WIP Wednesday #244

20190513_134524Morning! Our week has been pretty good – MIL is back home (on oxygen permanently) but is more able to participate in family life, is great with her friends and we had a lovely Mother’s Day dinner (I cooked, but I left the cleaning J). Ms Louise chose flowers for both of us & did a lovely, slightly unconventional, job of it.

20190510_081046Mase had Book Week and on Friday, dressed as Calvin and Tiggr “dressed” as Hobbes. Yep, we’re all about the classics in our house! On the redeeming front, Zac is chosing to read & study To Kill a Mockingbird.

On stitching, I finished the second part of the biscornu but haven’t FFO’d it (insert chicken noises here). I did start another Mirabilia – Mermaid of Atlantis – and am planning to use this for most of the #magicalstitches extra credit challenges for the Goblet of Fire May/June months. I started with #2, as the shell chandelier/light was approved as something that might be at a fancy ball AND it was the middle of the top; now I’m working on task #1 (500 on something that could be found in the lake) with the fish, and I’m about 70 stitches off completing that challenge (I need to take an update photo), and combined with task #10 (200 stitches on a piece that has something that lays eggs) I’m working on the border, on the theory that fish lay eggs. That’s not quite at the half-way mark. Like a lot of people, I’m very motivated at the start of a piece!

This week’s challenge is WIP list based again – and as I have less than 20 WIPS, I’m allocated to option 2, 350 stitches each on WIP #1 & #7. Seven is actually the biscornu, so I have approval to jump the line to #8, which just so happens to be Raven Queen. Progress shots next week!

WIP Wednesday #243

Morning! There’s not much progress this week, a bit of reverse stitching (does that sound better than frogging?) and a few days where I was too unsettled to stitch.

On Friday, instead of talking to the hospice nurse, my MIL was instead hospitalised. It’s been and up & down week, and I am trying to focus on the good.

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This week, I’m also doing the Ali Edwards Week in the Life project so it’s bittersweet that this may well be the last week she is in.

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Anyway, here’s my We’re All Mad Here progress. Here’s to a finish this coming week!20190502_103737.jpg

January WIPocalypse & OLW Thrive

Hello everyone! I hope you’re well. WIPocalypse is the monthly check-in SAL hosted by Measi on her blog, and via the Facebook group – we welcome all enablers! Click on the icon to the right to learn more.

My January goals were:

  • Finish Jardin Prive’s Eiffel Quaker COMPLETED
  • Mill Hill Golden Tannenbaum for my Small/Christmas All Year Round BOTH FFO
  • Hello There March (& FFO) not started
  • 341 stitches in Shakespeare’s Fairies for the HP SAL ACHIEVED

Additionally, I’ve got over a thousand other stitches in SF and at work, I’ve stitched two Genoa Santa’s (one for me, one for Lou), and started two of the Wales version. I’ve also touched one of my yearly goals and stitched on Fairy Idyll – one of the monthly HPSAL goals was 500 stitches in gold, so I’m used her dress. So far, there’s only 3 days this month I haven’t stitched, & I’m happy with that.

Late last year I asked Belinda (@aussiestitcher) if she wanted to part with her copy of Coffee Quaker (the one that says “first I drink the coffee, then I do the things”) and she sent me a huge haul. Three needleminders (great for holding up copies of charts on the frame), two pieces of Colour Cascade fabric, the chart and her thread remnants, some of which will be enough to complete the smaller portions on the chart! I’m spoilt.

February goals:

  • Bead & FFO Genoa Santa’s
  • Complete stitching on Wales Santa’s
  • Stitch & FFO Hello There March
  • Work on Fairy Idyll
  • Work on Shakespeare’s Fairies

Question: What SAL’s are you participating in this year?

After last year’s abysmal failure, I’m only doing two. One is the #ChristmasAllYearRoundSAL via my Instagram posts (if you don’t know, I’m Christmas mad) and the other is the #HarryPotterSAL via the Facebook group. I’ve completed a few challenges this year & I’m looking for ways to incorporate more WIPs into the rotations.

A LATE EDIT, JUST FOR STEPHANIE January Stitch From Stash has come out positive, despite the NZD-UK Pound exchange rate. Idyll cost quite a bit! And some fabric sales came thru the bank account last night, moving me from my already positive 59cents. LOL.

Jan-19
Budget $25.00
Fairy Idyll for Gail -46.76
Spotlight DMC*6 -11.40
Eiffel Quaker 21.25
Golden Tannenbaum *2 12.50
Fabric Sales (Lani) 70.00
Total Available Budget $70.59

As my One Little Word this year is THRIVE (and Simon has also adopted it when it comes to us as a couple, like he did with YES in 2018), we took advantage of a child & work free day and went to Hamilton on Monday. It was super hot very early on, so we didn’t spend much time in the sun but on the drive, I not only finished the stitching in Genoa but made a start to Wales. I enjoy these pieces when we’re driving. We ended up at the Gardens, a favourite place, and took in the new Katherine Mansfield garden. It’s based upon her short story, The Garden Party, and while I forgot to take shots of the tennis court area, the house had us going ah…

 

It’s just a 3-4M deep facade, but so much detail. In another year, when the garden is that much more established, it’s going to be beautiful.

And of course, in the entry piazza that leads to these extra garden “rooms”, there’s Alice & the White Rabbit:

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