Round and round...

For those who know me, it comes as no surprise that I can me a teensy bid OCD about things. But just certain things – my house can be a complete disaster, but certain parts have to organized. Like my stitching for instance. Once I heard about the “rotation method” all those years ago I knew it was the way for me. Basically each project in my rotation gets 10 hours and then I move to the next one. I used to go all old school with a little binder with pages for each project, but for this cross stich resurgence I’ve upgraded myself to an app for my phone (I use “Office Time” for my iPhone – it’s not perfect, but it’s pretty good). The only problem I have is I’ve found myself forgetting to turn the timer on or off a couple of times and then I have to guess. Really rubs my OCDness the wrong way, but what can you do.

I’ve set up pages for each of the WIP’s in my rotation (over to the right). I’m sure I have pictures for the beginning hours (somewhere), but I just started with where ever each was when I picked it up after my years-long hiatus. My current rotation is:

1.  Antique Shoes © Bucilla – this was a kit I loved the picture for and waited till it went on sale at Michael’s to buy. I switched out the aida for some jobelan and like it even better than the original project photo. This really reaffirms my hatred of kits though. They give you a project card to store your floss – what a mess! I keep all my DMC on little plastic bobbins all in order (see OCD above). And I’ve already run out of one color. Luckily I found a conversion chart online so I was able to find the DMC equivalent. If I had known about the conversions earlier I may have just used DMC originally. Oh well, live and learn I guess.

2.  Chat Noir © Mystic Stitch – this is for my husband, who loves the original poster. This is my most “stitch intensive” piece. I never knew DMC made so many tan/cream/yellow colors until this piece, which seems to use them ALL. I read somewhere that the best way to deal with the (9 page!) pattern is to tackle 100 stitches at a time (10x10 squares) and this seems to work pretty well. The squares around the cat’s head were rough - I think some of the background used 100 different colors in those 10x10 squares! I live for working on the actual cat. Straight black might be a little boring, but it’s much less stressful. Whenever I’m working on anything else my husband will look over and say “that’s not my cat…” I don’t think he has any idea how long it’s going to actually take!

3.  Family Sampler © Little House Needleworks – this will be for my brother and sister-in-law for Christmas (hopefully they won’t read this!) I’ve just started it and am loving it so far, especially after a Chat Noir stint – it’s very relaxing stitching. I’m a little concerned with how big it’s going to be. I think the fabric is more like 30 ct instead of 32, and it just seems huge. Luckily they have a pretty big house, and seem to love “Americana” type stuff, so I think they’ll really like it. There’s an option to stitch a family to mimic theirs, so that will be fun.

4.  Convent’s Herbal Garden © Chatelaine – this will be my forever project I think! I remember buying this years ago and actually had to go on a payment plan to pay for all of the silks and beads. Lots of stuff going on with this one - I had to insert the Family Sampler in between Chat Noir and this one to give myself a little break. Some of the specialty stitches might be the death of me. It’s pieces like this that make me appreciate my rotation. After 10 hours I need a break! I’m convinced the final product will be worth it though…

5.  The Sanctuary © The Drawn Thread – this is a new start for me. I was supposed to stitch something else, but the fabric is backordered so I pulled this one out of the stash. I was a little Leary of stitching it as directed (1 strand of silk over 2) but am loving how it’s coming out – very dainty and elegant. This seems to have quite a few specialty stitches as well, so hopefully they won’t kill me. Here I am at 10 hours. The “reverse cushion” stitches in the border are much prettier in person. It’s hard to capture the sheen of the silk in the picture.

(c) The Drawn Thread

32 ct linen

started 7/18/14, 7/20/14 - 10 hours

And that pretty much sums up the state of my rotation at the moment. In the past I’ve usually kept it to 5 pieces, but the little plastic drawers I use to keep them in actually have room for six, so I think I might add My Lady’s Garden © Mirabilia. Since finishing Gathering Eggs and Touching the Autumn Sky I want to make sure I add one of hers back in.

Oh, and I have a couple little projects going at the same time, for those times when I don’t want to work on something big or worry about timing what I’m doing.

Whew – that was quite a post for the 2 of you or so who are actually reading this (one of which isn’t even a stitcher – hi mom!). But I’m glad to get all the information down in one place – for when I forget what’s going on!