Gifted Gorgeousness SAL - December

I can't believe we already made it to December, so this means that this is my final update for 2018! Therefore I am going to recapture all the progress I made this year ;-) And being only two days late is an improvement for me, but nevertheless there is already plenty to see at this months link-up page ;-)

For this month I only worked on one project, stitching is getting better again since my medication is working quite well now, but the time before Christmas is always so busy. I have all my present ready by now (well - I still need to do some baking for my uncle, but that's scheduled for the next weekend), I just need to wrap them up. I also spent a lot of time making tags for the presents, unfortunately it's not so easy to take pictures of them (and with 16 tags made I didn't feel like taking individual pictures):

These are my first attempts to card making - it's really fun, I am not completely happy with some of them, but I am still learning, right? And since these are going away with presents, I decided that they belong to the GG SAL. 

The general idea is that I want to gain some practice at card making. You know, I am going to marry next year and we didn't find invitation designs that were to our liking AND for a reasonable price (some cards are really expensive and since we are going to need like 50 invitations, the price really adds up). I will keep you up to date with my "experiments" ;-)

But back to stitching! I worked on my Map of Middle Earth by Heaven and Earth Designs. Since this is the last update for this year, here is my starting point for 2018, back then I was at 43.000 stitches:

Since last month I added another 800 stitches - so here we are at 55.000 stitches:

So I managed to get 12.000 stitches this year - my original goal was to get at least 14.000 stitches in, but considering the nasty business with my hand, I am completely happy with my 12.000 stitches. I am not sure if I can get the row finished by next year - it's 20.000 stitches after all! But I will do my best and try to get as close to that as possible.

So far I didn't get any more progress into Candy Cane Santa by Dimensions Gold, I thought about not posting until I had something to show, but I didn't want to be to late with this post (well last year I posted on the 23rd...). Anyway, I was still able to make some progress in 2018. I went from here:

To here (at least I took a new full shot)

The biggest change surely is that Santa does now have eyes - I am not sure if he really looks less creepy now - lol.

Another project I took with me from 2017 into the new year is Wolf Kiss by Dimensions. I went from here:

To here:

I only picked this up twice during this year - the progress is really fine for that amount, but I should definitely pick this up more often! It's a nice design, not to many colors and it stitches up in no time.

Last but not least, I restarted my In the Moonlight by Tilton Crafts - you may remember that I managed to mess up the orientation of the fabric. I only stitched two columns, but it's a (new) start:

The background is as dull as the first time, I think I just need to get past the point of my previous progress and then the motivation to work on this will hopefully kick in.

Those are all the things I worked on, I am generally happy with what I achieved this year (there is always room for improvements). The GG SAL will continue in 2019 and I am in for that! Hopefully with more progress on Santa! 

For all those who only drop by for the GG SAL: I hope you have a wonderful and festive time and I am wishing you all the best for 2019 =)

Happy stitching!