Stitch away the pain

In my past there's a relationship that still haunts me. It's been years, but I dream about her so much still. Sometimes dream-her hates me, and sometimes they're happy dreams.

Having one upsets my life in so many ways (and makes me try to avoid sleep like the plague). Ignoring them hasn't helped, so this is what I'm trying now. This part isn't complete yet. I'll do each dream or thought in a different color, using different sizes of embroidery hoop. Fingers crossed. I can never remove her from my daytime thoughts, and I wouldn't want to, but the dreams are something else.

So yeah, that's what I'm working on now, as well as my shop pattern for "There is a special place in hell for women who don't help other women." I've completed the text on it, but things keep stealing my attention because I can start the little pieces of decor. Plus I've got some secret-knitting I need to finish up, and you know how that goes.

All Girls Together

Here’s a pattern for you all! I’m doing this quote for a pattern that will be in my shop as well, but the girls dancing image is from a 1900 publication and other than transcribing it to a clean, legible printable, copy, I didn’t do much work. I wish they’d had a few more perfectionist/obsessives doing those old patterns…

The font is from my backstitch font set in my shop. With Blogger I'm not sure the best way to get the pattern at original size (and thus best legibility), so you can just save it from here.

The dimensions are 93x92 stitches, no grid due to the backstitch. Some of the face stitches aren’t full stitches or from corner to corner, mostly the noses and mouths, so experiment and be a bit loose there.

I just loved this image so much (and the quote of course). So someone please stitch it so I can see how it looks finished! I have so many other things to work on…

Books

I read 156 books this year. I could have read four or five more, but 156 is divisible by 52 and I'm a bit neurotic about things like that. I started a really really long audiobook and otherwise I'm just re-reading things until new year.

Favorite Non-fiction reads of 2013: The Black Count by Tom Reiss, Toms River by Dan Fagin, Sister Citizen by Melissa V. Harris-Perry, American Nations by Colin Woodard, Bad Pharma by Ben Goldacre, The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander, The War that Killed Achilles by Caroline Alexander, Destiny Disrupted by Tamim Ansary, Indian Givers by Jack Weatherford, Marie Curie and Her Daughters by Shelley Emling, The Vikings by Neil Oliver.

Favorite Fiction reads of 2013: Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller, Behind the Scenes at the Museum by Kate Atkinson, Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh (most unexpected!), The Thing Around Your Neck by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Breath, Eyes, Memory by Edwidge Danticat, A Hundred Flowers by Gail Tsukiyama,

Favorite Children's and YA Reads of 2013: Code Name Verity by Elizabeth Wein, Swallows and Amazons by Arthur Ransome, The Illyrian Adventure by Lloyd Alexander, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm by Kate Douglas Wiggins, To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, Dealing with Dragons by Patricia C. Wrede,

Oh, here I am.

Where have I been? Not crafting, that's for sure. 

I have been in the biggest crafting malaise since September. I've finished a few things, sure (though I don't count the knitting) but not nearly enough and I've designed nothing new.

It's been awful, but unavoidable. Part of it came from trying to stitch the Roman piece again because having stitched it once already it was just boring. I have finished the pattern but issues with the program I use to create symbol patterns means I haven't listed it yet.
Lately I've been dealing with a psychiatrist I dislike (hey man, saying things like "You don't look like a girl who would be single" is confusing, inappropriate, and creepy), horrible side effects from trying different anti-depressants, and the knowledge that those medications are unlikely to help me but this psychiatrist won't address what I feel WOULD help (don't worry, I've left him).

I actually got a bit further than this

So here you see what I've managed to get done, and a fractal piece that's nearly done (I'm cropping the pattern to fit in a 5x7 frame), though I probably won't finish it for Christmas. I've also knit this dinosaur cowl for my niece and I'm in the process of knitting one for my nephew. Hers is green with blue spikes and his is orange with blue spikes. 

Also, I've put up my Tintin, Captain Haddock, and Arsenal FC patterns for free (happy winter holiday/New Years). You can find all my free patterns here.

Present for a friend's baby.

I wish I could snap myself out of feeling the way I do, but it is a symptom of my life, and there's not too much I can change there. What I hope to change is the level of irrational anxiety I feel when communicating and especially when initiating communication. That's what's causing most of my depression, I think, both due to a lack of socializing and seeing myself act in a way that's SO foreign to my pre-disabled personality.

We'll see what 2014 will bring. 

How I feel/what I want to do. So jealous of my cat.

New DMC Colors

In the continuing feeling of BLEAH I've gotten very little done. I did go camping for a couple days last week though, and that was really nice. I miss being outside a lot, but the weather and my body's issues with the weather makes it hard.

I did, however, buy the new DMC colors like a fan-girlish fool (the box set is a lot more expensive than the individual colors will be when they're released singly). But when you own all the colors you get a bit silly.

Anyway, I thought I'd give you all the rundown on how each new color compares to the ones already out. Basically, there's very little difference, and at least one looks to be absolutely identical (the very bright orange).

The bright spot for me is the nice royal blue. It's brighter and lighter than 311, and a bit brighter than 803. There are so few blues, and I've definitely felt the absence of a better basic blue. The bright fuschia, 3886, is the also a nice edition. There's a brownish-grey, 3895, which doesn't have a close match either.


These pictures make them seem closer to pre-existing colors than they are, but seriously, they're really close and most don't fill a real gap. Wish they'd just done an all blue and purple expansion, as that's where I most often feel I can't find the exact color I need.

Rome - WIP 03

I've been in a slump and not wanting to stitch, I'm afraid. I'm tired of doing the things I can do rather than what I want to do.

I love reading, I'd read lot even if I weren't disabled and alone mostly, but if I were active I wouldn't read over 100 books a year. I'd have other stuff I wanted to do. I'd rather be playing soccer in the park with my niece and nephew, or taking long meandering walks around town to take pictures. I'd rather be working 60 hours a week in the bookstore or really anywhere than creating and stitching cross-stitch so much.

It's just hard, and I'm not doing well coping with my life lately.

In any case, here's my progress on Rome. Getting close to the finish, though taking a break today to finish up reading a library book that's due soon. It's The Riddle of the Labyrinth by Margalit Fox, about the decoding of Linear B, and a woman who deserves a lot of the credit but died and got none. Story of womankind right there.

Rome II - WIP 01

Well, I finally tore myself away from Christmas gifts and started working on the second-stitching of my Roman mosaic. There's just enough done to look super creepy and Halloweeny.

This was the first "pattern from image" that I created, and the largest thing I'd stitched the first time around (probably still the largest, really, in terms of individual stitches). I was still a novice in every way, and didn't think too much about the design once it was done. I altered a few things while stitching, but not much.

Now of course I'm altering plenty, to give it smoother lines and curves, and taking it further from the original mosaic. When I stitched this the first time I only left a border of three or four squares of blank fabric on any side. I didn't use any sort of frame, either. It amazes me now, but that's the only way I knew to do it then.

I need to write down all the Christmas stitching ideas, as I keep forgetting them, thinking I have nothing planned, and then suddenly remember that I have almost everything planned. Sigh! Honestly I'm feeling dreadfully behind on shopping, and I've got two birthdays to plan for before Christmas as well!