Standing Nutcracker, 2

Well, I hope the National Hurricane Center removes Isaac from the list of future storm names.  While Florida was fortunate enough to dodge the full force of Isaac, a "rogue band" broke free after Isaac left Cuba and headed up the East Coast of Florida.  It dumped masses of water as it stalled overhead.  Vero's previous one-day rainfall record was broken Monday thanks to the torrential downpour.  I don't know what the 3-day total was.  A lot.  Of course, I was running my Monday errands.  As I was pumping gas, I saw lightning and heard the thunder and had the fleeting thought that perhaps I shouldn't be doing this under a metal awning at this moment.  Of course I had committed the cardinal sin of not having a full tank of gas when a tropical storm/hurricane was approaching.  Once I saw that Isaac was going up the Gulf of Mexico I relaxed my usual attentiveness to storm preparation.  My bad.  And as I was out driving around through buckets of water, there was a tornado warning.  And ten minutes after I pulled into my garage a tornado hit 3 trailer parks just west of where I had been pumping gas.  Why is it always trailer parks?  Life is not fair.  Fortunately no one was killed.  And I can barely bring myself to watch New Orleans.  I think it is worse to watch a hurricane hit someone else than it is to endure it yourself.  My prayers go out to all in Isaac's path.

Tuesday I was surprised when I got to the shop to discover that there was water on the floor of the back room.  Fortunately nothing was damaged.   And again, a wake-up call.  Knowing how much rain we were having, it hadn't occurred to me while doing errands Monday to swing by and check on the shop. "It's only rain."   Foolish me.  It could have been so much worse. 

My weekly progress doesn't seem like much on this gi-normous project. 

I wanted to complete the interlocking gobelin around the "feather" in the nutcracker's hat so I could start the long/short split stitch with its edges overhanging the background stitching.  I just barely made it! 

I tried to darken things so you could see the definition of my first row of stitches.  I'll have more on this in 2 weeks.  Next weekend (9/7-9/10) I'll be in Baltimore for a TNNA cash-and-carry market.  This is definitely too big for travel.  My mind is racing trying to select a small traveling project.

Standing Nutcracker

It was love at first sight when I spied this canvas on Susan Roberts' website.  It is a 30-inch-tall Nutcracker that I'm going to stitch and then have made into a standing stuff.  What a marvelous thing to have standing by the Christmas tree or in the foyer to welcome guests.  

Susan has 2 different 30" tall nutcrackers; she also has six 18" tall nutcrackers.  And she has a tree skirt that has 8 panels with a 2 nutcrackers per panel for a total of 16.  And I'm sure any of those could be painted individually.  (Easy for me to say since I can't paint).

Since I plan on turning this into a standing stuff, I first drew an outline around the canvas.  Actually I did it quite poorly since I later decided that I need to have at least 10 stitches of background around the figure.  This will change when I get to his legs because he will need "a good foundation" and so the bottom border will be much wider.  I couldn't face doing all of that background in basketweave, so I selected the Jacquard stitch.

As you may have figured out by now, I like to have the background done before starting other stitches that edge up to it.  Thus, I usually stitch several threads of background and then do a strand or two of design.  In the above photograph, you can see the start of the Jacquard and then the interlocking gobelin I selected for the reds in his hat.  I lightened the photograph so you could see the gobelin while still seeing the details of the Jacquard. 

My intention is to have this stitched and finished by Christmas, although no one but me seems to believe I can do that.  It is true that I have several canvases to partially finish for customers--like the finished frog that sprang (?) a leak only to reveal it was filled with pinto beans.  That is definitely a no-no in Florida where bugs quickly befriend old beans.  Had to locate some poly-pellets at the local Joann Store.  And Isaac seems to be racing toward Florida.  My weekend plans definitely haven't included battening down the hatches in preparation for a hurricane.  Think positive thoughts--the best option might be going north in the Atlantic.  The only problem with hurricanes is that they eventually make landfall somewhere--and you hate to wish such bad luck on anyone.   Another installment on this impeding story will come:  Saturday!