May WIPocalypse Update

It seems I’ve missed the May WIPocalypse post, again. Better late than never, I suppose. The good news is, I have actually stitched this month.

 

Guardian got a bit of love, and the castle is finally complete. I have started to move on to the tail.

 

 

 

 

It always amazes me, when I work on a TW piece, the ability Theresa has on her colour blends. It makes working on these pieces such a joy.

 

 

 

In other news, I wanted to share a fantastic piece of stitchery from my wonderful friend, Jenna. I jumped in on a challenge to do five Pay it Forward pieces for 2012, and here’s what she sent me.

Isn’t it amazing?! This is stitched all over one. I absolutely love it!

And for those people who have signed up for a PIF piece from me, I do have a couple done, waiting to be mailed out. It’s coming, I promise!

February WIPocalypse update

I know – I’m a terribad blogger so far this year. Sorry!

As I was catching up with my blog roll (and ultimately deleting a LOT of blogs from my reading list – no way I can keep up) I realized I missed the WIPocalypse date despite the reminder e-mail. Derp.

Needless to say I haven’t done much stitching. I’m finding my sons activities (ie climbing up onto tables, chairs, anything higher than he is, really) are really impeding my stitching abilities. I just can’t sit for a while and get a groove going. It’s not like yarn crafting where I can put something down and pick up to do a few stitches or even walk around with it while I’m working (which I totally do).

That being said, a bit of progress has been made this month. Here’s the Guardian now:

 

The date of this photo is January 18th, which means it has been nearly a month since I picked up a needle. Yikes!

I have been crocheting and knitting, however, so let me share a few finishes with you.

 

 

I’ve been stash busting a few baby hats… (pattern can be found here).

 

 

 

Doing a bit of amigurumi for Nerd Wars (sheep pattern can be found here).

 

 

 

Hot dog pattern can be found here.

 

And finally I’ve been knitting of socks. Yesterday while folding my hand knit socks I declared how happy it made me. And it really does make me happy to wear my own stuff.

 

Those are my finishes since my last post, and I think that’s enough. ;p

Until next time!

WIPocalypse Check In – January

Today is January 9, the date of the first full moon of the year. And so we check in with the WIPocalypse standings so far.

I’ve spent all my stitching time on The Guardian, as I knew I would. I am so loving this project.  Here’s my progress at the start of the year:

 

 

 

I had some of the castle done and decided it would be best to continue working on that then down that page so that I could get that section done and back on to the dragon.

 

 

I am now completed with the castle, and am working on the landscape on each side so that I can backstitch that part and move on to his tail.

 

 

 

I’m curious if, at my current stitching rate, I could look at a January finish? How cool would that be?

 

 

 

 

—xxx—

What am I working on?

Current knitting love: Socks!
Current crochet love: Granny Hexes
Current stitching love: The Guardian 

A word

A word, about thousands.

I have added, as you may have noticed, the WIPocalypse blogroll to my sidebar. This is a listing of all the blogs participating in the WIPocalypse. I’ve further added them to my feed reader with the well-intentioned goal of reading them all. Unfortunately, after digging through them all for about a week now, I still have over 1000 unread posts in my reader.

That’s a lot of reading, and I likely won’t get through it any time soon. I admit, those that just come up with a title in the reader without the actual post allowed I don’t click through to read. I’m sorry, that’s just too many for me to follow.

I’ve included the listing for any of my readers who are interested in checking out what my companions in this project are doing. Perhaps you’ll find one or two (or hey, all 350+) that you may enjoy and wish to follow further. I know I’ve found several already.

 

The obligatory New Year Post

I’m only five days late, so that’s better than I’ve done in past years, at least. I’ve been going over my goals for the year throughout other posts anyway, so you guys mostly know where I’m going with this.

If you’ve read my blog at all, you know I’m horrible at resolutions. So instead this year I’m stealing inspiration from the Knitmore Girls and working with a theme. In honor of the world ending this year, my theme is “completion”. I’m working on finishing things this year, be it in stitching/yarn crafting, organizing my home, etc. We have all manner of boxes that we haven’t unpacked or sorted through in our basement and garage; considering we’ve been living in at our current address for nearly two years (and some of those boxes are still packed from previous moves) it’s time to get rid of stuff and create space. We hope to have a crafting area in our basement (and space for my sewing machine! More on that in a minute), and I want a gardening/planting table in the garage. So we need to start organizing. An impromptu sock hunt yesterday lead to not only my girls cleaning out their bedrooms and getting rid of two giant bags of clothes that no longer fit, but my husband started on the basement and found several empty boxes we’ve been carting around and some plastic tubs that were easily condensed for space. So we are off to a great start.

Secondly I’m adding a crafting theme. This year, since I’m participating in the WIPocalypse, I’ll be focusing on cross stitching and hopefully knocking some big finishes out. (I plan on making 2013 my quilting year – hence a permanent place for my sewing machine!) I’ll still be knitting and crocheting, in fact I’m already making plans for the next installment of Nerd Wars (sign ups start January 15 if you are interested!). I will not be making holiday gifts this year (at least, I don’t plan on it) so my knitting will be just for me. I don’t want to commit to anything, but it would be cool to knit at least one pair of socks for myself each month. Just putting that out there.

Image courtesy of easyknits.co.uk. Clicking on the image will bring you to this companies website.

Just as a quick knitting aside, my participation in Nerd Wars has paid off! I’ve one a skein of the yarn shown here. It’s a sock weight yarn called Luau from Easy Knits in the UK. Hopefully I can squeeze a pair of socks out of that lovely skein!

The before shot

But on to stitching. I have jumped in with both feet and started off with Guardian. This is such a fun piece and I’m currently working on the castle portion (aka the boring brown stuff).

Fortunately it is stitching up quickly, despite the colour changes and confetti stitches Teresa Wentzler is famous for. I hope to make enough progress today to get the backstitching on the castle done and I can then move on to his tail.

The after shot, January 3rd 2012.

And guys? I have an ort jar for the first time in over a year.

It’s the WIPocalypse!

I’m finally getting off my hiney and figuring out my project list for the WIPocalypse challenge. If you pay attention to my side bar (and I wouldn’t blame you if you don’t – I certainly forget about it all the time!), you’ll see only three works in progress. Yep, that’s all I have.

A warning – there’s a lot of Teresa Wentzler in here. What can I say? She suits my style!

Let me show you! (Click on the thumbnails for full size images)

Woodland Faerie, by Teresa Wentzler. Just taking her out of storage got my fingers itching. I honestly don’t think it will be a problem to finish this one up in 2012. Expect it to be one of my first finishes.

 

 

 

 

 

Always, by Enchanting Lair - This one is going to be my arm twisting project. I don’t something about this project and can’t really pinpoint it. I think it may have something to do with the confetti stitching but honestly it isn’t that horrible. I do know the fabric isn’t my favourite, but beyond that, it’s just … something.

 

 

 

 

The Guardian, by Teresa Wentzler – Another one I’m enjoying, though I’ve reached a bit of the boring parts so hopefully this challenge gives me the oomph I need to get going.

 

 

 

 

I’m also encouraging my daughter to finish up a WIP she started a few years ago:

I just realized I shot that with the project sideways. Sorry bout that!

 

 

So I have gone through all my stitching and here’s what I’ve decided. I will be adding projects not yet started to my list, jumping in on the guilt-free January thing and start a bunch. I have two definite starts and a list of maybes:

Emerald Mermaid, by Mirabilia – this is a definite start for me. I even have two fabric choices to decide on (shown below). I’m going to hold off choosing until I actually do a floss toss but I’m leaning towards the blue since I don’t want these beautiful greens to fade out.

 

 

 

 

My other definite is Celestial Dragon by Teresa Wentzler. This design is charted in the fantastic blues and greens Teresa favours, but I would love to do this design in reds. So I’ll have to find someone who has done it or work it out myself (I prefer the former).

Runners up (and I would love input from you guys on this – tell me your favourites!):

Fantasy Sampler, by Teresa Wentzler
Millennium, by Teresa Wentzler (I’m looking for a different saying to chart in there, we’ll see)
Rapunzel, by Teresa Wentzler
The Castle Sampler, by Teresa Wentzler
Earthdancer, by Butternut Road
Firefly Fairies, by Lavender & Lace
Spring Fairy Spirit, by Passione Ricamo
Celtic Banner, by Butternut Road

The final thing I will be working on as part of the WIPocalypse is my finishing. As I was going through my stash, I was amazed at how many projects are finished the stitching but aren’t turned into ornaments/framed/etc. I’ll add those to my list as I go.

All of this will be posted to it’s own WIPocalypse page on my blog here, so we can all refer to it as I go. I’ll also be linking to a blog roll of other stitchers participating so we can all cheer each other on.