheated a few times and gone on the net away from work. Still, the headache is gone most of the time so I guess I will have to permanently cut back on my web and net stuff. More reading and stitching time. I'm usually in bed by now but my hours are all off from broken sleeping and will try again soon.

Happy Weekend  Stitching everyone.