Bad Mistake!!!

Never count your stitches before they're crossed. Unfortunately, that's just what I did this morning. The printer rug is going to take 15,386. I probably have the 386 done. Only 15,000 to go.........Why did I do that? I always do that. I can't resist. I never count how many I have to go, just the finished number. It always amazes me how many stitches go into one of these little gems.

I think that it must be because I worked as an inventory clerk for an electronics parts store for a couple of years. Have you ever tried to count a barrel of resistors by hand? Let me put it this way. Some of them are too small to make into something miniature. That was back when there was no such thing as inventories on computer.

I still find myself counting everything that I do. I will be peeling carrots and find myself counting how many times I have to run the peeler down the length of the carrot.(It's usually about 9 times. I'll bet you didn't know that and you probably didn't want to know either.) I even count weeds when I pull them!

This is an early mini that I based on a real Two Gray Hills Navajo rug. It measures 3 1/2"x5 1/2". It's just a bit larger than an index card and it has 9,075 stitches. That one was pretty easy. It only had 5 colors and all were in straight lines.

Ignore the dust bunnies. I took this photo right in the southwestern room box without cleaning first. I didn't want to disturb the realism.

The largest rug that I have made so far is the one in the Regency Drawing Room. There are 38,080 stitches in this one.

What is the point of this whole thing? I got to thinking about how many stitches I have done over the years......It's scary to even think about it. I think that I must be pretty close to the 1 mil mark by now! And I am not counting full sized cross stitch or needlepoint. I can't even count the number of rugs I have made, let alone the stitches that went into all of them.

If you are interested in starting to go crazy counting stitches, here are a couple of websites that have some really pretty pieces. One is here. One is on the other side of the world. Both are worth looking at.

http://micro-stitchery.com/links.html Bobbie Schoonmaker is an IGMA artisan.

http://www.janetgranger.co.uk/cwebb.htm Janet Granger is in England. She has a book of rug designs that is good. I have made a couple of them. She also sells kits.

I am going back to counting now.

See you tomorrow.