English Garden Sampler Update - Snow Day Progress

There's nothing like having a snow day to get lots of stitching done. I finished the left border down to the bottom of the whitework, almost finished the left font, and made good progress on the right font. It's good to be making progress again.
I'm sick of this weather, though. I hate ice. It's not supposed to be that much better tomorrow either, so I may end up taking another vacation day to stay home. I do need to get the binding sewn onto the back of the Quilt of Valor; maybe I can work on that instead of going to work. 8)

Quilt of Valor back from the Quilter

I sent the Quilt of Valor off to San Antonio to be quilted and it came back just lovely!
Debbie did a terrifc job on it. She stippled on all the white squares in white.

And put waves of multi-blue quilting in the sashing.

The Ohio Stars are going to really pop after it has been washed and dried.

It even looks really cool on the back!

Thanks, Debbie, for a job well done! Now I just have to trim the edges and sew the binding to the back so Virginia can hand sew it to the front. Virginia, you're a life-saver!

Yesterday was English Garden Sampler day, and I did make some progress, but I don't think it will show up much in a picture. Lots of border backstitching just doesn't give that same look of accomplishment that carving out new territory on a blank canvas does. Maybe next week I'll have more to show on it.

English Garden Sampler Update - More Border

I did some work on the English Garden Sampler's enormous border. I actually enjoy working on the border because it is so repetitious that it doesn't require much counting. My goal is to complete the entire left border down to the bottom of the whitework before moving on, and I am almost there.

I also located the missing peacock blending filament this week. What a relief! I think I bought this spool last March when I first realized it was gone. I have a vague recollection of taking a lunch hour to go track it down, but I couldn't swear to it. I love counted cross-stitch; this is probably the most enjoyable project I've worked on all week. Next up: Icky old pinch pleats. 8``(

English Garden Sampler Update

Remember the list? I think I'm almost done with March of last year. lol I wasn't entirely idle though. The peacock's body is nearly complete and I've gotten lots done on the left border.

Some stitches on the peacock's body require a special blending filament, which I appear to have lost. I'll have to either find where it walked off to, or source it from somewhere else. (This may be what distracted me from this project last year.)

Well, I tried monthly updates last year, and that didn't go so well. Perhaps regular Monday updates will be just the shove I need to keep moving on this behemoth.

English Garden Sampler - February Complete

I finished up all the white work that I was supposed to get done in February. If this keeps up, I might actually get to work on March's stitching in March. 8)

I'm afraid you have to enlarge these pictures to make the icky geometric waves go away.

I enjoy white work, the rope was especially fun to do. I memorized the repeat after a few repetitions, and it went really fast. Loading the needle with three different colors of floss, two of which were almost identical, was the hard part. lol
Eventually this part will have pearl beads that should really set it off well. Now I get to work on the second peacock. Stitching a picture is totally different from this geometric design; I'm looking forward to the change.

English Garden Sampler - January Complete

I know, I know, it's MARCH already. In my own defense I had decided to complete everything down to the bottom of the topiaries for January, which turned out to be a HUGE chunk of stitching. Here is where I started. February's section is smaller; just a 2-3" whitework border below the alphabet. That's all there is to do, so I really hope to be done with it before the end of March. 8) If you enlarge this image the hateful geometric pattern goes away.
I thought you might like to see the floss monster I'm using to complete this sampler. Before I started working on this project, years ago, I spent two nights organizing all the floss on 7 LoRan Mastercards. I drew each symbol next to a hole and threaded the floss(es) required to make that stitch through the hole. I also punched a smaller hole on the opposite side for partially used floss. I've been collecting floss for awhile now as you can see. I'm definitely SABLE on floss. 8) I have nearly all the numbers of DMC. I'm really fond of these LoRan organizers, which of course they don't make like this anymore. (And I really could use another one. One of these is so stuffed it pulled the velcro off the plastic and won't shut anymore.) At least they're still making the Mastercards. I love them!

English Garden Sampler Cross Stitch Project

Last year, at the beginning of the One Project a Month Challenge, I decided that 2009 was the year I would finish Teresa Wentzler's English Garden Sampler. It was already about 2/3's complete, so I broke the remaining task into 12 "do-able" chunks, wrote them neatly on a piece of paper, and never ever touched it again. Ever. Not even once.

Now, a normal person would be disheartened by this. Not me! I declared 2010 the year I would finish TW's EGS. By golly, I would make another list, because that part was a really good idea!!! Then guess what happened? I found last year's list; and it was still perfectly good. It's a sign (I know, me and my "signs" lol) so I decided to share it with you.

1. Jan - Everything straight across to bottom of topiaries, except (peacock) head
2. Feb - Whitework
3. Mar - Bird head and body and left side (border) down to bottom of whitework
4. Apr - Fonts and right side (border) down to bottom of whitework
5. May - Tail (peacock) and tops of pillars
6. Jun - Gate and left side (border) to bottom of bird
7. Jul - Upper shrubs
8. Aug - Grasses and right side (border) to bottom of bird
9. Sep - Numbers and sides (borders) to circles in corners
10. Oct - Bottom (border)
11. Nov - Pulled work
12. Dec - Beading

Yep, that would get 'er done, as they say in Texas. I just have to hop to it! I have this perfectly comfortable place to stitch:
All I need is continued motivation and a little accountability. So every month I'm going to post an update here to let you know how I'm doing. Please remind/harass me if I "forget". ;) Last night I sat down and stitched for several hours, but I still didn't finish January's goal. I'm going to try to catch up in February. I'll keep you posted.