An illustrated post

I promised photos of my latest finish, then a WIP, a couple days ago. I finished it Sunday morning. I think it's the perfect finish for a patriotic weekend. Isn't the eagle a scream?



I have the supplies to make it into a no-sew cube. It was just too darn hot to actually finish it this weekend. It's starting to cool down, though, so, hopefully, I can get it done this weekend.

I then started a new WIP. This is the 4 Season Fatty SAL from the Sanman board. I started it Sunday, and I'm almost 3/4 of the way finished already.


It's done with Sullivan floss. For the most, the conversion is good, but, wow, is that orange ELECTRIC! I don't know if I like it. It doesn't seem to go with the rest of the colors. I know the original DMC is not that bright--it's 3340, if you want to compare. I am toying with the idea of picking it out and replacing it with a softer, darker orange, probably one of the 920s, but, considering I've been to Hancock fabrics three times in the past week to get floss (one for an exchange and a project I was converting, once for this, and once for a birthday gift), I'm going to wait a couple days.

But that just shows you, no conversion is perfect. This is why I am so adamant about, if a design is highly shaded, I stitch it in the floss they used for the model. This is particularly true for Sandy Littlejohns charts, and Stoney Creeks; Sandy uses Anchor, Stoney Creek uses DMC, even though they show the other thread lines as a choice.

It really is amazing the change that working in the office has brought to my stitching. I have pretty much abandoned having a lot of things ready for the fair this year, since I'm still getting acclimated to getting up early and having a commute. And I haven't had a lot of time to work on big projects, which is OK, I guess. I am enjoying the smaller finishes. And I do like my job. It's a challenge in that I am having to learn a new computer system, and new guidelines for doing my job, but I like a challenge, and I'm really enjoying relearning the basics of why we do what we do. I figure, if the worst thing I have to worry about my job right now is being fully awake to leave the house, that's a small price to pay for professional stability. I feel immensely blessed; for the first time in a long time, I feel like I might actually be able to start dreaming the big dreams.

I am hoping to have my computer by the end of the month. I have decided it is not a good idea for me to roll into the electronics department. I went in on Sunday just to look at the laptops. The one I chose before was $600 for the bundle. Well, I went in and fell in love with one that was $250 more than that, without all the extras. It's amazing what we can attempt to talk ourselves into. I don't even know how to work my MP3 player, nor do I have an I-tunes account, and I found myself saying, "But it has Beats audio." I mean, shouldn't I have the best? Ya know, because I want to hear my Youtube videos clearly; wouldn't want to miss a golden note of "Take Me Home Tonight", would we? I might have talked myself out of that, but I'm not sure. Left-brain doesn't even use the computer much, but his ears perked up at the mention of Beats audio, LOL.