OJerusalem

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I have officially stopped following my rotation. Or it would probably be more accurate to say that my rotation has changed. I skipped Noah’s Ark and plan on skipping Our Family as well. I just can’t stand to even think of working on them at this time. Maybe I’ll feel differently the next time that they come around.

O Jerusalem can be a little daunting because there are huge patches of it that are basically the same color. I have to confess that I had a hard time starting work on it because it seemed a little boring. However, as areas started to fill up I was excited by how good they looked. I felt compelled to continue stitching so that I could see other parts fill in. There is still a long ways to go before this really starts to look like something, though. At the rate I am going I sometimes wonder if I will live to see it finished.

It is amazing to me how slowly this piece stitches. After ten hours of work, only a small section of dirt is completed.

I like the way that it looks, and I probably should. The whole bottom left quadrant of the picture is essentially the same color. I had better get used to brown because there will be times when that will be all I’ll be stitching.

Despite all of my complaining, it is encouraging to me to see a block of stitches running right up to the picture of Jesus. It won’t be long before I have an outline of him and then things will really start to take shape.

Even though I am working on a part of this picture that is the background, I find myself excited to stitch it. I believe that the picture is starting to take shape and I am excited to see what will appear next as I finish each cross. I love being able to see the outline of the tree that will eventually occupy the hole that currently exists.

The only dilemma that I have faced through this rotation is which way to go. Should I work horizontally and put in the next tree? Or should I work vertically and try to reach the bottom left corner? I believe that I am going to do the latter, mainly because in that direction there are huge blocks of the same color. Right now I find myself attracted to those big blocks because they can be stitched relatively quickly and mindlessly and it quickly becomes obvious what I have accomplished so far. Of course, there is always the possibility that I will change my mind and work horizontally when this piece comes up in the rotation again.

Cross stitch can teach you a lot about life. If you are bored with the section you are working on, go work somewhere else. The new perspective that you gain will give you new excitement about about your project.

It is a little risky making such a big jump. I used pins to mark every ten stitches to make sure that I counted twice and stitched once. I guess I find out if I made a mistake some time in the future. However, I have been working more diligently on the piece and am a little sorry to put it away until the next time it comes around. I am already planning what I am going to stitch next time.

Now that I have finished writing about all of the pieces I have finished, it is time to write about the pieces that I am working on. O Jerusalem is a cross stitch version of the painting by Greg Olsen. I love the painting and just had to buy the kit when I found out about it. This is what it looked like after the last time I stitched on it.

This piece is huge and there are times that I wonder if I will ever finish it in my lifetime.