Spelunking - An Update

In case you were wondering what happened last week, one of my co-workers decided to come to work sick - and several of us got The Crud, including DH who is sick with it now and will probably miss a day or two of work as a result :( So I was out of commission for a few days last week - and you KNOW I'm sick if I can't stitch OR read :( It had all the symptoms of flu, but tested negative for flu - and a week and a half later, I am still not quite back to rights. So people, do me a favor; don't come to work SICK, especially if you can work from home to prove your dedication.



(DISCLAIMER: all of these photos below can be found in their respective albums on my Multiply site - I do not know why they do not link back from here to the enlarged photo like they USED to - OR you can go to this post on Multiply and see the enlarged photos by clicking there. What can I say - HTML hates me).


BEFORE The Crud got me, and for a few days after, I worked on Celtic Banner. Lots and lots of border. It sure FELT like I did more than shows up - I had to re-adjust the frame a few times as I moved down. But I am finally to the compass rose, where there are about 10 colors already, and I've barely gotten into it - this piece is more complicated than it first appears, IMO. Here is where it was when I started this time:



And here is where I stopped:



And now this is where the spelunking comes in. Spelunking, a.k.a caving or potholing, is exploring caves. Or, in my case, starting a new CHATELAINE!!! Because I just could not stand it a minute longer, and I'll tell you why. On a FB cross stitch group, someone had finished a Dimensions kit called Southwest Mesa. And someone else had commented that they had the kit, and would be willing to pass it on. So I contacted that person, and arranged a trade - because, you know, it's Southwest, where I belong. So this is in the mail to me:



And I wait and wait, stalking the mail lady as always. And finally, Desert Mandala reaches the proper decibel level to FORCE me to get it out and start it, because no way in HELL is it going to wait for me to work Southwest Mesa, or Deep Blue Sea, for that matter. And well, New Mexico, where I belong, IS home to Carlsbad Caverns, which is just an amazing place to see and experience, so spelunking I will go...

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.So yes, I CAVED, or spelunked, as I prefer to call it, because it sounds cooler. And possibly contagious. Because I'm all about the contagion here lately :) And after working on it since Friday night, here is where I am on the ginormous Part 1:



Included here are 3 different blacks - PTB in black, plain ol' DMC 310, and then, DMC rayon in black - which, other than being a hair bulkier, looks EXACTLY like the cotton DMC. I am not entirely sure this is going to be worth the effort to outline all the coming parts in or not - I do not see any sheen to it when it is stitched. I can't imagine the Anchor Marlitt that I subbed this for being any different. So when I get to those parts, I may have to decide. Heck, I might order a few more skeins of HDF black regular to use.... Also of note - the coyote and the vulture are both over-1. Though I think, having read Stephen King's The Stand, oh, 12 times or so, I'm going to say that's a raven, not a vulture. Just because.



I will keep on with Desert this week, and will also look for that piece of 28ct antique white evenweave that I bought and didn't like for Growth Rings, to replace the awful piece of 80-grit aida that came in Southwest Mesa :) I'll save that aid for furniture refinishing or something... I am also planning to go to stitch night on Tuesday - I don't think I can spread The Crud now, all this time later, though I will try to keep myself to myself :) Maybe I will finish that IC Halloween ornie that I had planned to finish last weekend - or work on Rainforest....



And while I was busy spelunking this weekend, we had some wildlife visits, which I was able to capture with my new toy, the Canon 55-250mm telephoto lens that I got as my Good Raise present to myself :) :) NOT pictured - the red tailed hawk that was sitting in the yard by the pond, with a catch - I had a dog yanking on me, not a camera :( But I did get the snake that I almost stepped on (maybe the one we rescued from Beanie, or one of it's hatch-mates) before he just slipped into a crack in the step and disappeared:


And then, Sunday morning, I woke to see a deer right up by the house - not 10 feet from my bedroom window (if it was on the ground floor) - but I had the damn lens set to manual focus, and well, hey, I just woke up, so by the time I messed around and got it changed, he'd heard me and took off:



BUT they came back later that evening, and I got off a lot of pictures - which proves I need to clean a couple of windows, and lube another so it goes up quieter :)



Hopefully we'll have more visits, I am sure they were just waiting for me to get my shiny new lens :) And just because deer aren't really very sharp, here are some pictures of Dummy, doing what he does best - playing in the tall grass, hunting snakes, or whatever it is he thinks he's after - more here, which if you watch using the slideshow, you can almost see him hopping:


Happy stitching, and SPELUNKING, everyone! Come on, you KNOW you want to cave into some project or other!!!

(I have employed this bruiser to guard my bell pepper plants - I am going to have a TONNE of bells before too long!)