Another week of progress

Monarch Butterfly - Dec 7th

Well this week has been a very interesting week for crafting as I was able to find some time most evenings to craft.

The Monarch Butterfly got some attention early in the week as I was hoping to get all the actual stitching done this week but it didn't quite happen but will see if I can the stitching and back stitch done before the end of the year. I am very happy with how it is turning out and am looking forward to seeing what it looks like once all the stitching has been completed.

Monarch Butterfly - Dec 13th

This week I decided that since I was close to finishing the Monarch Butterfly I would work on another project that I started at the beginning of September.  This is a piece based on a drawing by someone we know.  I started the piece on September 2nd and then after realizing that I didn't like it on 22 count fabric doing full crosses and it would look nicer as a petite point.  Well that meant that Wednesday I got a piece of 25 count canvas and restated the design and am happy with how it is looking now.  I only worked on this piece Wednesday night and was able to make a good start on it and am now looking forward to seeing how it looks once I start adding some colour.  This design will be around 7 x 9 inches and is an oval design.

Flower and Butterfly - Dec 14th

My shrug that I have been knitting while listening to mp3's is still coming along and is around 18 inches now so it is at least getting there.  I have been listening to mp3's and watching video's while I am studying for an exam.  Being able to knit on something simple means that I don't want to start looking at other things on the computer when I should be focusing on listening to the presentations.

Caron Cakes Shawl - Faerie Cake

On Wednesday we realized that there was one gift that we needed so I went to Michael's and picked up a ball of Caron Cakes - Faerie Cake and decided to work on a shawl to see if I could get it finished by this week. The shawl is very simple and it became the project that I worked on while listening to the mp3's over the weekend.  The shawl is now done so that is making both of us happy because we wanted to give it to someone this week.

Cecilia's Shawl

Now after all the blues and greens that I have been working on I realized that I needed a bit of a change in colour so found some yarn and a pattern for a shawl for me.  The yarn was for a project that I realized I would never make so it needed to be used for something else. I started this shawl last night and am happy with how it is working up.  Yes the design is for a shawl that is not the normal triangle and I am loving it.  I am not sure how long it will take me to get this shawl done but I will see how much of it I can get done between now and the end of the year.

This week looks like it is going to be busy at the beginning of the week and then as Christmas approached work will slow down a little bit.  If work slows down some it means that I may have a bit more time to craft but will see how it goes.

To everyone who celebrates Christmas - Merry Christmas.  If you are a crafter, I hope that Santa makes sure you get the crafting items you wanted.  If you aren't a crafter, I hope you get what you wanted.

Slow week

Monarch - Nov 9, 2016

This last week I didn't find a lot of time for crafting but I did get a bit of work done on the Monarch Butterfly design which makes me happy.  I am finally seeing that the butterfly is starting to look like it should and that is making me happy.  I will have to do some backstitch on the butterfly and the flower once all the stitching is done but at least I am feeling better about the design now.

This week I hope to be able to put some more time in on this design as I would like to see all the actual stitching finished and then I can focus on the backstitching.  Just being able to see the rest of the butterfly appear will make me happy and then I will start working on another one of the projects that I have on the go.

Monarch - Dec 7, 2016

I didn't get a lot of knitting done either so the shrug is still around 13 inches so a long way to go before I can start wearing it. I figure that the shrug should get some attention as well this week as I have some mp3's that I need to list to so that is what I will knit while listening to them.  I also figure that I would like to get the shrug done soon so that I can start to wear it now that the cold weather has arrived.

The reason for not getting a lot of crafting done in the last week was that my computer decided that it didn't want to work as well as it should.  This meant a lot of additional stress on both myself and my dh as the computer is what I use for work.  After some investigating we figured it would be a good idea to just get a new work computer so that is what we did this weekend and I am back up and working and happy about that.

Now to try and get some work finished up so that this evening I will be able to maybe find a bit of time to craft.  This week I have a few other projects that need my attention so crafting is still going to be slow but I hope to at least find a bit of time for it.

Moving Forward

Teal Shrug - Nov 27th

This last week I finally decided that I needed to spend a bit of time in the evening trying to stitch my mind back together.  No, it didn't happen every evening but at least I was able to do it some evenings which is great.

The shrug that I started a week ago did get some attention because it is something that I can work on and not have to follow a pattern. The shrug is very simple now so that means that I can do it while listening to some mp3's that I need to listen to over the next couple of weeks.  I am knitting on the shrug so that I don't get distractions while listen to the mp3's and it seems to have worked at least yesterday.  I hope to be able to get through the other 11 mp3's that I need to listen to quickly and I will also see how much more of the shrug that I can do while sitting and paying attention to what the mp3's are about.

Teal Shrug - Dec 4th

Besides working on the shrug I have been able to put some time in on a cross-stitch and that was Cirque des Cercles that got the attention this past week.  The pattern does work up pretty quickly when  you can sit for a little bit of time and get some of the circles completed.

Cirque des Cercles - Nov 27th

I am loving the colour that I am using for this design because it is a nice bright teal blue and on the white it looks great.  I hope to be able to spend some more time on this design later in December but I think it is time for another project to come back up for some attention this week. 

Cirque des Cerles - Dec 4th

I did start a small design this weekend and it is a reindeer designed by Kathrin Ellison of Gitta's.  The design for a gift to everyone that went to the Christmas Open House at the store on Saturday.  I got a bit of the design stitched but not a lot so I hope to be able to get it finished up quickly so that it will be something else finished and not sitting partly done.

This week I am hoping to be able to spend some time during the evenings stitching but will see how things go.  I know that there are other things that need my attention so will see how I can juggle everything.

Now to get the work done that needs by attention and then will see what I can work on this evening.

Progress on projects

Teal Shrug - Nov 27th

This past week I didn't get a lot of crafting done but at least I can see that I made a bit of progress on a couple of things.

The first project that finally got started was a teal shrug for myself.  I have been wanting to do something with this yarn for a while so finally picked the pattern and started a shrug for myself.  The nice thing about this pattern is how simple it is because other than the ribbing at both ends of the design it is a simple knit one row, purl the other.  Yes something that I can do when I really don't want to do a lot of thinking about anything.

Cirque des Cercles - Nov 27th

The second project that got started this week was a cross-stitched called Cirque des Cercles.  I have this pattern in a different colour being worked on but I wanted something a little easier to work on so I started this on 16 count aida and am using one colour.  The other version is on 25 count fabric and with two colours in the needle at once.

Cirque des Cercles is about 15 inches x 10 inches but I am hoping that it will stitch up quickly on this fabric.  This is part of one evening of stitching so I am happy with the progress that I was able to make on it.

This week I am not sure what crafting time I am going to have as I have quite a few other projects that need my attention so crafting will be fit in when I have the chance.  I would like to see a bit more progress on the shrug this week so that may be what I focus on when I have the chance. The shrug is just one piece so I have to knit it until around 44 inches so there is still a long way to go but I would like to be wearing it when the weather is cold out.

Oh, I almost forgot to mention, the green mindless shawl.  The shawl is now off the needles and measures almost 68 inches long by 32 inches wide.  It is now drying as I am blocking it so that is why there is no pictures of it on this post.

Crafting is a great way to end my day as it gives me a bit of time to think through the day but there are days when I don't have the chance to craft.  Crafting does help me stitch my mind back together and even solve some of the issues that I have been working on throughout the day.  Stitching no matter what I am working on can really help me figure out what I have to do the next day and also give me some time to file all those other thing tasks into the various folders in my head.

Work now needs to get done so will see how much crafting I can do throughout this week and the coming weekend.

Things moving along

Here Be Tiny Dragon - Water - Nov 14

This week I was able to find a bit of time to craft which was great. 

This week I decided it was time to work on a cross-stitch project that wasn't one of the one's that I have been designing.  I figured that a change was what I needed because I haven't been making a lot of progress on anything for a couple of weeks.

I looked in one of my boxes of cross-stitch projects and found that of course I had a few that were started and then put away for one reason for another. I decided to pull out the project called Here Be Tiny Dragon and see if I could get it moved along and maybe even finished soon.  Well, I forgot the reason that I had put this project down was because I had made a mistake when I started it.  I started this design at the Creative Festival in 2009 and it has been sitting and not getting any attention since then.  So I had choices to make and they were 1) put the kit back in the box and ignore it again, 2) try and work around the mistake, or 3) pull out the area where the mistake was and correct it.

Here Be Tiny Dragon - Water - Nov 20

So my decision was to take out the area where the mistake was and correct it.  It wasn't really too hard to fix as there were probably only about six stitches that needed to be corrected so that is what I did.  This project isn't very big as it is on 25 count fabric and I am stitching it over one so the final design is around 2" x 2.5".  It has been fun watching this dragon come to life this week.  I did most of the stitching on Sunday on it.  Once this design is done there is another dragon in the kit and it is Here By Tiny Dragon - Fire so I hope to get that one done soon as well.  Jennifer Aikman-Smith designed - Water and Teresa Wentzler designed - Fire.

Green shawl - Nov 20th

Besides working on the dragon this week I have been able to get a bit more done on the green shawl that I am making. The shawl is now 62 inches out of the 72 inches so I am happy with the progress that I have been able to make on it.  I hope to be able to get this shawl done within the next couple of weeks but will see how it goes.

This week I am going to see what gets the attention because of course besides having these projects on the go there are other things sitting and also wanting a bit of time.

The weather has now turned colder here in Ontario and that means that it is time to focus on trying to stay warm so crafting may be something that gets a bit more attention now.

Slow progress

Monarch Butterfly - October 16th

Well here it is another week and I can really admit that I didn't get a lot of stitching done over the last week.

The Monarch Butterfly did get a little bit of attention and I am happy with that because it is slowly coming along.  I was able to spend an evening working on it and saw a bit of progress so now to see when I can work on it again.

The colouring of the latest picture is so different than the other one and that is because I didn't use my daylight lamp when I was taking the picture this time.  I hope to be able to find some time this week to actually work on the Butterfly as I would like to get it completed soon.

Monarch Butterfly - November 9th

Besides working on the Butterfly I was able to get a bit of knitting done on the green shawl and it is now 56 inches out of the 72 inches so it is slowly coming along.  This week I am going to try and give the shawl a bit more attention because I would like to see the shawl completed and then I will be able to get a good picture of it.

Crafting wasn't something I had a lot of time for last week and that was because work issues were high on the list of getting done.  Yesterday my original plan was to sit and craft for a while but another client issue came up and that needed to be handled.

This week I am determined that I am going to work a couple of evenings on crafting as I would like the time to actually sit and stitch my mind back together.  Stitching is one of the ways that I regain a focus and my energy and I haven't been doing that lately.  My calendar of course has a few things on it that need to be completed this week but I also see that if things go well I should have a bit of time to craft in the evenings.

Work now needs to get done and I will see if tonight will be one of the evenings where I can curl up and craft for a while.  Hopefully next week there will be more things on the list of what got some attention.

A bit more progress on things

Sugar - Oct 30th

 Here it is a start of another week and now to see if this week is going to be better than the last couple of weeks for getting some crafting done.

This weekend I was able to find some time to sit and work on the background of Sugar and I am just about finished it now.  There is just one some area that needs to be completed and then I can work on the actual dog.  The reason the background didn't get finished last night was I finished a skein of floss and didn't go and pick up the other one that is in my crafting bag.  I will work on finishing the background hopefully this evening and then it will just be working on getting the actual face of Sugar done.

Sugar - Nov 6

Besides working on this piece I but a few more rows in on the green shawl that I am making. I think I only knit about an inch this week so not a very good progress week but at least I am still on track to get it finished by early December.  Now I just need to get back to working on it and hopefully it will be done even faster than that.

The black shrug that I started to knit a couple of weeks ago also got a bit of attention this week and it went from 3 inches to around 7 inches but it is still a long way from the 42 inches that it has to be.

I am hoping that this week I will be able to find some crafting time most evening and will see what I work on.  I know that one evening is our local stitch night so I hope to be able to go there and see some progress on a piece. Of course, the time I work on crafting will depend on what work needs to get done and how quickly it is done.

The clocks went back an hour on Saturday evening and maybe it helped a bit with the cross-stitching but am not sure.  Now to see which project or projects get the attention this week because I am not sure which one will be the one that gets the most attention yet.  I would like to get at least one project finished before the end of the year so that means that maybe the Monarch Butterfly will come back out and get some more attention.