New Year Planning

So I'm a little behind with my new year's greeting - I hope everyone is off to a good start in 2018!  It has been brutally cold here, and I head back to work tomorrow.  In the meantime, I've done a bit of thinking about my stitching and crafting goals, and I think this is as good a time as any to share.

1) I've enjoyed the Smalls SAL for the past 3 years, and see no reason not to continue participating.  I like the small finishes, and I've found great inspiration for ornaments and other non-traditional finishing ideas!
2) I think it might be time to join the WIPocalypse again.  I did it years ago, and then completely fell off the wagon...  I've been slowly collecting projects from various nooks and crannies, and will document them in detail at the first check-in next week.
3) I've been on Facebook for years now, but have finally jumped onto the Instagram craze as well.  You can find me there under the username ekfrenchknots.  I must admit, it is fun to quickly upload a picture there and browse everyone else's things!
4) I did cave and make one new start for the year - Marbek/Serendipity's "Seaside Angel."  Here she is, on 32-ct. "Sky, Sea, Sand" fabric from Sunny Dyes.

I always start at the middle, so this little green blob is the bit of gown under/to the right of her left hand.  No telling how long progress on this one will take.

As I always enjoy saying, may your year be floss-filled and frog-free!

Holiday Thoughts

Here we are, almost half-way through December, and my tree still looks like a naked bottle brush standing in the corner of the living room.  Sigh.  I'm not a Grinch by any means, and I love the Christmas season, but sometimes the work that goes into being festive can seem so overwhelming.... I'm also working on making Christmas for my 4 year old NOT about getting tons of gifts.  We're trying to plan fun family stuff, and keeping gift requests to a minimum!

We had family portraits done last month, so here is a little pic of my favorite elf.

(She was SO excited to get decked out in Christmas gear.  LOL)

So what have been doing with all my time spent not decorating or shopping?  I'm really not sure!  The Elf and I have done some little crafty things - mostly painting and coloring (her choice).  Of course there is work, and the usual cooking and cleaning.  Oh, and we've put our house on the market, so I'm often trying to imagine which pile of clutter might be the most offensive to a potential buyer...although the market isn't really moving much at this time of year here, so I'm not stressing that stuff TOO much (probably not enough!).  And I've been thinking about my stitching goals for 2015 - I don't think I even set any goals for this year...

GOALS FOR 2015 (in no particular order):

•  join Heather's 2015 Smalls SAL
• work on the long-neglected Fairy Tale Towne (perhaps as part of the Smalls SAL!)
• pick and stitch something primitive/sampler-style to hang next to the Forget-Me-Not Sampler bulletin board.  Current front-runner - Homespun Elegance's "Olde Shaker Tune")
• stitch Brightneedle's "Ezmerelda's House"

I think that is enough for now.  If we end up selling our house and buying a new one, packing and moving could take up a good chunk of my year!!

For now I'll go back to working on that cute little chubby Santa Claus design I posted last week.  Happy Holiday Stitching to you all!

First Stitches of 2014

Looking back, I think I did pretty well stitching in 2013.  Most of my finishes were relatively small, but that's okay!
For 2014, my first goal is to finish that danged Labyrinth.  It shouldn't take too long, really...  After that, I still have a couple larger pieces in my WIP bin, including the Dark Sorceress and my Fairy Tale Towne.  I also joined Zeb's Just Nan SAL, and have kitted up 5 or 6 of Nan's smaller patterns.  And, because it isn't a new year without a new start, tonight I put in a few stitches on a small Blackbird Designs pattern called the Daring to Begin Sampler.  I was feeling ambitious and decided to stitch it over-one on 28-ct...

Bring on 2012!

So, 22 hours into the new year and I already have a finish!  But it is an exchange piece, so I can't share quite yet.  And since it WAS started in 2011, I think it is a WIPocalypse piece as well.  LOL

Goals for 2012:
- finish Cross-Eyed Kat's Labyrinth.
- finish a stocking for my daughter.  (After reading Vonna's post a while back about waiting until her children were old enough to pick their own stocking design, I hemmed and hawwed a bit over whether or not to do this....but my mom embroidered stockings for our family when I was very small, and I always love seeing that stocking now.  It reminds me of our family Christmases!  So I'm hoping what I create for Maura will hold the same kind of memories for her years from now.)
- stitch and finish my daughter's annual ornament.
- participate in Measi's WIPocalypse - my WIPocalypse tab has updated pics of most of my current pieces in that rotation - and the 2012 TUSAL.

I think that's enough for now.  I think I did pretty well this year, 19 finishes and all, and it is fun to stitch without too many hard and fast "goals" looming!  I'm planning to go to Celebrations in NH in April, so there has to be room in the schedule for some fun there....  And I'd also like to send Jill Rensel some more pieces for framing, namely that sand castle I finished last week and Just Nan's Mermaid Heart.  Last week I decided to spoil myself and dropped off a piece for framing at Hobby Lobby.  I've had bad luck with chain stores and framing in the past (booooo, Michaels), so I'm trying to stay optimistic.  Another lady was showing off a piece Hobby Lobby had framed for her at my LNS before Christmas, and it looked pretty good.  So I figured, what the heck, and picked a smallish piece (Rosewood Manor's Happiness Is sampler) to give them a try.  Pics will come when it is done!