Monday, November 03, 2008

Cross Stitch love returns

I love cross stitch. It is a frugal hobby when you look at the time spent working compared to the cost of materials. Some projects cost more then others. I started out in Early Oct. looking to make a welcome baby sampler of some sort.I could not find a pattern I wanted. I looked all over the place but I did not feel inspired.

20 years ago I made a sampler for my aunt when My cousin was born and I started remembering how I had accomplished that. I remember charting out the name and the letters along with a picture I liked. Bingo! I started creating a plan. I could make a sampler for my son of something I want.

But in the mean time I have found a pattern I loved in the latest issue of Just Cross Stitch Magazine (JCS). it was called "Smell my feet". It was so so cute. I decided to stitch it first being in the Halloween spirit. I had decorated for Halloween around the house and I needed something to take with me to all my doctors apts.

Once I found the needle in my hands again I was content. It has been 9 months since I worked on a cross stitch project. I was discouraged at the lack of stitchers there seem to be. All the craft stores cater to the scrap bookers these days. JoAnn fabrics, Michael's, AC Moore.To find the truly awesome designs you have to really know the designers and do a LOT of research.

Then I did a search on technorati for cross stitch blogs. Well Of course if people are blogging about Personal Finance they would be blogging about cross stitch. I fell deeper in love. I am reading about projects people are working on. Looking at different finishes they use to accomplish these items. A pin keep, a pillow, an ornament, framed. The passion is back. And I realized I was making a mistake. Art is influenced by our moods and passions. I had limited myself to work on one project and one project only until It was completed. Well I had a monumental huge project that I love. But it is a Christmas Santa. and who wants to work on Santa in the middle of summer??? So why not pick up a little quickie project that you can complete and let Santa wait. Its the same theory as the Dave Ramsey snowball. Pick off the little things first. then roll you efforts onto the bigger ones. So this is what I am doing in my cross stitch work. I have almost completed the Smell my feet design. Once it is completed I will be picking up Santa again. It will be November and that is not too early to work on Santa. Plus after a feeling of accomplishment with the small project I feel like I can take on a bigger mountain.

As for my CC status. I picked off a med size one with a high rate of interest. I am working on another Med sized one with a lower but now the highest interest card rate of all the cards. I do believe I will be able to pay this one off by next summer. Then its on to card #3. I am sticking to the Debt snowball plan.

As for projects... I have Smell my feet to finish. Which I have already purchased the fabric and cording for. I have a plan for two others. I am going to work on them this weekend after the Hospital birthing class. I have been inspired by others finishes and I know I can do it. In a way this is mental clutter and planning on clearing it out feels so good. In the mean time here is a photo of the smell my feet in progress. I Will post it again after completed.

Cross stitch This is something in my life that I am really proud of. As a young girl I heard often the message when you leave a place you should leave it behind you even better then you found it. Well that is what Cross Stitch does for me. It allows me to leave beautiful things behind that lets me know I have been here...

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