Half and Half

While at my daughter's for Thanksgiving, she brought something to my attention. That I'm stitching a lot of canvas these days. And a lot less stitching on linen.

I used to be maybe 70% linen and 30% canvas. Now that ratio is probably flipped. This was happening before I started working in the needlepoint store. 
I'm enjoying my canvas more and it shows. 

But never fear linen lovers. I have dragged a project out of the past - the Tsunami Charity Sampler. 

 Here's when I started it - Feb 2006

Not much attention paid to it - progress as of Sep 2008.

By March 2009. It's a big piece on a large scroll frame. I can't just casually take it anywhere.

April 2009

By the end of April 2009 - I guess I got in the groove.

Maximum progress - November 2009

But this isn't where I was when I picked it back up, because I had to frog a huge knot on the back of motif on the bottom left. And I lost a lot of that motif.

I uncovered this piece from its hiding place when I was readying the china cabinet for shipment to daughter. It was living there along with two other forgotten beauties. I immediately felt guilty. It's a beautiful Quaker sampler. I changed the fibers to Crescent Colours (by the way, did you know that Sharon Crescent has sold her business? Just in case you missed this news -  Crescent Colours hand dyed threads will now be manufactured by Classic Colorworks, a brand new company in the cross-stitch industry. 

Ronny Williams, the son of Little House Needleworks founders Diane and Ron Williams and brother of Country Cottage Needleworks founder Nikki Leeman, is the sole owner and will oversee dyeing and shipping operations for his new company. )

I took my Quaker off to stitching with me today. There are some people there that have never seen it. Yikes. But my cold made my progress very slow. The medication fog coupled with the interrupted sleep. There's not much to show, so no photo yet. 

And that brings me back around to what kind of balance do I want in my stitching? 

Right now I'm completely enjoying hand painted canvas for the freedom it gives me. No need to follow a chart! Not sure if I want this to be 50/50. I'm guessing I will always have a foot in both worlds. Maybe I'll just stitch on whatever calls my name and keeps me captivated.