Lady of the Thread Cross Stitch

Lady of the Thread is overdue for an update. I haven't taken a picture of her in nearly a year! This morning I finally finished the large green part of her skirt. It doesn't look very big in the photo, but when you're doing it one stitch at a time, it's gigantic!

The Pattern: "Lady of the Thread" by Lavender and Lace.
The Fabric: 28 ct black linen from my LNS
The Thread: DMC Floss
Date Started: 3-10-09

SAL Progress

I was really on a roll last night with my Lady of the Thread. I finished her head, and did a few of the spots where there are only two or three stitches in a color, then two or three in another color. After I finish the bodice of her dress, I'll work on the ribbon down the edge of her housecoat, then work on the coat itself.
I'm pondering leaving out the red rose..things... on either side of her. They don't make a lot of sense, and look a bit odd. The one seems to be sprouting out of her back, and the other seems to pop out from behind her stitching. Opinions, anyone? (If you can't see them, there's a better photo in this post.)

Stitches in Life

In the long interval since my last post, I have not done a lot of crafting. I've been babysitting, studying for Wednesday night Bible studies, went to Gardenscape with my Grandma, went to game night, planned my garden, narrowed down the varieties, ordered the seeds, prepared two new garden beds, cleaned up my 'bulb bed', oh, and joined a stitch-along.

The stitch-along is being held on Ravelry of all places. It started on the 16'th. We had our choice of two themes - a WIP or a box. I decided to work on Lady of the Thread. I spent the first three days ripping out, then stitching. By Friday night it was finally correct, and the lady had, err, has a partial neck. I accomplished nothing on Saturday due to spending the day outside gardening. Sunday I dealt with a headache, and worked on the study guide for Wednesday night Bible study. I managed a few stitches between 9:30 and 11, though. Today was gray and dreary. It seems to suck away all my energy; I spent two hours in front of my light box, was almost late to work, but made it through the afternoon. After dinner, I went upstairs, and worked on a topical Bible study. Now it's almost bed time, and my stitching is still in its bag. *sigh* There are still 4 more weeks to the SAL, so I'm hoping my pace will pick up soon.


Since I don't have any new project pictures right now, I'll leave you with this picture of my Bible,  concordance, and study books. The book on the left is from Reformation Heritage Books. Jasmine at Joyfully At Home blogged about these Journibibles back in February. The concept intrigued me, and I ordered three - Proverbs, John, and Romans. Something that has been exceedingly difficult throughout my life is daily Bible study; I'm always looking for new study material hoping that it will encourage me to study daily. As soon as I finish my current topical study, I will start on the Proverbs book. Since each chapter is broken down over a few pages, my goal is to complete at least one chapter a week.

Studying and Stitching,
Sarah

Lady of the Thread - Post-Olympic Picture

I meant to post this earlier this week, but lost my camera card/USB adapter in the recesses of my messy desk. The adapter has been located, and the pictures downloaded, so without further ado, pre- and post-Olympic pictures of Lady of the Thread.

I was unable to meet my goal of finishing her skirt, due to spending a weekend in Penn Yan for my Grandpa's funeral, and taking a couple days to knit a baby hat. I almost finished it at my craft night on Thursday. I did manage to finish it this evening. My next goal is to complete the remainder of her dress and put in her head and the mirror. One of these days I'll remember to put the project picture in my progress picture so you can see how little I've really gotten done how much progress I'm making.

Baby Hat

I took a 2-day break from my Olympic Cross Stitching to knit this little hat for my employer's newborn daughter. Doesn't my penguin make a great model?

The hat is from the 2009 Knitting Pattern-A-Day Calendar. The pattern date is April 1, 2009. I'm going to copy my Ravelry Notes here, rather than type them out again:
Things went pretty well until I got to the Herringbone stitch. It took a few minutes for me to figure out how to do it, and required a lot of concentration. I also wished that I had larger needles, as the stitch is very tight. Most of the other people who made this hat complained about it being too tight. I made the hat as instructed, and it is almost too tight for Meadow. (She was 3 days old when I gave it to her.) I would recommend doing the eyelet row an extra time before starting the herringbone stitch, and/or going up a needle size for the herringbone stitch.
At the end, I purled a row, then bound off in purl, as was suggested in one of the other projects.

Tonight will is the last night of the Olympics; I'm hoping to meet my cross stitch goal. Apparently I didn't mention it on here. My goal was to finish the blue and white part of the Lady's skirt. I've nearly finished, and have tentatively extended my goal to finishing all the blue/white parts of her dress by the end of the Olympics tonight.

LOTT Update

I feel like I have nothing to blog about. I haven't finished anything lately. I've thought about but avoided sewing and tatting. Sunday night was crochet night, but due to a migraine I stayed home. My knitting needles are empty. I finally decided (well, narrowed it down to 3 patterns) to use the yarn I bought on Etsy a couple of years ago. Since I was having a difficult time deciding between 3 patterns, I thought I should see if I had the needles for any of the projects. I don't have the right needles for any of them. So, until I decide on one of the three patterns, the yarn will be waiting in my yarn basket.

I did put a few stitches in Lady of the Thread last Thursday at the monthly craft night.

I'm planning to work on her (or my pillowcase) during the upcoming Olympics, since I'm sure we'll be watching quite a bit of them.

Various Projects

I've been writing this post in my head for several days, and figured it was about time to blog it.Warning: this is a picture-heavy post!



For starters, I'm planning on an Etsy update sometime this weekend. All my listings have expired, and I have some new items to list. These fan pulls will be among the new items.

My latest knitting project was this reuseable Swiffer cover. It's made with The Original Sugar & Cream yarn, the colorway was 'Potpourri'. The pattern is from Ravelry.







A couple of weeks ago in this post, I set a goal to finish the yellow rose and fabric in Lady of the Thread. I was able to finish the rose, and got the two bits of fabric connected, but not finished. In other cross stitch news, I finally took Ruth 1:16 to Hobby Lobby to be framed.

 

A while back I joined the Rochester, NY Crochet Group on Ravelry. I've been going to the bi-monthly meetings, and have progressed slightly on my Never Ending Granny Square Afghan. The afghan consists of 70 squares, and I'm doing one color at a time. There are 7 rounds to each square, and the white makes up the third and fourth rounds. After all the squares get sewn together, there are four border rows.
I  got the pattern from freepatterns.com and it appears to be copied from Crochet World Magazine Vol. 19, page 40.



I made two of these bookmarks for the Summer Missionaries that came to minister at our Church for the month of June. The pattern is one of my favorites for quick gifts. It's the Ribbon and Lace Bookmark from the Big Book of Tatting, page 14. My current tatting project(s) are the Facebook July TAL motif (the theme is Christmas in July), and finishing my second cross bookmark. The reason I have two is that I broke the thread on the first one and couldn't figure out how to fix it, so I started over. By the time I finished making the second one, I had figured out how to fix the first one.

I think that's everything I've been working on while I haven't been blogging. Hope you enjoyed the crafting gallery!
~Sarah

Lady of the Thread - Photo Update

My current progress on Lady of the Thread. I'm planning to get the fabric she's sewing on and the yellow rose done by Thursday, July 2.
~Sarah

Lady of the Thread Cross Stitch

This is my current large cross stitch. The design is by Lavender and Lace, and is called Lady of the Thread. I mentioned it briefly here. I am stitching it on 28 count black linen. For some reason I'm having more trouble with stitching over two than I have with my previous linen projects. My mini-goal for this week is to have the Ecru section at the bottom of the picture on the right finished by Thursday night craft night.
~Sarah

Buying Incentive

Mom and I visited the LNS and I bought some fabric for my next large cross stitch to help expedite my Ruth 1:16 cross stitch. See, the bonus (or downside, depending on your point of view) to having one large scroll frame is that you can only have one project at a time going. My Mom thinks I should just take one off and put the other on, but that's too much work. Besides, I'd never finish the current one if I did that. I have issues with DMC color 311, and that's the only color left. Let's just say I have some bad cross stitch experiences associated with the color.
Back to the fabric; yes, it's 28 count black linen. No, I'm not insane. I own three Lavender & Lace patterns. This is the only one on black fabric. I have a friend who just finished a project on black aida and nearly went cross-eyed. So, being younger than my friend, I figure that doing the black now while my eyes can cope is a good idea. And to really prove my sanity- I was originally going to get 36 count, but realized that I would only be able to work on it in front of my Mom's Ott-Lite. The design is Lady of the Thread - and guess what? It's got color 311 in it. It's only in three spots though, so I think I can handle it.

I also bought a chart that came with a pre-cut piece of linen. It didn't come with a photo, so here is a picture of my progress. Yes, I started it, and to help myself deal with the guilt of starting a new cross stitch without finishing one, I finished the Honey Teapot, sans backstitching. I'll post a picture after I finish the backstitching. I'm planning to do that after I finish the quilled picture for my friends.
~Sarah