Irresistible Things

     I do believe I have little or no willpower when it comes to resisting certain temptations. Chocolate is one. Need I say more on that? Gelato from Dolcezza is another. I usually visit the one in Bethesda, but evidently I could also stop in their Georgetown location when I get my hair cut and colored (yes, I admit it; I'm not ashamed) at Ury & Associates every now and then. A new needlework project is yet another. So I caved last week and started something new. (Just trying to fill out my weekday rotation dance card, doncha know.) So what was it that so captured my fancy?

     Liz Morrow recently released a new bargello design, Hens & Chicks, which sparked fond memories of growing up in Elkton, Maryland, in an old, three-story Victorian on the edge of town with a picturesque side yard against a backdrop of a meadow and pond where we used to ice skate (awkwardly on my part). In our side yard, the gardener had filled a half-barrel planter with hens and chicks. I loved the way that plant grew. Liz's design captured it perfectly. We ordered it for scarletthread.com and kitted it per her specifications with DMC floss. Evil temptress that she is, Liz noted in our correspondence that she thought it might be nice stitched with Silk & Ivory. Gah! I couldn't get this out of my head, so the other day I decided to see if there were appropriate greens and blues with enough shades to do it, thinking I'd come up short somewhere. Ha! Here's what I found.

     The colors are just perfect for the way that I remember that potted plant. I'm in love with this project, so I worked on it at my Thursday morning and Tuesday night stitching groups. Bargello goes so fast! I'm not a power stitcher, as we all know, so I'm very pleased with my progress, considering that I had to rip out a couple of times because I can't seem to count.

     My photos are not optimized, as I'm still in the midst of selling my house and don't always have the space to set up my studio in a box. Thus you have a discrepancy in the color. But it's fairly accurate.

     Things are going just swimmingly with the sale of my house, if perhaps at a quicker pace than I had anticipated. I'm down to the closets, having sorted through everything else (except for a couple more boxes of books discovered in the eaves storage area). Since my home is a typical small Cape Cod style of the 1930s, the closets are mercifully small and few. There is a limit to how much one can cram into them. So I'm in the home stretch. Within the next week I should know whether the sale is going to make it to closing or we have to start over again. Wish me luck on the appraisal on Friday.

     Kthxbai.