One Stitch At A Thyme

Well here she is...  I finished the backstitching on the ship last night.  Now it's on to the Viking Liturgy under the ship and I'm almost done.  I've purchased the wood frame today, I don't know yet if I'm going to have a mat cut for it as Tony wants his middle name stitched above the ship's mast and I don't know if there will be room for one. But without a mat the stitches will get smashed if I have a glass cover for it.  Guess I'll just deal with that little road bump after I get it finished and laced up for the frame.

 

Well it's going to be a really slim recap for 2013 as I only had one finish for the year, Birds of a Feather by Brenda Gervais of With Thy Needle & Thread.   I'll be setting up a finishes page  for 2013 and from now on every year after that - soon.

 

I can't believe the blog year is over all ready.  I hate to say it but I've been rather neglectful in the years since 2009 about posting here; in fact I didn't post at all in 2011.  I've tried to make an effort to post at least once a week now that I've been unemployed for the last 14 weeks.  I'm still trying to keep a positive outlook but it's really getting hard, especially when I'm running out of jobs openings that I qualify for to apply to.  I'm grateful my parents are still around and they've given me temporary shelter under their roof.  It really sucks being homeless. The sad reality is I'm not going to be able to find work around here and will probably have to start looking in the Seattle - Tacoma area.  I've never lived and worked anywhere else in my life and it scares me to death to think I've got to leave my family and friends and go some place I don't want to be. What makes it worse is knowing I've got no one that wants to go with me.

Today, just for the hell of it, I re-read my entire blog from the very first entry all the way to now.   It's amazing how much has happened in my life in the time I've been blogging here. I've done an awful lot of pissing, moaning, and complaining. Along with the occasional happy dance/stitchery finish and quite a few book reviews. I hope this next year shows more frequency in the stitching updates/finishes, and less complaining about the other crap in my life.

Happy Holidays to all and may the New Year give us all what we wish for.

I was hoping to have the dragon backstitched for this progress photo, but oh well...   I still have plenty of progress to show for this week.  All that's left to do is the back half of the ship and the verse at the bottom.  I've got things to do this week that will cut into my stitching time and next week is Christmas, so this may be the last update until the last weekend of December.

 

Click for larger picture.

 

Anyway thanks for stopping by.

Or it would have been if I would have got this posted yesterday.  Got finished with the backstitching on page two and a goodly amount done on page one.  Not too bad for a weeks worth of stitching. Normally I would drag this thing outside to take a picture in the natural light, but being it's 22 F ( -5 C ) today I didn't feel like venturing outside.

 

I probably would have gotten a lot more done yesterday on this project but I kept getting distracted by the Seahawks/49ers game.  Man what a tight game, unfortunately my hawks lost by 2 which puts them 11 and 2 for the season. Thanks for stopping by.....

 

( Click picture for bigger image )

Wow here it is my second official TUSAL report before the end of the year.  I hope next month and the start of 2014 shows a lot of progress in my TUSAL beaker. 

 

 

Along with my ORTs posting is my one week progress update for a Vikings World.  I've almost got one page of this six page chart done.  I was really hoping to be a little farther along.  But I get the feeling it's not going to be done for Christmas.  I kind of wish now that I had started working on it when I was first laid-off work two months ago, then I probably would be almost finished by now.  O well, Tony knows it's going to be his sooner or later, I was just hoping it would be sooner. 

 

After I get this project done I need to decide what to finish next. There are at least three projects on my WIPs list that I'd like to finish for 2014. They are "Camelot Sampler" & "The 12 Days of Christmas" by Teresa Wentzler and "Musical Bell Pull" by Donna Vermillion Giampa. 

 

I don't know if I'm gonna do a straight shot and work on them one after the other or do a rotational system like I use to years ago.  O well, I guess I'll worry about that when the time comes.  Anyway, thanks for stopping by.

For anyone who's interested I've finally gotten around and setup my for sale page and have listed my "Birds of A Feather" 3 part chart set plus my left over WDW floss.

This next project that I'm finally getting off the WIP pile is for my boyfriend Tony.  His ancestors came from Norway and he's interested in his Viking heritage.  I bought the chart February 8, 2013 or so said the receipt that was tucked inside the chart.  I think I started it the 17th of the month.  I'm guessing as I forgot to write down my start date, figuring I'd get this stitched up before the end of the next month well before June and his birthday.  Well you know how real life kind of takes over, I got busy at work, I tried stitching on it over the weekends but I always seemed too tired.  So I just ended up putting it and all my stitching away.

When I put Vikings World away I had one shield done, the bottom of the mast and two and a half sections of the sail.  I couldn't afford the "Gentle Art" sampler threads it called for so I went with the "DMC" conversion that was provided.  I started working on it again Monday November 18th.  Here is my progress after one week's worth of stitchy work.

You can find the chart at this website:  http://www.xstitchdesignsbylisa.com/AVikingsWorld.html

On the football front the Seahawks are now 10 and 1 for the season. YEEEAAAA!!!!  I never use to be a big football fan until I discovered that I could stitch and listen/watch a game for 3 hours and not miss count my stitching.

P.S. I took a chance and soaked the finished "Birds of a Feather" project in Orvus and cold water and it came out fine with no bleeding of the red thread into the linen it was stitched on.  So now it's been ironed, rolled up, and put away until I can afford to have it framed.

It's hard to believe, my first finish in four years.  I didn't think I'd ever get this thing off my WIP list, but here it is.  I have one dilemma with this piece.  When I got the floss with the charts and fabric as a kit I didn't bother to check and make sure the floss was colorfast having never worked with WeeksDyedWorks over dyed floss before.  After I finished the border from part one I discovered the large red flowers bled when I got one wet.  So the question is - Do I soak it in Orvus and cold water and hope for the best. Or, leave it dirty and try and steam out the hoop rings in the linen.
 

Name:  Birds of a Feather
Type:  Counted Cross Stitch
Finished Chart Size:  173w x 190h (11.5" x 12.75")
Leaflet/Kit #:  3 part chart pak mystery
Designer/Publisher: Brenda Gervais© 2011 With Thy Needle & Thread
Finished:  November 17, 2013
Misc. Info. : Started May 21, 2011 using WDW linen 30ct. confederate grey and WDW over dyed cotton floss.

Sorry for the crappy snap.  I tried taking a picture outside in the natural light. In one corner it says ... 11-2013 and the other my initials...  J K J

Over the last almost two years I've been seeing Daffycat's "Totally Useless Stitch Along" Ort thread posts on various blogs.   I know it's a little late in the year to be starting this, but what the heck, at least I'll have something for the last two months of the year. Now that I've got more time on my hands then I know what to do with. Maybe I'll actually be motivated to get some very old projects done that have been lingering in the WIP box for years.  And yes, I realize that I'm officially one day late with my posting - so what else is new....  LOL
 

Well here it is, another bird's update.  I can't really say it's taken me two weeks to finish off the forth quadrant of the inner square.  More like four days of really intense stitching with a final push to get this posted today.  That way I can get started on the first quadrant and finally be done with this sucker after having it in the WIP pile for a little over two years and five months. (Click on picture for bigger image)

The one job interview I've had in the 6 weeks since I've been unemployed fell through, with an "Oh we decided to fill the position with someone inside the company" after making me wait for three weeks before telling me.  Every application I've filled out either directly through WorkSource or on-line has gotten no response or an automated e-mail saying you're not what were looking for or the job's already been filled.

On a lighter note...Sudden death overtime for the Seahawks with a win of 3 points for a score of 27 to 24 over Tampa Bay.

 

Hopefully I'll have better news in my next update.

By the looks of the last progress picture it seems I managed to do a fair bit of work on the tree and leaves over the year 2012.  I know once I get it finished and framed (provided I've got money) it's going to be a present for someone; as I really don't care for this style of needlework.

I haven't really forgotten about this blog, it's just I've been in a bit of a slump/depression call it what you will.  A year, four months, and a week ago I was pissing and moaning about the fact that I moved into my parent's prefab-house (aka the rat shack).  A lot of things have happened since then.  I gave up trying to fix the place after a list of repairs that cost me a pretty penny and then found out the floors were rotting just inside the front door under the linoleum.  Work was going some what well other than the fact that I wasn't being paid enough.  And I'm talking living wage here nothing way above the norm.

It was only a few months later in august 2012 that I met my new boyfriend through the karaoke friends I hang with.  A 300 pound ex-trucker/biker club member, His road name is "Viking" but his real name is Tony.  He has this thing about flashing his face out on the internet, so I won't.  Things between us have gone a bit on the cool side in the last 3 months.  And have only gotten worse because I was laid-off work over 4 weeks ago.

 

In March of this year my sister who was currently living in Ohio told me that she hated living there and that her husband was looking for work back here in Washington State and that she wanted to move into the rat shack that I was now living in.  I was fine with that, I could move out and someone would still be here to look after mom and dad.  So in July of this year I got on the waiting list for the apartment complex I use to live in.  I didn't have long to wait I got a move in date of September 20th.

 

Then my world crumbled around me.   September 19, just one day before I was to pick up the keys to my apartment, at 8am I and 9 other people were brought into the company conference room and summarily told you're laid-off. We were given no advance warning - just boom - get your stuff and get off the property.  I couldn't move back into the house, my severance pay amounted to one month's wages (roughly 1,600.)  Only enough to get the phone, electric, and cable turned on - the partial and one full month's rent. So I couldn't move into the apartment either.  I was essentially unemployed and homeless all within the span of 2 days.  I was given little choice, the only option I had was to put every thing I owned except the bare essentials in storage and move into my old bedroom back into the mold and insect infested basement of my parents home I escaped from 3 years ago.

 

I've been living in "The Cave" as I call it for a little over a week now.  And as I said depression is starting to sink its teeth into me.  I've found my old "Birds of a Feather" project and have started working on it again to keep my mind occupied.  I was going to post a progress picture, but when I finally found my camera I discovered the battery was dead so it needs to be recharged.  I'll post it some time tomorrow, well in this case later today as I've just noticed that it's now after midnight.

 

Whether or not someone actually reads this it was still therapeutic to get it out and down on paper.