Dunvegan Sampler - Week 3

Wow was so hoping I would be finished with pages B1-B4 as of the writing of this post.  Perhaps by the end of week 4!  I do, however, get to roll my scroll rods up so that I can work on the bottom of pages B1-B4 and for that I am happy!  

And.... there are parts of these pages that I have skipped around saving those motifs till last.  There's a thistle on the chart that the head of the thistle is all Queen's stitch.  And there is another motif that calls for diamond eyelight stitches.  The diamond to be over 4 squares and I tried it, but mine seem to look more like snowflakes. 

I keep looking at this sampler and feel like I'm not making a whole lot of progress, but when I compare to last week's picture, I guess I am!

The baste stitching has really helped on the border keeping me on track, hopefully no one step forward and two steps back!  Plus since I'm working off a copy, I've been crossing out stitches for the border as I complete each row with my handy dandy pink highlighter. 

I keep telling myself that I must stay off some of my stitch FB pages.  There is way too much temptation to add to an already hefty stash of charts, threads snd fabric.  But alas, perhaps the xstitch addict is in fact a reality.  Do they have meetings for that type of addiction?

I keep trying to tell myself that as long as my stash doesn't cover every inch of two rooms, or even one, that I must not be that bad!  

This week I bought 3 more charts. Part of the addiction is you can buy stuff without leaving your house and it's delivered to your front door.  And to be quite honest, there's the thrill and anticipation of waiting for the mailman, or fedex, or UPS.

Hannah Lancaster, Lucy Redd and the Historic Countries Mystery Sampler were 3 I just couldn't pass up.  When oh when will I find the time?

Dunvegan Sampler - Week 2

After the first week and 3 days, I thought I'd be whipping this project out in no time at all.  What's that saying about counting your chickens......boy was I totally off!

I was whipping through those first four pages because they were easy.  Come to pages 5-8.  Not so much!

Turns out for anyone that has this chart in their stash, the directions, are well, not all that great.  Course wouldn't you know the designer has retired.  And there are no corrections listed on her site for this chart that was last updated in 2007.  Guess I'll being using my best judgement of what she meant.

The border,  well not only does it zigzag, but it zigzags within the zigzag.  Making as much opportunity for someone, like me, who counts 3 times and still manages to get it wrong!

I spent as much time frogging as I did stitching!   (Rip it, Rip it!)

Alas, I finally bit the bullet and ran baste lines along the sides to help me stay on track.  Not to say that I won't make any further booboo's but at least I can hope the baste lines will help me find my mistakes sooner.

I also managed to buy fabric for five more charts in my stash.  Two pieces of linen, one for Susan Rambo and it escapes me right now what the other piece was for.

In addition I purchased a yard of a very specific Aida from Yarntree that Moira Blackburn suggests to use for her charts.  So happy that I managed to squeeze out 3 pieces for 3 of her charts I have in my stash.

Looking forward to March so I can purchase a few more pieces of fabric!

Dunvegan Sampler - Week one and 3 days

Got to say this sampler has been quite the challenge.  I have managed to work through pages 1-4, although not completely finished with those.  Lots of detail and thread color changes.  Lots of vines, and I still have lots of Algerian eyelid stitches to do in the middle of the flowers.  

In stitching the big letters I realized that one of the colors was the exact same shade as the fabric.  Tried replacing with white and that wasn't any better.  Ended up switching to 930 since it was already used in the little letters.

Guess that's what I get when I chose a fabric without pulling the colors.  Happy with the result!

I managed to order some more linen for a couple of future projects and a whole yard of a specific Aida that Moria Blackburn likes her projects sewn on.

In an attempt to further organize myself, I went through my book and found projects I haven't bought fabric for.  I used my handy dandy stitch calculator from yarntree to calculate the fabric needed and then estimated cost of the fabric using 123 stitch or several other sites.  Since I allot myself a budget every month to spend on my hobby, at least I'll know whether I can buy one piece of fabric or several.  

Dunvegan Samplar - just beginning

I'm a little early in my post.  But when I finished up with Amish Life-Tending the Garden, I just couldn't wait to get back to working on a sampler!

I knew this would be my very next projects.  My hubby, who supports my hobby, purchased this chart for me several Christmases ago.  Rather then work on something I just got, I decided to try to stitch up some of my older charts first.  

This chart is by Samplar Workes.  I decided to use 32. Ct Magnolia linen and using DMC threads.

Downside of chart so far, has been no shaded area to show where pages overlap.  Upside - my own copier to piece the chart together where it should, without messing up my original chart.  

Sure that makes my sister happy as she will inherit the chart from me upon completion.  Plus it has her favorite object in it, that being some sort of house/building.

Colors are awesome and I pic does it the justice it so deserves!

Amish Life - Tending the Garden - Week 3 1/2

Whoop whoop!   Put the last stitches a few moments ago.  So happy to be able to move onto something else. 

Amish Life - Tending the Garden - Week 3

So hoping I would be finished with this! But alas, sometimes life just interferes with stitch time.  I'm was plugging right along till I came to the bottom.  Lots of random single stitches.  Lots of color changes and lots of backstitch outlining.  

But next project in line is a sampler before I start on the 3rd and final part 

of this 3 part series.