It's not dead!

This blog is not dead. I promise. Just sorely neglected. I recently got married, so I'm settling into a whole new routine in a city and a new state.

The main reason of this post is to show off my finally framed Queen Mermaid. She sat in a drawer for 3 years waiting on me to frame her. She's going to hang in my guest room.

Finished socks!!

Yes, you read that right. Finished socks. As in plural. There are two of them. On my feet!! They've been there since I took the picture and I have no plans to take them off anytime soon.

Sweater HD!!!

I finished the baby sweater!!!!!! A good friend had a baby on the 3rd, a little boy. It's been so unseasonably cold down here that the poor thing is in dire need of a sweater.

I don't remember where I found the pattern, but it's an online freebie. Called the Yoda Baby Sweater if I remember correctly. The yarn is Hobby Lobby Baby Bee something. Color is pretty true here on my screen, a lovely pale gray.

Next up: Finish the sock so I can knit my hand warmers with the leftovers.

New Year, new start!

I have a truly new year laid out in front of me. I'm starting a new job in another 2 weeks, one that I'm really looking forward to. My income will be going up, so a new car is in my future as well as more spending $$$ for stash. The new job has me working from home, and since I'm setting my office up in my room, I decided it was time for a major cleaning spree.

I do have a rather large room, when this house was built it was originally the master bedroom. I've divided it up into sections and I'm tackling one section every day until I get done. I should be done by Thursday if I stay on track. The massive cleaning also involves some re-arranging and organizing.

A friend sent me a nifty little fold-out knitting case. And I do mean it's little! And terribly cute, and yellow which means it matches my bedroom beautifully. The friend doesn't know what color my bedroom is either. Since I keep my small knitting projects in a little bag, I decided to put all of my thread crochet stuff into the little fold-out thing. So all my thread gets put in there, my favorite little pattern book and some beads that I'm about to play with.

Naturally I want to put my hooks in there too. My mom bought me a full set of steel crochet hooks for Christmas a couple years ago. 00-14 all in the same case! I think that was my favorite present that year. But I can't find them. Anywhere! I found the last hook I was using, the 6 out of the case. But no case. I've looked everywhere. In all of my tote bags, pulled all the yarn out of my knitting bag, looked in all of my little chests and sewing boxes. Zilch. That little green case is nowhere to be found. Rats!

So if anybody sees a little green case with steel crochet hooks in it that's missing the 6, please tell it to come back home.

WIP update

Warning! Picture heavy post.

Kimono Butterflies Mermaid ACEO QS by HAED, artist Nadia Tate. It took me forever to "see" her face, lol. I'm very pleased with the way she's turning out.







Chatelaine St. Petersburg White Nights part 2 complete. Still totally head over heels in love with it! It's so sparkly already and there's not a single bead or crystal on it yet!






And my PV, cuz it's been awhile. The mirror is TOTALLY finished now except for the backstitching. The bouquet is just about complete too. It's still driving me batty, but I'm starting to see a light at the end of the tunnel.

Bad stitcher!

Yes, that's me. I've been a very bad stitcher. I haven't kept up with my blog or shared pictures or anything. So I'm going to attempt to explain.

My last post on 9/10 is right around the time that I switched jobs. I've worked a lot of evenings, which is my main stitching time. So I haven't been stitching as much as I used to. I haven't even made one full go through of my rotation. I did finish Part 2 of St. Pete, and stitched 2 more times on KMB. I'll put some pictures up tomorrow.

I've also been swimming right along on my medical transcription course. I also have landed an MT job!!!!!!! I start the first full week of January. My last day at Hobby Lobby will be December 29th, and then I'll have a week to get my room cleaned up good, get my desk cleaned off and arranged and get some serious stitching done.

My silks for the Ink Circles freebie came and I've got them all picked out. I'm completely redoing the color scheme to match my grandmother. She successfully finished all of her treatments without one single adverse reaction, except for a sunburn type rash on the radiation site. No nausea, no dizziness, nothing. She did great and we're all very glad of that. I've gotten started on my Christmas stitching way too late and I'm trying to rush through 4 things in 3 weeks. Yikes!

On Tuesday I leave for New York!!!!! Our Mermaid tickets however, are up in the air at this point. The stagehands are on strike. They're supposed to sit back down and talk on Sunday, and I dearly hope they come to a resolution. I've been ready to see this show for nearly 2 years, since I first found out about it.

Come January I shall attempt to be a better stitchy blogger. I do have another blog that you can get to from my profile where I'm chronicling my life as a writer. Feel free to stop by there as well.

And one more thing. I've started selling hand-painted tote bags on Etsy. My store is called Ivy Cottage. Please stop by and take a look.

HAED SAL weekend

This past weekend was the HAED SAL Challenge weekend. Yeah, that's a mouthful. It gets better though. This is KMB ACEO QS by Tate that I stitch on during the HAED SAL weekend. Take that, Army!

That translates to Kimono Butterflies Mermaid ACEO by Nadia Tate. I adore it. Didn't get a whole lot of stitching time this weekend because I had other things I needed to do, but I'm still very pleased with the amount of progress I made. I need to do a confetti session next month. Ugh!

I survived my first day completely intact. And I am exhausted! But it's a good kind of exhausted, one that I can live with. I discovered, much to my surprise, that I get an hour for lunch when I'm working an 8 hour shift. Thought it would just be 30 minutes.

So, I'm going to become a lunch knitter. None of my stitching projects are conducive to pulling out for 30 minutes at a time. So I'm going to get my sock finished, and then I can finally let myself order the yarn and pattern for the Ivy Trellis stole.

I just LOVE the pattern, and I've gushed about it before I think. I love ivy. I mean I really love ivy, my dishes for my kitchen are th Corelle ivy dishes. The yarn I'm using is Knit Picks Palette Iris Heather. It is a lace pattern, but done with fingering weight yarn instead of lace weight. Since I love the look of knitted lace and want to learn how to do it, I figured a heavier weight lace project would be a good place to start. And I can use the leftovers from my pair of socks to practice the new stitches. See, I do have a plan!