Happy Thanksgiving!

To those of you who are celebrating today ~ Happy Thanksgiving!!!

Getting There...

I think I'm about 45 hours into 'Mother's Tree' now... I sort of lost count. I've been really sick for the last two weeks, which distracted me from my note-taking and also slowed me down.

The tree is now too big to completely fit on my scanner - and for some reason, my scanner is back to turning things green. I ought to buy a new one... hmm... Christmas is coming up though, isn't it? :D

Here's how it looks now - hopefully I'll still manage finishing the tree by the end of November!

Half a Tree

At 35 hours, I am halfway done with my tree:

Yay! The greens are beautiful in real life, and the letters are more visible. I love it - even if I am on my third skein of 934 XD
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Also, I bought this at a yard sale, thinking I would finish it and have a quick Christmas gift - but when I got it home and looked at it better, all the stitches are crossed in the opposite direction that I cross them. The top legs on this one go this way: / When I cross mine this way last: \

Since it would drive me crazy to finish it like that, I am giving it away. If you're in the US and want it, just send me your address. Another country, you can have it for postage. It has the fabric, needle, pattern and hoop, but there was no floss with it. It's an old EMS freebie. First to ask for it gets it.

October Goals/November Goals

Here's the goals I had for October:

1. 30 hours or half the tree on Mother's Tree - done! see scan below!

2. Finish 'Though Far Apart' - done!

3. One motif on Mary Wigham - done!

4. 100 stitches on a UFO - done! (no scan yet, I finished the pink on my third Wise Man, but I left the kit in my car XD )

5. Finish a crocheted gift (a shawl for Mum or Dad's hats) - not done I didn't like the way the shawl was looking so I pulled it out and started my nephew's afghan. It's nearly done, though!

November Goals

1. Finish the tree on Mother's Tree

2. Finish Jaden's afghan

3. Restart and possibly finish Mum's shawl

4. 100 stitches on a UFO

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5. 1 motif on Mary Wigham if I have the time.

Here's 30 hours on 'Mother's Tree' - it nearly got half the tree done; I'm quite happy with the progress. The line down the middle is the halfway point; I did a little on the right side and would have finished the left side in a few more hours (and gotten to the other colors of green). I can't wait for that!!!

What's Your Oldest WIP?

I don't know who started this meme, but I thought I'd see what I could dig up:

What's your oldest stitching work-in-progress? How many years has it been since you worked on it? How close is it to being finished? Do you think you'll ever finish it? What are some other old WIPs/UFOs that you have? Show pictures if possible!

Here's my oldest UFO:



It's called 'Our Daily Bread' and I paid a dollar for the whole kit back in... 1993, I think. This is all that was ever done. I don't have a picture of what it's supposed to look like - I don't even know for sure if I still have the chart, although I do have the fabric and floss. I'd like to finish it someday, but only if the chart is still around. It's no longer to my taste - it wasn't really to my taste when I bought it, but I had just learned to stitch and all I could find were cheap little kits.
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These two are my second oldest - they're both UFOs right now but I'd like to get at least one of them back in progress in 2010.
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'The Wave' by Dimensions:




I bought this one in 2001 I think. Could have been '02. I started cross stitching again in '01 so I think it was that year, but I started in November so who knows?! I would have it about 1/4 done if all the stitching I've done on it had been allowed to stay in, but I've pulled it all out twice and finally restarted it on a new piece of fabric. It currently looks like this:

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Amazing, huh? :D I definitely plan to finish this one. I want to get Fred done first, though.
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This is my other old UFO - 'Cluttered Country' by Jeremiah Junction. I bought this one and The Wave around the same time, so I can't actually remember which is older. I didn't keep notes on my stitching at the time. This one was supposed to be for my Mum.


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It currently looks almost like this:

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I remember that I stopped working on it when she changed her decor, but I had gotten a wee bit further than this. I think I finished the shelf and the basket. I can't quite remember. She's changed back to country stuff now - I plan to dig this one out and finish it soon. It's a surprisingly easy stitch.
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These are not - in any way! - the only UFOs that I have. Just the oldest. I'm afraid to count up how many things I actually have in-progress.
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In othere stitchy-news, I'm almost done with my nephew's Spiderman afghan, and I'm up to 28 hours on 'Mother's Tree'. I haven't scanned it though, since it sadly doesn't look that much different.

I Have No Bananas Today

But I do have a finish!

'Though Far Apart' from Just Cross Stitch Jan/Feb '09 (boy, was I off with my last guess!)

Fabric - 14ct blue

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Sorry about the picture quality; my computer has issues, which means my scanner has issues, which means the crappy camera was used. It washed out all the ecru. Those blank spots in the borders? Filled with ecru, and looks nice against the actually much darker blue fabric.

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This is my brother's Christmas present - and I showed it to my parents, and both of them said, 'Don't you think that's a bit feminine for him?'

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I thought that over. We grew up extremely rural - even when we moved, it was to somewhere else rural - and over half our schooling was done at home. So he was my buddy. My first steps were taken in order to follow him down the hall. When we played, Barbie married Optimus Prime (that's brotherly love for ya!) He may be a big, 6'5", 300+ lb tower of muscle, but - Y'know what, I don't care. I miss him, he was my best bud growing up, I had to frog the thing (if you stitch it, watch that top border. One of those colors only takes 4 stitches, not 5 like the rest) He's secretly a sentimental sap just like me, even if he does hide it by loving gory action films and football.

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He's getting the feminine cross stitch.

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I did, however, leave the really cute checkered heart button off. That would have been pushing it.

The Booger is Scanned ^__^

Here is the Booger (aka Mother's Tree - well, it's, um, green and oddly shaped? and mildly annoying; that's a lot of green!) So ever since my last post, I've been calling it the Booger. I'm such a twit :D

Here it is at 21 or 22 hours - I can't remember.

Only 8 hours to go to reach my October goal! Yay!

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'Though Far Apart' is almost done, so I'm waiting for the finish to scan or photograph it. Hopefully soon!

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I decided I'd lay out my HAED patterns to get an idea of how I'd stitch them - I may have bitten off more than I can chew:

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I find this mildly intimidating 8I

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'Poet' is not quite as scary, until I thought about all the color changes:

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Since I won't be starting them until December or January, I refuse to worry about it!

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On the crochet side of my life, I have to make four big shawls for Christmas - the pattern was a super easy one in the last issue of 'Crochet World'. My sis bought it for me; if I had been at the store, I could have just looked at the pic - that's how easy they are. Just a bit boring, since they are half a granny square. This is the first one, about halfway done:

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It does get pretty cold here (it's 43 degrees tonight, and feels colder) so the fact that these shawls are nearly ankle-length is going to be quite popular! One of them will be for my sister-in-law in Georgia; her's will only be a little past waist length.

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Happy stitching!