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Sunday, September 22, 2013

February Dreaming

Hello everyone, hope your Sunday has been good so far! I'm experiencing major "fall envy" with all of you who are sharing your season changes and autumnal stitching projects.  September is always the worst down here.  I know that everyone living anywhere north of the Georgia-Florida state line is getting out their sweaters, building fires in their fireplaces and noticing a crisp change in the air.  At my house though, the ground feels spongy, we have thunderstorms every afternoon and the air conditioning never stops running,  Have to keep reminding myself that February will be glorious, but that seems like such a far time off now....

Anyway, I do have a little more progress to share on Ann Grimshaw, which I've focused on almost exclusively since my last posting.  Here she is:


Believe it or not, Anne is only about half finished, and I've already gone through more than two skeins of the Finnegan's Fog.  I do still have quite a bit of the darker dye lot on hand, but the lighter one is getting smaller and smaller.


I noticed on the Needle in a Haystack website that when purchasing more than one skein of the same silk you can check whether or not you'd like them both from the same dye lot. My first impulse was  of course I'd want them that way.  But then I starting thinking what a happy coincidence it was that the first three weren't all the same.  Maybe I'll take my chances again and just see what they send?


Anyway, I'm looking forward to picking up the pace for the missing motifs that will finish the current row.  After it's done I can move into the many alphabets underneath them.  It may just be me, but it feels as though them might move a little faster than the stuff on top has.

 
 I don't know about the rest of you, but I'm counting the minutes until tonight's episode of Breaking Bad.  Halley has been watching the show faithfully since it first premiered, but Jim and I have only been mesmerized by it since we signed on for Netflix a few months ago.  All summer long we've been trying to catch up and living from one episode to the next.  It's really cut into my stitching time, because the show is so compelling I can't just stitch and listen, I have to focus on it completely.  Her's a clip of one of my favoorite scenes. 



So on that note, I'll say "Adios, Heisenberg!"

Monday, September 2, 2013

....and I Really Should Be Back at School

Hello everyone, and welcome to September!  It seems all week the words of that old Rod Stewart song "Maggie May" have been floating in and out of my head, though I really can't keep many of them straight.  Still though, that part about "I suppose I should collect my books and head on back to school"  seems to suit my stitching as well.  After lolling the summer away on my Hemingway version of"Once Upon an Island, I've gathered my thoughts and returned to my school girls, namely Ann Grimshaw and Frances Eden  Here's a report on Ann:


She's not so very different from the previous time I posted about her, though I'm excited to see the last motif in the 3rd row coming up very soon.  One more row of big motifs and I'll be on to the alphabets! 


  Ann is such a big girl that I keep her tightly scrolled on the rods most of the time and don't often take a look at her from the top down.  It was great fun to unwind her this morning for photos and see how nicely the two different skeins of Finnegan's Fog were contrasting with each other.  It was also fun to stitch the eyelet M.

My other schoolgirl is Frances Eden, who's also been a very pleasant traveling companion over the summer..


Again, she's not a great deal different than the last time I posted a pic of her, though the lettering of the verse to this point was added during my week in Little Rock.  So far, Frances has been such easy straightforward stitching that I know I could get her finished fairly soon if I could just show her a little love.  Why is it the finicky, high-strung , high maintenance pieces are always the ones that draw all my attention?  Speaking of which, as I was serenely plucking along on Frances, this little she-devil crossed my mind and I had to at least have a flirtation with her.


This is Hands to Work, one of Tricia Nguyen's exquisite little pieces.  Yes, it's 40 count, and yes, it's over one...am I crazy?


Part of the thrill is how perfectly the silk fabric I found suits the stitching.  But still, I don't feel very certainly that I'll have enough eyesight, much less sanity, to get it done.

So that's how things are looking for me as of Labor Day.  I've loved seeing every one's thoughts shift to autumn on their blogs and in their stitching!  If you blink your eyes it will be Christmas.  Thanks as always for stopping!