January: The Tree, Part 2

Do you ever get an idea in your head and it's all you can think about? For example, during my workday on Friday, I decided that I had to make potato soup for dinner. There was no real reason for me to make potato soup other than that it's gotten cold again and soup is always nice when it's cold. I found a recipe (I'm a recipe kind of cook - just the way my brain works) and had everything for it except the potatoes and cream. I was going to the store that day so no problem. I made the soup. It was very good and will probably taste even better tomorrow or the next day. Some food needs to sit to be truly delicious. I enjoyed making the soup (the recipe was very easy) and it stopped me from ordering takeout.

Now I have a lot of potato soup at my house, more potato soup than one person can eat. I'll probably freeze some and maybe take some to my parents when I see them this weekend, but it's still a lot of soup. But I couldn't get the soup out of my mind and I knew I didn't want to buy pre-made soup, so now I have a large quantity of soup.

I feel like my stitch journal projects for this year are a lot like this soup: they're all I think about. This is a good thing, but also not. I have a job and a cat and stuff to do (like write a conversation piece outline for the museum and vacuum). Instead, I'm trying to figure out how long it will take me to finish the second outline of the tree (it took about an hour over the course of 4 days) and if I think I can fit a cat tree onto the cat t-shirt next month (probably). I have long conversations with Keely (with myself) about the phrases I'm going to use in March and November. I had a really great idea the other day about the August piece (tentatively called Scar - it's a pair of linen shorts). I wasn't sure how I'd feel about this year's project, despite my enthusiasm, because it's so very different from the last two years and I really loved those projects. However, like the fact that I have massive amounts of soup leftover, I also wonder if I made a bad choice. Is it interesting enough? Am I challenging myself enough? I like to think the answer to both is yes. Self-doubt, especially about art, is such a terrible and weird thing. 

I'm pleased with the progress. There are two weeks and three days left in January and I think I'll be able to finish the tree (it has to be filled), add the stars, and include a moon (it was in my original design). I don't know if I'll get to the snow, but that was always a bonus item anyway. Progress is progress. 

I drew the original version of this tree back in August when I ended up skipping a trip (my brother got sick and we couldn't go) and doing a stay at home art retreat. It was part of an art journal tutorial from Let's Make Art. I expanded the branches and made a slight modification to the trunk for the version I'm currently embroidering.

I love drawing trees. I drew a lot of them in 2021 and was particularly fond of Grandma Moses style trees. The next phase of this tree is going to be a little Grandma Moses-y. I think her trees are a little odd and so are mine. 

Here's this week's recap:

January 8

January 9

January 10

January 11 - funny thing happened with this entry. I skipped over part of the tree. I went back to it on the 12th, but I didn't even notice until after I was done.

January 12

January 13

January 14: Two views

I'm using two shades of white, DMC Blanc (White - left in above photo, right in below photo) and Sublime Stitching 100 (right in above photo, left in below photo). They are different shades. I'm not sure if it comes through in the photo very well. The other DMC white, B5200, is what I used for the outline. It's also slightly different from these two. I'm also going to use DMC Perle 12 in Blanc to fill in the tree. It's a finer thread than the other three.  

For today and tomorrow I'm stitching a base layer of straight stitches using the full six strands of thread. After that, I'll switch to a mix of two, three, and six strands as well as the single stranded of Perle (it's a non-divisible thread). This should create a nice texture like bark. I did it a few times in 2021 for both trees and cats (it also looks like fur).

WIP - PopLush Patterns

I ordered several vault patterns from PopLush and am starting on my first one this weekend. I also joined their Embroidery Club because of course I did.