At Last!!

I'm almost scared to believe I have finally finished this project! I began work on The Wave (a Dimensions kit, design by Jim Warren) on 1 May 2002. Yes, you read that right. It was originally intended as a house-warming gift for my brother-in-law, who at that time was in the process of buying a lovely ground-floor apartment with a garden. Needless to say, the deal was settled, and he moved in. The Wave, however, did not make the move.


I kept working on it (back then) and telling myself it would be a birthday / Chanukah / anniversary of moving in gift. Hah. No such luck. Eventually, my enthusiasm for cross stitching waned (along with my eyesight) and I put The Wave and all my other Works in Progress aside. I put my efforts into knitting, and made my BIL a lovely Irish Hiking Scarf from Lamb's Pride wool in a gorgeous deep burgandy color. His reaction upon realizing I had knitted a gift for him was, and I quote: "Oh, no."


Well. Even though The Wave was close to finished, I just couldn't muster up the enthusiasm for it. Until, as you know, very recently. Now I've decided to have it framed (wish me luck with that!) and hang it up in our living room. If, when BIL comes home from working for two years in Intel San Jose, he sees the picture and acts like it's the most gorgeous thing he's ever seen, the true ownership of the picture will be revealed. If his reaction is anywhere in the region of lukewarm, it's mine. All mine.

Some deets: The finished picture is 16" wide by 10" high. It was stitched on the 16 count (that's 16 stitches to one inch) Dove Grey aida cloth provided in the kit, using the thread that came with the kit (some people like to swap out other fabric and nicer embroidery floss. In fact, I've been known to do that myself. Some of Dimensions' prettiest designs are only available as kits, for some annoying reason).

But today was not all about fun and games. No siree. I finally decided I'd had enough of this:


and this:


So I did this:


and this:



And now I feel much better. Not really. But it seemed like the thing to say. I'll feel fantabulous if Meital will keep to her agreement to keep her room neat(er) from now on.

I finished Liat's Valentine's washcloth, and will be able to share photos tomorrow. I also worked a smidgeon on my sock. I'm sure I'll do more knitting this evening, but I'm trying to resist the nigh-irresistible urge to cast on for a small sweater for a baby or child of unknown identity. I really, really ought to make more progress on my other projects...

What's that? What's my new stitching project? Well, I'm glad you asked.


This cute little design is something I started a long while ago (no clue when). It was originally intended as a last-day-of-school surprise gift for the girls (what? doesn't everyone prepare such a gift?). Obviously, a funny thing happened on the way to the end of the year...


The pattern is actually four separate designs presented as a series in the now (sadly) defunct Cross Stitch & Needlework magazine. I believe these designs were published in 2000. I started with Autumn, because that is when the New Year starts here in Israel (Rosh Hashanah). Naturally, now that I just nearly went blind doing the backstitching on The Wave, I unrolled this project only to discover that I left off at the point of... you guessed it... doing the backstitching on Spring. "Now, that's what you call ironic." Eh, Lizzie?