Kitty Litter. Finished!

So finally this one is finished, going to start some other "century project". Definetely not a cross-stitch this time.

373 hours total.

Don't know whether I'll frame it. It seems using canvas included in the kit was not the smartest idea - it slants left no matter what I do...

Kitty Litter

Only whiskers are missing! Hope to complete it this year :)

Kitty Litter. Week 18

Lots of boring single colour background stitching... OK, this is a five-strand colour mix, but it's the same colour mix so I think calling it "single colour" is correct. Oh, well, and I changed to the third needle: never thought cross stitch was so needle consuming.

~60%, 258 hours

Kitty Litter. Week 17

It's summer, I have less and less time for crafts. Time to go outside while the weather is fine.

~55%, 248 hours of work.

Kitty Litter. Week 16

A tiny bit more than a half. Of course, this "half" is while counting only cross stitch / half cross stitch percentage. Much more work to do before framing...



~53%, 243 hours

Kitty Litter. Week 15

Halfway, finally! OK, almost half, just a few cm missing...

~49%, 229 hours

Kitty Litter. Week 14

The first corner completed :) It's so much quicker using 4-5 strands and working half cross stitches mostly. I can't say I like working using so many strands: it's too thick. Well, but it's much faster.

~ 45%, 215 hours of work.

Kitty Litter. Week 13

~40% of the picture, 204 hours of work.
Some half cross stitches make the progress a bit faster.

Kitty Litter. Week 12

~37% of the picture, 190 hours of work.

Kitty Litter. Week 11

Week 11 is over: ~35% of the picture, 183 hours of work.
It was quick this time. One bad thing -- there are too many stitches to be worked using 5 strands at a time. My hands hurt... I need to remember to take breaks more often than one in four hours :D

Kitty Litter. Week 10

Week 10 is over: ~31% of the picture, 172 hours of work.

I've got a theoretical question: how long does a stitching needle usually last and how to identify a good embroidery needle? I started this picture with a "kit needle" and after a few weeks noticed some usage marks on it. I didn't expect much of it, those "kit items" are rarely of very high quality, but this one had a really short lifecycle. The needle became darker and darker and more difficult to work with, so after ~120 hours I decided I deserve something better and changed to some Prym needle. Now after 50 hours I still see no signs of wearing out on it (and I was using the same needle for some Hardanger embroidery before). 

Kitty Litter. Week 9

Week 9 is over: ~29% of the picture, 161 hours of work.

It's not so complicated at the moment: much less colours so the progress is faster. On the other hand -- it's spring here and I'm spending more time outdoor so the progress is slower :) I just hope to finish it this year.

Kitty Litter. Week 8

Week 8 is over: ~27% of the picture, 146 hours of work.
Actually, it was two weeks, but this time I count them as one: it was Easter, so I've spent my usual "embroidery time" decorating Easter eggs, travelling etc.

Kitty Litter. Week 7

 Week 7 is over: ~24% of the picture (37 x 7 cm), 134 hours of work.

No huge progress this week, I was a bit too busy with other things. Embroidery using shades of grey and other dark colours is over (at least for now). Yellow, light brown and shades of these colours are so much easier to work with.

Kitty Litter. Week 6

 Week 6 is over: ~22% of the picture (34 x 7 cm), 122 hours of work.

The middle part of the picture will be over soon. Only one kitten left.

I think now I can tell for sure: I won't be doing another cross stitch project for a long time. It's just not the kind of craft I could love. I guess I would be more interested in this kind of craft if I'd be creating a picture of my own. By "creating" I mean choosing some photo, choosing and mixing colours from lots of  different threads etc. Now it's just a job that has to be done according to someone else's idea. I'm given all the materials needed, I know how exactly the final result will look like. Too little creativity (well... too little? I guess -- none according to what "creativity" means for me).

Kitty Litter. Week 5

 Week 5 is over: ~16% of the picture (25 x 7 cm), 95 hours of work.

Got bored this time. Embroidery of the leftmost kitten was just "work to be done", no pleasure. I even noticed myself getting sad while working all those dark colours. The kitten now has a name -- don't know how to translate this diminutive exactly, but "Tiny Depression" could be something similar by meaning :)

It was boring. I had to learn something new in order to keep going on (well, that's me -- learning something new motivates). So I decided to learn how to begin and end the thread from the front side. I liked those tutorials:
- http://www.funkandweber.com/starting-thread-with-a-pinhead-stitch/
- https://apinnick.wordpress.com/2009/08/14/pin-stitch-tutorial-part-1/
- https://apinnick.wordpress.com/2009/08/14/pin-stitch-tutorial-part-2/

My version of pinhead stitch is a bit different from each of those two. I think I combined the ideas I liked in each of the tutorials and now I have my own method. I'll decribe it later if I'll succeed taking close up pictures.

Kitty Litter. Week 4

Week 4 is over: ~12% of the picture (18 x 7 cm), 73 hours of work.

I have new method for calculating percentage done. I've created a simple table using MS Word, 10 rows x 10 columns. Each cell is fixed width / height and this is exactly 1/10 of the final picture. Then I just measure already embroidered part of the picture and fill completed cells with some colour. Single cell is 1% of the picture, so I just need to count the ones in colour to tell percentage completed. It looks like this at the moment:

Why do I need this? Well, I feel the progress better this way. Otherwise it seems to be so slow...

Kitty Litter. Week 3

Week 3 is over. I have  ~8% of the picture (12 x 7 cm), 57 hours of work.

Things I like the most:
- puzzle "find the most efficient way of using the thread". I don't want to cut the thread too often, I want reverse side as neat as possible, and stitches of a single colour are definetely not in a single row. I guess my progress will be much slower when the puzzle part will be completed. I don't expect so much fun from large area in single colour embroidery.
- using scanned pattern and MS Paint for marking stitches already completed. I wouldn't  like doing this on paper.

Things I don't like:
- embroidery hoop. As far as I remember myself, I never liked them. Seems I just need to feel the thing I'm creating and embroidery hoop brings some distance. Well, I think I'll have to finish this picture using the hoop. I do understand that embroidery in hand would be made in another tension and this would be visible so I guess I have no choice now.

Kitty Litter. Week 2

I've decided that "kitty week" starts on Saturday. Daylight is so much better for taking progress photos. And it's mostly weekends when I have more time for my crafts.
Current progress, 32 hours of work and it's ~2% of the picture:

Kitty Litter

Well, I'm definetely insane. This will be my first cross stitch project ever. I made some cross stitch as a child, that's all my experience.

Accidentally I saw the pattern somewhere on web and loved the kittens. Three days after I found this embroidery kit at our local yarn shop... The kittens were really looking at me :) I had to buy it!


I'm really happy with my progress after 21 hours of work. I'm counting the time spent very precisely this time; I'm so interested how long this will take.

Much more to go...

This is "Kitty Litter" Dimensions Gold Collection counted cross-stitch kit, to be made on 18-count Aida.