The month of page finishes and a giant nostril. What?
I started the month of March with The Kiss, my piece for Every Day Counts for the Ultimate Cross Stitch Group. But, switched to my Epic Pokemon on the 3rd day of March when I stumbled upon the PokeMarch Challenge after watching Stitching Marie’s Flosstube.
Epic Pokemon Generation 1 is one of those spur of the moment starts I had in 2017. It has long been neglected and that is the reason why I included it in my YOW and WIPocalypse Lists. PokeMarch, I felt, is a great opportunity to jumpstart working on it this year. And it was. I started the month with page 30 almost finished and page 29 half-way done. My goal was to finish those 2 pages. When I accomplished that, I found myself not wanting to switch to another project. So, I continued working on it and finished the whole bottom row (Pages 26-30).
I think joining PokeMarch was a big motivator. But, a bigger motivator is the Ultimate Cross Stitch Group’s Mega Million Stitches to Oz where the group is aiming to stitch 2M stitches from March 5 to April 8.
I enjoyed stitching on this that half-way through the month I have accomplished one of the goals I have set last month. I was still itching to stitch on my full coverage projects. But, I also want to work on accomplishing the other goals I’ve set last month. Which is to finish 2 Advent Animals and the July block of my Magical Creatures Calendar. The only solution is to work on a full coverage and one of the smalls in a day. Doing this I have managed to finish the July block of Magical Creatures,

Advent Animal #2 Peter Polar Bear, Advent Animal #3 Mary Mouse,

Page 1 of Farewell to Anger, Page 6

May of the Joyful World Calendar,

Page 1 of The Kiss,
and Page 6 of SS The Listener. I’ve already started page 7 and it seems like I stitched a giant nostril.

That’s a lot of stitching. There’s still a few days left for March and I hope that I can finish Page 7 of SS The Listener and Page 2 of the Kiss.
2018 GOALS CHECKPOINT
My WIPocalypse 2018 List
- 24 full coverage pages (8 out of 24 accomplished)
- 10 of the Advent Animals (2 out of 10 accomplished)
Linen and Threads Mystery Sampler 2017
Spirit of the Cougar
- Coffee and Tea
- Summer Sampler
Other Projects/Finishes I worked on in 2018 not included in the WIPocalypse 2018 List
Elf Garden , Spring SODA Stitch
- English Pinpillow
- Fairy Grandmother
- Hanging the Quilts
- Intertwine
- Joyful World Calendar (1 out of 12 accomplished)
- Lion
- Magical Creatures Calendar (7 out of 12 accomplished)
- Still Life
- Wonderful World
APRIL PLANS
My plan for April is to create a dedicated craft room so that my living room will always be clutter-free and guest-ready. I also plan to research on English Paper Piecing because the hexies are just screaming at me saying “Please, try stitching me.”
However, I still would like to work on my cross-stitching:
- 3 full coverage pages
- 2 Advent Animals
- August block in Magical creatures
- January of the Joyful World Calendar
Other plans:
- Finish reading Kafka on the Shore.
- Start a vegetable garden.
Let’s see how much I get to accomplish.
STITCHER TIDBIT
My most neglected WIP was Epic Pokemon. Well, it was until I stumbled upon the Pokemon Cross Stitch Group. It is not my oldest WIP though. My oldest WIP is Still Life. I work on this every now and then. When I discovered cross-stitching in 2015, Still Life was the first model piece I saw. I recognized it as an adaptation of an Amorsolo painting. Because I am into art I wanted to start it immediately. At that time, the only available fabric was stiff local Aida. My apprehension over the fabric was strong. But, the need to start the project was stronger. So, I bought the fabric only to find out that my wrists hurt if I work on it for long periods of time. I’m not the type to abandon projects. So, I made a decision to start another project to alternate with this.