Progress and Running Amok

Borders added, seams pressed and ready to quilt.

Ok, so I didn't get the quilt finished.   What!?   No surprise to me......I usually do bite off more than I can chew.    I was disappointed that we stopped working last weekend. In retrospect, it was the best thing to do......moving forward would have just lead to workmanship that was less then would find a place within my range of acceptable.    I have my quilt sandwich ready to stitch but I have learned (as can be verified by the recent $168 machine repair bill) that I need someone to help me pull the quilt top through the machine to keep the quilting straight and even and prevent the heavy drag on the machine.   This will prevent me from bending the entire shaft of the presser foot....again.   And I have found out from Roxanna's son, his grandmother's full name and I think I will stitch a label with her name to add to the back.

Going to pack this up and go to Philly next weekend for a
sew-a-thon with my daughter to finish this up.

Yesterday, at my guild meeting, we had a speaker who instructed us in pinning rather than lacing.  Pretty easy and I think this could quickly become my preference.    She provided instruction, pre-cut mat board, pins and the frames.  We provided a stitch design of 5 x 7.

I am not really in love with this frame but I dilly dallied and the selection was slim but the time I got to browsing through the collection of frames she brought.


Also, not much on my Random Thoughts.....but progress all the same.  I am still confident I will be finished the main body before retreat.  I will get the moral support I need to cut the pull the treads for the border around the design and to be able to finish the stitching by the end of the year.   This is one of my challenge projects for 2016 so that is my incentive.

Not much cross stitching because I needed to turn my attention to the finishing of Pinning to Stitch.   My EGA guild meet for the first time this season and we were all to bring in our completed stitch-a-long to share.   Yikes!    This meant I'd better assemble the needle book and the 'envelope' for all the pieces.





It is always fun to see how other stitcher's pieces turn out.   We all work on the same pattern but the outcomes can be very different.    Buttons or charms added, different finishing techniques, etc.
















And as if didn't rant about how I don't jump from project to project......I starting something new.
#1. I have no willpower
#2. I can justify just about anything.

This is  from Pat Thode at Heartstrings.    I need a take along project.....and the fabric count is 18 (stitched over two) is easy to stitch on and see even in bad light.    And I can blame Diane H. who showed us her finish and got us all smitten!

And I am frogging already.   I use floss bags to store my floss on a ring in my stitching bag.   Seems I put 3774 in the bag for 3773 and vice versa.   Needless to say, my witch looks like she have a tan and had the white zinc oxide on her nose to protect it from burning.   She may not look bad above, mid-frogging, but compared to my stitching friends and their facial color mine  was really off.......frog frog frog and restitching in my future.





Happy Stitching all and thanks for stopping by......