More Multitasking

During those long car trips to take my two younger children to college, I've used my time wisely and stitched these canvas ornaments.
These are Kathy Schenkel designs from a series called "Countdown to Christmas." The first two or three ornaments took me around five hours to complete. Now I have it down to a science and each one takes about three hours.
Except for this one which took me about three months. That pesky satin stitch on the candle (see close up below) was ripped out, oh, about four times, before I could get it to a reasonable facsimile
of the way the stitch looked in the diagram.
Fronts will be joined to backs (not by me--way beyond my finishing competencies) and embellished with ribbons and hangers to go on a small tree that serves as an Advent calendar. In fact, I tried to drop these off at the needlepoint shop on Monday, but forgot they aren't open on Mondays. It wasn't a wasted trip as I had breakfast near the shop with a good friend and enjoyed my first day as an empty nester as well as my last day of summer vacation. One more day of inservice training this week will be followed by a long weekend. We'll welcome the kids back to school on Monday and those leisurely mornings spent reading the paper and enjoying a second cup of coffee will become a distant memory.



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