BWA HA HA HA HA!

I see that my evil little plan to get attention and acclaim worked. Bwa ha ha ha ha (she says, as she maniacally rubs her hands together over a steaming cauldron). Thank you! I really do appreciate you comments on my stitching, but let's just call it like it is, shall we? Raymond Crawford designed a fabulous canvas, and Ruth Schmuff brought it to life with stitches and fibers.

I just followed directions.

But I'll take all of the praise I can get, especially since I am but a fragile and delicate little creature, and my ego relies on all of you for constant feeding and watering.

(Stop that snickering in the back, please.)

Who knew that my announcement that the Great Purge of 2010 had begun would garner such reaction? Before y'all think I've gone round the bend again, let me explain what I mean by "purge"...

At the end of the year, I like to go up into the studio and take all of my stitching and go through it. I start by getting everything into piles and bins in a "like with like" fashion so that I can see exactly what I've got. First, all of the fuppies get a little admiration and stroking and sorting out as to who will make the next trip to the Michael's and who will go to live in the box for finishing. (Oh, um, sorry. Fuppies are things that are stitched but not finished into their final form. I wish I could lay claim to that term, but I shamelessly lifted it from another stitcher's blog and I can't remember whose it was.) (So sorry about that, dear stitchy friend who probably hates my guts right about now.)

So once the fuppies are all settled into their respective bins, I set about going through each category of stuff: painted canvases, counted canvas charts, cross stitch, crewel, hardanger, etc. This is where I get a little ruthless, because I sit on the floor and do a very fast "yes" or "no" decision making that relies only on my gut feeling as to whether or not the item blows my skirt right up. If it doesn't, it goes into a pile.

Once I've made all of those yes and no determinations, I gather up all of the no's and put them in a storage bin and then put it away for a year. (See? I don't throw anything away, so there's no need to faint over the thought of me getting rid of piles and piles of stitchy stuff!) Then, at the end of the next year I go through that bin to see if I've changed my mind or taste and want to re-consider the no's into yes's.

It's not a perfect system, but it seems to work for me, and I'm happy to report that my cross stitch baskets are now filled with things that I might actually want to stitch and NOT crap that I've collected for the last billion years because I thought I would just die a painful death if I didn't have a particular chart, etc. right then on the very spot. It's a little crazy, but some baskets went from having a hundred or so charts to now having five or six. (What does THAT say about me and my obsessive hoarding tendencies, hmmm?)

Oh, I forgot. My baskets of cross stitch charts are pretty much separated into seasons, since I seem to be a very seasonal stitcher. (You know....spring, summer, autumn, winter, etc.) And I have a basket for stuff that isn't exactly seasonal, like samplers, geometrics, etc.

Speaking of geometrics....here's an oldie but goodie that I pulled out of the stash yesterday and then put a few stitches into last night. This is a painted canvas from Maggie and Co. and I think I bought it all the way back in 2004 or so:


As you can see, I've started stitching it already, but I'm kicking myself over the lack of notes for this one and the fact that I've taken a few of the threads out of the kit for other stuff over the years. So I'm a little stuck between wanting to rip out everything that's there and starting all over and trying to match up colors and threads from my stash. I'll give it a good going over this afternoon in the light of day and will probably opt for the less demanding job of it, since we all know how keen I am to do anything more strenuous than laundering dog pee out of the drapes.

Aunt Chrissy and I finalized our New Year's Eve plans yesterday. There will be dining and dancing and partying and all kinds of revelry going on. Too bad we won't be doing any of it, though. We'll be parked in front of the TeeVee in our jammies, stitching and slurping dietCoke into the wee hours, and on New Year's Day we'll watch the Tournament of Roses parade and we'll stitch some more. Hopefully Stewey and Bosco will alert us to the issuing in of 2011 by calling us on their iPhones. (They, in fact, are going to a black tie event in Vegas. Apparently, Bosco's rating at Ceasar's warrants a private plane being sent, as well as some front row tickets to see Cher and Elton John. Stewey has already cleaned and pressed his little tuxedo, so I imagine it will only be a matter of time before he demands that I make an appointment at Mr. Gordon's House of Style for a little pre-party pampering.) Damn dog.

That's the report on a December Tuesday! If you're snowed in wherever you are, I hope it's with someone you love and that you've got lots of stitching to keep you company!