IHSW February and Gifted Gorgeousness

I hope to be working on MH1656 this weekend. I spent most of yesterday playing with the colors. The pink bothered me so I changed to grey. Here is my progression:

 The pink in the center is the  same as the pink in the satin stitch, which I find interesting.
Oh! What is IHSW? It is the third weekend in the month where you are supposed to take time for yourself to stitch.You do not need to kick your family out of the house or run away from home. Just take a dedicated bit of time to stitch.
Gifted Gorgeousness is the brainchild of Jo over at,you guessed it,  Serendipitous Stitching
The idea is to stitch something that is a gift, will be a gift, you can shoehorn into the idea of gift...You get the idea. But how can I do that with MH1656? Well the full title of this piece is MH 1656-My Beloved's Gift because Nicola Parkman received the original sampler from her husband as a gift. I want to work on this and can't think of another project for GG...
It is also Friday Off the Grid so I hope to join that group too! No, I have NOT joined the Magical Stitches group. In fact, I unsigned up for it as they are doing Harry Potter. I am not a fan, sorry to say.
Anyway, hope you have a great stitching weekend!

Secret Stitching Sweetheart Blog Hop

Well, it is time for candy and hearts and dinner out, if you are into those sort of things. We are not and we generally stay home on Valentine's Day. But I do stitch a few things for Valentine's Day as the colors tend to be reds, pinks and whites which I love!

But the Secret Stitching Sweetheart Hop is the brainchild of Jo over at  Serendipitous Stitching        
We sent her a photo of something that would be nice to pop up in an email and then we are supposed to post the photo on our blog today. Then we are to hop over to her blog and try to guess who our Secret Stitching Sweetheart is. I am bad at guessing games, but I love this little pillow that showed up in my email:

That is such a lovely finish I am ashamed to show mine, but here it goes!
The above pattern is from The Scarlett House and the freebie is on on Facebook and Instagram. I took some time to FFO my piece and here it is:

 I put my pieces on fabric that I had. I now see why people match their threads to their finishing fabric....

 This little one is from  Heart in Hand

 And this one is from The Scarlett House The Scarlett House Facebook. I used beads in the letters...

 My brother-in-law had some clean sawdust that I used to fill the pillows.

 And now they sit on my mantle although I may move them to my basket after a few days...

I also have a ton of hearts that were designed by Gay Ann Rogers:

Now to go figure out who my Secret Stitching Sweetheart is... Have a great day!

Black and White

My friend mentioned in a comment to look at the sampler in black and white. Here it is in color:

And black and white. Notice that the pink looks like a medium tone. The light blue in the row above is slightly lighter. I think I need to find a very light shade of a color to use in this piece.
What do you think?

It is an FFO!

There IS a SAL for finishing our objects! Ten Hour Stitcher 
is the one hosting the SAL and she has a few rules. Obviously, we should not be pulling things we finished years ago for this. It should be things we recently finished.It is supposed to be cross stitch or stitching related, not sewing, knitting or crochet. (I am guessing my needlepoint will be fine and also any embroidery.) Other than that, I think the objective is to finish things!
I had hoped to have a Valentine's finish for this post, but that did not happen. Hopefully they will be done before Valentine's Day!
But without further ado, here is my FFO:

 I think I stitched this guy last year, but never got him finished. I have another Santa to FFO before I will allow myself to start another. And a few other things to fully finish. It would be nice to get them all done for March!

Not Sure About the Pink

I have made some progress on MH 1656. It is a lovely sampler, but it does require thinking.

I pulled all the yellow as I thought it looked too close to the fabric color. But is the pink too bright? I think it is staying. I have to rip some of the blue as I made a mistake. Those pin stitches are a bear to take out!

I Shouldn't Start Anything New....

but you all know that it is going to happen! 
Last year I watched Michelle G at Bendy Stitchy stitch Here Lie My Needles by Shakespeare's Peddler. It came out at Nashville's Market last year. Here Lie My Needles
I thought it would be great to stitch this piece to celebrate Hari-Kuyo in 2019 so I bought the pattern and put it in my stash.
Oh! What is Hari-Kuyo, you ask? Well I first heard about it from Pam on her blog,
Hokkaido Kudasai. She lives in Japan and had an interesting post about it. It is a ceremony honoring your needles where you place them in a shrine and thank them for the joy they gave you. If you want to find out more, here is a Wikipedia article.
My original thought was to have the piece STITCHED by February 8th and make it into a finished object in 2019. Ha! Ha! I now have the goal to have it stitched by December 8th and have it finished into something by 2020. I am changing my colors and making it less prim.I am not prim, that is for sure!
Here are the threads I pulled with the 40 count Lambswool:

 And here is my start:

 

Hopefully I will have an FFO soon to show you. After all, there is a SAL going on somewhere in blogland for finishing.

Valentine Stitching

I saw this free pattern on Facebook and decided to give it a go:

I hope to get it stitched and made into a pillow before Valentine's Day. But I doubt it as too many other things call my name!