I am pretty sure evil gnomes visited in the night and unravelled all the work I'd done each time I knit on these. They took FOREVER! I cast them on in January - yes, January! - and finally finished them a couple of days ago. They were started as a project to carry along to the hospital when AJ had surgery to close up his belly. I worked on them in fits and starts all year. They just never seemed any closer to completion.
The yarn is Regia Galaxy, and I didn't love working with it. I don't know if it was the fact that I pulled from the center of the skein or what, but the twist was intense and I kept ending up with coiled, kinked yarn. I had to drop the sock-in-progress every inch or so and let it unwind so I could continue knitting. Not so fun! I will be stuffing these in the back of my drawer, to be worn this winter when I'm done being frustrated with them.
On to other things: I've been taking lots of cross-stitch and embroidery books out from the library, poking around for inspiration.
And inspiration struck.
Oh boy. The book is Traditional Samplers by Brenda Keyes. One design jumped right out at me, and I told myself if I had all the supplies on hand, I would let myself start it. And what do you know...I had all but one color of floss in the house, plus the correct aida cloth, needles, and hoops galore.
This is the Edwardian Style Birth Sampler. I originally thought it would be for my son, but now I am thinking perhaps it will be a Christmas gift for my nephew instead. Neither of them is a Patrick so I'll have to re-chart the name and birthdate, of course. So far (the past 3 nights) it's been a blast to stitch.
I've been listening to The Help on CD (because I cannot get my hands on a paper copy) so it's been working out perfectly to enjoy the story and stitch away.
I love cross stitches - the orderliness of them, marching across the cloth. This sampler appeals to me because there is a minimum of backstitching and no other stitch is used. I don't care for lots of different styles of stitches on aida cloth as I find them hard to execute.
It's a bit of an ambitious undertaking when I have plenty else to do, but it's buzzing along so quickly, and I am enjoying it so much...I think I will actually finish the thing! Stay tuned!
2 comments:
I feel so much better knowing someone else has a yarn project that sat in a cupboard for much too long. I bought yarn for socks two years ago, and I still haven't used it. Maybe because I'm afraid of making socks. I have yet to take that challenge. Was it hard???
Oh no, Crystal, socks are not hard. They are time consuming and certain parts are a bit "fiddly" especially if you're new at it, but I've made gazillions of socks now and it's worth it. These just sat around forever, I think because I didn't love the yarn. You should definitely go for it!
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