Resetting the Needlework Rotation for 2026

New Years Day is the annual resetting of the Needlework rotation.  I am going to continue to use my standard four slot rotation for the basis of my 2026 plans.   The SAL / extra slot will remain open for the moment, and the travel project (which is occasionally filled with needlework) will continue to have charity knitting in it.   I intend to cast on a Musselburgh Hat later today with my Christmas gift yarn.

So, what are the needlework plans?

Pictorial:  "Mead Dragon", art by Stanley Morrison, charted by Paine Free Crafts continues in this slot. (Current stats are in the December month end post from yesterday - here.)  My best guess estimate on this is around three months of work remaining.  I had originally estimated a 3/1/2027 finish date, but steady work has shaved over nine months off that initial schedule.   I will continue with the 100 stitches a day goal for January and then make "Full Coverage February" into a monogamous push to see how much I can actually accomplish in 28 days.  

Not Counted Thread:  The vintage German Needlepoint "Old Farmhouse" will be in this slot.  I don't have a goal or estimated end date for this one yet.   Ten hours of work in the sky area got me to about 1/8th complete more or less, but it was block stitching and there's a ton of confetti in the part of the piece with trees / bushes.  And the buildings will be fiddley.  I'm pretty sure that pace will slow right down when I get into the more complex parts.

Historic or Historic Inspired Sampler: This slot continues to be filled with assorted Blackbird Designs Loose Feathers kits.  I still have 30 of them in the stash, but I also want to work on something besides BBD in this slot - like actual reproductions, and Quakers.  I've been toying with the idea of "every other project" is a BBD LF, alternating with other designers.  This goes into effect with a non-BBD after I finish "And to All a Good Night".  It is at 58% currently, and the goal is to finish it up during "Christmas in July" (if not before).

Modern: One of my perforated paper ornaments is in this slot.  "Garden Santa" is just barely started - about a hundred stitches or just less than 5%, done last night while waiting for the fireworks to stop going off. (Dela was NOT amused.)  I should be able to finish this little ornament in one or two rotations at most.   I think I'm going to do an "every other project" rule in this slot, too.  I plan to alternate between the perforated paper Santas and other modern projects.  I'm going to see how many of the small projects like ornaments, needle rolls and tiny samplers I can manage to get done this year.   

The stash is down to 88 kitted items after I decided I didn't like the fabric that I had pulled for one of the Quakers.   I still want to do the project, but I had compromised on both the fabric and floss; life is too short for that.   So, I put the design back into the 'to be kitted' list, put the fabric and floss back into the stash and will re-consider choices once the queue is whittled down a bit more. 

FINISHED NEEDLEWORK: "Temperature Stitches" Daily Log by Sarah, Stitchin' Mommy

 

Pattern: "Temperature Stitches"

Designer: Stitchin' Mommy aka Sarah Hughes

Fabric: 28 count Cashel Linen by Zweigart in color 'Antique White'

8.5 inches wide x 6.5 inches high

Threads: DMC as charted

Used the "extreme" color pallet, but didn't need the highest and lowest colors

 

Stitches:  Cross stitch one over one (date/location block), Herringbone (borders), 

January - Queen Stitch

February - Jessica Stitch

March - Diamond Eyelet

April - Satin Stitch

May - Rhodes Heart

June - Tripple Rice Stitch

July - Rhodes Butterfly

August - Diamond Frame French Knot

September - Scotch Stitch

October - Lazy Daisy

November - Norwich Stitch

December - Octagon Eyelet

 

Started 12/26/2024 (borders and date block), needlework completed 1/1/2026 (just after midnight)

One stitch per day tracking the prior day's high temp as recorded at the Philip Billard Municipal Airport, four miles from my house.  Used the Weather Underground website.

Full Coverage Month End Report - December 2025 AND 2025 Rotation #7, Slot #4 (Pictorial)

Mead Dragon is progressing nicely.   I put in 3,724 stitches in December, bringing the yearly total for 2025 to 47,369 stitches and the project total to 83,462.   I am now at 88.32 % complete, and I am working on Row 303.  So I met my December goal despite the holiday and semester end craziness. 

Here's what she looked like at the beginning of the month:

And this time last year!

That 100 stitches minimum per day goal really moved this project forward!  I got a lot more done than I had originally estimated I could.

This finishes out my needlework rotation for 2025.  Look for the reset post tomorrow!

Slow Sunday Stitching - December 28, 2025

I hope everyone is having a great holiday season.  I had a fairly quiet one, with just family at my son's house.  We did a taco bar.   I got some practical gifts - a vacuum sealer, a new drill (at my request), and sock yarn (though I think it will be a hat or cowl since it has yak fiber and silk in it). 

I'm sharing the December Temperature Log early since it will be a finish right after midnight on New Year's Eve.  December's specialty stitch is "Octagonal Eyelet".  Our high temps have been fairly warm, so we are not really into the blue part of the spectrum.

And here's a close up:

Look for the Finish on New Year's Day, though it will need to be framed at some point.

Today's Slow Stitching is hemming.  My granddaughter's other grandma bought her a couple pairs of lounge pants that are too long.   I've done one pair already, and here's the second pair in progress.  I do like using my vintage sewing bird when doing hemming or seam felling.  Being able to keep tension on the piece makes it so much easier.

Linking up with the other Slow Sunday Stitching folk.  (See this week's links here.)

A Christmas Stocking disaster - and the resolution

Riley, my son's dog, strikes again.   This is the same dog that ate the edge of Alexis' blanket when it was a puppy.  This time she targeted Carl's Christmas Stocking.   I think she was intrigued by the buttons that embellished the snowman, because she basically ate his head!

There were two of the 'mouth' beads left out of the five that were the mouth and eyes, so at least I can put eyes back on, and the metal carrot button the was the nose is more or less intact.  It's scratched up a bit, but still useable.

The yarn is a standard worsted weight single by Brown Sheep Co - a semi-local mill and is in stock over at the Yarn Barn of KS.  Road Trip!  I'll need one skein of the blue and one of white and just a tiny bit of black for the hat.

The plan is to run a lifeline just at the bottom of the top (name) band in the last row of red, drop off the bottom of the stocking.  Then rip back to just below the "neck" row, reknit the damaged area, kitchner stitch the top back on and then add the snowman's head and hat back on with Swiss Darning, and put back the eyes and nose embellishments.   I've done similar 'sweater surgery' before and it works out fine.  Any knitted item that's made of stocking stitch can be cut apart and reknit in either direction.  Only works for plain knitting, though.

Monday 12/22/2025

Materials acquired.  The gals at the Yarn Barn were so nice; they even found a scrap of black, so I didn't have to buy an entire 190-yard skein for the twenty or so Swiss darning stitches I need for the top hat!   The blue is only off by a dyelot difference, so if I pull back two or three intact rows and knit it up striping the old and new yarns, it should trick the eye into blending the two very close shades.   It's only when there's a stark dividing line that dyelot changes get problematic. 

Lifelines run and starting to pull out the damaged section.  We are at the 'it looks worse before it looks better' stage.

Tuesday 12/23/2025

The top is all pulled back to the lifeline.  I used my interchangeable needle set cable as a lifeline because all I will need to do is put on a needle tip and it will be ready to kitchner.

And the bottom of the stocking is about halfway to the grafting point.   I had to go one row further down than I'd originally intended due to the way mom did the intarsia section originally, but that's fine.  I think I matched my mom's gauge pretty well, and the stripes to disguise the dyelot change seem to be doing their job sufficiently.  You can sort of see that there are stripes, but there's no line of demarcation.  And the Swiss Darning embroidery and the face embellishments will push all the blue into the background in the end.

12/24/2025 Wednesday

Kitchner has started.  It's a long way around this thing comparted to sock toes!

And kitchner is done!  Back seam all put back together, too.   Ready for the swiss darning.

12/26/2025 Friday

The snowman is no longer headless (or hatless).   He does, however, need a good blocking.   We were not able to find the rest of the beads that were chewed off to be able to give him a mouth, so I have some Mill Hill pony beads coming from 123Stitch.   Hopefully they will be here early next week. 

12/31/2025

He's blocking and the beads are 'ready to ship'.  So hopefully this will be finished soon.

I'll keep updating this post as the repairs continue.  

Slow Sunday Stitching - December 21, 2025

 What a week!  My grandson made it through his finals.  Good grades unless he bombed his public speaking long form speech on the last day, but even if he gets a poor score, he will pass the class. (Speech was NOT his favorite class, and I can't blame him.  I hated it every time I had to take it - high school, college - both degrees - and a couple of rounds of professional development over the years!)  So now on to Christmas!  I can't believe we are only four days out. Where did December go?

Bells play today for the last Sunday in Advent and again on Christmas Eve at the early service.   One of the pieces has a very tricky syncopated section that I only get right about half the time.  I'm praying that the service is on the good side of those odds! 

Crafting has been a bit scant on the ground this week.  Two extra rehearsals in the run up to Christmas services and the end of the school term really cut into my free time.  But I did get the binding for the 80s quilt finished and all ready to go when it gets back from the long arm quilter.   And the design wall looks a bit different this week.

First of all, look at it all mounted on the wall and everything!  Thank you, JC and Carl for plaster anchors and levels and getting it squared away.  Second, you'll notice that all the 'parts of blocks' are now actual blocks except for the 3 inch finished squares.  I ended up with a total of 12 blocks to date.  

I've been thinking about how to approach this back.   The quilt is going to a long arm quilter, so I will need an extra 4 inches on each side of the top dimensions.   The top is 85 inches / 216 cm square.   So the backing will need to be a minimum of 93 inches / 236 cm square.   That's way bigger than my design wall, so I'm going to put it together by the quarter like a huge 4 patch.   

I'm going to set some guidelines for myself:

• No blocks in the outer six inches / 15 cm (so no blocks get chopped off and the binding is easy on the back).  
• Asymmetrical so it doesn't matter where the top lands relative to the back.  
• Bottom left corner - light neutral for name and date label (use that lone rosette to embellish).   
• Use up the bright rose fabrics and the intense plaid first for large sections of backing.
• Three blocks (plus fill in as needed) per quadrant.  May need more.  
• I'm going to try not to worry or overthink too much about the layout.  As Karen Brown says in the tutorial I am using, the only two rules are 'big enough for the quilter' and 'must lay flat'. 

I'm hoping that the back goes together quickly so I can get an appointment with the long arm quilter that I used before.   But I'm not going to make that appointment until I get the back finished and ready to go.  I don't need the stress of an actual deadline on this thing!  Besides, this one will probably hibernate for a couple of weeks until after the holidays now.  The sewing table needs to be clear for gift wrapping and holiday crafting.  This is better than the old house, where the dining room table had to suffice for all of the above plus dinner!

Linking up with the SSS crew (this week's roundup).

Mead Dragon Milestone - the first zero

 

I have my first finished color on the Mead Dragon project!!!   I love that the Pattern Keeper app tracks the remaining stitches by DMC number.   I actually only have three colors with more than 1000 stitches left, but one of the three is over 5,000.   So a long way to go yet, but I just had to mark the milestone!