Speaking of finals… The good news is that I am now done with this semester’s creative writing class and I am taking some vacation next week… just in time for my birthday! The not-so-good news is that I start my intensive summer classes in about three weeks and, as a result, don’t anticipate I will get to stitch much until August. I guess I better stitch as much as I can while I have a chance!

Speaking of stitching… tell me what a putz I am. Today I got an email from my mom asking if I would stitch a wedding sampler for my stepdad’s stepgrandson (I’m pretty sure that means we aren’t related) who is getting married June 20 and I said yes!

Of course, I used this as an excuse to go stash shopping (Yeah, yeah, who needs an excuse, right?) and will soon be enhancing my stash with Bent Creek’s “Wedding Globe” (for the wedding), Nora Corbett’s “Lily of the Valley Pixie” (or is she a fairy?), Little House Needleworks’ “School Girl Lessons,” and some assorted WDW and Kreinik.

And now that my final is turned in and all five of my readers have been indulged with some stitchy progress, I am off to stitch and watch Season 2 of 24. Cheerio!

Of the 13 Halloween ornaments, there are 6 that I would like to stitch, and 3 that I must stitch. In fact, since this weekend is SAT weekend, I think I am going to do start one of those must stitches. (Probably “Pumpkin on Gingham” from the Sweetheart Tree)

As you may have noticed, I also have a finish to share: Bent Creek’s “Cat-o-Lantern.” It is stitched on 32 count Natural Belfast. This isn’t from the JCS Halloween issue, rather it is one of the pieces that I ordered the overdyes for a couple of weeks ago.

Speaking of overdyes… Once they got here I decided I didn’t like the main color for the pumpkin (WDW Harvest… very brown) so I switched it for a different color that also came with the order (WDW Carrot). I also switched the stripes from GAST Brandy to GAST Butternut Squash because GAST Brandy blended in too much with WDW Carrot.

Anyway, I like the way the pumpkin turned out in Carrot (as far as I know, pumpkins are supposed to be orange, not brown ), but now I wonder which pattern I ordered the Carrot for and whether or not I will have enough left when I get there.

P.S. Click here for another cat-o-lantern.

Ta Da! Here is “Kitty Cat Row” all finished! I finished it late Monday night, but wanted to wait until I had washed and ironed it to post the happy dance picture.

In case you were wondering, I made a couple of minor changes near the end: First I altered the last two kitties’ collars from bark to brethren blue (2nd to last kitty) and mulberry (last kitty). I did this for no other reason than I thought they looked cuter with more colorful collars than with dull greenish-brown ones. I also changed the last kitty to oatmeal instead of onyx because I already had an onyx kitty and thought an oatmeal one would look nice with the mulberry collar that I had planned.

Though this is not the first project I have stitched with overdyed floss, it is the first “large” one and I think I can now say that overdyed floss does have its charm if you can use enough of it to actually see the color variations.

And now, because it is Wednesday, it is time for the SBQ! This week’s question was once again suggested by Nancy and is:

Do you do anything special to your threads before putting them through your fabric to make them more manageable?

In a word, NOPE!

Every time I went to the quilt shop with my mom last year I would look at “Thread Heaven” and wonder if I should try some though…

As you can see, I worked some more on “Kitty Cat Row” today. I think it is safe to say that next time I post a picture of this piece it will be a happy dance.

In other stitchy news, I also worked on Outi’s belated birthday exchange piece today. I have now restitched everything I had to frog and made a little more progress to boot. Hopefully the rest of the piece will stitch up without any drama. I think I could very well finish this by Christmas but I will probably wait until after the first of the year to send it off to Finland nevertheless so the chances that it gets lost in the mail will be minimized. I hope you don’t mind waiting a wee bit longer Outi!

And finally, I wanted to mention that Bea’s robin made its way back to her in Spain this past week! She was part of The Robin’s Nest round robin that I organized almost a year a half ago that fell apart due to a number of bad circumstances. Three of the original participants of this robin stitched squares for Bea and the fourth was done by Dawn.

Dawn kindly offered to be a substitute stitcher if I needed one, so I took her up on the offer. She did a great job choosing a pattern for Bea’s “cutie” theme and I could tell from the translation I did of Bea’s page that she was very happy to finally see her robin in person after all this time.

Thanks for helping us out Dawn! I really appreciate it.

Tonight I passed the half way point on “Kitty Cat Row.” I am enjoying stitching this so much. It is fun and easy, but will look spectacular when finished. What more can you ask for in a cross stitch pattern?

In the spirit of my ten hour rotation though (I have reached 11 hours on KCR), I should put it aside and work on something else next time I get a chance to stitch. The question is, am I ready to tackle Outi’s belated birthday present again?