Peppermint Purple (Green) - Happy Dance!!

Today the last block (week 52) was released on Peppermint Purple Facebook Group.  I decided to complete this project before going back to SYOA tonight.

Peppermint Purple (Green) - weeks 44, 45 & 46

I’m finally all caught up again because I stitched 3 blocks (weeks) last night.

2021 Stitch-a-longs

I know this year is not over yet, but we stitchers like to start planning our projects for the new year early.  We need time to buy supplies and get things kitted before January 1.  Steward Cunningham (the person who designed the Harry Potter project I’ve been working on all year), has 2 new stitch-a-longs starting in January 2021.  He has posted the project size and thread needed on his website https://cunningcrossstitch.blogspot.com/2020/10/2021-stitchalong-briefings.html  for the 2 SALs listed below.  

The first one is Magic Kingdom SAL. There is no frame, so it will start on January 1.  After that, each pattern drops on the 1st of each month.  I’m not a Disney fan, but I will download the patterns in case I need to stitch them in the future for a friend or my sisters.

The second one is an Animal Crossing SAL.  There is a frame around this one, which will be released on November 15, 2020.  I am definitely participating in this one because it is my favourite video game.

Let me know if you are going to stitch either of these projects, I would love to follow along with your progress.

Peppermint Purple (Green) - weeks 38 & 39

I completed 2 more blocks, and only 2 more until I am caught up.

Week 38

Week 39

I thought I’d show everyone the whole project.

Peppermint Purple (Green) - weeks 35, 36 & 37

Trying to catchup on this SAL. This Wednesday they will release week 41. I should have lots of time to finish all 7 blocks by the end of the week. I stitched 3 yesterday, so only 3 more before Wednesday.

Week 35

Week 36

Week 37

Nonogram - Day 4

Here is my progress for day 4.  It looks like it says ... “Are you”.

Nonogram Cross Stitch SAL

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I have joined another cross stitch SAL.  I joined a Facebook group called Nerdstitchalong.  They just started a new SAL from July 1 to July 25.  The project is 50 x 50 stitches framed with full cross stitches.  Inside will be 25 boxes 10 x 10.  Each day she will post a nonogram puzzle to solve and then use this as the cross stitch pattern.  This is a mystery TV show, hopefully it isn’t a new show because I don’t have cable I just watch Netflix.  Most of the pattern will be words and the border, only box 18 and 23 will have a picture in it.  If you are interested in joining, or just to see what it is all about go to  https://www.facebook.com/groups/nerdstitchalong/. She has lots of other stitch alongs during the year.  This is the first time I’m participating because I love solving puzzles and this one intrigued me.  It took me a little while to understand how to solve a nonogram, but now I’m hooked.  You can try a sample at http://www.landofcrispy.com/nonogrammer/nonogram.html

I found a scrap piece of 28ct evenweave.  Mystery evenweave could be cream, antique white or ecru but it will work.  I have chosen 2 bright pinks and 2 different shades of blues.  Not sure which blue to use with the 2 bright pinks.  I’ll see as I go along.  We already have 2 blocks of the pattern to stitch.  I will start stitching tomorrow.

Let me know if you are participating so I can stop by and see your progress photos.

Peppermint Purple (Green) - week 12

Last night I stitched week 12 of the Peppermint Purple SAL.  I’m all caught up again until this Wednesday.  Here is a close up of the pattern.  I see a missing stitch and at least 3 wrong stitches.  Everyone complained that this one was really hard to stitch, I agree.  I’ll fix them before this week. 

Here are all 13 blocks so far.

Peppermint Purple (Green) - all caught up

Well I’m finally all caught up.  I stitched weeks 10 & 11 last night and went back to finish week 9 today.

I have decided to leave the light green (DMC 989) in the 2nd row.  Thank you everyone who left me messages about the different shades of green.  I like Rachel’s advice about alternating greens (DMC 988, 989, 988, 989), but I’m really worried about screwing up the pattern.  If you look at the border photo below you can see that it is broken up into 3 sections.  I think I will add a row of light green in each of the 3 sections to make it look symmetrical.  Hopefully I won’t screw up the pattern.

Section 1 - row 2
Section 2 - middle row

Section 3 - 2nd last row (opposite of the top section)

I could also do the long skinny rows (2 of them) in the light green as well.

Peppermint Purple (Green) - week 7, 8

Last night I completed week 7 & 8 and started week 9.  I stitch with a magnifying lamp, so I should see things more precise.  Well I noticed week 1 looked a little lighter colour, but thought it was because of the design and I’m stitching at night.  After stitching 3/4 of the second row, I realize that yes this green is definitely lighter than the top row.   Can you tell that there are two shades of green?  Maybe it’s not as noticeable in the photo compared to in real life.  I will stitch the third row with my original colour DMC 988.  I will decide after the the next row if I have to rip out row two.  I really hate to rip it out again, but once I’m caught up I’ll have the time to fix it.

Peppermint Purple (Green) - week 6

Last night I worked on Peppermint Purple 52 weeks SAL   I only did week 6.  I’m still behind by 5 weeks, but hope to catch up soon.

 

SYOA - Chapter 2 - Quidditch - update #4

Monday night I started working on a bludger and club.  There will be 2 of these because there are 2 beaters on each team and they each have a club and bludger to shoot at the other team.  The ball is almost done and I stitched the handle on the first club.

Last night, I finished the first bludger and club then started working on the quaffle.

Reminder of how my layout will look for Chapter 2.  I’m thinking of making a small change to the blue tower.  I saw that someone on the Facebook group change it so the towers are both facing the Quidditch field.  The checkered area on the towers is now on the inside facing the field the same as the green one.  Also, they don’t have the seating showing on the blue tower. 

This is my original layout with the tower facing sideways.  You can see the seating in the tower.  What do you think?  Should I leave the blue tower as it was originally designed below or change it as in the above example?  Everything else is the same on the 2 images.

SYOA - Chapter 2 - Quidditch - update #3

Last night I finished stitching the Hufflepuff uniform shirt.  I modified the shirt to a general Hufflepuff badger head and a small Hufflepuff house crest.  I used DMC Rayon black (1 strand) to do petit point stitches to create the badger's head and house crest.  I forgot how much fun the Rayon floss is to work with.  It is very shiny and slippery.  I'm also used to stitching over 2 on 28ct evenweave and the petit point is stitch 1 over 1.  It took me several nights to stitch this shirt, because I found it very hard to see the holes when stitching over 1 even with my magnifying lamp.  I'm so glad I didn't make any mistakes because I'm not sure if I could pull out the stitches without ripping the fabric.  Overall I'm very happy with the results.  It turned out better than I expected.
Here is the whole project so far.

Here is a close up of the shirt.

Let The People Choose

Coffee anyone?

I am excited again to be participating in the following SAL, which is hosted each month by Jo at Serendipitous Stitching.

I’m not a coffee drinker myself because I have to use so much sugar, milk or cream to kill the bitter taste.  But it's funny, I love to walk down the coffee aisle in the grocery store just to smell the coffee beans.  

This is the only coffee related cross stitch I have stitched over the years.  It is called Coffee is Magic by Dragon Dreams.

I do have one other coffee related chart in my stash because my close friend Lisa is a coffee lover so I bought this to do for her some time.  It is called Let’s Do Coffee by Ursula Michaels.

Peppermint Purple (Green) - weeks 1 & 2

I finished weeks 1 & 2 last night, so now I’m only 5 weeks behind.

Here is the half of the project so far.

Peppermint Purple (Green) - week 3

Last night I finished week 3.  This is week 10 of the SAL, so I‘m now only 7 weeks behind.  

SYOA - Chapter 2 - Quidditch - update #2

Here is my little progress from last night.  Not much accomplished because I started stitching late and my eyes were getting tired.

Tonight I will stitch on Peppermint Purple SAL.  We’ll see how much I get done.

SYOA - chapter 2 - Quidditch - update #1

I didn’t get much done last night, just a little start on the Hufflepuff shirt.  I hope to stitch some more tonight.

No progress on the Peppermint Purple SAL, but I did frog the variegated DMC floss, so it is ready to restitch when I have time.  Week 10 came out today, so now I’m only 8 weeks behind.  I’m not the only one who started late.  I noticed on the Facebook group that there are a lot of stitchers who are behind as well.

SYOA - Chapter 2 - Quidditch

If you are interested in these patterns, you can get them at http://cunningcrossstitch.blogspot.com/p/syoa-letters-from-hogwarts.html.   There is also a Facebook group which you can join to get alternative patterns, discuss the project and get inspired from seeing what other stitcher’s have changed in their project.

Chapter 2 was released on Sunday, March 1.  It is a smaller area at the bottom of the project.  I have decided not to stitch anything at the top or bottom until all 6 chapters have been released (which is every other month).  I will be stitching the castle (alternative pattern with more detail), the train and the 4 coloured swirls to represent the house colours.  Other than that, I have lots of time to find other items to add to the top and bottom and I won’t have to worry about duplicating any items.

This chapter is all about Quidditch, specifically what position you would play if you were on the Quidditch house team.  For those who are not Harry Potter fans, there are 4 positions on the team.  I don’t have a favourite position, so I took the online quiz and found out I’m a Chaser.  Here are the 4 patterns to choose from.

The Keeper is the goalie, who has to protect the 3 big rings.

The Chaser is the one who scores by getting this big red ball called the quarrel into one of the 3 rings.

The Beaters use a club to hit the brown balls (x2) at the other players to stop them from scoring a goal.

The Seeker (like Harry Potter) chases a very small ball called the golden snitch.  The seeker who catches the golden snitch gets 100 points for their team.

I really liked all 4 choices and wanted to combine them all into this space.  Other stitchers on the Facebook group are doing similar things.  Here is what I will be stitching.  I wanted 2 bludgers & clubs because that is what is used in the real game in the movies.  I also created a smaller golden snitch and redesigned the Hufflepuff shirt (with my own badger and crest).  As you can see this layout goes below the area and would interfere with the letters at the bottom (if I had stitched them already, which I have not).  I have lots of fabric to do whatever I choose to with the top and bottom.

Where the 3 pink dots are you get to stitch a shirt to go with the position.  All the shirts are the same but they have a letter to represent the position on the team.  Keeper (K on his shirt), Seeker (S), Chaser (C) and Beater (B).  I’m stitching the Hufflepuff shirt because in Chapter 1 I chose Hufflepuff as my house.  I guess if you wanted to represent all 4 houses in the project you could choose a different house shirt for this chapter.

Here are 6 shirt designs I came up with after looking at all the Hufflepuff shirts online.  The bottom one is the original without a letter in the middle.

 Sorry for overloading your brain with so much information, but I thought this might help other stitchers.  For all the Harry Potter fans it is nice to see the choices offered throughout the project.  Or for stitchers still thinking about joining the SAL, there are lots of people still waiting for their fabric to arrive.  Or you can always collect the patterns for a future project.  Let me know what you think of Chapter 2.  It is always nice to talk to other Harry Potter fans.

Peppermint Purple (Green) - weeks 4 & 5

I was making great progress, but decided to change the inside colour of green.  I don’t like how the variegated was looking.  You can’t see the stitch detail when using one strand of the lighter shade of green.  I will frog weeks 1, 2 and 3 sometime this week.

I tried a new shade of green (DMC 988) on weeks 4 & 5.  I like this green much better.  It is lighter than the outside of each shape, but dark enough to see the details.