Why yes, I did begin work on my Felix the Cat pattern! I'm proud of this pattern. I loved Felix the Cat cartoons when I was a kid and I still quite enjoy it.
I charted this pattern ages ago but there have been so many things to work on. I am slightly OCD and needlework for me is a godsend. It is involved and perfectionistic and I can either be stitching or coming up with patterns or blathering about them on a blog. Three activities springing from one hobby, it's brilliant.
I thought I'd just take a break from Frida to work on Felix and then ran completely out of black thread. Having just come back from a long car trip (which really destroys me) with a sinus infection (or something quite like it) tagging along, I am knackered. Absolutely knackered. So driving way out to Michael's on a weekend when the area is packed with shoppers is not my idea of fun. I have to go out tomorrow though to pick up the mat for the Roman mosaic which I sold to a friend of mine. That's the last time I stitched something in an odd side, I'll tell you.
In any case, here is my progress on Felix. I suppose I could have gone in and done the white backstitching on the head and hands but my brain didn't realize that. Actually it took some hours to realize I could at least do the red tongue. Stephen Fry told me on his quizish panel game QI that if you block the left nostril your spatial and visual intelligence increases and if you block the right nostril your verbal abilities increase. So given that both nostrils and my entire sinus cavity feels as though someone filled it with caulk I will attribute my slow-mindedness to that.
Thank you Mr. Fry for the brilliant excuse, PS please ask David Mitchell to marry me as I'm quite lovely, enjoy history, and generally think everyone around me has been struck with madness.
Well, there's been great progress with my Roman mosaic. I've got over half of the background finished and only a tiny bit of the brown ground area at the bottom left to do. That's the trouble with not having a needlework frame yet - the bottom of anything is especially hard on my hands. After that I just have the white parts of the skull to do, which I've smartly saved for last so it doesn't get stained.
I was working on the mosaic while visiting with my nephew, Benjamin, kept pointing to the skull and saying "Daddy" while giggling. I love the toddler sense of humour. If you misunderstand whatever he's saying (I'm not good at understanding toddler-speak) and repeat back the wrong word he thinks it's hilaaarious.
Anyway, I thought I'd post some patterns. One I've stitched already and one I haven't (but it will be my next quick project). This first one was inspired by a Cake Wrecks post making fun of the way teenagers talk. This particular phrase struck me as hilarious so I stitched it. Only in the pattern I've corrected all the mistakes I made and done some other changes to make it generally more attractive.
The next is a Felix the Cat cross-stitch pattern. I haven't filled in all the black because that's so annoying and boring but I've filled it in around where you'll need to do a little white stitching to show that he has two legs and fingers and all. I think it will look nice when stitched, in any case, and hopefully there are some other stitchers out there who grew up watching (and adoring) Felix cartoons.There's only really a specific group of Felix cartoons I really like though. I love the early early Felix and I love what I *think* is the beginning of the 'new' Felix cartoons they made in the 1950s. Those ones with Poindexter and VaVoom are, for many reasons, detestable to me. I can literally remember my face spreading into a huge grin when the Felix theme song came on after I stuck the Felix tape in the VCR. Cartoon theme songs still hold some unnatural power over me. I hear the first beats of Rescue Rangers or DuckTales or Count Duckula and magically become a happy, giggling eight year old with no problems.
