I'm Still Alive! Updated WIPs and Finishes

This spring has been hectic with boards, patient completion, requirements and graduation. Officially, graduation is in one week and I cannot wait. I have been stitching but not too much.

Finished!!!

Garden Party Cakes - Mirabilia (framed)

Stitched on 32 ct Imagination by Polstitches.

Promessa - Alessandra Adelaide (framed)

Stitched on 22 ct Jade by Picture This Plus
Guests at my wedding will sign the white border as the "guestbook."

Persephone - Mirabilia (unframed)

Stitched on 32 ct Lavendar by Steph's Fabbys
My all-time favorite. I can't wait til I make some money to frame this beauty.

WIP!

Queen's Farmhouse - Chatelaine

 


TTAS (Touching the Autumn Sky) - Mirabilia

Stitched on 32 ct Cotton clouds by Stephs Fabbys (I think)
I have a more updated picture somewhere, I am just not sure where. When I pack up my stuff to move, I will take a better picture.

Stitching Updates

Danggg it's been a while! I just didn't feel like I could truly relax until I found out the results of my licensure exams. Fortunately I have passed the national exam (the one that certifies me to practice dentistry in the US). The regional exam is the one that allows me to practice dentistry in a specific state, and the scores are not out yet. I feel good about it though.

Thanksgiving break turned out to be a Game of Thrones and stitching marathon. It was amazing. I finished a project and got as far as I could through two others before having to stop due to lack of threads. I started another project on an impulse and now I am in love with that one too. Let's view:

1. Faerie Spring Fling is so lovely on Steph's Fabbys's Spring Green. I am missing the beads and kreinik for her wings. I am determined to finish her before the new year. I don't think she will be featured at my wedding but will look wonderful on my walls, regardless.

2. Persephone is also resplendent on Steph's Fabbys's Lilac and is my most favorite project in the history of cross stitching. Yes, you heard that right. It's been kind of a long haul, as I started her in the summer. I ran out of one of the caron waterlilies for the background and I am missing the other waterlilies so I'm just playing a waiting game. She is huge too, like a foot and a half long and 9 inches wide. Something like that. I can't wait to frame her!!

3. New start! Lady Hera and her pretentious peacock will also grace my walls in a few months' time. I am stitching her on Steph's Fabbys Simply Sage. I think it's safe to say that Stephanie Bishop is my supplier. My dealer of deliciously smelling fabrics, if you will. The colors are just so lovely and the fabrics always arrive with the edges serged (finished by stitching the edges so they don't fray)! What a thoughtful touch.

I just started Hera last night and I adore the colors already.

 

4. A finish! I completed Alessandra Ambrosio's Promessa a few days ago. It was stitched on PTP Jade. It was a lot of fun! Some mistakes here and there but they were easily fudged. I substituted beads from my stash for the french knots, and I think they add a little sass and a little sparkle. I will be framing this one with the mat on the outside of the glass, so people can sign the mat at my wedding instead of a guestbook. How awesome will that be? Extremely awesome. Frankly, I just want an excuse to buy charts for the wedding. 

Anyway, here is the finished Promessa with lots of random shots: 

How Wedding Planning is Like a Lobotomy

Things I’ve learned in Wedding Planning

1.       Everyone gets excited for you!

2.       You will get swept up in crafty DIY ideas that will change at least once per month per item or idea, which is proportional to the amount of time spent on Pinterest and Style Me Pretty

3.       You will become an amateur calligrapher, photographer, baker and/or florist until someone (fiancé) reins you back and reminds you that you can’t do it all and sometimes it’s better to pay someone qualified to just get it done. Outsourcing is a hard, hard lesson to learn.

4.       You will care about things that don’t matter at all to your fiancé or even to yourself prior to this whole wedding thingamajig.

5.       You will start to feel yourself slipping away a little bit as hours of your time are spent in a hunched posture, with stomach growling because you’re on a diet and your credit card groaning from the impulse purchases online.

I WILL find a way to use 50 mismatched gold frames after the wedding!

6.       You will start to critically evaluate yourself, your friends, your wardrobe and your DIY Pinterest-y craft choices as SMP-worthy. If it’s not, back to the drawing board, or in this special case, Pinterest.

7.       You will be convinced that you need a theme. This year, it’s the 1920s/Great Gatsby. Next year: Hunger Games: Catching Fire?

8.       Money will flow out of your wallet uncontrollably.

9.       There will be mysterious family members who neither you nor anyone else have ever met, and in fact may be dusty old skeletons in their house on the hill, but are obligated invitees. No questions asked, no arguments given.

10.   Some wedding trends will just pop up over and over again, and the only thing you can wonder is “WHYYYYYY???” Ahem, gray and yellow palette, AHEM BURLAP AND LACE. MASON JARS. MUSTACHE PROPS. REGISTRIES!!

11.   Okay, that last part isn’t fair. Registries are useful to guests, yes, who have been socialized that weddings = gifts. But that’s not the point of a wedding! It’s to observe the joyful couple’s commitment to and love for each other, and to celebrate with days-old bakery cake and a conga line if you’re feeling rowdy.

12. You will hear this phrase: “People will expect [xyz].” Expect what, you ask? Cake. A registry. An invitation to the rehearsal dinner (which, prior to all this research, I literally only expected to invite those involved in the actual rehearsal!!!). Flowers. Favors. An open bar with top shelf liquor that no one drinks except at weddings with someone else’s dime. A dinner. A place to sit. Some form of entertainment including a belly dancer, a firebreathing sword swallower, a clown, an acrobat and/or a poet.

I personally want a birds of prey exhibit at my wedding, but I can’t imagine the logistics or liability. Would a pygmy owl perched on my shoulder, nuzzling my cheek be worthy of a Pinterest post?

13.       You will want to elope. Many times. Probably every day. But I have heard that it will be all worth it on your wedding day, mostly because your opportunity to elope is pretty much gone.

 

Wedding stuff

Damn, this wedding planning stuff is hard!! I remember when I visited Bryn Mawr college in junior year of high school,  and the lovely tour guide said she was studying biology but her secret dream was to be a wedding planner.

Well. I just thought that was the coolest thing. So antithetical to her chosen career path. For her sake, I hope she incorporates some of her dream into her reality.

Now I think she is crazy to want to do this for a living! Wedding planning is stressful, competitive and emotional. It is so easy to feel like you must keep up with the Joneses. There is a ton of family expectations that are tied in with the financial responsibilities. It got to a point that I was begging my fiance to elope. I could cross stitch while waiting for the JoP to arrive! En route to the  honeymoon! 

We decided that we have already invested so much into the wedding that we will have it anyway and that I would try to change my perspective. Family will not be an obligation, they will be witnesses to our joy and part of a banging party. We will incorporate all the things we love,  like ballroom dance, cookies,  delicious food and games. Our vendors will be people we truly like and feel good with,  and so far they have been wonderful.

So everyday I browse pinterest, weddinggawker and other sites for inspiration. Everyday, I take a step back, clear my head and ask myself if this is really me,  do I really decorate in those colors or styles, do I even like how her hair is done, will people notice the details when they're onto their second shock top beer?

In the beginning, I said to anyone who would listen that all that matters at the end of the day is that I am married to my love.

My feelings haven't changed.

A Goddess, a Farmhouse and French Treats

My favorite non-stitchy things to acquire are cookbooks. I have quite a few dessert cookbooks, and I enjoy making something from each book every once in a while. Lately, I have been cooking up a storm from the Martha Stewart Cookie Cookbook and rather than sitting on the couch and eating them all, I "taste" a few and give the rest to my classmates.

Ever since I bought a macaron from the local bakery, I have been obsessed with learning how to make them. I bought all the accoutrements (see, French!) like a digital scale, almond meal and a decorating kit, and have been waiting for the perfect time to try out a recipe from my macaron and cake pop cookbook. Fiance's mother is kind, wonderful and generous and has been making us delicious eggplant parmagiana for our lunches, so I think it's time to give back.

This is my attempt at a chocolate macaron with salted caramel.

Delicious!


I don't mean to hijack the stitching blog with baking news. So here is what is up, stitching-related:

1. Put in long hours on Queen's Farmhouse. Looks awesome. Love every stitch.

The center of Versailles, up close

2. Picked up Persephone and struggled through the confetti in her hair, backstitched her face and marveled at her loveliness. Also, I think I misplaced the Caron Waterlilies used for the background. Oops!

  

 What's next, you ask? Probably cake pops. Oh, stitching-related, you mean? I feel itchy for a new start! I think it's time to bust out a wedding project. More news on that, coming soon!