August Gifted Gorgeousness

Hello, lovely people! I'm a little late, as usual, so sign up with Jo's Gifted Gorgeousness, the SAL dealing with all things gifted and giftee, so that's nothing new, but...I actually have some stitching to show! Gasp! Actual stitching, no knitting or crochet! And it hits multiple spots for this SAL too, so bam! 

Story time first. In just about three weeks, I will be attending my very first stitching retreat in Basel, Switzerland. There will be a small exchange, so I have to stitch and finish something...and that information came right in the middle of my stitching slump. Great timing! I pushed it off for a long time, but eventually went through my patterns and picked something out that just barely fulfilled the size requirements of the SAL. But at least I was stitching. I got about halfway through the design, then I started feeling bad because I took such an easy way out, so I went back to the drawing board, bought a new pattern (at least it was one I had been planning to get for a long time) and started stitching that. I'm actually loving it and I'm about 70% done, so I decided to 'log in', finish my first attempt and show it for this SAL, so now that it will be 'public' there will be no turning back! So, after all the dramatic introductions, what *did* I stitch?

Wear a Smile by Lizzie Kate! I won this chart in a giveaway from the lovely Tiffstitch back in 2017, vowing to stitch it 'soon'...so I guess soon is 6 years later! The fabric was a gift from my dear blogging friend Rachel, after I won a giveaway of hers. I guess I am a lucky girl, having such generous friends! So together with this originally being intended for an exchange, I think it triple-qualifies for this SAL!

August Fully Finished Gallery

Welcome to my (very late) entry to Rachel's Fully Finished Gallery finish-all-the-things SAL! Again, I am not only late posting, but just squeezed in a finished object on what is almost the last day of the check in period. My stitching bug had been missing for much of late July and early August, and while I am slowly getting back into it, not a lot has happened yet. Last week I sat down and stitched and finished the second of the Kogin buttons (I showed you the first one I did last month for this SAL).

This one is yellow thread on blue, and the pattern was a bit more complicated than the first one (although not by much). I like how both of them turned out, and that I finally got to stitch this kit I bought years ago!

Hopefully, next month will be a bit more productive and exciting again!

The People Chose: Fairies

I'm still so far behind with my blog reading and posting...my laptop is in the process of breaking down (the display is going and everything looks funky), and as I am still very much a laptop person and don't like doing everything, especially writing, on my phone or tablet, things are going slow! Still, I'm trying to get a little caught up, and one of the things I missed was the check-in for Jo's wonderfully versatile all purpose SAL! This month, the topic was Fairies.

Fairies, as you probably know, are quite a popular subject in cross stitch, with plenty of beautiful designs out there - plenty of beautiful designs in my stash, even - but to my great surprise, it seems I never stitched any! How can that be? I got witches and angels, mermaids and ghost, but no fairies! I will need to remedy that. So as inspiration to myself, here is one of my favourite fairy stitches, Dimension Gold's Fall Fairy. It's quite an intense design, but maybe one day...

A New Obsession - Delicate

As I might have hinted up, there is a new project I am kind of obsessed with...but it's totally not my fault! A friend on a discord server posted a free pattern for a knitted cardigan, a couple of us liked it...started joking about doing it as a KAL...started looking at yarn...started buying yarn...and then one Sunday morning, four of us sat in a video call and cast it on! It's the "Delicate" cardigan by Annamária Ötvös and for me, will be the first real fitted garment that I'm knitting. 

That first morning we were knitting together, we only made a tiny start on the 'Left back collar extension' and it took me a while to figure out that meant the part of the collar that will sit on the back of my neck. That part was then mirrored for the 'Right back collar extension' and then we had to cast on more stitches, do some shaping, and work down the upper back, to just below where the arms will be. That was where I finally ended up after about 13 hours of knitting:

Next up are the two fronts, casting on stitches from the shoulder and also working down to below the arm. It's exciting to see it all shape up, so it's hard to put it down right now! I'm also really happy about the yarn I'm using, it's from Holst Garne and I'm combining their "Tides' (merino and silk) with a one ply alpaca ("Titicaca") which is a really pretty combination of similar, but not the same colours, and so, so soft! I think you might see a lot more of this one soon...

An Old Obsession - Sekamelska Part 6

While I was working on the last rows of the Snuggle Up blanket, I had been thinking what crochet project I wanted to work on next. I got a couple ready to go, but also a couple of WIPs still, and ultimately decided on one of those - the Sekamelska shawl. This was a free CAL back in 2019, and I think that is when I talked about it last, as well!

To recall, this was a cooperative CAL by six designers, who each designed one part of the pattern mix shawl. Some of the patterns were quite complex, but very fun, and I eventually got stuck on part 6, which required me to make dozens of little trees that just didn't want to look quite right. Now, with a couple more years of experience (and lots of additional patience - I'm looking at you, part 12 of Snuggle Up!) I got back to them, and on one car ride to Felix' home village to attend a wedding, I sat down with those trees and finished the first repeat of the new pattern this weekend. Seems I broke the spell too, because over the next two weeks or so, I finished the second repeat as well, and that concluded part 6!

No technically, I only have the border left to do know, but since I had over 100g of yarn left over (there are three shades of purple in this, and I just barely started the first one!), I decided to repeat Part 1 (or at least some rows of it), to use up more of my yarn and also because Part 1 was just this tiny triangle at the start and really deserves to be brought back! So I will have to work on this for a little longer, but since I already figured Part 1 out ages ago, there shouldn't be any further snags. Unless I find something new to obsess over, of course...

July WIPocalypse

Welcome back to WIPocalypse - it is now August, which is hard to believe, because I really don't know where July went! This month was so busy (very fun, but busy), it really was over in a flash. Now I'm hoping for an August that is a a little quieter...but frankly, I don't see it yet!

After finishing Daisy mid-July, my stitchy bug has gone awol for a bit. So while I did make some nice progress knitting and crocheting (I have a couple posts lined up about that, but my blogging bug also seems to be missing), I did not meet my stitch goals on The Loneliness of Autumn or The Meadow Tablecloth. I did make some progress on both and am sure I'll catch up sooner or later, so that's alright. I always get back into it, eventually, so I'm not worried. So before I show you how much I *did* get done, the question of the month is Which are your favorite and least favorite fabrics to stitch on? and that's an easy one to answer - my absolute favourite is 32ct Murano. I don't have a *least* favourite per se, but I don't enjoy 14ct aida and anything bigger than that as much. I'll still use it though, it's all a question of the type of project you're making! On the question of linen - I don't mind it, but it's not usually my first choice if I pick out fabric myself.

So, what have we got in August? On TLoA, which I am SALin with Rachel (although I think we can barely call it a SAL anymore at this point, with either of us constantly being behind, but I still will!), I added most of the next colour, a rather boring 3860. I still have 252 stitches left to go, and then we move on to 523, which isn't all that much more exciting, but alright, it's going to get done anyways.

I added a total of just 697 stitches since my last post, so there wasn't much progress - 74.75% and 88800/118800 stitches done. Exactly 30k stitches left do do, which is still more than 15 *good* stitching months on this, and yet it feels so close!

July was also a one-a-day challenge on WIPocalypse, and while I managed more than the required 30 stitches on my chosen Meadow Tablecloth, I certainly didn't work on it every day. I finished the corner block on the third side, the single ladybug on the last side, and made a start on the snail. I wanted this to get finished, and it didn't, but looking at it, and how little there is still left to do, I'm still optimistic it will be a finish this year!

Last night, I had a small start that I need to get done for an exchange, and I hope that might revive my stitching bug a little. If it does, I'll aim to get caught up on the TLoA and finish the Meadow Tablecloth first, and then I got a page finish on Dark Forces calling my name, but we are getting ahead of ourselves...exchange first, and we'll see. In the meanwhile I'm making progress on some crochet projects, which is also nice, so I am not complaining!