October stitching

 October was a great stitchy month.  I did 21,573 stitches on 10 projects and stitched 28/31 days.  I had one new start.

My new start was The Awakening. This was a limited edition and part of the solo collection,  by Heaven and Earth Designs. 

My focus piece Eyemagination gets 1000 stitches every weekend

My second focus is stitched after my main focus on the weekend and after 500 is done on Monday and Tuesday spins.  This is Fairytale  the haed sal 2026

Im aiming for 6 pages for this,  so I can get the other charts in the SAL.  I should reach this goal in November,  once done I will change the focus piece and this will go into a weekday spin rotation.

From November I am going to do a second focus piece, which i have the option of changing out whenever I feel like it.  My second focus will be worked on after 500 have been stitched on the spin on the tiny decisions wheel on Wednesday to Friday.    This will be Mini At The Steps as I am quite close to a finish on this.

I have 2 sets of projects on the wheel.  One wheel is for projects i want to get 1000 stitches in monthly. I'll keep this at 5 projects. The other wheel just want some progress,  but I don't mind how much or little is done.

The 1000 wheel, in addition to steps and Fairytale are Pandemic

Caricature 

And Cat Nap

The other wheel has The awakening,  and also 4 of bees

Alice and the Rabbit

And Gertrude 

September update stitching and knitting fo

 In September I worked on 8 projects and put in 18563 stitches.  Stitching on 28 out of 30 days.  I also had a knitting finish.

My knitting finish was the Stockholm V neck vest, pattern by Petite Knits.  It's my second Stockholm vest.  This will be another wardrobe staple 

My stitching focus for a 6 page finish was Fairytale.  I got in 8058 stitches and it is 42%. I have less than 7000 stitches left to reach the 6 page goal.

 My main focus was Ophelia.   I was waiting for a special chart to be charted by HAED which has now taken over Ophelia.   I've also decided to UFO Ophelia for now. I feel she is simply too big, now that my special chart has arrived.  I want to limit the number of large pieces I have.   Before I came to that decision I put in 1094 stitches which takes her to 12891 stitches and 5%. I don't have an updated photo.

My new main focus is exciting.  Michele at Heaven and Earth Designs offered Eyemagination charts.  You use Chatgpt and take a photo of your eye, use Chatgpt to select just the iris and create a nature chart using colours from your iris.   I decided to use my iris and put in pictures of my pets, past and present set in a new zealand background.

At the top is my current dog,Gracie.  To the left is Sandy, the right is Maxie and at the bottom is Sammy.  There is a lovely tui on the bottom left.

I made a start on this.  It now has 4595 stitches out of 202,500 and is at 2%.

I worked on pandemic.  This was my focus on a row finish, it got 1756 stitches at 9.6%

Caricature got 1033 stitches and is at 28%

Cat Nap got 1016 stitches and is at 15%

at the steps got 511 stitches and is at 85%

When i put Ophelia into time out, I took Gertruce out of time out,  this one is slow going as is very confetti heavy.  She got 500 stitches and is at 23%

I'm playing my version of a stitchy game.   A lot of flosstubers are playing Great British Bake off game,  where projects are assigned to a contestant and if someone wins a challenge they get a certain number of stitches.  I like the way I work on my projects, with focuses and wheel spins so that doesnt work for me.  Instead I assign projects I would like to start to players in reality competitions.    The winner of the competition will have their assigned project as a new start.  Ive just started playing with Traitors and Genius.   

This month Markup RXP did a major upgrade.   It is so much better that I have now transferred all of my wips except at the steps, across to it.  The guide bars make it so much easier to concentrate on an area, particularly my Long Dogs.  Also the symbol shows if you already have a parked thread, so saves time searching if its not there.

Let's see what next month has in store.

August update, nearly 20k stitches and knitting FO

 I was 14 stitches short of doing 20,000 stitches in August.   I did 19,986 stitches, worked on 7 projects and stitched 27 out of 31 days.

My main focus was Fairytale for the HAED SAL.  I want 6 pages by the end of the year, so I can get all the charts in this years SAl.   I did 6548 stitches and am now at 33.12%. I've nearly finished the 4th page.

At the steps was another focus piece and got 5388 stitches to take it to 84.17%

A focus for a row finished was Lady Ophelia Verre.   She got 2624 stitches and is at 4.19%

Gracie and me got 2054 stitches.  It was also a focus for a row finish, which it got.  I put in 2054 stitches. It is now at 26.22%

Cat Nap got 1985 stitches and is now 13.97%

Pandemic got 863 stitches and is at 7%

I have decided to put Gertrude away for now.   I want to work on other projects more.  She still got 524 stitches and is 22%

I also finished a pair of socks

 

July update. 3 page finishes and 1 project bag. Rotation plans

 In July I put in 16058 stitches on 7 projects.  I stitched 26 out of 31 days. I also had page finishes on Mini At the steps,  Fairytale and Cat Nap 

Ophelia had 4942 stitches and a page finish.

Fairytale got 3619 stitches and I finished page 3.

Cat Nap got 2809 stitches and I finished page 3

At the steps got 1563 stitches .  

Pandemic got 1051 stitches

Gertrude got 1038 stitches 

Caricature got 1036 stitches

I also made another project bag. 

I've decided I really want to finish 6 pages on Fairytale for the HAED sal so I can get the other SAL charts.  There are at least 2, maybe 3, I'd like to do.

Im going to adapt Anne, the Max colour stitchers rotation.   So until Fairytale is finished, it will be my focus piece.  I will do 1000 stitches each weekend, and in the evenings do 125 stitched.  I should be able to get the remaining 3 pages i need, finished by October.

Once Fairytale is done, I want to make At the Steps a focus, so will do the same for that.

When Steps is finished, I will make Ophelia my ongoing stitch to do 1000 per weekend.  I will make another piece a focus for evening stitches.   That can be flexible, so can change weekly, monthly or whenever I wish.  So I could do the largest piece, oldest wip, closest to a finish, or needing a page finish.

In addition my other wips are on a decision wheel.  I will do 500 stitches on each. If I finish in the day, then I will swap to my evening focus piece.

June Update. Knitting finish , 2 prpject bags and cross stitch start

 In June I worked on 8 cross stitch projects, including one new start.  I also had a knitting finish and made 2 crossstitch project bags.

I total I put in 16071 stitches.  

Alices Rabbit got 801 stitches 

 

Cat nap got 1216 stitches 

Caricature got 2017 stitches 

Gertrude got 1489 stitches 

 Pandemic got 820 stitches

Four of bees got 1381 stitches 

Mini at the steps is my focus piece and got 4016 stitches

My new start is Lady Ophelia Verre which was a Limited Edition that was only available from HAED for a very short time,   artwork by DGB creations.

This is my progress. 4231 stitches 

I also bought some new charts.  HAED had a short re release of some of their limited edition pieces.  I bought 3 minis

Chiquita

The awakening 

Mythical mermaid 

Right now HAED are having a 50% off sale and I bought this huge piece. The Trident and the Tempest. It is around 330,000 stitches.

I also made 2 project bags

 I had a knitting finish. This is the Ranunculus sweater and is the fourth Ranunculus I've made

Plans going forward have changed.  As ive added 1 large piece and want to start Trident as well that will be 2 very big pieces that I want to see some progress on.

 So each month I will do ;

Ophelia.  Half a page

trident.     Half a page

After they are done, the others are on a wheel and when spun I will do half a page.

However I want a focus for a finish piece,  so that will be entered twice on the wheel.  As cat nap is twice the size of the others that will also have 2 entries on the wheel.  My focus for a finish piece is Mini At the steps.  I have another 16640 stitches until finished.  Those that aren't haeds will get around 3500 to 4000 stitches. 

Once all the wheel spins are complete I can start another project, but keep to mini size.