...ahem. *clears throat, adjusts the mike, and looks directly into a spotlight* Um, could you lower the lights a little bit, they're very bright.

Thanks.

Hi everyone, and welcome to the Q4 State of the Stitching address. I am going to attempt to keep this brief which shouldn't be that difficult considering the amount of things that I've managed to accomplist in Q3. *hears a comment from the back of the room and sticks out her tongue*

No, that doesn't mean I didn't complete anything.

The Starts/WIPS pile:

This quarter involved only two new starts. The first would be my CATS nametag for 2005. I started and finished it within a span of two nights. Nothing impressive to look at, as it looks much like last years, with different colors involved. The second WIP would be another version of Tempest, with a color change on the pocket of a denim shirt.

I brought the shirt with me to CATS. I didn't manage to wear it because I still have some linen to remove from it. Interestingly enough, the shirt seems to have managed to vanish and I am not happy about that. A dragon in hiding is never good for the closet.

Guardian also managed to get leaps and bounds worth of work completed on it. So much so that I almost could count it as a finish. But I can't, because I didn't finish it until after Q4 started. You'll have to catch a picture of it somewhere, when I publish it. I've published the picture on a couple of BBs, you'll just have to see it there, or wait until I publish the end of year SotS (that's State of the Stitching, for the acronym challenged).

And that's really it for the WIP Pile.

Finishes:

Remember that baby sampler that I started last quarter and claimed to finish. Well, that's partly true. I had finished everything on it but the date of the baby's birth. I finally got that in mid-August, and finished stitching it while standing up in the stitching lounge at Nashville CATS talking to momstitches. No, still no picture on that one because I need to frame it and send it on it's way.

I also managed to finish the aforementioned nametag, and the Tempest in Hiding.

Then there was Guardian, but again, he's not a Q3 finish. He was more than 36 hours out of Q3 when he was finished, so I can't count him.

Goals for the year:

Well, all the major ones have been met - I finished Shimmering Mermaid, Phoenix and Guardian. I'm trying to take a really good pic of the mermaid so I can enter it in the Silkweaver contest this year. I finally took a good picture of the mermaid and entered it. Now it's just a wait and see.

I still haven't put together a "kit" to start stitching a Christmas stocking for DH, and I don't know if I'll be able to finish one in time. I suppose I *could* finish one if I put down Floral Bellpull, which is the next thing I'd like to whack off the WIP list.

I do plan on re-starting Desiderata before the end of the year. Really, K, I promise I will so stop laughing at me.

So there you have it - the Q4 State of the Stitching, and we're heading into the home stretch of the end of the year. Thankfully, I don't do stitching for Christmas gifts unless really inspired in which case the rest of the year would be a boondoggle of stitching for obligations instead of pleasure and relaxation. I hope to have another completion to share by the end of the year, but if not, oh well.