Mystery XI Part 4 Chapter 1

Sounds like a mystery novel doesn't it. I started part 4 of Chatelaine's MXI yesterday. It has a lot of backstitching and french knots, but it looks really nice. I still need to finish the beads and then I'll move onto the next quarter. I find it easier as it gets larger to work in quarters.

Here's a closeup of the french knots.

FoS Page 2

I finished page 2 of FoS today. When I'm stitching I don't actually see the picture, but when I step back I can see the mermaid and fish. It could be because I use a magnifier and I'm concentrating on one section at a time. I love how this is turning out and I'm surprised how fast it is going. My goal that I posted on the HAED Goal Challenge was to do 6 pages this year. I think I will be able to do that and maybe a little more. I would love to be able to finish this in one year, but I don't think that's realistic as there are 42 pages and I am stitching other projects. Maybe I can get halfway?

Finally Done!

I have finally finished part 3 of Mystery XI. This has been a lot of work but it is well worth it. Now that I have it done, I need to get my supplies ready for Mini Mystery I. I'm also going to work on FoS from HAED tomorrow.
I bought 3 more HAEDs during their sale this past weekend. I bought Stephanie Pui-Mun Law's The Fool and The Magician from her Tarot series and Wall's Presence of Gaia. I'll probably start The Fool next. Like I don't have enough already going!

Jan

Half Way There

I finally finished half of part 3! This is a monster to stitch, but it looks so great when I get parts done. It is so sparkely. Of course part 4 will probably be posted by the time I finish the rest of part 3. The weird thing is I had a dream about this piece last night. I dreamed that I got this far and realized that my material wasn't large enough. I woke up a 4:44 am and almost went out to check on it! I waited until the morning though. It's fine, but I was freaking out over a dream. Now that is a stitching obsession.

HAED March SAL

This is how FoS looks after the SAL this weekend. I put almost 4000 stitches in. I can't believe how fast I can stitch on this. Why can't I stitch that fast on other pieces? I'm going back to Chatelaine's Mystery XI tomorrow. Hopefully I can make some headway on it. I had trouble getting started on part 3. Needed some motivation. I also need to sneak in the needle roll that Michelle sent me. She was really nice to pass it on to me.

Sears delivered my new washer today. Woohoo! Now I can wash clothes again. Isn't it sad when getting an appliance is exciting?

I went for a job interview last Monday; haven't heard anything, but I know it takes a while for reference checks. I'm not holding my breath. It would be nice though.

More Mystery XI

I finally got some stitching done on this today. I did nothing on it yesterday. Sam and I went to the garden center to get birdseed and looked at some plants on Sunday so no stitching done then. There is a lot of counting on this. I've counted over eighty stitches in one row. Sam looked at it on Saturday and declared it one of the prettiest I've ever done. He wants to hang it in the bedroom when I finish it. He's shown interest before but never as much as on this one. It's a lot of work, but Martina's designed a masterpiece here. Now all I need to do is dye the fabric for St. Petersburg, buy all the fibers, etc, etc. Oh, and Martina posted a pic of the new piece coming out this summer, the Harem. Too many pieces to stitch! I'll never stitch them all. But as my friend March used to say "there's patterns for stitching and patterns for collecting". That's me, I'm a collector.

Jan

Mystery XI

I worked on part 3 of Chatelaine's Mystery XI today, but not as much as I wanted. I woke up with a killer headache that didn't go away until the afternoon. I also took forever to get it on the scroll rods. I usually work on QSnaps, but this is too big for that. There has been an NCIS marathon on today, so when I wasn't vegging because of the brain, I was stitching and watching my favorite show. I am a big Tony fan. Hopefully I'll get to stitch some more tomorrow.

Now onto Gray's new favorite toy. It is a shopping bag with some quilt batting on it. I learned long ago not to spend money on cat toys. The best ones are the ones they find on their own.


Jan