Floss Friday #129

Welcome Back Everyone! Weather update for Nor Cal – Raining. February is typically our wettest month of the year. It has been known to rain all 28 days of February. While that won’t be the case this year, we are getting enough rain to cause flooding north of San Francisco. I am not sure why anyone ever moves up there, because it happens every rainy season. I am sure it is gorgeous the rest of the year though. Enough about Nor Cal weather and lets check in on my stitchy projects for this past week.

January WIPGO Results

Had a very successful WIPGO month for January

Project 11: Fruit of Plenty by Modern Folk Embroidery

I started page 7 of 9 in January. My goal was 2500 stitches and I actually stitched exactly 2500 😆 I am 47% done with page 7 and 72% done with this project which I started in January 2021. I am feeling very pleased with my first sampler and the progress I have made.

Project 20: Calendar Gnome: Mr. January by Charlie’s Needle

This happened to be a new start for me. The WIPGO project was actually Calendar Gnome and I had just finished Mr September as my November WIPGO project. December I had focused on Christmas and saved starting Mr January until January. Imagine how thrilled I was to have it pop as my WIPGO project. I had found the perfect background fabric last year but had really wanted to stitch it closer to the season. I have never worked with Cashel Linen before but I am loving working with it. This fabric was originally purchased for a hummingbird chart I have. But when I got it, I realized it was just what I was looking for Mr. January. I set my WIPGO goal to be 2000 stitches as I still need to pull floss. I ended up missing 2 skeins of CCW – a navy for the gnome sweather and a water blue for the pond the snowman is skating on. They didn’t come until February but I still managed to make great progress on this project. Beginning of January I was 0% on this project and finished the month with 2160 stitches (exceeding my goal) and 42% done. Just love this series. The gnomes are too cute. I could do without everything being plaid all the time but it does add charm to the series.

Starts & Finishes

This week I had three new starts and a finish. Let’s take a look:

START & FINISH: Pop of Winter by Bent Creek

This is the third in this series that I have completed. My first was my favorite Summer which had a the cutest hummingbird ever. I also completed Autumn and now here is Winter. These are quick stitches and they come as a complete kit (except needle) which includes the 20 ct linen and DMC Perle Cotton thread size 8 I think but could be 5. I use a 24 needle for this project. The seasons could be stitched as all one piece but I have opted to do them as individual pieces. It was fun using all the different shades of purple to make the different snowflakes. Add in the cutest darn snowmake and it was just fun!

START: Winter Basket #2 by Hands on Design

I finished up chart 3 in this series last month and chart 1 in December. So February I am hoping to finish up chart 2. I wish my white showed up better but I do really like this 16ct stone aida by Fiber on a Whim. The dmc is just so complimentary of each other.

START: WIPGO Project: Frosty Tiny Town by Heart in Hand

It was exciting to start (another snowman) Frosty Tiny Town. I decided to use the fabric I had actually purchased (but haven’t used yet) for Patriotic Tiny Town. I am really liking how it is stitching out on this 16 ct aida Silverfox by Fiber on a Whim. I got started when my happy mail arrived but I quickly realized I somehow didn’t order one of my flosses. So I either have to order it or drive to Morgan Hill to the only store in about 100 miles that carries hand-dyed floss. It is really a needlepoint store but they use alot of the same threads. I was able to get in 500 stitches my first night. I was going to start the day before but decided that I wanted to import it into my Cross Stitch app which meant I had to set it up. Beacuse the this is a long skinny chart, they cut it in half to fit everything on one page. My app can only read one chart per page. I had a brainstorm on Monday, and opened my PDF and duplicated the chart page so I could use the app. It worked! I am very happy but I had a mess with it trying to read the legend so I ended up setting up manually versus automatically. It took about an hour but I am super happy I did it. So excited to do Snowmen again this month!

February Start & Finish Goals

I am a little more reserved this month with my planned starts and finishes. Just wanted to share them with you.

Start Goals:

• Frosty Tiny Town ☑️
• Winter Stitching Season
• January Square Dance

Finish Goals:

• Snow Village
• Pop of Winter ☑️
• August Stackables
• January Square Dance

The Square Dance series by Heart in Hand look like quick easy stitches but I haven’t gotten serious to pull together floss and fabric. My intention is to use the leftover fabric from last year’s Monthly Markings. I just haven’t trimmed it yet.

WIP Updates

Even with focusing on my WIPGO projects and finishing my Pop of Winter, I was able to get in some quality time on my other projects.

Crescent City Velaris by Woven Wild Crafts

I worked on this for January by filling in my 10×10 grids for this full coverage stitch. I am working in the top left corner. The color changes are so subtle, that I am not sure if I would even be able to tell if I was looking at the chart. My goal was 400 stitches for January. For February, I think I might up that to 500.

Snow Village by Country Cottage Needleworks

I have worked on Snow Village a couple of times this week in an effort to finish it up. I feel so close to being done. Last night I didn’t want to stop but I couldn’t keep my eyes open any longer so I let it go. I need to finish the tree, snowlady, and then add snowflakes. Not much to go to finish this project! Hopefully I can show you a finished project next week. I don’t really want to make this a framed piece even though it is large. I think I will ended up making it a wall hanging instead. I have some fabrics in mind so the final finish could be a way off as I work through the finish in my head. But first, I have to finish the cross stitching.

WIPGO Project: Christmas Calendar by Tiny Modernist

My WIPGO goal is pretty conservative since I struggle to stitch on this particular linen. The month of December it took me 3 days to finish “Day” 22 but only two day to finish “Day” 17. I think the more linework the harder it is especially if the linework is white with this very pale gray linen. I was super happy I finished Day 12 in one night. The ornaments were actually fun to stitch and easy because there was a “pattern” to them. It probably helped that the box for Day 12 was already complete. That leaves me with Day 2 & Day 7 still to stitch.

2025 SJ Temperature Moon Phases 🌖 by Climbing Goat Designs

I have a ton to do with the border. I have been struggling get this project setup to work on for 2025. It is very different from the library I made last year (that was just easy peasy). I got enough of the border done so I could start January. I had to mess with my excel sheet for the min/max versus just the high each day. So here I am in February still working on January and finding my process with this project. I think I almost have it dialed in. Once I get my process dialed in, I will go back to start filling in the border. This pattern from Climbing Goat is a very detailed and involved chart. I downloaded about 10 files all related to this project. She really goes in to make it perfect for whereever you live. She has the moon charts for each time zone. The border is in a seperate file plus another one to customize the project with your location. I am using 36 colors because I didn’t want to have a day where I wouldn’t have the needed contrast.

I have stitched January 1st – January 12th. So far I think it looks fantastic. I choose a black background and of course you could have done anything else, but I liked the idea of “space”. I also opted to use 18ct and was even tempted to go with 20 ct in an effort to make the overall project smaller. I have old eyes and so I passed on the 20 count.

Each moon is outlined and I haven’t worked out my process for the outlining yet. Now that I have the basics figured out, that will be tackled next. Plus I have my first outline using the min/max (for full moon and new moon) coming up next.

Afterthoughts

I have to decide if I want to do another online order or drive to the Shop in Morgan Hill this week. With it raining so much for the next 10 days, I am leaning towards ordering. If that is the case, then that will be something I do today. The ladies at 123stitch are quick and if I submit my order early enough, they get it out same day which is cool. I even get it in just a few short days. With needing to pull together the floss for the Square Dance series as well….

Looking foward, I have put a plan together for next week (subject to the whim of the moment) of projects to work on:

• Finish Snow Village
• Work on Crescent City Velaris
• Shabby Winter Calendar Day 11
• Snowballs for Sale
• Winter Camper
• February Month to Month barn
• Christmas Calendar Day 7
• Fruit of Plenty
• 2025 Moon Phases Jan 13 – Jan 22
• Snowman Collector: The Shepherd

LOL! That should keep me plenty busy right?

Declutter update

I thought I would give a garage update. We are almost done going through EVERY box, crook, and cranny in the garage. Last week ended with a day looking at books. I shared that adventure on Tuesday so if you missed it go check it out. Yesterday was craft stuff. Man! I can’t believe how many crafts I have done over the years from beading to leather work. Also in all that was prior cross stitch projects. I decided to try and save a few of those projects. They are not in prime shape being in the garage for the past 10 years and boy have my tastes really changed. It was a lot of fun seeing so many things I have tried over the years. They are being specially boxed for my upcoming move and I have decided I will tackle them once I am in my new space. I found a half finished Hummingbird stitch, rods for a cross stitch holder, several finished pieces, lots of floss, floss baggies, yarn, crochet hooks, fabric, etc. A ton of kids crafts which is not surprising as I was a youth group leader for over 20 years. It has been a trip down memory lane and my life here in California and the life of my children. I saved a few keepsakes, but I was brutal about cutting stuff. The changes in the craft world are pretty significant and I don’t need to go backwards.

That’s enough reminiscing for now. I hope you have a great weekend. Be sure and stay safe. Lots of happy thoughts being sent your way for a crafty weekend.

Peggy Stockwell in San Jose, California