Mishra - 30% done

I know that it has been forever since I've posted, alas, that doesn't mean that I haven't been stitching.  The past year  and five months have been crazy.  It sort of went like this...fine...vacation..fine...What the?!?!..surviving...good...great...sad...great.  And tah-dah, here we are.

I will say that the only thing that got me through most of it was stitching.  Honestly, the only thing I remember from June, July and August was stitching.  I'm sort of amazed that I managed to keep my job during all of that.  But, I digress.  No one wants to hear about all that, they want to know what happened with Mishra.  So here he is.  I've completed nine pages and have begun working on the tenth.  Funny thing, the seventh page took exactly 30 days.  The eighth and ninth....119 days.What the what???  Don't ask me I have no idea what happened.  I'm hoping the tenth page is closer to 30 than 119.  I still have hopes of getting the fifteenth page done by the end of the year.  I will then be halfway through the design.  A girl can hope.  Here is a picture of Mishra now.  He has the cutest little button nose.  Since I have been terrible about updating my blog, let alone two blogs.  I will now be putting Mishra updates on my personal site only.  If you are interested in watching him grow, please stop by and follow me at http://krisstitches.blogspot.com/

And now, for what you've all been waiting for.....

Umbrella Sky March Progress

Page 2 is about 3/4 done, I am so anxious to see it finished!!!

The Maiden

Return to the Land of HAED

 2015 has been shaping up to be a challenging year, and it was in this theme that I started Umbrella Sky by Dahlig. Here is page one completed, stitched on 25ct Lugana "fairy dust" 3 strands of DMC floss over one tent stitch.

The photos are horribly washed out unfortunately, the red is really so VIBRANT in person!

Any hints on how to secure the thread on confetti heavy areas where there may be only one or two stitches far apart? I cannot bury my thread like I would normally do for a full stitch and the only solution I could think of was to knot the thread (I do worry about the bulk in the back of the fabric only in these areas...) The Maiden

Mishra February Update

Mishra has been getting lots of love so far this year and I have just about 3 pages complete.  I am well on my way to my goal of having 15 of the 30 pages done by December 31st of this year.

Here is Mishra's January status:

And here he is now at almost 3 pages complete.

 I've realized I can get 3 pages across in my q-snap so I'm going to go back and do the third page on the bottom and then work my way up 3 pages at a time.  I'm very excited to get this project moving along.

Happy stitching everyone!

Mishra Progress

Well I've decided that 2014 is the year that I get at least halfway on Mishra.  I would like to have fifteen of the thirty pages in the pattern completed as of December 31, 2014.  I'm allowing myself a three week rotation.  Two weeks are spent entirely on Mishra and the third is for any of the million other projects that I have started or want to start.  I'm hoping that this rotation will help me meet my goal.

Here is what Mishra will look like when finished.

Here is a view of Mishra as he stands today.  I currently have two and half pages finished.

Happy stitching everyone!
















Happy stitching!

Mishra seeing some love and finally has more than two stripes.

I  was distracted for six months working on my sister's wedding present.  Then I needed a break.  Finally, I started stitching again and have decided that Mishra would be my focus piece with several non-HAED pieces being on the sidelines for distraction and to give me a break from the over one on 28ct fabric.

The last time Mishra made an appearance, he looked like this.

Now, my sweet boy looks like this!!!!!  Drum roll please....

Ok, ok, so maybe not the most progress ever but one page is complete, a second is about halfway finished and a third is about a quarter done.   He is stitching up faster than expected and I'm liking that.  I'm giving myself 18 months (approximately February 2015) to finish him but I'm hoping to have him done way sooner than that.  Fingers crossed.

Happy Stitching All!

More stashing!

With so many HAED sales what else is a girl to do?

 

 Adrift

 Cinderella

fallen.

Two of these were gifted to me from a girl at work who I just taught to stitch as a thank you. In under 4 weeks she has jumped from Mirabilia's to HEADs! The Maiden



A year

Amazing that I hadn't touched Catch Me in about a year but then I started thinking about which HAED  I could actually see a finish on and which HAED called to me it was a resounding Catch Me!!!! So here she is older pics first then the progress I made in the last 2 days!!!! 

Mishra has two...yes 2 stripes!!

I had been concentrating on Mishra to get the first page finished and for the most part it is with the exception of about 50,000 white stitches.  I've put it down until I decide if I want to go ahead and do the white stitches now or wait until I finish the whole row of pages and do the white all at once.  Anyone have any suggestions?  Here's little Mishra.

2014 HAED challenge

No that is not a typo, Kris and I are actually planning a HAED Challenge for 2014! This is what happens when you drink Muscato and stitch! Below are the two HAEDs we will be stitching that year, so excited!





She does not know it yet, but I just bought us both patterns! Too excited!

Mishra...eventually you'll get more than one stripe

Here is my HAED Mishra. Poor Mishra has had a rough go of it. I started him with full crosses with 1 over 1 on 25ct. Then I was introduced to tenting and I decided to frog all of the stitches and start over with half crosses with 3 over 1 on 25ct. Then I decided that 3 over 1 was too bulky on the back and that I didn't like it so I decided to start over again. This time I did 2 over 1 on 28ct and so far I'm liking it a whole lot better. So, in pictures we started with this:

Went to this:

Was introduced to tenting and frogged all of the above and arrived at this point (I don't know why it's rotated):

Hated 3 over 1 on 25ct and started over yet again with 2 over 1 on 28ct and after a couple of hours stitching have ended up here:

I like the 2 over 1 on 28ct much better and am going to stay here for this and all future HAEDs.

A Ravenscroft start

I have another start LR Queen of Hearts..... the minute I saw this HAED I knew it had to be mine and I needed to start it immediately. As a matter of fact my heart skipped a few beats when the owner of my LNS handed her to me. I mean I really started hyperventilating.... It was kitted and started that night. And since I'm tenting 2 over 1 on 25ct the first page took me 13 days..... I really need to get back to it.......
Juls

She called

So I had to answer her call. I picked up Catch Me by Selina Fenech © HAED last Saturday and finished page 4 today and started page 5. So exciting. By page 7 I should hit the building. Here she is....... As you may not know a quirk of mine is name my projects. She was Charlotte but she screamed Olivia at me this last Saturday so meet Olivia

Long time - Captive©Marta Dahlig

Well this is bizarre but here I am posting. It seems Captive was tired of being ignored so she used all of her might screamed rather loudly and I had to take notice. So I'm posting her picture as she has requested and she will be out for a month or so .... Now if Catch Me doesn't notice I'll be good

Patient Pretty

My HAEDs have sat neglected as I desperately try to whittle down my WIPs. Pretty from Nene Thomas has seen a little progress...

You can see the start of skin! This page is confetti city, I may need to jump to another just to get back into it! The Maiden.

A Fragile Beauty

I have a HAED bucket list of sorts and one of the artists that always stitches up better than the image is Linda Ravenscroft. I started A fragile Beauty in 2011 during my tent stitching frenzy, and this is the only piece I liked the look of (and will continue tenting). Below is the original...


And here is my progress, a little over a page. Stitched on 28ct lugana, 2 threads over one tent.

The Maiden.

too long....simply pictures...

New Bear of a Start

I purchased this chart ("Love" by Dahlig) within an hour after it's release, and I may have lost my mind but by the end of the day I had all the DMCs and fabric ordered!  Fabric was an issue for this one, I decided on full crosses but was not happy with the way DMC 310 (black) covered on 25ct.  I considered 22ct lugana with 2 strands of DMC, but that was too large. There was 28ct with one strand, but I feared that was small (insert my Goldilocks moment).  I finally decided on 25ct lugana antique white with black silk.  Of course my stitching store was out, and I had to wait for an entire week before starting!

I have now had the project for 1 week and am 2,000 stitches in (all black and I love the coverage).  I will post an update once an image starts to emerge. 

DMC has a grain! Seriously?

I discovered on the HAED Bulletin Board (BB) that our beloved DMC floss has a grain.  That's right, stitching against the grain can cause your crosses to appear less shiny, to fuzz, or even to lay differently.  "To find the grain direction, cut a length of floss, loop the thread over so both the cut ends lie next to each other.  Holding the cut lengths close together, about 1/2" from the tips, use one finger of your free hand to gently tap the cut ends.  Watch carefully - the end that balloons most is the end that should be threaded through your needle."  Colette (taken from the HAED BB)


Funny, I always ignored ends that ballooned and threaded the oposite side! The Maiden

Here I am

First let me say thank you to The Maiden for creating and inviting me to this blog!!! What fun we will have !!!!!
My name is Juls and I have always been fascinated by HAED's!!!! Now its an all out obsession......so let me introduce my two works.......

First is Catch Me....

and my progress....

the first page is almost done!!!!! There is large blocks of color on this one...... and I am so loving her!!!!! She has lovingly been named Charlotte.....it just seemed to fit!!!!

Next is Tower of Stoneywood

...... and its progress  .... lots of confetti stitching but loving it tooo!!!!

All told I have 12-13 in my stash with another on the way  which will be started very soon.....thread gathering will soon begin in earnest!!!!!

Again thanks to The Maiden !!!!!!