It's a SAL! And a dilema.

Wait, another one? Why yes! Yes it is. I adore SALs, it's so much fun knowing that someone else is also working on the same piece you are, so you're not alone. That's why every year, I was annoyed with myself for missing the HAED BB deadline to sign up. Especially with last years, as one of the SKs was Ice Wind I, which of course, is what Corsira will look like when she's all grown up.*

Ok so what is this one?

Well . . . actually two, really.

The first is one I will be doing with a facebook friend, Valerie. I had gotten the HAED Ballet Shoes as my $200 reward chart. I used to work at a local dance school and have always thought toe shoes are beautiful. Plus . . . 14 or 15 colors, so that's good. Valerie saw my picture I posted and said she thought that would be perfect for one of her granddaughters. :) So I was like, hey wanna do a SAL. And she thought that was a great idea. I found a lovely piece of light blue 20-ct lugana - I adore that fabric, I would love to have about 30 bolts of it . . . ah well I must stop drooling over the keyboard and finish my blog. So, now I just have to wait until she's got everything together and we pick a start date. Not sure when that'll be, but that's ok, I've got loads of other projects which want to be stitched.

This is Ballet Shoes:



Pretty isn't it?

This one isn't a SAL, but I'm soooo tempted to start it. It's called Expecting and I have a lovely piece of 25 ct light blue lugana and all the floss for it. I just don't have the pattern actually printed out. But I sooooo would love to stitch her. (While I'm thinking about Ballet Shoes, I kitted both of them up at the same time, so I think of them as a pair.)





Ok so what's the other SAL? Why it's a Shinysun SAL! Shinysun is another cross stitch design company that I positively drool over. I had realized that they didn't have a facebook group and I thought that was kind of sad, so I had to fix that. I started the Shinysun group and it was going along rather nicely. Then I got the idea of a Shinysun SAL, cause you know, I love SALs. Plus, I wanted someone to stitch a Shinysun with me. So I had originally thought hey why not post this on the group and see if anyone else is interested. There seems to be an interest. I had also originally thought, we all pick one from a list and then stitch it, kind of like how the HAED BB SAL is organized, just we buy our pattern up front, instead of being emailed one page at a time, that sort of thing. Then we can all work at our own pace, etc.

Eventually, we decided on everybody doing their own Shinysun pattern of choice and posting weekly pictures. The only other guideline is that it starts January 1st so people can decide on what they want to stitch. It doesn't have to be a new purchase - it can be one you already have in your stash - but I'm kind of like ooooh a "legit" reason for stash enhancement! lol I do really like the 5 I've got in my stash, but I also rather like the ones I suggested for the original concept of the SAL.

So we are calling this SAL "New Year, New Start SAL" . . . I kind of think between this and the "End of Year Finish" (sort of) SAL, this might become an annual event. lol Which would be kind of neat. The EoYF would be where you try to finish the piece by the last day of the year; I kind of enjoyed finishing SK Courage on Dec. 31, 2011, it was a nice feeling to finish something on the last day of the year. I might even finish most of something earlier, just to be able to pull it out and put the last few stitches in it right before midnight. Oh yeah, I'm a party animal there. Oh and the cool thing of this SAL? The owner/designer of Shinysun, Dawn, is going to also participate in this . . . how cool is that? lol She won't reveal her choice until it starts though so it's all mysteeeeerious.

So . . . what's my dilema? It's not do I get a new pattern or stitch from stash? Though that was a question I was debating about, I reslly do want a new pattern to stitch for the NYNSS. So . . . what to pick? What to pick?

The choices have been narrowed to two at the moment - I had six I rather liked, but these are the top two contenders.

Single Iris Flower (Lachri):



I would want to stitch this on a dark purple swirly sort of hand dyed fabric (which I'd dye myself), rather than on black. I wouldn't stitch all that black. Of course, that makes me then think of the WWS Tribal Mouse pattern I want to stitch on the same sort of purple hand dyed background but with silver #4 (or possibly #8) braid.

Spectrum (Lindsey Cormier){



I think she looks like a pin-up girl from the 40s/50s. I can so picture her on this piece of African daisy jubilee I have (hopefully, it'd be big enough, not that she's a large pattern, I just don't remember how big that piece I have is).

See my dilema?! lol I keep going back and forth between these two the most and I can so picture both of them stitched up and framed and on my wall. I am thinking of adding some blending filament to each one, like the flower of the iris and the wings of the fairy. Actually, I'm thinking of ordering both patterns and then letting them fight it out in a death match arena or something like that. Well maybe not death arena, but getting both and figuring it out come January 1st.

So . . . which one should I pick?