If you’re spending some time this weekend stitching in your own little world and you are looking for something entertaining and educational to watch, here’s something for you!

A Stitch in Time is a BBC series that aired in 2018. I’ll tell you about it here and give you some sources for viewing it.

I’ve lately received not just a few little emails asking about the progress on my hexagon quilt that I first showed you here, which is my “grab and go” stitching project at the moment.

I don’t have as much time to work on it now, and I’m not really making time to work on it now – not like I did when I first got the project going. Now, it truly is a grab-and-go project, something I grab and take with me when I know I’ll be waiting around, biding time, and needing something to do with my hands.

Surprisingly, though, there is progress on the thing, and a lot more than I actually realized!

So, for the curious, here’s my progress, some insights to my current thoughts on it, and a couple notes on how and why I had to expand the organizational aspect of my grab-and-go, hand-pieced hexie quilt project.

Christmas in July.

It’s just a bit overdone, isn’t it?

I know it’s a marketing ploy. And it bugs me in a number of ways, on a number of levels. I like my seasons – and the holidays that go with them – just as they are. I like them to show up when they’re supposed to. And I’m not too keen on the marketing trends that play havoc with them.

The only instance that “Christmas in July” makes any sense to me is when it comes to embroidery and other forms of arts and crafts that require time to develop.

Embroidery, after all, is a slow craft. You can’t just snap your fingers, press a button, and voilá! A hand embroidered gift pops out, ready to deliver.

So, while I tend to be a bit of a cynic who looks askance at “Christmas in July” as just another marketing gimmick, I have to admit that, when it comes to embroidery, thinking ahead to Christmas-in-December while sweating away in July does make sense.

And to that end, for those who want to get ahead on Christmas needlework, here are two ways you can do that…

I’ve made a little more progress on the Jacobean Blues embroidery that I showed you last week, but as usual when I first set out on an embroidery project and start exploring stitch options, I’ve had a few Moments of Pause.

I’ve changed my mind once.

And I’m pretty sure I’m going to change it again.

Today, I’ll show you what I’ve done so far, talk about the thread a bit, show you an element that got stitched & removed, and share my thought processes along the way, for whatever they’re worth.

A couple weeks back, we chatted about different resources that can help embroiderers (from beginners to advanced) take the plunge into needlepainting, which is often viewed as an advanced, hard-to-conquer technique.

Today, I want to highlight another really good resource for those who want to learn the art of realistic shading with needle and thread. We’ll take a quick look at the embroidery works (and instructional ebooks) of Emillie Ferris.

If you haven’t seen Emillie’s embroidery work, I think you’ll really enjoy it. And there are a couple points about her approach – and her project e-books – that I think make her work unique and worthwhile to use as a springboard for learning and practicing needlepainting.