July Smalls

I've been trying off and on all day to get this post up from my laptop and finally gave up in disgust. I'm posting from my tablet now. On July 1 we celebrated Canada Day and that got me into the mood to stitch a couple more of Jeannette Douglas' Patriotic Snippets. I received the floss I was waiting on for last month's snippet, #5, and started by finishing it off.

It's hard to see the shine from the metallic floss but it's there. It's been years since I've used any kind of metallic floss or blending filament. I'm not a huge fan of it but it served its purpose in this piece to demonstrate the Northern Lights.

I'm not committed to stitching these in any particular order so the next start was snippet #2.

I was really motivated because I went ahead and did the final finishing of each of these! Anyone who knows me knows that I'm not fond of finishing and tend to put it off but I've had a lot of time on my hands lately so here are the results.

After seeing how well they turned out I pulled out my Canada 150, another Jeannette Douglas Design, that I stitched up last year and completed the final finishing on it as well.

I'm so pleased with how they all turned out. I was able to display them with some of my previous patriotics, just in time for the holiday.

The last snippet stitched this month #12, I finished up last week.

I'll wait until I've stitched a few more before I do any more pillows.

I've been concentrating on larger projects this year and when I need a break these are a great diversion. They stitch up quickly and I've feel like I'm making progress. 

The weather here has been so hot and humid. In fact Ottawa broke a record for the hottest July ever! When the humidity gets bad I spend most of my time indoors. I'm really hoping August cools down some. If it does perhaps I'll get in the mood for some autumn smalls!

June Smalls

Six months into the year and this is only my second posting for the Smalls SAL. This year has turned out to be the year of the larger projects. Understandably they help pass the time more during this quarantine plus I have some large projects that have been on my wishlist for some time. However I couldn't resist stitching up a little Canada design for the upcoming Canada Day on July 1.

This particular design is one of Jeannette Douglas' Patriotic Snippets, specifically #5. I had hoped it would be completely finished by now but I had none of the required Petite Treasure Bread, Kreinik Blending Filament and none of the required Threadworx floss. I couldn't find them locally which means that I have to wait for them to arrive from the US before I can finish this.

The missing threads will fill in the outline on the left which is meant to be an interpretation of the northern lights. There are 12 of these sweet little snippets to stitch. They were released two to a package every other month throughout 2017 in celebration of Canada's 150th birthday. I hope to do several more of them if not all but it probably won't happen this year. Too many other things are wanting attention. I'll post a pic of the final finish on this one as soon as I can get it stitched up. Floss orders have generally been taking anywhere from 3-5 wks to arrive!

I hope you are all well and getting lots of x's crossed!

July WIPocalypse

Summer is here and the living is easy! Would you believe I didn't touch any of my cross stitch until mid month? Even then I only worked on small projects until this last week. My small finish can be seen on my previous post. The weather this spring was so lousy that as soon as better weather arrived we took advantage of it. However now the sticky humidity has arrived which forced us indoors and out came my stitching.

I've been concentrating on The Scarlett House Mary Ann Farmer this past week. I made significant progress from my last post.

Before: 

After:

The lettering on the centre portion is stitched over one and stitched up very quickly. I actually enjoy over one stitching and I had just finished working on a name tree which used the over one.

I almost forgot to show you the finish I had right at the beginning of July. It wasn't finished in time for Canada Day this year but I'll have it ready to go for next year. As you'll see it was designed for Canada's 150th birthday celebration two years ago so I'm a little late to the party, lol! Better late than never! This is Canada 150, designed by Jeannette Douglas.

That's it for this month. I hope you're not melting the way we have the past few days. More reasonable temperatures are called for later in the week. Lots of visits for us this coming month including a stitching get together. I can't wait!