WIPocalypse November

After being on time last moth, I really needed a break and decided to mess it up again for November. I somehow thought November had  31 days, so I thought that I had an additional week and today would be the official WIPocalypse day... Ah well... I am not really ready for December yet. I am not in a Christmas mood (even though I went to a Christmas market last Friday and spent a ridiculous amount of money on food and drinks) and yesterday we bought a last-minute advent wreath (there were not so many left, but we found a pretty one). We don't have any decoration up yet, but we lit the first candle for breakfast and it was pretty festive =)  I started to collect the first presents for Christmas, so I am making progress!

But back to topic, this is supposed to be about stitching ;-) I made a fair amount of progress since last month, looks like the end of the year in sight makes me speed up! I worked on three projects.

First I still hast QS Trapped on my Qsnap, since I started late with the one-per-day-challenge, my challenge ran until the 6th November and I kept my pace of one square per day. I was pretty close to finishing the first row, I think like 1 600 stitches, so I decided to do those in November as well. So I went from here:

To here:

So I did 2 880 stitches on this one in November, even more than in October =) I am super happy that I finished this row, I originally wanted to finish the next page on the second row as well for this year, but I think I am trying to work on a few more of my other projects instead. I did over 5 000 stitches on Trapped and I think that's a good amount of progress.

The next project I worked on it Whispers by Melanie Delon. It has been quietly sitting on my WIP-pile for ages now and when I took it out and started to stitch on it, I just couldn't stop. So I stitched a full page in just 10 days! I went from here:

To here:

I still had trouble putting this down, but I had to do a bit of work on my Map of Middle Earth for the GGSAL and afterwards I put Kriemhild back on the frame, so I put it away after one page. But I plan to work on it again early next year.

The third project was - as mentioned above - Kriemhild by Howard David Johnson. I still have a row to finish there and did a fair bit towards that already. I went from here:

To here:

I did 3 columns, which means that I still have 3 columns left to stitch. I am using this project for the current Haed-challenge, so I need to finish those three columns until Christmas, which should not be a problem.

So I did a total of 10 150 stitches in November, oh my! This might explain why I only read 5 books :D Well, I listened to a lot of audiobooks (mainly the Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and The Institute by Stephen King), so it's more like 7 or 8 books for the month ;-)

Last but not least there is this months question, about which new techniques I learned in 2019: eh.... none :D
But maybe someone else picked up something new, only one way to find out: Check out this months link-up to see all the other updates!

Happy stitching =)

WIPocalypse - January

And here we go with the next WIPocalypse, hosted by Measi and here is the link to the linkup page. Thanks to my rotation, I have quite a bit to show and I think January worked out really well!

But first I want to answer this months question: What SALs are you participating in this year?
The answer to this is quite short - I am doing the Fabulous Women in History SAL by Cloudsfactory.
The idea of this is really nice, I just hope that there will be a few scientists there, too (like Marie Curie or Mageret Hamilton, I would also love to see Emmy Noether as well, but I don't think she'll turn up).
So far we got Eleanore Roosevelt (in my eyes a very extraordinary women) and Coco Chanel (I'm not really into fashoin and could have done without her, but she's there and it's ok).
Unfortunately I got quite irritated by the little black arrows on the pattern and thought they would indicate the middle of the designs, but they were only for the middle of the block. Anyway, I had to change the position of Coco and Eleanore and I think this should work out now:

I am sorry, but the fabric color is really hard to catch, especially with artificial light in here.

As for monthly SALs, I am joining the gifted gorgeousness SAL hosted by Jo, where I show my work on pieces that were gifted to me or are meant as a gift for someone.  For further information on the SAL or in case you want to join the ride, you can sign up here.

Next step, WIPs!
First up is my new start Whispers by Melanie Delon, I did 4000 stitches (new start enthusiasm I guess):

Doesn't this flower look pretty! I was so close to screwing over my rotation (after week one...) to continue with this, but I forced myself to go on!

Then I spent 5 days working on Kreimhilds Revenge, I did I think like 1300 or 1400, I just hope that these stitches will add up over the months. I am aiming for 2 columns per month (1 560 stitches) and hope to catch up soon. I went from here:

To here:

There actually was quite a lot of confetti there, even if it doesn't look like it. but I think it looks very pretty and I am looking forward to picking her up again in February.

I picked up my Supersized Iris Keeper by Josephine Wall, not a lot of progress, but 1600 stitches is still more than no stitches. I went from here:

To here:

I am at 17 600 stitches in total now, I will do my best to finish the first row (that would be 24 000 in total)!

The nest Haed I worked on is my The Potting Shed by Aimee Stewart. A stunning design, but I am not sure if I ever stitched so much confetti in my life! I love the outcome and I really spent a lot of time on this one, but it just takes a while to stitch up. I went from here:

To here:

When I bought this, I was quite tempted to go for the Max color version, but considering the amount of confetti, I am pretty happy I went for the normal version. There were so many color changes in that small bit of sky there! But this doesn't bury my plans of doing a max color one day (I saw someone work on Aimees Birds and Blossoms in MC and that looked stunning and then that is also one of her "smaller" designs). I managed to add 1400 stitches in the week I worked on this.

Last but not least I have been working on the Haed Challenge, I am doing about 100 stitches a day (at least that's the plan) and since I started a bit late on it, I am at 2000 stitchs now. The section I picked is 7 800 in total, so I have a way to go, but this will also mean that QS Trapped will gain a bunch of stitches. I went from here:

To here:

That funny thing next to her head had some confetti, but I think the outcome looks quite nice. I hope to finish page 1 by the end of february (3200 stitches to go) and then do the half page underneath in march (2600 stitches).

Ok, that's it for this month,

Happy stitching!

New start and rotation plans

Well, I finally have time to write another post here. 2017 didn't go so well, my boyfriends mother is in hospital with a broken leg and there are a lot of things to organize. So I am sharing various things in this post.

First up is my new start "Whispers" by Melanie Delon charted by Heaven and Earth Designs.
Here is what the finished designs is going to look like:

I absolutely love the lace and the colors and also the flowers, such a stunning design! It's 525 stitches wide and 770 stitches high, I am working this on 28ct light grey (gotta try some new colors from time to time, right?) lugana and so far I did 4000 stitches, it's some background and the beginning of that first little flower in her head piece:

I absolutely love it, it's so much fun to stitch and the flower looks amazing! That's my usual problem with a rotation, I work on something and then I don't want to stop!

But I was a good girl and put this away and took out my Kreimhilds revenge, 22 500 stitches are to be done in 2017! I made a start on the 4th row of pages, due to all the trouble around here I only did 1330 stitches, I wanted to do at least 2 columns, but I will just catch up next time:

That page does indeed have some confetti, but the sky is ging to appear soon enough, so I won't complain. But I think the second page of that row is actually the last full page of sky there is! Yay!

I just put my supersized Iris Keeper on my frame as the next piece in mal rotation and will share an update on it in a few days.

In the meantime I made a small start on the haed challenge, the big plan is to stitch about 100 stitches on my QS Trapped each day (decided to do so on monday - I am at 400, 7200 to go...) and I will see how things go. In the beginning I wanted to use Kreimhild, but parked threads are not allowed this time. I am not entirely sure, if I don't find enough time for the challenge, I will leave that one out.

The bigger plan for this year is to try a rotation. First I want to work on Kriemhild each month to make some progress, so from the 8th to 12th of each month, she will be on my frame.

From the 1st to 7th, 14th to 20th and 21st to 27th I am going to work on one of my bigger projects and from the 28th to the end of the month I am working on a smaller one and then the month is done. I usually manage to stick to a rotation for like one month and I will ses how far I get this time.

Anyway, I am off to stitch all the stress away now,

happy stitching!