Not the best week, but...

Stitch-wise, it wasn't a bad week, it was just the rest of the world that fell apart, but more on that later. I did actually progress with The Bride Doll Making (I really need to make sure I do that title right, half the time I say "Dollmaker" which is the artist's name, but you guys know what I mean). I left off last time here:

I worked on her for three days, although each day I did less and less. I got another 1566 stitches in an additional 9.02 hrs, for a total of 47,583/107,269 stitches, which is 44.36% and a total of 248.63 hrs.

I moved on to a new start, the 40 year-old kit, The English Garden. I remember why I never started it (I was scared of the 18ct fabric, which is hilarious now), but I don't remember why I purchased it in the first place because it's not my style. Maybe it was a gift? I really don't remember, but here is what it will look like:

I had replaced the fabric with another 18ct but, my goodness, is the new fabric stiff! Since the threads aren't labeled with their DMC numbers, I'm a bit SOL on those if I run out (other than just trying to color match them). I also can't give you a total percentage or how many stitches I have left. Since it was from a kit, and the pattern was one long sheet of pattern (and not the only of my new starts that is that way), I can't trust that Markup-RXP has the correct number of stitches total. I'll know if Markup-RXP got it right or not by the end of the project. So, I'm going to do this one like so: I did 3466 stitches in two days and in a total of 16.18 hrs.

It was weird working on a kit again, but I'm glad there were no half or quarter stitches. There will be some backstitching, but not a lot, so I'm not worried about it.

On Sunday, I started another new start, Strangely Lonely, artist Jasmine Becket Griffith and charted by HAED.

This is my absolute favorite piece of artwork by JBG, probably because I feel a kinship to this picture. But stitching it started out rough. Firstly, I got about 350 stitches in and realized I hadn't gridded it properly. I took the total measurements, split them in half in both directions, found the middle of the fabric, and counted away. I wasn't considering the fact that the first page would start at the beginning of a 10 block and not in the middle.

It took way longer to frog the stitches than it did to; a) stitch it originally and b) restitch it. Numerous times I almost just stopped altogether. The culmination of everything else from the week was really dragging me down, but I continued on. I got 1159/273,150 stitches done, which is 0.42% and I put in 6.35 hrs (I did keep the first stitching time included in that, but not the frogging). Here is where I stopped last night:

I'm not sure what will happen this week stitch-wise. Strangely Lonely is in a weird place, so I'm not feeling it, but I know I will eventually if I get through this rough patch.

On the home front, the boys went to the vet for their 6 month check-up and shots on Thursday. The news wasn't great (to say the least). Bug needs his teeth cleaned (which isn't cheap), but he's only 11 so it can still be done. Bam's can't be cleaned because he's 15, and they desperately need to be cleaned. Bam, my beautiful baby boy...his heart murmur is starting to affect his kidneys and liver and his counts were elevated. They put him on the medicine that Zander was on for years, so we'll see how it goes. Back in the day, they also told me that Zander didn't have long to live when he was 5 and he lived to 11, but with Bam being 15, they told me to "prepare myself" (although I'm trying to stay positive). Plus, Zander was sick his whole life and Bam never really has been other than being blind now. Bam also has a knee that sounds like one of mine, all gravel, which explains why he's been walking like a car drifting on sand. To make it all worse, their bill (not including the future teeth cleaning) was almost $1000 for 15 minutes worth of interaction on a 9lb and 17lb pup? Really? Bam was a bit put out by the time we got home, and me hovering over him didn't help. He got so aggrevated, he wouldn't sit in my lap, he sat in his bed, but he did stare at the chair, even when I wasn't in it and I could tell he wanted up. Stubborness is a trait that runs in our family though, so he camped in the bed all weekend!

And, if that wasn't enough, I've been having issues with the skirting around my trailer since we have high winds almost constantly now, so, once we got home from the vet, I was checking it and found something really disturbing.

I'm pretty sure it's been almost a year since I looked at that spot, but I don't remember any burn marks (and I think I would had the same reaction I had this time had I saw it before). Also, considering this is also about one foot from the incoming natural gas pipe, I wasn't feeling too good about it. So, Thursday night, I barely slept at all and I called my electrician first thing. He wasn't going to come out because he said it wasn't anything he recognized as electrical and I needed to talk to the trailer park people and find out what that was. I let work know I would be late and they just told me to take a vacation day (which I'm glad I agreed, I needed it). Once the trailer park maintenance came out, he said it was an old cable box that wasn't connected anymore and the burn marks looked old and were probably burned into the pipe piece before they placed it there to make a dent for the box. I wasn't happy with that answer, but what could I do? I had two separate "specialists" telling me it was nothing and the burn mark does look old.

But I also had a long discussion with the park people about getting my skirting replaced and potentially my deck (depending on how much the skirting costs). My deck is about like a surfboard now, you never know if it's just going to slide and collapse on itself with every step on it.

There are a lot of repairs that need to be done on that trailer, but I really don't want to invest the money in it, especially when the park owner (who lives in Texas) could sell it to a developer at any time and then we'll all be homeless (the entire neighborhood now is nothing but cookie cutter subdivisions). I was told when we moved my trailer here (almost 30 years ago now), that it wouldn't survive another move. And land here is so expensive (and exclusive as to where trailers can even go), I would be out of luck even if I could move it. But there is no way I could afford a house now, even if I had to move, so I just sit and wait for doomsday. But I figure if I keep the outside looking good, maybe they will leave me alone for now. They don't need to know what the inside looks like, right? If I'm about to get swamped with vet bills, the house can wait.

I kept waiting for that third terrible thing to happen (bad things come in threes), but it hasn't happened yet, so I'm on hyper-alert waiting for #3, because it's coming. Here's hoping that it's only two bad things, for the first time ever in my life!

Weekly Update-Slow Stitch Week

I'm not sure if I just wasn't feeling it, or because I was setting up for the new starts, but I had very little stitch progress this week, really only stitching on Saturday and Sunday, and even Sunday was a bit of a bust. I didn't touch Everest at all. I'm not sure why. But I did move on to Happy Haunts by Neni Designs (and I'm not that's still even her store name anymore, she changes it like every five minutes). This has always been one of my least favorites and now, I'm not sure why. I did OK on it this weekend, all things considered. I did have to reload it in Markup-RXP, again, not sure why I didn't do it right the first time, but a lot of symbols and colors were missing. Then, I had to remark off all the progress so far.

This was a project I haven't touched since 12-31-2023, again, probably because I hated it. The colored patterns are just too hard to work from and I really don't like 18ct Aida anymore. I really should have done this on 28ct, but I think my logic was the design is a bit pixelated, it needed to stay that way, so it was better on a bigger fabric (or at least that's all I can come up with for my 2017 brain). I had previously stopped at 28,862/62775 stitches which was 45.98% and 165.03 hrs.

This weekend, I made it up to 30,813/62775 (another 1951 stitches) or 49.08% and 177.83 hrs (another 12.8 hrs, most of which was Saturday). The Hatbox Ghost and the head of the Opera Singer is really starting to pop. I also changed out the needle minder from one of my new ones from MadForMinders. It is more of a Disneyland Haunted Mansion pattern rather than Disney World (the Haunted Mansion store at Disney World is named Memento Mori), but I'm OK with it.

I have gotten most of the new projects put on their respective scroll rods. I'm still waiting on two more scroll rods (for A Discovery of Witches and Hook, part deux) as well as the modification hardware to my stand. All the fabric is gridded up though (I still have to draw grid marks on gridded fabric to make sure I hit the lines the same since the pre-grids actually cover an entire row and column of blocks, but the pregridding saves me all the counting). I'm also having issues with storage (shock...lack of room in my house for more "stuff"). In this pic I have the Aimee Stewart Bookshelf just hanging from the wall, but I have since taken the big projects and put them in another gray bucket in the floor. But here is what the situation looked like at least until Thursday:

Speaking of Aimee Stewart, I finally broke down and emailed Michele at HAED about seeing if Rio could be charted up completely. I have the one that HAED released already even though it's not typically my type of chart:

But what most people don't know is that the full image also has Duran Duran in it! It was something Aimee did for a contest or something. Even finding images of the full image on the internet is hard and, although I have it in a file somewhere, I don't feel comfortable posting it here because I'm not sure about copyright issues. I planned on just charting it myself (as long as I don't sell or share it, that's OK, right?), but if I could get HAED to do it, all the better. Michele also said that, if Aimee agrees to having it licensed, it would be the full cost of a custom chart (which is $125), but I'm cool with that considering the subject matter. If I could get it in a max color chart (not sure if I want it super-sized, have to consider that), it would totally be worth it to have a professionally charted Duran Duran pic! We're still waiting to hear back from Aimee, so I'll either be starting another project soon, or I'll chart it up myself at some point in the future (when I rebuy some charting software...plus, I won't have to worry about dithering if I do it myself, although I'm now wondering if I can request a non-dithered pattern from HAED with the custom stuff). I'm probably getting ahead of myself on this idea, but whatever. I did not, however, ask Michele about Tudor Rose by Jasmine Becket Griffith. I still think it will appear eventually.

I also cleaned out more stuff from the Duckroom. My therapy Zoom session last week was me walking her through my house, and I'm still not "calmed down" from the process. I don't like being judged for my stuff (although the judgement is probably all in my head). Like I always say, there is a thin line between OCD and hoarding. So, since I've been so anxious about it, Friday night I got rid of all my Magic Band boxes (yes, I even keep empty boxes, so sad!). I tried to get rid of the external boxes for the Funko Marvel sets that togther make a display (the cardboard boxes, not the actual Funko boxes, those I'll keep forever), but I couldn't do it. My logic is that the cardboard is protecting the empty Funko boxes (flimsy, but it's the way my brain works). I found some old Christmas bags and, since I don't participate in Christmas anymore, I was able to get rid of quite a bit of them, well, the ones that weren't Disney. I even had an empty box from a Blu-Ray player two Blu-Ray players ago! Needless to say, it was still enough stuff to fill a giantic-sized garbage bag. Now, I just have to actually take the bag outside and put it in the can. I might be better bringing it to work and putting it in the dumpster. Work trash gets picked up every day. Knowing that stuff is sitting in my can till Friday might mean I dig it all back out again.

I've put The Bride Dollmaker in my stand to jump back into tonight. I barely touched this when I started stitching again, so let's see if I can do a bit better. But then again, I'm starting to think I might start one of the smaller new starts. We'll see when I get home. So, until next week, that's this update!

Stitching ups and downs

I've had my good days and bad days stitching since my last post. I was moving along on Alice and the B's, but I have since switched four times (but more on that in a bit). I left off last post here:

And, after another 2876 stitches and 12.75 hours, I stopped Sat the 15th. I'm at 186,830 stitches out of 329,175 total, which is 56.76% complete. The lack of dithering makes stitching this one a breeze, I'm just in a weird area of the picture and don't care for it (which is odd because faces are kind of my thing, it has to be the colors). I left off here last post:

I know I had planned to finish the row, but I was getting so bored with it and I decided if I didn't switch, I would quit stitching again.

So about mid-day on the 22nd, I switched to The Bride Dollmaker by Medusa Dollmaker (a GeckoRouge kit). It was one I started in Jul of 2017, before my stay at the "Hotel California", so she's had ups and downs of her own. I left off on her back in Nov of 2023 here:

As a side note, the level of dirt that accumulates on these things is just horrible, so please ignore. It will get stitched over eventually.

After a sparce week of stitching, days on and days off, I got 2563 stitches done in 16.17 hours, which is a total of 46,024 stitches out of 107,269 and 42.91%. I stopped last Friday here:

I wasn't feeling the dithering on this one (you guys know how I feel about dithering and the fit I threw when HAED switched to that method of charting, but that's an old fight best given up now because it can't be changed). I love the picture, I just don't care for the charting method. It will be great once it's finished.

I decided to switch again to Snow White (a non-dithered HAED retired pattern) by Jessica Clark when I got up last Saturday (I didn't even get up until 3, so weird weekend all around). It was one of my 2016 New Year's starts, so it's been hanging around for a while. I also left off on her in Nov of 2023 at the second row finish here:

And very quickly remembered why I don't like this one...crappy fabric. By Sunday the 23rd (the next day), I was just done. I did a measly 10.23 hrs and finished 1318 stitches (which is shameful). That leaves me at 42,769 stitches total out of 69,374 and 61.65%. I could probably finish this one easily by the end of the year if I could stand the fabric, but I just can't take it for long periods of time. I still don't know why I didn't restart it from the get-go. Maybe I didn't have spare fabric? Oh well, again, a dead fight. I did manage to cover a chili stain from like 5 years ago, so not all bad. I am more worried about the dirt on this one since there is so much blank area that's part of the picture, but anyhoo, another dead subject. I left off here (which looks like more than it is):

By this point, I was struggling and debating quitting again. I think my mind was just in a weird place last week.

I took Sunday night off and started again yesterday with Harry Potter US Bookcovers by Fox and Teacup Designs. This one was one of my Leap Year starts in Feb 2024 and I stopped here that same month:

Since I decided to switch later last night (I wasn't going to stitch at all), I only got 5.1 hrs in and 1508 stitches. It was slow at first, but I picked up once I had literally done almost 2/3 of a page! That's not as great as it sounds because they are weirdly formatted pages and probably only equal about 1/3 of a large-charted HAED. So, even though it was just one night, that makes a total of 8231 stitches out of 121,975, or 6.75%. I'd like to finish the row this week (which is another 2 1/3 pages), but I'm taking it one day at a time. This isn't dithered and the fabric is the pre-gridded 28ct evenweave, so I can't use those excuses on this one. It will probably just be boredom that stops me. Last night, I stopped here:

I'm not sure where the rest of the week is going to take me, but I guess time will tell. My "change every Sunday" policy is obviously going out the window (for now), but whatever I have to do to keep interested, that's what I'll do. I have also decided to change my 55's on my stitching from 55 total stitches on every project to 5500. I think that's an easily obtainable goal at this pace, at least on most projects, probably not the UFO's though. I said I would pull UFO's back out too, but those may stay at 55 stitches total. They are, afterall, UFO'ed for a reason. For right now, one day at a stitchy time for me!

More Stitching...well, I'm trying anyway

I've been trying very hard to not spend any extraneous money. It hasn't been easy, but I've been focusing all my energy on paying off my vacation so I can then focus all my money on this stupid hvac. My water heater is now making strange noises, but I'm trying my hardest to ignore that.

I think my stitchy bug has come back though, finally! I've been watching a LOT of FlossTube and I've got some more stitching done, although I am having some serious issues with my ADHD. All I think about all day at work is stitch, stitch, stitch and, as long as that's the first thing I sit down and do when I walk in the door, I'm good for a while. But the first time I get up to do something else, or if I get distracted for a few minutes and set it down then BAM! I can't make myself pick it back up again. Sometimes that means I've stitched for 10 minutes, sometimes an hour, but usually no more than. Or, even worse, I spend all day daydreaming about stitching, only to get distracted right when I get home long enough that I end up just vegging on the couch and not stitching at all! It's kind of ridiculous sometimes, especially when a lot of the time I'm actually watching FlossTube for the motivation, but I can't bring myself to pick up my stitching! I'm trying hard to get my ADHD under control right now, but it's just been allowed to run wild for so long, it's like trying to tame an unruly teenager.

Needless to say, I did work more on The Bride Dollmaking, although I didn't get much done. If the amount of time I spend thinking about her translated to stitching time, I would have gotten the row done. But for now, I left off here:

And I got just a bit further here:

I was enjoying the project, but by Friday night after skipping another night of stitching (after an entire day of stitchy daydreams, and a lengthy conversation with a new coworker about my "love" of stitching and showing off my WIPs...I mean seriously, how is that NOT motivation?), I decided maybe I needed to switch it up and try another one, so Saturday morning I whipped out Snow White by Jessica Clark (back to a HAED, more comfortable territory for me) and had much better luck. I apparently havent't stitched on her since Jan 2021, and left off here:

And I faired far better this weekend, I averaged about five hours a day on Sat and Sun, so she ended up here by Sun night:

Snow White was always a pattern that I loved, but it was the fabric that sucked on this one, so it's been horrible to stitch since day 1. The co-worker I mentioned earlier was really excited about this one, which in turn got me excited about it, which is why I chose to go back to it. I was expecting problems but, to be honest, other than being able to tell the fabric was different than Bride's, it seemed OK his time around. Either it's because I'm not used to stitching and I just can't tell the fabric is a pain, or I've softened in my old age. But as of now, as long as I'm stitching, I don't care!

I don't have a non-Apple tablet, so I can't use Pattern Keeper, and frankly, I'm not going to buy a non-Apple tablet just for an app. I did try the free version of Markup R-XP on The Bride and spent a bit too much time at work getting caught up to where I was up to now. And yes, while it was nice to see all the percentages of where I was, what I done, and what I had left, the extra work just wasn't worth it in the end. When I do typically use apps, I use HoursTracker to keep up with my time and EZPDF reader to find hidden stitches (on the HAEDs at least), but I'm still very much a paper chart girl. I print them off on a lighter cardstock that is sturdy enough for everyday use for a couple of years, but not too heavy and thick to take up a lot of space. I use color pencils to mark my progress and that works for me. As someone who works in I.T., I know that you can't trust I.T. exclusively. I can just picture marking dozens of pages and then the app crashed or the pad does and whoosh! All gone! My system works for me and I just don't see the need to throw out percentages and stitch counts, while cool, in the end it doesn't really matter unless you have a FlossTube channel I guess.

And, of course, despite the spending moratorium, there were a couple of things that slipped under that radar. First and foremost, my stitch lap stand that I love so much is on its last legs and now that I live on the couch instead of my recliner, it's all just very awkward anyway position-wise. I broke down and ordered a K's Creation floor stand. I hate I had to spend that much money, but I'm wasting a LOT of time trying to keep my frame in the stand (it keeps falling out), adjusting myself because the whole setup is just weird, etc. I may have to go back to the chair anyway, but at least the new stand (whenever it comes in), will hold my project secure no matter where I'm at. I debated a Lowery or something else, but by the time I added all the extra things I would need for it to work on the couch, the K's ended up cheaper (although not by much) and it's coming from the States, so I don't have to worry about waiting months for something that is going to inevitibly get stuck in customs (story of my life).

I also took advantage of the HAED 50% off sale, but I only had one item in my wishlist (well, the same item twice in two different versions), so that wasn't a big deal. There are technically two versions of this pattern, one without the quotes from famous writers and one without and, initially, I had both in my wishlist, but in the end, I decided the one with quotes is more "me", so that's the one I went with and deleted the other one. It's Bountiful Bookshelf by Aimee Stewart. I have quite a few of those bookshelves, and I always get the supersized, max color versions, so I'll probably NEVER stitch them (because there isn't enough lifetime for one, let alone all the ones I own), but here we are...

I also purchases about four patterns from Vivsters (a seller on Etsy that I found through a FlossTuber). I initially just looked at some patterns and wishlisted them, but they almost immediately sent me a coupon, so I thought, "why not?". The all look fairly easy and my mind immediately went to some nice hand-dyed fabric and silk thread (I'm already thinking big again). This one is Quaker Tiles-Gemstone Forest

Quaker Tiles-Black on White (and just now I realized it's the same exact pattern as Gemstone, but I'm so horrible at color conversion, I don't even mind because I would screw it up if I tried to change this out to just black by myself...and yes, even I could screw that up!

Moroccan Lanterns, because I just LOVE Moroccan lanterns...I have dozens of them all over the house. I actually like a lot of Moroccan decor, but another story for another day.

And last, a really quick and small stitch, All Hallows Eve-Pumpkins

As I was sorting these new stash photos, I realized that there were also four other new projects that I bought quite some time ago that I apparently never mentioned! So let me show you those as well since I'm on a roll. I have no clue when I bought these, but it had to be some time in 2022, because I'm fairly sure I haven't bought anything since then. There are only four, and three are Aimee Stewarts (shock...I seem to really only buy Jasmine Becket-Griffith and Aimee Stewart), but there was one by Joanne Rowland called Toffee. Part of me really hates the thought of stitching all that brown (reminds me the giant Jesus head), but I just LOVE the thought of a Highland Coo above my couch!

There was one Max Color Super-Size bookshelf from Aimee, The Grand Library

And the other two where the Life Is An Open Book series, one for London and one for Paris (both are both MC/SS, of course, because I'm a glutton for punishment):

And that's it for now! We'll see how I get along stitching on Snow. I'm not ready to enter any stitch-alongs or anything yet, but I'm working on it. I need to see if I can keep up the momentum first.

More Stitching and other stuff

Okay, so I know I said "no negativity", but can I just say that I HATE that Blogger made us switch to their "new" platform? Either I'm forced to use outdated "Compose view" or I'm stuck with semi-writing code "HTML View" just to make a new paragraph! Bad form Google!!

Now, on with the good stuff...I left off with Dollmaker here:

And, I finished the second row, I'm 217.97 hrs in, and here she is!

I spent my B-day watching YouTube. I made myself a roast with all the trimmings and also a Pavlova:

It was my first time making a Pavlova, but I think it turned out OK...it certainly tasted amazing, although it didn't keep very well and I had to throw a lot of it out. Miranda, I'm not. My Sister also got me my Disney watch I REALLY wanted, but wouldn't dare spend that much money on myself! I wish she hadn't, but she did.

Once I got done with Dollmaker, I went back to Maleficent (I was feeling in the mood to finish rows. I left off on her back in April of this year:

And, as of now, I'm here, so not much progress:

Oh, and I forgot to mention it, but a few weeks ago, I got a couple new Once patterns, including this AH-MA-ZING one from WitchyKitt Designs, who are quickly becoming my new favorite designer (oh, and in the process of getting this link, I see she already has another new Once pattern I'm gonna have to get!):

And that's about it! Still nothing else to report on the positive side. But maybe I'll get there soon!

Pitiful stitching with no excuses other than laziness!

It's been a couple of weeks since I stitched anything, I left off on The Bride Dollmaker here:

Granted, the first few days of that time were spent worrying about Bam, but he's had his teeth cleaned and, although we're still playing the "I'm not going to eat unless you hand-feed me" (a trap which I'm still falling into), he's doing MUCH better. Ever since then though, I think that, between the miserableness of work (which I should be grateful that I still have a job when so many don't) and the horribleness of the world (when I live in the most protective bubble ever), I just feel like doing absolutely nothing but watching YouTube (excluding Wednesday night's Agent's of S.H.I.E.L.D., where I lament over their lack of Fitz, which puts me in an even bigger funk). I just can't bring myself to stitch at all anymore and I have no excuse. If I didn't have such a stupidly cheerful demeanor most times (could that be med related?), I'd say I was depressed. But I don't feel depressed. I just hate my job, hate my surroundings, hate everything happening in the world and feel helpless to fix it, and just want to go home and shut my brain off. But otherwise, I love my pups, my stuff, love watching various YouTuber's do their thing, and am anxiously awaiting the moment when I can do my ninja warrior road trips again (I want to beat my 34 hours straight record), although there is no telling when travel will be safe again (or when I will feel safe traveling, a completely different animal).

I decided this weekend to change my blaa mood, and I did, sort of. Saturday, I stitched all of an hour, and Sunday, all of 10 minutes! Shameful! But needless to say, I made it to here:

Again, SHAMEFUL! Saturday was all YouTube, Sunday was more of a "trying to do stuff" day, like laundry and cleaning, but never really doing anything day, because I just ended up watching Kissing Booth 2 (which meant I had to watch the first one again...wasn't a fan of the second one, so I had to watch both the To All The Boys again to even it out), then I just watched YouTube till I fell asleep with laundry in both the dryer and washer (yea me for tonight).

Sucky Stitching, but I have my reasons

For the 4th of July week prior, I didn't stitch because I had the worst week ever at work! It seems like, here lately, work keeps getting worse, but each level of "worse" is different. It's not certain situations that keep getting worse, it's new levels of problems, new issues, new doctors coming on, software problems, just random things hitting me from areas that I'm not used too...random chaos, and I don't like, nor function, well in chaos. So, with the holiday weekend and the three days off, I spent them doing something I apparently haven't done very well for quite a while...I cleaned my house! It took me almost all of the three days, and I could barely move for most of the week afterwards. But I did manage some stitching late on that Sunday. It sucked. But I left off last time here:

And barely made it to here because my hands were shaking from the cleaning:

Last week wasn't any better at work...it was a different level of worse. A whole new set of problems, each completely different than the previous week, but the previous weeks issues were all still piled up. Considering that a lot of my problems stem from the company I considered leaving here for, I don't regret my decision not to quit and move to California, but still, I'm getting too old to deal with some of these issues. It's just too much for one person.

On top of that stress, I've started to notice an issue with Bam, and I'm almost scared to mention it, but towards the middle of the week, he stopped wanting to eat. He would eat if I hand-fed him, which I know Zander used to do back in the day to play me and I don't want to start that trend if Bam is playing me, but since he is a rescue, and I don't know his real age, and it's obvious he is getting old, it's worrying me, so hand feeding it was. Then he got to the point by the end of the week where he wouldn't even accept that. He would eat his Dentabones and Pupperonis, but not his food, so I switched to boiled chicken and rice and hamburger meat, which he would eat if I hand-fed it to him, but usually not all of it. He's drinking fine, he's bathroom-ing fine, he's playing fine. His teeth seem OK, he doesn't grunt or groan when I squeeze across his torso, his heart is not loud, I've checked his dew claws and they are fine, no growing in, but I can't figure it out no matter how much I poke and prod at him.

I debated just taking him up to the vet on Saturday, but he seemed better then, so I didn't. By Sunday, I regretted that, so I called them this morning and they are supposed to call me back. He is getting a haircut on Tuesday and it is SWELTERING here, but he's always inside and, although I keep it warmer than most, my dogs have always been as cold-natured as I am, so they have never minded. Maybe now, he does mind. Once he gets his hair cut, maybe he'll go back to normal. But best to take him to the vet, spend a couple of hundred and have some tests run just to find out he's a big faker, than to keep worrying and find out that something is seriously wrong and I did nothing. Then again, I'm terrified there is something wrong. I'm definitely not ready to lose him. I knew taking on a rescue was a risk...they thought he was 5, but they didn't really know, he could have been older or younger. I've already had him for 7 years, so either way, he's a senior dog, especially for a pure bred Shih-Tzu. If it's something serious like cancer, I can't afford those treatments like my Sister could, so what am I going to do? I've had to put one down and I've watched one die horribly in front of me, I don't think I can do either again...sorry, I just can't think about that right now. Moving on...

But, once again, just on Sunday, I did stitch some, when I wasn't waking Bam up to check on him, so here is a bit more progress:

I'm going to keep working on the Bride until I finish this row, I'm determined on that, but at this rate, it could take me forever! I have to get back to stitching on the regular again. When it comes to work, I have to leave it at work, and Bam, well, one step at a time...vet first, then worry. Total face of a faker, right?

Still Stitching!

I am proud of myself, I can't believe I'm still stitching! I said I would, but that usually doesn't mean much, especially with my current work schedule. I left off on The Bride Dollmaker here:

And stopped on her here at 183.13 hrs:

I started to get bored and tired with stitching, so I decided to switch projects and it fixed that issue and I think I decided that might be part of my problem. I'm trying to force myself to either stick to a schedule or finish a row when I really should move on when I'm feeling stressed by it. I picked up Snow White, which I apparently haven't touched since November of 2017! How HORRIBLE! I should be ashamed! I left off on her here at the second row finish:

And I stopped on her here last night:

It's also the first time I've worked on a HAED in FOR-EV-ER! It might also explain why she is SOOO dirty! I tried to wash the little stains off her, and I just ended up making it worse, so I just figured I would just wait until I was done. "Hopefully", the final wash will clean it up and, if not, I will have to get "very" creative with the matting! Just a reminder, this is what she is supposed to look like when finished:

I'm going to continue on with Snow until I get "bored". I'm also using my phone now to take pics, which is why they are a bit darker...I need to apparently tweak the settings a bit and fix that. I just thought it was ridiculous to dig out the camera, take multiples, find the best one, edit it down, upload it, blaa blaa blaa, when I could just take a pic with my phone and have it automatically upload to Flickr.

Speaking of which, I'm NOT happy with the direction that Flickr is going to lately, and I'm looking to switch my photos over to another site. What photo site do you guys use for your pics? Sure, there is Google/Amazon and all those sites, but they tend to compress them down and they really aren't blog friendly for links and what-nots. I don't want to pay Photobucket out the wahzoo...I've been grandfathered into Flickr's old Pro program for YEARS and I have almost 53,000 pics uploaded, sorted, and tied to my blog, so I hate to leave them, but the politics of Flickr since they got bought out has just gotten horrible and I doubt they will be around much longer. I just need something more reliable, so I'm looking to you guys for suggestions!