Monday, June 25, 2007

A Restful Night update and life

First thing:

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Here is my lovely! Shes missing two colours in her hair, but it's getting too fussy to go back (due to parking) so I will fill them in on the next pass as I work under them :)

I have passed the 4000 stitch mark on her! Yay! About 300 stitches into the next row I'll have met the next major percentage marker, 25%. I continue to be amazed by the translucency of her wings - the way you can see the leg through the wing, and the way the wings overlap is gorgeous. All the shades of blue and purple come together to make something stunning. Now that I've started work on the second wing it's quick stitching from here until the end of the row - always is. Mostly blocks of the same few colours, except the background part, and even the background isnt particularly confetti laden. What I will do with the next row though, is not start it until I am certain that I have all the colours. Though I recently found another box of DMC so I need to sort that...lol...and make sure all the colours are there this time around. In the meantime I'll either trim the width of the fabric tranquility's on with my overlocker (it wont fit in Anna's frame, but not due to design size) or get White Musings out again while I'm waiting to get the threads set up.

Troy has got his shamrock out again and is tackling the very fiddly backstitched border again now that I drew him a stitch diagram (order of lines, essentially) for it. He's promised to get it done before I order him fabric for the samurai, so thats incentive - and all the inner backstitching is done, its just a case of this border now. He has 1 and 1/2 sides done now though, and the 1/2 side he did tonight didnt take long, so hopefully it will be done soon and I can show you all! It looks great, I'm very proud of him.

This weekend has been the Fairy Day SAL at the HAED board, and I've wanted to join in but more or less been a dead loss due to illness - not CFS this time! I got a stomach bug or something and have been miserable all weekend, but I ate a roast and several pancakes with (real!) maple syrup and cream tonight which was all very yummy and I don't feel ill for it so that is good. Powerade was my friend - for some reason I dont understand it settled my stomach, and gave me the sugar and things to keep going. What has been fun has been the Cyber Stitching Retreat with Nicole, Lana, Polly, Liz, PJ and others (sorry, I forget all of the names!) which even without stitching for much of it has been thoroughly enjoyable. Talking stitchy things is fun!

I am looking forward to tackling this next part of A Restful Night, because it sees the end of the top wings and the hair above the face - more confetti in the hair, though it seems to have settled into diagonal rows now for the most part - thank goodness, all that colour changing was annoying. The row after starts her face proper, and will give some more definition to the little head I see peeking out at me!

Troy and I have paid for our tickets to Melbourne this weekend, so that should be fun - it's by train, and we're staying with a wargaming friend of his and his fiance and baby son. And baby 2 who is in the oven still :) I can take apart my stand and its getting tucked into my suitcase - why wouldnt I take it given we'll be gone for a week? Even if I dont use it, it's a safety blanket. We've asked if I can bring it and they said no problem. Troy is taking his miniatures, of course, and I predict a few warhammer games during the week! Bianca and I can escape and talk girly things instead.

I went china shopping, which was fun, and got a huge stash of things. All white, to match the dinner set - a 6 cup teapot, sugar and creamer to match (they look like little bubbles! so cute), pie dish, small casserole dish with a lid (for 2 person cassaroles), a big pasta bake type dish, a square one as well for things like rice pudding (or chocolate!) and a little baby teapot for just two people. It's adorable, and I will have to take photos of it. It looks like a white bubble. Troy and I have tested it out, and it pours very well (doesn't drip down the spout, hooray) and makes a lovely cup of tea. Troy's mum has also bought us a dinner set apparently, so that gives us even more flexibility. At the same time (since everything was on sale due to homewares stocktake sales) I got two sets of six glasses for good - Krosno ones, tall cylindrical water glasses and wine goblets. Mum wanted me to get champagne flutes too but I asked her when she thought Troy and I would ever drink champagne. She said I had a point, so no champagne flutes! That was a thoroughly enjoyable day, and I saw dad off at the airport the next (early!) morning to america where he is attending a theology conference which he has been looking forward to with a friend of his - who happens to also be one of Troy's lecturers, which is a bit of a giggle.

But it is a stupid hour (again!) so I need to sign off and get some sleep.

2 comments:

Michelle said...

Beautiful progress - your stitching is lovely. So glad you're feeling up to it.

Rachel Leigh Smith said...

I love china shopping! I have 3 sets of dishes that I'm collecting for my house someday.

You can drink Sprite or ginger ale out of champagne flutes. It's fun drinking out of them, even if it's not champagne.