Stocking Number 1 End of Week 1

Well, I have have been stitching whenever I have had a few minutes. Sometimes in big blocks of time. I sure have been enjoying the process of doing handwork. 

Here is my progress as of this morning January 29, 2020.

I am excited the house is done. Well, I do have to finish some windows. I also have to do a tree on each side and one in the arch. I am so glad this section has gone smoothly. 

Looking at the graph on the screen gave me an answer to a concern I had. See all that snow, I was concerned about keeping it clean until the stocking was finished. I could see by looking at the graph on the screen that the tree base in the arch is on top of the design below and that can be my jumping-off place to the bottom toe design and I can wait to do all the snow when most of the stitching is finished and the snow will stay clean. 

There are 4 charts, some of them have a lot of overlap areas. 

Yes, I still have a lot to do but I have made a good dent. 

Happy Stitching!!!

Stocking Number 1

I started with Nick's stocking because his fabric count was just one size bigger and I didn't want my old eyes to strain anymore then they were going to be. You know as a warm-up to this new task before them. 

In one evening I Fray Checked the edges so they won't unravel while I worked and I found the center of the fabric and loaded it on my frame. Of course, I have adventures in all that I do. My old bottle of Fray Check was solid as a rock and I had to run out to buy some more. Luckily the shop is close by and they were still open. This was also while helping a child with homework. 

Don't I do marvelous work!

Why is that little piece of paper sticking out of the frame, you ask? Because I couldn't get the frame tight enough and that little bit of paper took up the slack, just enough to make it tight. 

Don't you just love it when the first stitches you have to put in are right on the centerline? It sure makes it easy!

Two days later I took a picture of my progress to make sure she liked the colors we are using and she was happy. 

I wished the fabric looked this big when I am working on it as it does in this magnified picture. 

It is a New Year and a New Project

The Big Sister to my adopted daughters is getting married on the 15th of February.  She is unofficially one of ours also. Over the years she has been very attentive to the girls and is involved with them. She is here for every Holiday and celebration. She takes the girls so we can go away and she does things with them when she can. She supports me and what I am trying to teach the girls. She watched me make the girls' stockings. And sees all the other stockings of the whole family. She and her fiance have stockings here at the house that we use.  You know the little cheap kind.  

Leticia asked me to make her and Nick stockings for them as a wedding gift. And I agreed. 

I searched the internet for patterns and I went to my local cross stitch shop, the Attic and took and sent Leticia pictures of stockings. She picked out one she liked. 

And the winner pattern is....

Then we went to The Attic and picked out the fabric and thread colors for her stockings.  They will both have the same image but one will be on a light grey and the other on antique ivory. I will reverse the colors of the letters for their names and the words on the stockings. Just so they have some individuality. 

So this will be my main project for the year, to finish two stockings. Thank heaven I have a good light with a magnifying glass on the pole so I can see what I am doing. 

Christmas Creativity

Here we are in the last week of January and I haven't posted anything about what I made for Christmas. The season was busy plus I had bronchitis twice, once at Thanksgiving and again in January. Wears me out. 

Anyhow, let me do a little sharing.

I made six of these tags for my scrapbooking friends, plus one for me. Plus it took 3 tries to find where all the pieces go. He was a hit with my friends. 

Of course, I made a bunch of cards for my favorite people. My very favorite friends received a Christmas Basket.

Either a Gingerbread or a Snowman.

Or one of these!

For myself, or should I say for our home, I made this 

Christmas Shadow Box. 

This was really fun to make.  Picking colors and 

trying to make it look balanced was hard.