Playing Catch-Up for the Whole Year!

Hello, everyone! I admit, I'm a slug when it comes to posting anything here - and it's been a pretty busy 8 months for Chatelaines in my house, actually.

Let me back up to January, because after spending the 2nd half of last year in FINISH IT mode, I allowed myself several new starts - and Hummingbird Lace was my January 1st new start! There's nothing like the smell of a new Chatelaine in the morning!

Now, the fabric I picked for this is a 28ct jobelan that I special ordered from a company that I don't think is in business anymore - Faery Fire Fabrics :( I can't find them anymore, so maybe they have changed names or some such - I am very happy with this fabric. I worked for just 2 weeks, I believe, and got the center and the first over-1 Hummer done:

I cannot for the life of me figure out how to turn this 90 degrees - but you get the idea...

I look forward to working on this again later this year when it comes back up in my rotation - gotta get those over-1 hummers done while I can still see 'em :)

I have also gotten a rotation in on my Tuscany Town Mandala, completing Part 6, and the under-bridge bargello from Part 11, since I was in the area. You know, I was wondering about that Grapefruit Kisses color used for the tiny Jessica flowers - but as soon as I started putting it in, I fell in love with it! But then, it's Jessica's, with BEADS, so what's not to love? And I am happy to report that this part was much smoother that Part 5, which took FOREVER!

I don't know if this one's going to make it into the rotation again this year or not; probably not, I've got a pretty full dance card... This is on 28ct Waterlily jobelan, using most of the called-for threads, though I also converted a few to HDF silks.

Not too long after Tuscany was put away, Secret Victorian Garden came up again (it's funny how all these Chats seemed to have made the rotation during the first half of the year - what will I do the 2nd half?). Anyway, May was a very busy month here - I graduated my last kid from high school and had family visiting in honor of that; it's a wonder I got in any stitching. But I did finally complete Part 8 of SVG, though this one took a very long time, whereas I have pretty much breezed right through the last few parts on this one. Still loving every stitch on this, though there weren't any beads this time around - but all those Swarovskis are coming!

Every time I finish a part on this one, I lay it out somewhere flat and get all the bicones out and lay on it in the middle - man I can't wait to get those on permanently! This is on 28ct Pewter jobelan, using all charted threads.

And lastly, I just finished a rotation on my Desert Mandala - Part 4 with the beaded rattlesnake!!!!!!! I have been so eager to get to this snake that it was all I could do to get through those $@%^ feathers in Part 3! LOL My MIL was visiting while I was working on this, and she has a huge fear of snakes - she couldn't even look at it while I was putting him in - her loss, because he's FABULOUS!

This part went pretty quick - I was actually kinda sad to put it away, but if I'm going to get through ALL  of my 18 WIPS in a year, I had to move on. Desert is on 28ct Desert Sky lugana from Silkweaver - it doesn't photograph well at all, but it is very pale blue & tan. I have a lot of the called-for colors converted to HDF, which I think are a tad darker than the originally charted colors - but so far, I'm liking it; it definitely reminds me of the 2 years I spent in New Mexico (where I hope to go back some day).

That's 8 months worth of updates from me. I am tentatively holding out a New Year's Start for 2016 - Deep Blue Sea is really not happy that it didn't make the cut this year. We shall see, since I am NOT going to finish ANYTHING this year, after completing a lot of big, older things last year. DBS will bring me to 19 WIPs - which is not the highest I've ever been - but that may or may not be the straw that broke this camel's back. I will try to be a more regular poster in the coming year, new start or no :)