A very brief intermission

I have eased off a little, for a very brief time, on the RR and gotten back to some of my regular WIPs ... I needed the change of pace and the gratification of closing in on a few finishes. Today, it'll be back to focusing on the RR ... after all there is a deadline looming in my not-too-distant future.

So for the past two days I worked on the following:

Heartstrings Santa Factory February Card: Santa with Heart. Since this is stitched on 40ct, I can only work on it indoors with my magnifying lamp. With the weather being so lovely, I have been doing a lot of my stitching outdoors. So while the other two projects, seen below, have occupied most of my time, I did manage to do a bit more on this piece which is now a little more than half finished.

Antique Sampler & Needlework Quarterly, Summer 2009, Plimoth Scissor Keep. This is quite a different sort of project for me: worked on Tokens and Trifles cards, primarily worked in back-stitch with very few cross stitches, finished with tiny little closely spaced blanket stitches. I just have the lavendar flower and date to work on the back piece. Then I'll need to choose a lining fabric and assemble the two sides to make a sheath. It will be a lovely and delicate stitching accessory when done. It will also be the sort of chart I know I will revisit whenever I need a pretty little gift for a stitching buddy or for an exchange.

Last but not least, I picked up Workbasket's Mermaids Singing again ... and really got into it. This one is so close to being finished that it literally pains me to set it down again in favor of the RR. All I have left to do is the couching of the Caron Watercolours wool over the cross-stitched seaweed. That will involve probably no more than 2 or 3 hours work, possibly less. However, I will be a responsible stitcher and revert to the RR. But at least I know that once I return to my regular rotational stitching, I will have a quick and easy finish in no time at all, at all. Knowing I have that almost instant gratification waiting for me will give me the stamina to soldier on with the boring back-stitching in my RR border.