Incoherent Scribblings

Last week I went to Las Vegas for Christmas vacation and while I was there I met Juls for her Wednesday morning stitching group. However, before I could sit down with all the lovely ladies and stitch the day away, I had to get some S.E.X.!

As a little Christmas present to myself I bought some Cresent Colours (no specific colors, just ones that I thought were pretty), “Celtic Summer,” by Marilyn Levitt-Imblum, “The Nutcracker” by Country Cottage Kids, and the letter “R,” and “Portrait of Lauren in Blue” by Nora Corbett. I also bought a swatch of pink hand-dyed fabric and 805 of the Magenta range in Needlepoint Silks.

I bought the pink fabby and the silks for “Austrian I” by Bleu de Chine from the latest JCS and started that while I was at the stitching group. All of the ladies were very friendly to me and I got to see some great projects! Juls brought some of her stitching to show me and I got to see her “Quaker Christmas” in person. All I could think while seeing her things was how much more impressive projects always are in real life…

But as much as I like “Austrian I,” I totally fell in love with “Portrait of Lauren in Blue” and just couldn’t resist starting her yesterday. I guess I was craving a Nora Corbett design because I think that I am enjoying this project entirely too much! And the best part about Lauren? She is about half to one-third the size of a “regular” Mirabilia!

I still have the rest of this week off so I plan on stitching as much as I can and who knows? I may have one last happy dance before the end of the decade!

Once upon a time I used to blog and I used to stitch. And sometimes I would even do both! Like tonight!

Yes, you read right: I’ve been stitching!

I am working on a Country Cottage Needlework piece called “Summer Retreats.” It has three houses and I have chosen to stitch the one called “Butterfly Bungalow.” It’s slow going… I started it last month for Pete’s sake! Normally a piece like this wouldn’t take so long, but in addition to the interference called my life, I’ve had a couple of pretty severe encounters with the frog, and I haven’t been 100% happy with the fabric. Oh, I like the color (it’s 28 count Opalescent “Green Apple” Lugana from Silkweaver), but I don’t think the threads are very even for evenweave. I am pretty close to getting finished with it though. I hope it will be either my last or second-to-the-last piece of the year.

I also have a new small start on deck from the latest issue of Cross Stitch and Needlework called “Snow Pals.” It is a pretty simple design, but I am going to try and work on it in the car when I go on vacation later this month. I have never stitched in the car because I am usually driving when I go on a trip, but this trip I am mostly going to be a passenger, so we’ll see if I can stitch.

And finally, in case you were wondering, I haven’t worked on “Castle Sampler” since mid-October. I know I will eventually come back to it though. I love the piece, I just needed a break from it. Maybe I will take it to work on while lounging in the hotel or visiting while on vacation… Hmm… Now there’s a great idea!