Punch Needle Monarch Butterfly

On one of my road trips I purchased a punch needle pattern of a monarch butterfly. I've had the urge to do some punch needle lately - mostly because it goes so quickly.

I had most of the DMC flosses called for in the pattern in my stash but needed a couple of varietgated ones - a purple and a green. After trips to my local LNS shops, Artisanthropy and Kimat Designs they were easily obtained. Both shops have online ordering and curbside pickup.

I started two nights ago by outlining the butterfly. The pattern is printed/drawn/ironed onto the weaver's cloth (a strong cotton/nylon blend). If letters or numbers are involved they need to appear backwards on the back so they are the correct orientation on the front.

The pattern calls for 3 strands of floss and to get gradations of colour they are mixed with two strands of one colour and one strand of another.

I am using one ring of a Morgan lapstand to obtain drum tightness being careful not to stab myself on the other side.

I used the colour photo on the pattern to place the white dots on the wings.

The oval is various gradations of the purple/blue flosses and will be completely filled in when finished. The vines are a solid DMC colour. The echinacea (coneflower) petals are a variegated DMC and the 'cones' of the are a blend of two DMC colours.

All I have left to do is finish the ovals with gradients as I punch towards the centre and the lighter variegated green background of the border.

I've also been working on my autumnal paint-by-number and have started the yellows. No pics yet but the image is somewhat Group of Seven-ish.

A while back I purchased a pair of scissors with curved blades - similar to those pictured below. They are great for using on punch needle pieces. I highly recommend ones like that. 

I think I'll mount the piece on a little box lid or a little wooden crate like the raw wood ones at the big box craft store. I can paint it with chalk paint.

Scrappy, Striped Socks Are Finished

I finished these up last night and had to wait 'til this morning when the light was better to photograph them.

There are a bunch of yarn ends to sew/weave in but I may just leave them loose as they don't feel lumpy when the socks are on.

This is my first time doing two-at-a-time socks. It was the best way to get identical twin socks but not my favourite method. 

But they're done and I can go back to my second camo sock when I want to do some knitting.

After 4 blankets and a pair of scrappy socks, I can now close the lid on my scrap sock yarn bin. I do have a bunch of small balls of sock yarn that I'd love to use up somehow. I may use Arne and Carlos' idea of holding three yarns together and knitting cozy plain mittens.

I have a yen to knit another bandana cowl/February hat set so will be checking out my worsted yarn inventory for two 100g skeins. They knit up quickly and look very stylish when we're all bundled up to go outside in the 'bleak midwinter'. 

Resurrecting an Old WIP

Motivated by Barb and Jeanette who are tackling WIPs (Works In Progress) in an orderly fashion, I rummaged through some project bags that were languishing in a couple of piles. I finished a project yesterday and wanted to tackle a UFO (UnFinished Object) before starting a brand new project for which I've pulled most of the threads and just need to substitute one more colour.

Newcastle Bouquet is a big sampler that I hope to plug away at over the next few months. 

Yesterday during our Crafternoon chat, I worked on the darker red bossoms on the border. It's great for mindless stitching if the basics are outlined. I'll be happy if I get it finished by the end of 2021.

The project I'm 99.9%  finished was Christmas Birds by Eszter Marjanovic. I just noticed I need to do the two stitches for the two birds' eyes and cross one stitch at the bottom of the 'T'. Then to pop it into a 5 x 7 frame.

And my scrappy socks are almost finished. I'm almost ready to start the toe decreases.

I'm doing about 7 rounds of each colour. Which I will do right to the end of the toe. I'm looking forward to wearing these once they're finished.

Christmas Birds

Taking a bit of a break from my Sea Turtle piece, I started Christmas Birds from the Winter/Christmas 2020 issue of Punch Needle and Primitive Stitcher Magazine.

It was designed by Eszter Marjanovic of SubRosaDesign .

I've had a link to her blog on my webpage for years and love her designs.

I did the Jean Farish trick and created some cross stitches along the warp (parallel to selvages) and weft to see what thread count I had. This was a large piece of linen I got at the Old Tattered Flag over  year ago and it was unmarked.

The warp is 17 sts over 2 or 34 ct.

The weft was also 34 ct.

The pattern called for 36ct and the design would fit in a 5" x 7" frame. Since this fabric has a slightly smaller stitch count, it would exceed the open area of the frame so I altered the pattern, eliminating some stitches on each side.and moving the borders in a bit.  Now it will fit into a standard frame.

I am using WDW Bright Leaf and the DMC equivalents for the other 3 colours. I am very partial to these colours and somewhat primitive designs. It would make a really nice flatfold.

I have made a bit more progress on my scrappy socks and am on the home stretch of the gusset decreases. The jog in the striping when I change colours is buried in the purl column of the ribbing.

It's taking a while because there are a LOT of stitches going around the sock at this stage. I'm using stocking stitch for the foot of the sock.

As I've mentioned before, I tend to wear my socks out on the bottom of the heel so continued the Eye of Partridge pattern in that area. The stranding across the slipped stitches provides extra fabric so the heels will wear longer.

Yesterday, Skip and I had to go into The Big City for an appointment. Normally we would avail ourselves of our excellent commuter train system but in times of COVID, we're reluctant to mingle with others - especially with these nasty variants developing. So we drove into the city. Traffic is much reduced with so many people working from home so it was pretty stress-free.

Again, because of COVID, I was unable to go into the appointment with Skip so I found a place to park on the street (Green P) and entertained myself while I waited for him to be done. I played with my phone a bit, then started listening to an audiobook ('Olive Again' by Elizabeth Strout) which had been recommended to me by one of my stitching friends. I also got a bit of knitting done on my second camo sock even though my hands were cold. It was -9ºC yesterday or 9ºF.

It's a basic K3, P2 ribbed pattern. Here's the finished first sock.

I did the same Eye-of-Partridge-on-the-sole of the heel thing on this one, too.

Schools are back to in-class learning and next Tuesday our region will open up a bit. Stores can open with limited capacity. I have a couple of things I need done in a store for which curbside pickup won't work so that will afford me the chance to knock a couple of things off my 'to do' list. 

Continuing with Stripes

I work on my scrappy socks when I take a break from stitching. I have turned the heels and have started the gusset decreases.

I continued the striping on the heel flaps and now with the blue/mauve yarn am doing the gusset stitches and instep. I will maintain the colour changes every 5 or 6 rows and will be knitting a plain stocking stitch foot. 

I am continuing the Eye of Partridge pattern on the stitches on the bottom of the foot. With the slipping of the stitches, an extra strand of yarn reinforces the heel stitches where I wear out my socks most frequently.

I'm running out of scraps of yarn long enough to do 6 rounds of stripes on both socks so will have to repeat some colours. I do try to maintain putting a contrasting yarn next to the previous one. 

These will be very fun to wear. And I've certainly been getting a lot of wear out of my many pairs of knitted socks since we're not spending the winter in the sunny south,

I checked on Hope's (my sea turtle that I sponsored) progress and she's swimming back to the waters of north of the Bahamas.

She started off last May when she was released at Jupiter FL with a tracking device glued onto her shell. By the late summer, she had made it up the coast off the NJ shore.  Undisturbed by a worldwide pandemic she made her way to the warmer waters a few hundred miles east of Puerto Rico.

Then she turned and started making her way back in a west-north-westerly direction. I'm hoping she'll return to the area where she was hatched and lay eggs of her own.

I wear my turtle bracelet every day and cheer her on. 

We have been blessed with a mild winter thus far. We've only had one significant snowfall since Christmas Day when we had  the first significant snowfall this winter. Thank goodness. It is very windy today and the temperatures are plummetting but at least we're not dealing with snow drifts. If we can't be in south Texas doing our favourite things, I'm glad we've been spared a horrendous winter thus far.

Here are some of our favourite things to do in south Texas:

look at the roseate spoonbills and sreat egrets,

birdwatch at the wooded Valley Land Fund lots on the island,

photograph any butterflies that stay still long enough, 

then go and eat yummy tacos al carbón and frijoles charro with a frosty tropical drink on the side.

Guild Project

Our embroidery guild has been working on a project since the fall - an alphabet sampler. We're up to the letter 'q'.

Just above 'qrstu' in the goldish thread (it's actually shades of green) is the Rhodes stitch with Smyrna stitches in between using #12 Valdani perle cotton. I hope to put a charm or button in the gap above 'r'. Above 'u' is three interlocking rows of the queen or rococo stitch with  one strand of DMC in three different shades of blue. 

The white braided-like stitch above that is the Portuguese border stitch with #5 perle cotton, and Norfolk waffles above that with 2 strands of DMC floss. Between the dark waffle stitches should be Oblong Cross stitches. They're easy and I'll get to them sometime.  Above the waffles are two rows of Montenegrin stitches with a #12 variegated blue thread.

I spent almost 3 hours on a video chat with my sitcherly friends today and worked on my turtle, then cross-stitching the 'qrstu' letters above in preparation for tonight's tutorial. Our regular guild meeting will be next week after which Kim will teach us the Tip of Leaf stitch and possibly the Upright Gobelin. 

We're nearing the home stretch now. 

I am saving all the beads 'til all the stitching is done. Tonight we discussed various ways we could finish this - as a bell pull, finishing the edges with hem stitch, framing it, making it into a needle roll. Lots of options. 

After doing this project, I'm somewhat inspired to design something myself. I recently bought The Proper Stitch:

and have had the DK Stitch Dictionary on my bookshelf for a while. 

They're both chock full of stitch diagrams, many of which I'd love to try out.

I actually went out for a walk in the sunshine today. I brought my mailbox key with me so I could collect our mail. The postal carrier was at the mailbox so I continued on my walk, planning to get the mail on the way home, As I walked towards the community mailbox, I realized I no longer had the key. Well darn! I went home to see if I had inadvertently left if there - nowhere to be found. So I retraced my steps of my entire walk and didn't find it lying anywhere. It's easy to spot because I kept it on a yellow coil - which snugly fit around my wrist. No dice.

Back at home I retrieved the second key from my car and got the mail with that. I then checked the Canada Post website to see what was involved to get the key replaced. Because I still have one key, I can just take it to any key cutting place and get another cut. Easy peasy. If both had been lost, I'd have to pay $29 to get my mailbox lock changed and a pair of new keys mailed to me. But because I still have one good key, I can just get another cut. Phew! Crisis averted.

I did find something in the house yesterday I had misplaced about a month ago. Barb gave me a gift certificate for Christmas and it was in a Ziploc bag with a pattern I traded her for. I totally forgot where I had put them and have been half-assed looking for them for the past month. I found them yesterday between the sofa and the end table. Yay!

That's about all the excitement around here during pandemic times. Skip and I are planning a big shopping spree at Costco one of these days just after it opens at 8am. It will almost kill me to get up that early but it will be worth the sacrifice. We haven't been to Costco since late October or early November so we are running out of the things we usually buy there.

Kids in most of Ontario are going back to in-class learning on Monday because our new case numbers have gone down significantly. Most parents, students, and teachers are very pleased about this. Our Premier needs to be very careful this time about opening things up after our lockdown so things don't skyrocket like they did leading up to Christmas and beyond. Vaccines for all cannot come soon enough.

Groundhog Day

I'd love to have lots to post today but not a lot happens in my world during our 'period of confinement'. Every day rolls into the next. If it wasn't for my daily videochats from Sunday to Wednesday, my weeks would have no structure. Between Thursday and Saturday, I rarely know what day it is. Thank goodness for technology and those videochats. We are always saying how grateful we are to be able to connect on a regular basis during the pandemic.

On my Sunday videochat with my stitcherly friends we were talking about what we needed for various projects we wanted to start. Someone needed a particular colour of DMC. Jeanette has a surplus and offered it. She needed something that someone else had who offered to drop it off. Marilyn needed some 28ct Monaco in antique white and I have a pile of it in my stash so today Skip and I welcomed the opportunity to get out of the house and go for a drive to drop it off at her place. It would have been nice to have been able to chat in person for a while, but it's still too cold out for that. I do remember going over there last summer and having a lovely porch chat while we both wore masks. And I had a few folks over to my deck a couple of times, too.

On the way home I popped into the liquor store to pick up 'essentials'. I tried to shop there yesterday but it is closed on Mondays. Then I did a takeout order at Subway and we took our salads home to eat. I now wear an N95 mask covered by a triple layer mask when I go out shopping. Skip bought the N95s years ago and they have come in handy whenever I've had to be in close quarters with others. So far, in the least year, I've only been in really close quarters with one person outside of my household - my hairdresser. Twice. But with this stricter lockdown and the variants rampaging through Ontario, I don't want to take any chances of getting the virus so I double-mask.

I zoned out on the sofa all afternoon doing some stitching and watching YouTube videos. This evening on my chat with the Whitby Spinners, I knit some more on my scrappy socks.

I knit stocking stitch on the pink and have started Eye of Partridge blue heel flaps. I do plan to continue the EOP pattern on the bottom of the heel for reinforcement. My hope is to continue the striping on the heel flap as well.

It was good to get out today. 

Oh yeah, and Wiarton Willie saw his shadow.