I realised recently how impersonal my blog feels. Its main purpose is to share patterns with you, but I never really thought about bringing myself into it and making it a little more me. Since I broke my leg, I have spent more time stitching than usual and I’m finding it quite therapeutic. I sorted out my drawers recently and realised how many UFOs I have. Here’s just a small sample of what I found:
- Massive eagle kit
- Fox card
- Tatty ted kit
- Boat kit
- Mistletoe Kisses kit
- Two Christmas tag kits
- Paddington bear card
- Somebunny card
- Penguin card
- Fuzzy bear kit
The list goes on. My problem is that I love starting new kits. I love the excitement of picking out a kit and the look of that fresh white canvas before it has been manhandled or shoved in an embroidery hoop. I love the contrast between the aida and those first bright stitches. It’s so much fun starting new projects! I just tend to fizzle out once I’m about 50 stitches in. I feel like I’m not getting anywhere and I get to the point where I can’t be bothered to continue or I make a mistake and I can’t bear to go back to it, so then I start another new project. I have a serious problem people!
Hopefully, that is about to change. I’m a member of a stitching group on Facebook called I cross stitch and I’m not ashamed of it and have been for some time, and although I’m not very active within the group I enjoy checking in to see what people have been making. One of the members started up a new group (Wednesday UFO Cross Stitchers) this week, perfect for compulsive starters like me. I joined and yesterday was my first UFO Wednesday, something I was really looking forward to, However, will I stick to it week after week? Time will tell. But probably not. As an extra shove to keep me on the wagon, I have decided to blog about my UFO Wednesdays, ensuring that not only do my projects get done (you have my permission to yell at me if I miss a week) but also that I do take that time for myself just to stitch when I do get to go back to work. I went back to work in January after both redundancy and illness, I found that unless I was making something for my amazing partner I didn’t sew at all, and I really missed it. Sewing has always been my “me” time. So, yesterday’s project was to be my metallic Christmas tag kit. This has been a particular nightmare for me. I have done very little work with metallic threads, I find them hard to work with. The threads tend to fray easily and the metallic substance separates from the floss. Plus the pattern calls for french knots in 1 strand. I have found that impossible to do. Every french knot with 1 strand failed and drove me nuts with frustration. So I ended up using two strands instead, and even then, as metallic thread is quite rigid compared to normal floss, the knots are very untidy. I’m planning on using these as Christmas tree decorations, so hopefully once they’re hanging on the tree my shoddy knots won’t be noticed.
Want to know how I got on? Read on.
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