Monogamously

Hello everyone! Still eating leftovers? I am. That's because my daughter and her significant other cooked ham and prime rib for our Thanksgiving! Sides were dressing, corn and green beans, potato gratin, mashed potatoes with gravy, the 45 year old fruit salad recipe that is made only for Thanksgiving, and pumpkin and apple pies. Whew! I brought home a lot and just had the last slice of pumpkin pie with whipped cream for breakfast this morning! Breakfast of champions! 🤣 

Let's get to the cross stitch.

As my title suggests, I've been stitching monogamously on Bertha Mae Brown...

That's a good representation of the color of the fabric. I stitched in that tree on the left side last night around midnight. I'll pick this back up after I click publish for this post. 

But! The squirrels are moving into formation and could interrupt my monogamy! Haha. Look at my recent stashing. All PDFs, and printed this morning. I'm getting that Christmas stitch bug and just might start 1 or 2...

Back story! I was watching flosstubes last night as I stitched. A new tuber I watch is also a model stitcher for Erin Elizabeth. Her handle is Cross Stitch (or Stitcher) Kim, she lives in Canada. She stitched the freebie on the right on black and I swooned! I stopped the video and went to the website under Erin Elizabeth and got it and the beautiful 1 color pattern on the left. The Winter Freebie calls for 14ct but I'd use 28ct black linen. It's getting hard for me to use 32ct black linen! So yeah, I might hold off on the freebie.

Next! Instagram gets a little dangerous and as I was perusing, I ran into these 2 patterns. I follow both designers on IG. My IG name is #azcampis if you'd like to follow. Here's those patterns, PDFs...

Just cute, both of them. I have fabric for the Tiny Village on the left and uses all DMCs. Sweet Pleasure on the right just hits me right! I have a mystery piece of 36ct linen in that same color as the model. It takes overdyes but has a DMC conversion.

So tempting!!

One other purchase is this JCS Christmas ornament preview magazine that I had to have because of the ornament on the middle right...

It is so pretty!

Last weekend I dropped off donations at a local charity shop that helps women who are in a  abusive relationship. I parked and went straight to the craft area. I always fantasize that I'm going to find OOP cross stitch charts!! It never happens but look at what I did find...

Looks like a Mill Hill piece, mounted to a papier mache box, for $2.00. Saving the Stitches!

After that I headed to Hobby Lobby for floss and a new storage box for some of my floss. You know the really pretty boxes that are sold during Christmas? I use them for my floss storage. Here's a few...

I like the boxes that look vintage. I store my CCW, and GAST floss in that box along with lose DMC metallic floss and any lose uncarded but identified overdue floss. 

I keep my WDW floss in this one...

I have all my floss on rings.

Last box is for silks and it was a mystery box. Too pretty to throw away, lol...

I also bought this tiny framed wood piece that has like a putty heart in it. I thought it would be perfect for a round ornament to place inside covering that heart...

I joined an exchange on Facebook in a group called Smalls or Cross Stitch Smalls. I should have wrote the name down🤦🏻‍♀️my recipient lives in the Netherlands. We are to send a finished Christmas piece that has enough fabric for our person to do their own final finishing. So I'm sending her this BBD ornament with 3 skeins of Christmas colors. I was ready to send this 3 weeks ago but I and the host of this exchange are having trouble getting in touch with her! I've sent 2 messages asking for an address and the host has sent 1! Hope she shows up! I've mailed to Malta, England, an Eastern Europe city that I can't remember now, and to Australia. The Netherlands will be a first

I think that's it! I might be the only stitcher out there not stitching Christmas right now! But I'm feeling the pull for sure. I wanted Bertha done this month but that's not happening. I'm pretty sure she'll have her day in the sun in December. 

Weather here is warmish, it's supposed to get to 63 here but it dips below freezing at night. I'm predicting a non white Christmas this year. Boo hoo.

Have you begun decorating? I will put up a few things like lights hanging from the mantel and getting out a 3ft green artificial tree that I use for ornaments. I had a white one last year but it was getting that ugly yellow color to it from age.

I almost forgot to say I won a chart from DJ at Tickled Pink In Stitches, and it's on its way from the East coast. Woohoo! Exciting!

Have a super day and stitch a lot!

Post Halloween Hangover

Good evening, everyone! Hope you're all well. Many thanks for all the comments on my Halloween Party post😊it was a hangover after all that finishing! I took the next 2 days off, no stitching and no FFOing! And it's blasphemous to say but I got a bit tired of the scary season! Haha. So I moved on to whatever WIP caught my eye and I'll show 3 that I've worked on in the last 8 days. 

First up is the Sarah Rickwood Sampler by Running With Scissors and Needles...

I'm using the called for fabric but in 36ct and my own floss conversion from Vikki Clayton silks to DMC and 1 over dyed. I started in the middle with the green and white bush and worked my way to the top which is where I like to start. I do a bit of vine and add flowers then work in the middle. Last time I showed this I had the bush but not so much white flowers and a little border on the left. 

After that I grabbed Yule...

by The Primitive Hare. I've filled in a lot of the bricks but ran out of GAST Brown Bear for the sides of the fireplace and the grout. I wished I had darkened the fabric more but I may do that after it's finished. 

Then I worked on A Sister's Love by BBD...

I had 3/4 of that top border done but have since finished it and turned the corner. I also stitched M N and O. It uses just 4 colors and it finishes out to about 8 1/4" x 8 3/4. 

In the first part of October, I FFOd a freebie from Blue Flower and kept forgetting to show it, here she is...

So cute!! I used a very mini chenille trim and stuck in 2 gold colored pins top and bottom and to hold that ribbon in at the bottom. 

That's it for my WIPs.

My plans for this month and December is to work on just WIPs. I was thinking of a new start for Thanksgiving Day, Christmas, and New Year's Day but I scrapped that and have new plans! It's a secret but the magic number is 61 and it starts when the clock strikes midnight on the 1st of 2025. So stay tuned!

Thanksgiving is coming up and we're not sure what we're doing. There are some good restaurants in the area advertising dinner and may do that but I love leftovers so we might end up cooking. We shall see.

I'll probably be back at the end of November with hopefully a few finishes. I don't have a lot of WIPs, just about 21.

And that is all she wrote! 

I'd like to wish everyone a

to those of us in the US.

Take care and see you soon!