WIPocalypse 2017 – February

This month's theme is: What is your favorite stitch other than the standard cross stitch? (bonus points if you provide a how-to link or diagram it on your blog post!) I think last year I said satin stitch. It's still my favorite, but recently I've come to appreciate the good old back stitch and couching stitch. You can do so much with it especially when you start using beads or gold threads and cords.

I did very well this month :) One night I took Bramble and the Rose to a guild meeting, so there is a tiny bit of progress here. See if you can spot it.

Ink Circles - The Bramble and the Rose

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Teresa Wentzler - Tracery Dragons

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Satin Stitches - Donna's Fantasy Lace

I was asked to come to a Stitcher's Rendez-vous :) On Sundays there are music concerts in the hall we use for guild meetings and there is a room visitors can come to before the concert to watch demonstrations from our embroidery guild and the spinners and weavers guild. It's a way for us to promote Embroidery and the guild. I decided to take Romantic Rosebud and managed to get some progress on weaving some leaves. It was really fun, I hope I get asked to come again.

Kathryn Drummond - Romantic Rosebud

Three updates in one post! While waiting for the next Pearl Butterfly lesson, I took out Fleurs de Sakura and got some more leaves appliqued.

Annie Penin - Fleurs de Sakura

Speaking of Pearl Butterfly, this is a project I've been working on a lot this month. If you want to see what it looks like click here for my previous post. Tomorrow I will be posting my latest progress from the weekend. 

WIPocalypse 2017 – January 29

This month's theme is: What Stitch-a-Longs (SALs) are you participating in this year? Except for TUSAL and WIPocalypse I'm not really participating in any SALs. What I am doing is taking classes with other stitchers either in person or online. Does that count? There are 3 so far: a cyber class with Alison Cole which has started already, a class at the JEC (Japanese Embroidery Center) in April and a class at the EAC seminar that will start once I get my kit.

This month I worked on many things, none of which are my WIPocalypse project. But I did finish one project so that's good :) There are more pictures here for those who are curious.

The rest of the post is pretty sad, but I'm sure it will be better next month.

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Ink Circles - The Bramble and the Rose

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Teresa Wentzler - Tracery Dragons

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Satin Stitches - Donna's Fantasy Lace

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Kathryn Drummond - Romantic Rosebud

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Annie Penin - Fleurs de Sakura

WIPocalypse 2017 – January

This month's theme is: Introduce yourself, your projects, and any goals you have for the year! So here we go:

My name is Dima. I'm a Software Engineer by day and stitcher by night. This is my sixth year blogging and I've been stitching for 7. I started with cross stitch, but have been trying to add in other types of embroidery (hardanger, pulled/drawn thread, punto antico...). You'll notice that most of the embroidery I'm drawn to is whitework, although I love color. I'm still hoping to learn crewel as I have a lot of kits in my stash but looks like it will be replaced by goldwork this year. Better luck next year :P

I also crochet, mostly amigurumis that I give as gifts, and I am learning how to knit (still very bad at it). Last year I added Kumihimo and this year my new addiction is beads. I hope to use lots and lots of them.

I've already posted my goals here. but I will re-iterate them below. I picked easy goals again this year as I will be very busy again this year come spring which means I will be very busy in the coming year finishing projects.

I had finished my goal last year on Bramble and the Rose and I got a head start on this year's goal as well. I always take out this project the last week before the New Year. The goal for this year is to again finish at least one page.

Ink Circles - The Bramble and the Rose

I worked on Tracery Dragons last year which was great. The goal this year is to finish all the stonework.

Teresa Wentzler - Tracery Dragons

I haven't touched Fantasy Lace since the summer. This year I'm hoping at least to have the hemstitch border done. Most likely to happen in the summer as it's a great project to take outside :)

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Satin Stitches - Donna's Fantasy Lace

Officially being added to the roster this year is Katherine Drummond's Romantic Rosebud which was a Creative Festival class in 2015. The goal is to finish it this year.

The second WIP being added that is also to be completed this year is Annie Penin's Fleurs de Sakura.

More projects will likely come and go during the year, but these are my offical WIPocalypse goals for 2017.

WIPocalypse 2016 – December

I'm doing things in reverse this time, starting with updates.

I finished all the stitching for my Hana scissor case. Now it's just a matter of waiting to get the fabric to finish it and the fob. I think after Fandango this is my favorite piece this year.


I didn't get those olive green leaves done this month on Fleurs de Sakura. This piece will be one of my pieces for WIPocalypse next year.

No update on Fantasy Lace.

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Satin Stitches - Donna's Fantasy Lace

No update on Bramble and the Rose.

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Ink Circles - The Bramble and the Rose

My dragons are back, but still invisible. I decided to concentrate on stitching one element of the piece so that I'm not constantly threading and un-threading needles. So for now I concentrated on the stonework. I'm going to keep at this piece until we break for the holidays.

Teresa Wentzler - Tracery Dragons

I didn't touch Sfilati Fantasia.

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This month's theme is: Recap your accomplishments for the year! (Your finishes, your final before/after photos, etc)

I reached all the goals I had set for this year. It helps that I kept them very small ;)

• Finish one page Ink Circles - Bramble and the Rose - Done

Before

After

• Finish beading Mirabilia - Tree of Hope - Done

Before

After

• Stitch on Teresa Wentzler - Tracery Dragons - Done

Before

After

• Finish eyelets on Donna M. Olson - Fantasy Lace - Done

Before

After

For my finishes of the year, I will do a post for it closer to the end of the year so look out for it :)

WIPocalypse 2016 – November

This month's theme is: What pattern (or designer) is on your must-try-to-stitch bucket list? This question is very apropos for this month as I've been dithering and hesitating about buying a kit this month. Europeanxstitch is having a sale until the end of November and I've been trying to decide if I should buy the kit for Chatelaine's japanese Octagon Box. However it's looking like (for the third year), it's not the right time for it.

Other things on my bucket list:

• Alison Cole butterfly goldwork kits. I love her new one Pearl Butterfly that will be a class in April
• Hazel Blomkamp's kit for Gussy Up just because I love how complicated it looks
• Jane Nicholas kits for patterns from her book Stumpwork & Goldwork Embroidery, inspired by Turkish, Syrian and Persian Tiles
• All of Luzine Happel books on Schwalm embroidery
• I could go on and on...

Fandango is done! You can read more about it here.

I started working on my accompanying piece for Hana. I got a lot done on it over one day. Now that Fandango is finished I can put in more time on this.

I didn't get those olive green leaves done this month on Fleurs de Sakura. I will try again for next check-in.

No update on Fantasy Lace.

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Satin Stitches - Donna's Fantasy Lace

No update on Bramble and the Rose.

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Ink Circles - The Bramble and the Rose

Still hidden away poor dragons. But, putting stitches into this piece is the last goal I have for this year. So this means that by the last WIPocalypse post there will be some progress on it.

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Teresa Wentzler - Tracery Dragons

I didn't touch Sfilati Fantasia.

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WIPocalypse 2016 – October

This month's theme is: What online stitching communities do you enjoy? I've been on Blogger for 4 years now (Wow! Time passes fast), before that I didn't have much of a presence online as I was more of a lurker than participator. Since then I've become more active on Facebook and Instagram. I don't post on my personal Facebook page but I do help manage Virtual Threads' Facebook page. Click the link to check us out :) I have a HUGE feed of blogs that I go thru every morning and share what I find on there for others to check out so in that way I'm very much involved. However even with that I'm still a lurker :P I'm horribly awkward when leaving comments so don't think I'm not reading your posts. I am, I just don't comment.

Fandango got a lot of love this month. I had planned on concentrating on the four small squares but that didn't go as planned. Instead I ended up finishing the center square and a whole lot of bullion stitches that go all around the piece. There are close up pictures in a previous post here and here. Right now the goal is to finish up all the bullions that go within the piece.

I finished my beaded fob Hana. The next step for this piece is working on a scissor case to go with it. There was a delay in starting that as I didn't have enough of the 3-cut black beads. I finally have those but I think I want to get all those bullions on Fandango done first.


I didn't get those olive green leaves done this month on Fleurs de Sakura. I will try again for next check-in.

No update on Fantasy Lace.

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Satin Stitches - Donna's Fantasy Lace

I took Bramble and the Rose to my guild stitch meeting and got a tiny bit in there, but not enough to warrant an update pick. I spent most of the evening swapping book titles with the guild librarian. Love books!

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Ink Circles - The Bramble and the Rose

Still hidden away poor dragons. But, putting stitches into this piece is the last goal I have for this year. So this means that by the last WIPocalypse post there will be some progress on it.

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Teresa Wentzler - Tracery Dragons

I didn't touch Sfilati Fantasia.

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