Update on Mario Through the Ages

Okay, pun intended here, but it's been ages since I've worked on this project. And even longer since I've posted anything about it. The last post I put up on here was May 29, 2018 which was my third week of working on this project. For grins and giggles, let's say that I started this project on May 4, 2018. That makes today day number 335 of this project. And frankly, I'm pretty okay with that because I'd say that I'm about 35-40% of the way done with this piece. I don't work very fast on my cross stitch, so 35-40% is just fine with me.

In this post I don't have a full-piece progress picture, but I should have one posted soon. It's silly because for me the biggest change that I'm noticing is that I've changed my needle minder out, but in reality the progress that's been made on this piece is enormous. I've almost finished four complete pages with just Mario aspects left to stitch (the hard parts, of course!) The filler parts I've been knocking out on my breaks at work which is the progress that's in the picture below.

More soon. In the meantime, enjoy!

Before work                                            After work

Metallic Thread Experiment: The Booty!

So, I feel like a bit of background is needed on this one in order for it to make absolutely any sense whatsoever. I follow a band called Planet Booty and I've been a really big fan since July of last year. So much so that I actually just finished seeing them five times this month during their Southwest tour with TWRP. (It was a blast and if you ever get the chance to see either of them, you should.) But I digress.

The point is, I'm a big fan and there is a large community of other fans like me that are all over Twitter and Instragram. We're like a family. There's this girl named Katie who does perler bead art that actually made a perler bead version of Planet Booty's Booty. It immediately called to me. I had to cross stitch it. So I reached out to her and she very kindly made a pattern for me.

Originally, I followed the pattern exactly, but the perler design didn't translate to cross stitch the same way, so I ended up tearing everything out and starting over with metallic silver thread. Now, I'd never used this stuff before and I likely never will again. It is an absolute PAIN to work with. It splits and it frays and it hates me despite all the tricks I looked up online and tried to make work for me. My piece ended up a mess, but I'm still happy that I made myself a Booty. I have one now and I never have to make another one again!

I probably wouldn't have it done today, though, if it weren't for Josh Cantero's birthday. He's one of the Planet Booty band members and an absolute sweetheart. If you get to meet him, I almost guarantee that you'll get a hug. My point, though, is that with today being his birthday, I finally got motivated to finish the Booty and post it online to say happy birthday. Since I can't draw and I can't paint and XC is one of my main creative outlets, that's how I decided to show my appreciation. He liked my post, so hopefully he actually liked it, but it's the thought that counts, right? Here's what the Booty turned out like along with a few pictures of Josh from PB's NYE concert. Let me know if you have any suggestions on using metallic thread. Any and all help would be appreciated for the future.

Cardmaking - Party Animal Edition

A dear friend of ours just had a birthday on Friday. (Happy birthday, A!) And true to tradition, I made her a birthday card. This one I had a specific idea in mind going into it which was nice, but what made me really happy about the whole thing is that I was able to use a lot of scrap paper. (I have a ton and it really needs parring down.) This little card is by no means perfect, but the recipient loved it and that's all that matters. Hope you like it, too!