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After my stitches were removed last monday I started stitching again. It is still a bit sore, but I’ll manage.

I stitched for 23,5 hours this week, for a total 134 hours. And the best thing? I finished my first full page! To finish that one page (page 3 of the chart) took me 128.5 hours in 8 working weeks (I started on December 6th, so it took me a little over three months real time). This page contained a little over 7300 stitches, and 54 blends of color. I think the rest of it will go faster, because I have started to stitch larger areas at once so I am not slowed down so much by confetti.

The green on the lower right is the beginning of the first tree, and I am really pleased with how beautiful the colors are turning out. Because the original is so large, a lot of detail (for example in the rabbit or the flowers) is lost, and in the tree it returns because of its large size. I can’t wait to finish the tree :D.

Besides stitching larger areas, I have also started using a Pako Needle Organizer to help me. This is a place to keep threaded needles. It originally holds 50 colors, so I bought 50 extra needles (I use Permin Gold 26 cross stitch needles without a point). I have more than 50 blends already though, so now I have two colors in each square, one in the upper right, the other in the lower left. It save me a lot of time I spent on threading and rethreading the needle, especially in the case of confetti where sometimes a color is used for only one cross…

After reading great reviews/stories about Neal Stephenson’s latest book, Anathem, I really wanted to read it. On a recent trip to London I picked the 950 page book up for a reasonable price, and I saved it for when I would have my wrist surgery, because I would have plenty of time to get lost in the story.

The story takes place on a planet called Arbe, where society is roughly split up into two factions, one is a non-technical monastic culture that is based on science (math and physics mostly), the other is a ‘modern’, ‘regular’ culture with technology and faith in (a) god. The monactic culture (living in concents, whose monks are called avout) is split up into unarians, decenarians, hundreders and thousanders. For the unarians the door to the outside world opens for 10 days each year. For the decenarians, 10 days every ten years, hundreders every 100 years and thousanders every millenium. They take great care to not let any outside news in when the doors are not open, meaning the thousanders have no idea what happened outside of the concent since the last time they went out.

The story is from the view point of a decenarian avout, Fraa Erasmas, and starts right before the door to his part of the concent is opened for the first time in ten years. Soon it becomes clear that strange things are happening, but because of their limited contact with the outside world, and their non-access to technology it is hard to figure out. This doesn’t stop Fraa Erasmas of course, and it all becomes the start of a great adventure featuring math, physics and a bit of philosophy too.

I found this book a lot like Sophie’s world by Jostein Gaarder, wherein the reader is introduced to basic philosophy through a fictional story. In this book a lot is learned about math and physics. The avout learn and study through dialoging and teaching and the reader gets to follow all discussions. Some of it was a bit over my head, but all in all I really enjoyed it. None of the ideas are too difficult, and because our Fraa Erasmas isn’t that good of a learner, all gets explained.

In another level of the story, the great adventure part, Fraa Erasmas is as much in the dark as we are, so when he figures things out as he goes along, so do we. This makes things confusing in some parts of the story, but all gets explained eventually. The adventure itself is true science fiction, and the world that is spun around it is vast, and beautiful.

I really enjoyed this book. After reading reviews online it becomes clear that it is a “hate it or love it” kind of book, and for me it is clearly love. Some negative comments were that the story was too slow, to pretentious and that the science part played too big a role. Yes there was a lot of science, but it helped explain the mind and culture of Fraa Erasmas. Yes, new words for familiar concepts were perhaps unnecessary, but that really helped in establishing that while this planet is a lot like earth, it truly is not. And yes, the story might be slow due to all the science, but for me that was part of the culture of the avout, no need for speed.

If you love science fiction, with a big backstory, I recommend this book. It might take time to read, but for me, it was really worth it!

LibraryThing link

The surgery on my wrist went fine, and I will soon be back stitching again. Today we went into Groningen for some shopping and I couldn’t resist the lovely craft shop (Sajet). They had several great sampler kits for sale (mostly Permin). I love the monotone samplers, and when I saw the one on the left for sale (almost 50% off) I couldn’t resist. It is Permin’s Vierlande 1826, an original old design from the collection of Museum Celle in Germany. I bought a full kit with brown linnen (I think it is 32 count) and blue and red DMC. The design features initials and a year (1826) but I think I will change them so they fit me (my and Henk’s initials and the year I will finish it). The lettering is from the alphabets and numbers featured elsewhere on the design, so changing it should be no problem. I am planning to start this when I finish “I love dogs” but I don’t know if I can wait that long… :D

This week just a couple of days stitching. I stitching in the evenings and one full day, filling up confetti between the big splotches of red I finished last week. Total stitching was 11,5 hours for a total of 110,5 hours…
After this week I am in for a stitching break. Thursday my wrist was operated on, and that will need some time to heal. I hope to be stitching again in a week or two, but we’ll see. I hate to not be able to stitch, especially so close to finishing page 1. As I said before, I decided to treat each page as a finish, since stitch-count-wise they are as big as small projects anyway…

After finishing the small celtic knot (see below) I picked up my tapestry again. I managed 13,5 hours of stitching (total is 99 hours now) in between cleaning the house and moving furniture.

I worked my way downwards in single colors that cover a lot of space. All those new stitches are only four colors, with most of it being only one color (the Libra symbol, and I am a Libra… coincidence? I think not!). The rest of it is mostly non-red (branches and flowers, they don’t call it mille-fleurs for nothing), so the rest should take me tons more time, but it is nice to see it going somewhere. The white area on the right is the start of the first tree!

As an in between stitch I made a small celtic knot this week. I wanted a finish (I love finishing something) and I also wanted to try out DMC color variations thread. So I took some left over aida and stitched this up in a couple of evenings.

I used two threads of DMC 4215 (blue/pink/purple) on ? count aida. The pattern is from Ink Circles and can be found here (it’s a freebie!). It is the september pattern.

I liked the color variations. I find that monochrome patterns stitched with color changing threads are gorgeous. I ordered some Vikki Clayton threads that I am dying to try out… maybe I will start on a bigger Ink Circles pattern someday… I have my eye on Cirque des Cercles in the color Dragon Blood (Third picture from the bottom).

Only a couple of hours evening stitching this week. I worked on it for 10,5 hours, for a total of 85,5 hours now. I tried to finish the top right corner of the page, while also filling in confetti spots in other places. I am real happy with the progress. I guess with such a large project each page feels like a finish, so now I am getting close to my first finish!

This weekend I hope to have more time for stitching, we are staying home so I should get in at least 7 hours each day, if not more.

On a side note, I started a small in between project, just to have a real finish. I also wanted to try out DMC color variations that I got cheaply at a local store. More about that later :D

I’d like to feature some cross stitch designers and designs that I have encountered in my browsing sessions looking for new things to make. The first one is Ink Circles. Ink Circles’ website sells the original designs of Tracy Horner (and also designs by several other designers).

Tracy designs great celtic knots, and also great monochrome designs. I especially love the design on the left, Cirque des Cercles (she also has a version with triangles and squares). They lend themselves very well to stitching with over dyed (multiple color) thread. They are quite big (but I am a sucker for big designs), and very beautiful! When you do visit the site, don’t forget to check out the gallery where her designs can be seen in many different colors.

There are also a fair few free patterns on the website (mostly celtic knots). She stages a stitch-along (SAL) last year with new free designs every month, leading to a big final piece in a month or so.

I am very interested in medieval history. I studied it for a while, but unfortunately I was unable to continue this. After graduating last July I had to make a decision, do I try medieval history again (a further 5 years at university) or do I stay at my current (very nice) job? I decided to stay at my job, mainly because even though I love medieval history, I cannot see myself becoming so good at it to find a job where I need that education. And besides, if I want to know about medieval history, I can just teach myself by reading. So, that was my plan. In England, history is very popular, and this includes medieval history. Unfortunately, in the Netherlands, it is hard to find new medieval history books, and when you do, they’re about twice as expensive. So, anytime I go to London (which is luckily a lot, for business) I try to pick up some new history books.

The time traveller’s guide to medieval England, a handbook for visitors to the fourteenth century, by Ian Mortimer is a book I picked up last December. I was intrigued by the idea presented in the book, that we can approach history as though it was a place you visit. In the same way that we can visit London or New York, you can also visit London in 1349 or New York in 1945. It is just an extra dimension, but it adds a lot to your perception. This book tries to be a sort of travel guide to a visitor from the twentyfirst century to the fourteenth century.

The book describes aspects of daily life. It does not concern itself too much with historical events, so you will not find more than a passing mention of big wars, invasions, changes in leadership and big social changes (of which fourteenth century England saw enough). Instead it delves into daily lives and describes things like clothing, relationships, religion, food, housing, law and order etc. Mortimer tries to explain things that seems strange or barbarian to us now, but that were logical for that time. For example, he explains the relationship between man and woman, and the perceptions. He explains that even though women were clearly seen as the lesser of the two, this did not mean they always were. Actually, this offered some advantages to the woman too (a husband who severly abuses his wife is unlawful, because she is weak, however, nobody believes that a wife could abuse her husband, because he is supposedly the stronger of the two). Mortimer never tries to say that these differences are better or worse than our current ways, he just tries to place them into a fourteenth century perspective. It has been said many time, never judge history with our current standards, and this is propogated throughout the book.

All in all the book offers a great insight into daily life and habits of the medieval English, throughout all layers of the population. The book does not presume a great deal of knowledge of the fourteenth century, and never delves very deeply into the reasons why things are the way they are. I am sure a whole study could be done into the footware of males in the fourteenth century, but that would soon be boring for many readers. The fact that Mortimer explains this in no more than a page or two makes the book good to read and a great introduction.

LibraryThing link

Finally I got it, my very own display cabinet for my massive Bette Midler collection. I have been wanting it and planning for it for months, and last weekend my mom came over, with her car, so we went to Ikea and got it.

It is a Besta, and I filled it with shelves, drawers, and doors :D The top is two see through glass doors, with on the top shelves objects like mugs and keychains and such, and on the bottom shelves magazines and books. Below that are two smaller glass windows with pictures in them. Behind them are my folders of pictures, clippings and magazines on the one end, and my vinyl on the other end (records and singles). Below that are two sets of two drawers, with CD’s, DVD’s, bigger booklets (mostly concert souvenir booklets) and stuff I still need to put away in the correct place. Below that are two wooden doors, one has an empty shelve behind it, behind the other is a box with yet more magazines and my clothing (concert t-shirts etc.). I love having my collection all in one place (it used to be spread out over different locations through the house) and having a nice place for it where it won’t be damaged. Other advantages are that there is a lot more free space on our bookshelves and in the CD cabinet, we need that! :)