more mushrooms!

Keeping up with the Owlforest SAL! Well, almost, since a new part was released yesterday and I just grabbed it a few minutes ago. But here's everything so far!

I haven't added the borders or title yet because I'm not sure I like them without seeing the completed pattern. The newest part has some flowers coming right out into the border, so I'm glad it's not just a repeating zigzag along the right and left. The top border is very cute with tiny mushrooms but my fabric would need to be adjusted in the qsnap before I can add it, so I'll wait until I completely run out of room for stitching new parts before moving it.

I love this pattern! It's so cute. :3

Wisteria - finish!

I finished Wisteria last week! She had a bit of metallic backstitching for the fancy curly bits (I changed from purple to green to make them vines) and a LOAD of different beads.

I didn't have most of the beads that the chart called for, so I subbed in similar ones from my stash. I was originally going to skip all the size 6 beads as those tend to end up leaning over even when stitched on very tightly, but I ended up liking the variety of sizes and put a few in to keep it interesting. :)

Here she is, all shiny and ready to display!

I'm still a little iffy on the reddish spots in her wings, but it seems to work well with the fabric being mostly pink, so I won't mess with it. :)

Violet Patch Mandala - progress

This poor thing hasn't been shown on my blog since November 2021! To be fair, I haven't made much progress but there's definitely enough to show.

Last time I only had the center and a bit of the lower left corner. I've added a lot more detail to the center (finally got all those little backstitched herbs done!), added the outer layer of the lower left corner, and did most of an orchid panel! There are still lots of small details to add and I'll be making sure to fully complete each section before moving on. Learned my lesson from Mushroom and Fern, haha. :p

And now some details of the (upside down) orchid. The small leaves arching above and around the orchid are pretty much exactly the same as the ones on Mushroom and Fern. I still don't like them but at least I know how to stitch them so I'm reasonably happy with how they look!

The lower left corner, which needs a lot more over one orchid stitching but is otherwise pretty close to being complete. I think...

And finally, the center in more detail. I think this is done except for the over one vines and flowers, which are honestly more fun than those tiny herbs/grass on the previous layer! Over one doesn't really bother me, even on black, it's just a lot of concentration so I have to be in the right mindset for it.

As always, the pictures don't do this justice at all. It's especially hard to get good pictures of black fabric without the thread colors looking too bright or washed out, which is unfortunately what has happened here. The fabric doesn't show all the weird variance in color in real life, and the thread colors have more contrast with each other. I know it looks kind of like a blob of pale colors but they're richer and more distinct in person.

This isn't a priority project for me right now but I do make slow progress on it when the mood strikes, and I enjoy working on it, so hopefully it won't be almost three years before the NEXT update! :3

progress and goals

It's been a while since I posted about goals so why not? :)

This is my old goals list, but with any completed projects removed because... they're done!

- Amethyste Band Sampler (iStitch Designs) - finish in 2024
- Chinese Garden Mandala (Chatelaine) - finish in 2024
- Magic Potions Temperature SAL (Teeny Weeny X Stitch) - finish in 2024
- Rosarium (Chatelaine) - ???
- Violet Patch Mandala (Chatelaine) - ???
- Wisteria (Nora Corbett) - finish in Q1

Even taking out the completed projects, this is so ambitious! I don't think I'll finish any of the first three this year unless I get a serious move on. Honestly I'm not super interested in the temperature SAL anymore, and Chinese Garden needs a qsnap adjustment before I can make any serious progress. I was also having an issue with a flower color not showing up on my fabric so there's going to be some frogging involved, which always dampens my enthusiasm a bit.

Okay, let's make a new goal list and add some new projects too. :)
New additions since the start of the year are in blue.
Future new starts are in pink.

- Amethyste Band Sampler (iStitch Designs) - complete half in 2024
- Chinese Garden Mandala (Chatelaine) - finish one side in 2024
- Full Moon Castle II - started April, to finish in 2024
- Luna (Nora Corbett) - finish in 2024
- Magic Potions Temperature SAL (Teeny Weeny X Stitch) - resting
- Mushroom SAL (Owlforest Embroidery) - started June, to finish in 2024
- Queen of Hearts (Prairie Moon) - finish in 2024
- Rosarium (Chatelaine) - progress as I feel like it
- Spring Lock (Mill Hill) - finish in 2024
- Violet Patch Mandala (Chatelaine) - progress as I feel like it
- Wisteria (Nora Corbett) - next finish

Possibly too many projects, at least for me, but I won't start anything until Wisteria is done, and new starts will be one at a time. I'll probably do Queen of Hearts, then Spring Lock, and then Luna. I don't have any illusions of having Luna done in time for Halloween, I just want to stitch her because she's cute!

And to keep this post from being incredibly boring, here are model pics of the three new starts. :)

Next time should be Wisteria progress or (hopefully!) a finish.

Or maybe I should post some progress pics of Violet Patch Mandala, because I haven't done that in an eternity and there's a lot more done than I've shown. Oops.

Wisteria progress

Quick post to show where Wisteria is now. :)

August 7, after frogging. At this point I'd caught back up to where I was before frogging her dress.

August 18, after lots of attention! The colors are more accurate in this picture, too. I'm very happy with how the purples look on the reddish background.

That's all for now. :)

Snowy Winter - finish!

Snowy Winter by Owlforest Embroidery ended up being my next finish as planned. :) I completed this back on July 20 so I'm not quite a full month late posting this!

The colors are pretty accurate in this photo.

And a closer look at the center portion, which has some specialty stitches. Colors are really off here but my camera didn't want to cooperate once I started zooming in.

For some reason the chain stitch was a lot easier than I expected. I have a terrible time with lazy daisies collapsing when I add the anchoring stitch, but the chain stitch doesn't have that problem. Until the very last stitch, which is just a lazy daisy, haha. Luckily the thread didn't pop through to the back this time.

Next up is Wisteria. I did end up frogging her entire dress and restitching in the charted colors, and I've made a HUGE amount of progress. Like "almost done" amounts of progress. The original colors are very pretty and blend well together. Letting go of my desire to make her the right color and fix the shapes of the flowers has helped a ton. I'll just accept her as a generic flower fairy and enjoy her as is. :)

Pictures next time, though!

a couple of pics

Since last post, I've been working on the Owlforest mushroom SAL and their Snowy Winter kit. I'm creeping up on the finish line for Snowy Winter, so I'm going to make that my focus for this month.

Here's the mushroom SAL, all caught up through part five, minus the border which I'm not adding. I think part six will be out tomorrow, so I'll be back on that for the weekend to stay on track.

And here's Snowy Winter, with lots added to the top and top right since last post:

Unfortunately that top right corner has a lot of paler dye areas, and the motif there has a lot of white feathery patterns, so it blends in a lot. I'm trying to be chill about it but I really wish I'd picked something a tiny bit darker. It does stand out more in natural light (versus super bright stitching light, which is what I use for pictures) so I know it will be fine on display. It's just hard to chill about it when I always work on it under a strong light that makes the white disappear into the fabric.

Hopefully next time will be a finish post for this one! :)