Some progress

First things first, Margaret, you bum! In something less than a week you're mostly done with Halloween Fairy????? Isn't there some rule against finishing a project before the person who "inspired" you to start it finsihes it??? lol I think mine needs to come back out and play.... maybe tonight even.

It's bordered on too hot to stitch, but I've been semi-focused for a change so I planet myself in front of my fan collection and stitch anyway. I started my second square for Sharon's RR. Tan flowers aside, I liked stitching the May square so I decided to try a new color pallate and started the August square.

Now, I've posted a question to Sharon for advice before I continue. You see the fabric she's using is the same color as the floss for the gulls and the lighthouse. I switched the gulls to light grey, but I'm debating the lighthouse. At first I thoguht it should be brick, but now I'm wondering if white and outlined would be better. I've left it to Sharon. Hoepfully she's still online today so I can finish tonite and get it in the mail .... early for a change!!!!

I've managed a tiny bit of progress on my Quaker a la 6 Mains

I was woring on it for a few minutes at lunch on Friday and discovered I'm a row too high with my swan or a row too low with my tree. Sigh. Oh well, I'll just wiggle that swan's fanny around to fit. I am not a frogger. I am an adjuster.

The recent string of memes regarding how you stitch and what you carry in your stitching bag got me thinking. So I did a little photo essay or my "essential" stitching stuff.

That's me (well, behing the camera it is anyway) sitting on my bed with my "stitching table" on my lap with the essentials all around. The cookies are interchangable. I'd prefer something soft, but I take what I can get, and frankly the Girl Scout's lemon creams are quite respetable. The floss boxes of DMC aren't usuallly out, but I was puling threads for Sharon's August square so they were up top for a change. Usually they live under the far corner of the bed. Actually the real essentials are seen below--

The stitching/dinner/writing/laptop tray is a giant, fold-out timeline of world history. My mom got it for me thinking it would be really useful. I find it interesting, but I only really used it once-- to fill in other points on interesting context on a medical history timeline for my students one quarter. As a lap tray the book is darn handy, and I use it daily. The tension hoop is my best friend. If you haven't tried one, give it a shot, just don't get the big one -- it's like 8 inches across and it just can't hold fabric tight enough. The scissors are one of a half-dozen small scissors in arm's reah of my spot on the bed, but they are the set without an sheath and with the really cool point protectors which not only do their designed protecting, but make the scissors easier to find when I drop them. The TV remote is absolutely essential. I cannot stitch to bad television and apparently I have a guy's patience for commercials. lol There are two other essentials, but the camera isn't wide-lensed enough -- my Ott Lites and glass of water. They're both off to the right of the photos on a small bookshelf. The bottle of water that refills the glass so I don't have to go "all the way" to the kitchen when I drain a glass is on the floor next to the bed in front of the shelf.

That, in short is my stitching regime. It works for me, but I'd still prefer Chris's reclining couch!

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Just started: Rex Stout's Please Pass the Guilt
Bought Last Night Because I Couldn't Resist: Glen Cook's Cruel Zinc Melodies (Nero Wolfe in Sapce/Fantasy -- wht can I say, I like the Wolfe format)
Hoping to Pick Up Tonight with a Border's Coupon: Louise Erdrich's The Plague of Doves