Ihsw/ row finish on Paddy/ new start

The third weekend of the month is the International Hermit and Stitch Weekend where you are supposed to hermit and stitch. Most of the time I don't manage to join because I have a lot of stuff to do at the weekend (don't ask me what - the weekend just fly by!). But this month I managed to set some time aside and even got some stitching done =)

I could have done more, but I spent a lot of time reading and I decided to get Instagram and spent some time there. I decided to make an account because I hope to post updates more often and so far (I only added a few pictures) it's really easy and quick to just post a picture at the end of the day. I hope that by taking and sharing pictures I feel more motivated to blog and I definitely want to continue blogging. But if you are interested on (hopefully) daily updates on my stitching, feel free to find and follow me, I go there as lady_stitchalot ;-) I'm also sharing a few updates on my reading and my garden there, while this blog will stick with my stitching.

Anyway, back to topic. I managed to work on two projects this weekend.

The first is my QS Paddys Luck by Joanna Bromley (Haed). I only had a bit left to finish the first row of pages. I worked on the project for a few days before, so the first row was nearly done when the weekend officially started on Friday. 

Last time you saw Paddy:

Before Ihsw:

And now:

So since the last time you saw it, I added 1 200 stitches, but only about 300 where done for the Ihsw (did that on Friday).

On Saturday I decided to do some further work on my latest new start - Garden Gate by Dona Gelsinger. I started this a few days ago, but I only did 800 stitches. I am working on 32ct Murano and the amount of confetti is a bit complicated and takes ages (I think I am below 100 stitches per hour), but it looks awesome and is very addictive. The first picture show my first 800 stitches, which I did before ihsw and I must apologize - the colors in the picture are awful, the second update looks way better.

Before:

And now:

I am stitching this on a light green fabric, I think it's fitting for such a lovely garden design:

I think I will stitch another row before switching to something else, I really love this. I am currently listening to Stephen Frys Mythos while I stitch, so I am sort of glued to my frame anyway and hope to finish the next column during the week ;-) 

I originally thought about joining the Haed-challenge on Facebook, but I am obviously not getting the page done for June 26th, but I don't really mind, I am doing my own pace with this ;-)

So that's what I have to share for this month.

Happy stitching =)

Gifted Gorgeousness SAL - June

And it's time for another GG SAL update! I fear I missed making an entry for May, I didn't have anything to show anyway. That was the first month in ages where I missed making an entry, but I was just so occupied with my health situation (which is improving - I went to see my doctor on Tuesday and we decided to try and reduce my medication again) and then the month was already over. But I am back on track now =)

I only have a small update for this month and it's not Middle Earth! I just didn't feel like working on that, when I work on something on a longer basis I sometimes just need a break for a month or two. So I decided to take out Wolf Kiss by Dimensions! It has been ages since I worked on this and it was a lot of fun. This one stitches up really fast - on the one hand it has only a few colors (I'm so happy that I don't need to stitch all that back...) and on the other hand this is done on 14ct so stitches look like a lot more progress. 

Here are my Wolves like you last saw them:

And here is where I got to:

The second wolf has a (nearly) complete face now! As always I am totally impressed on how much depth you can get with just a few colors and full crosses! I didn't even work on this for to long and once again I am thinking that I really should work on this more often... To many projects, to little time...

As every month there this a link-up at Jos place and since I am late (as always) a good deal of people already signed up - so there is plenty to see ;-) 

Happy stitching =)

WIPocalypse May

Well, long time, no see, but now I'm back in blogland. I just opened my blog-reading-thing on my computer and holy cow! I don't even know where to start catching up! So I am going to promise you the exact same thing as every month - I'll catch up on all your posts and will be a better follower and blogger in the future ;-)
Well, things just went over the top here. Due to my chronic pain I applied for a treatment in hospital and they were like "yeah we are going to send you a questionnaire and you fill it in and sent it back and then we will get back to you", so I answered all the questions and sent the thing back to hospital, on the paper it said that it could take up to six months due to high demand, so I prepared to wait. I got a phone call on Friday the 12th, talked to the doctor (not a secretary or something) and she told me that it would be best if I could come to hospital for "a few days" and the secretary would get back to me. About 30 minutes later the secretary got back to me and asked me "ah well, can you get here on Monday 15th for some first test and from the 23rd on we have a bed for you". That was fast. It's like you can get a treatment immediately or you have to wait for 6 weeks. So I ended up in Hospital after Easter Monday and "a few days" resulted in 16 days of therapy for chronic pain.
I am really glad that I did this, I mean going to hospital sucks (especially if one of your roommates is 75, dement and slightly racist and half the time you are like "if you were just 30 years young, I would simply punch you in the face for all the rubbish you are talking"....), but this treatment helped me a lot. The finally diagnosed me with CRPS, so no more random visits to random doctors, they improved my medication, so I am not feeling so dizzy anymore (we cut back on the strong pain killers) and I have less pain. Also I feel more active again, the strong pain killers made me tired all the time and half my evenings I spent on the couch recovering from my daily activities. I could not really do sports (20 minutes of yoga finished me off) and a lot of days I felt so tired in the morning, I was close to throwing up. I am not able to run a marathon, but I can do my all-day activities (go to work, meet friends, go shopping, do house or garden work) without feeling awful for several hours. I even started on sports again, which I missed so much! I also talked to my doctor and in about 2 weeks we will try to cut back on the medication once more =) Most of all, I am way me optimistic now and I feel like I am back on track again.
Anyway, I got home in the middle of May and I just took a while to settle in again and start stitching again, so I decided not to push myself to blog. But I really and honestly hope and think that I will improve in the future ;-)
Also, I have the official allowance to stitch! The doctors told me that one of the ways to beat CRPS is a lot of interaction with my hand, my body and brain need to get used to using my hand again, so stitching really is a therapy for me now ;-)
Unfortunately I feel like I don't really have a lot to show, but here are my updates.

The first one I want to show is my work on "Danielle" by Sarah Butcher. I absolutely love this design, the colors always make me happy and I really don't get why I skipped this WIP in 2018. All the more a reason to pick it up and I went from here:

To here:

I did a total of 2 400 stitches and managed to finish off page 3 and make a start on page 4.

The second WIP I worked on is QS Paddys Luck. You know I wanted to finish up the first row of pages, but I didn't manage to do so. I didn't really enjoy stitching the tree, but since it's really not much to finish the row, I will do so for the end of June =) But I still went from here:

To here:

I only did 800 stitches, but they took ages! I'm so happy when the tree is done, the rainbow was way more fun to stitch ;-)

Last but not least is Kreimhilds revenge, which is currently on my frame. We are still stitching brown and sandy colors, but we are getting there. I am still working on page 37, one and a half columns left there and I will finish those before I move to something else (I hope, I feel a certain itch to stitch something more colorful). I went from here:

To here:

She is getting a hand! it looks so amazing and real =) I added a total of 1 830 stitches, not as much as I wanted, but still something - right?

Talking of more colorful stitching... Michele is running another challenge on Facebook, the idea is to make a new start and stitch one page. On the one hand I have more than enough WIPs, on the other I recently bought a new chart:

It's called "Garden Gate" by Dona Gelsinger and it's amazing! You know I love working in the garden and this contains hydrangeas, which are my favorite flowers =) This was released when I was still in hospital and I already felt better and really optimistic, so I spent a few hours online looking at things I want to do "now that my hand got better again". This was released together with another Dona design called "Gardeners paradise" and I had a hard time deciding, but the hydrangeas got me ;-) So as soon as I got home again I bought this. I even have a matching piece of 32ct murano in light green to go with this and I have all the colors and I even printed the first pages of this chart. So I am pretty sure that I will start this soon =)

so this is all I have for this month =)
Happy stitching =)