I hate coming up with titles. Can you tell?
Happy New Year to all of you. I hope to see more of you in person this year!
I’m still not feeling well at all, so I haven’t been online much. Despite that, my wrists have been aching as if I were working again. How does that happen?
Our Yule was quietly pleasant. I hope your winter holiday was as good.
I did finally finish stitching the Fairy Tale Sampler for Sam. It didn’t take that much stitching (so it can’t be blamed for the wrist pain), but I did have to re-purchase some Mill Hill beads. That gave me an excuse (like I needed it) to talk to Susan of Nease’s Needlework, which is always lovely. But now it’s finished!
My camera battery won’t recharge anymore, so I’ll have to convince the girl to take a photo of the piece for me.
I think I’m finally ready to do Deep Peace. It’s a gorgeous piece, and some people I love dearly got all the supplies for it as a gift for me a few years back. Unfortunately, we broke up right after that, and every time I started to work on it, I cried. I think there’s been enough time now that I can focus on the happy memories instead of the hard stuff.
I think I need to start a smaller project, too, that I can carry around with me. Complex projects don’t lend themselves to productivity while doing anything else, anyway. Sam tends to get me so interested in gaming that I can’t get much stitching done. Multi-person games are better for needlework, because I stitch while the focus is on someone else.
I’m not really into New Year’s Resolutions, and if I made them seriously, I’d be more likely to do so at Samhain than the end of January/beginning of December. Still, I’ve been realizing how much I’ve missed needlework. My eyes are still giving me trouble, but I got out an old, portable magnifier/travel light and that helps. I think it may be worthwhile to check into a magnifier attachment for my Ott Lite (after getting new glasses). I’m going to try stitching more regularly, and I’d really like to learn needlepoint and knitting and/or crocheting. I think I can manage the needlepoint on my own, but not the yarn stuff. Hopefully I can find someone local who is willing to teach me. Apparently there’s a group meeting at a local library that may be a possibility.
I thought my DMC was getting too old for use or something, because it kept fraying apart while I was stitching. I finally realized (after buying 3 new skeins of black floss) that I’d been using those needles that doesn’t require threading (which I love), and that they stress the floss (and the floss slips out easily). I switched back to a regular tapestry needle and presto! the problem was gone. I can’t find those no-thread needles anywhere online, so I guess other folks figured that out far more quickly than I did! I have a two-sided needle that came with a magazine or some such, but I don’t know that I can quite figure out how to use it.
Sam and I are staying in this evening, avoiding all the obnoxious drunks in favor of our own celebration. The girl is here, too, because her beau is in Europe with his family and most of her other friends are also out of town (something about a Flaming Lips concert?).
After getting caught up with all the shows I enjoy, I went looking for something else to view. I enjoy Bones, but I find the sizist comments (and plots) highly offensive. I tried to watch the first episode of The Mentalist online, but it keeps timing out. Sam got the first disc of The Tudors from Netflix, and it’s interesting at times. I tend to get annoyed with the liberties they’ve taken with history, though.