One for the Crow...

...one to die, one to grow.

Just an old gardening rhyme with lots of variations:

"Four seeds in a row, one for the rook, one for the crow, one to die, and one to grow."

"Four seeds in a row, one for the rook, one for the crow, one will wither and one will grow."

"One for the blackbird, one for the crow, one for the cutworm, and one to grow."

"One for the mouse, one for the crow, one to rot, one to grow."

"One for the wind and one for the crow, one to die and one to grow."

...and so many more one could write a book of nothing but these rhymes.

Anyway...that has little to do with this post.

The season to sow is long past. Sometimes I feel like I went to sleep sometime in April and woke up and it was the end of October.

 

Somehow there is less than one week until Halloween.

I've not gotten a fraction of the things done that I had hoped to (including blogposts), but I have gotten some of my Halloween up and a few (small) projects crossed off my list. 

Wow...have I veered off topic. 

Back to "One for the Crow"....

In addition to an old and prolific gardening rhyme, it's the name of this design by With Thy Needle & Thread.

I stitched these designs several years ago but was disappointed in the linen I used. It was the called-for 40 ct "Legacy" from Picture this Plus," but my pieces did not look like the model photos. 

I distressed the linen a bit after I completed the stitching, but they still were pale and sickly.  (These photos make them look closer to the models but they aren't really.)

However, after extended stays at both the Isle of Misfits and Castaways and The Isle of the Unfinished, they finally made it into these little pinkeeps.

Two littles off the list....

Now back to my other distractions.

Flights of Angels and Turkeys...

I'm in another one of those funks.

This funk, though, is different than my other funks.

Who'd'a thunk there could be so many kinds of funks?

My "typical" funk is that I don't feel compelled in the least to pick up a needle, a hook, or anything of that ilk.

This funk, however, is, as I said, unique: I want to create and I actually pick up my needle and hook and such, and I start...but then careen quickly off the rails.

Nothing...and I mean absolutely nothing, pleases me.

The linen choice is wrong, the floss colors are wrong for the linen (and, often, both the linen and the floss are wrong), the color plan doesn't work as I thought for the hooking, the finishing technique isn't suiting me...

You name it, I will count the way it displeases me.

So, I have accomplished nothing - other than add to the land mass of the ever-expanding Isle of Misfits and Castaways.

Start over you say?

Oh, but I have...over and over and over.

Colors changed, fabrics changed, techniques changed, projects changed...until I reach "that point" - the one I call the Marly Point of Inflection:

I have gone too far to rip everything out and start over - or I have started over too many times to start over again - and I start to seriously consider a bonfire in the backyard.

I really can't remember anything I've completed in the past 6 months or more so I have little to share with you in that regard.

But...I did force myself to finish this piece even though, again, I am not pleased. 

I will not tell you how many different floss choices were started and frogged, replaced (often with ones I had already tried and ripped out), and I am still not happy but I did not want to risk weakening the linen further.

It is called "Flight of Angels" by MommaLovesYouGB, a designer from the UK.

Her original design had crowns where the angels are on mine to commemorate Queen Elizabeth's passing, but I loved the verse and stitched the modified version as a remembrance of my mom.

{Stitched on 40 count "Natural Brown" linen by Wichelt, 1 over 2, except dates, which are 1 over 1.}

The back is based on a portion of a design called "Handprint On My Heart" by Heartstring Samplery.

It's done and that's all I'm going to say.

In other "flight" news, I have been invaded by turkeys.

Flocks and herds of turkeys.

Snowdog used to keep them at bay, but now they have free and unfettered range.

This is just a small fraction of them.  

They have taken up residence in copse of pines that borders our property line, venturing out many times during the day to overwhelm the front and side yards.

It is disconcerting as I can hear them walking on the hardened snow even when I can't see them...day and night...like an invisible army marching endlessly to battle.

It is even more disconcerting when I absent-mindedly walk outside realizing too late they have paused their eternal march and taken up foraging operations and they then take flight...the whole company of them.

The airborne division they are not - I am certain there are not many other birds more ungainly or noisy in flight than the turkey 

And someone really should tell them they need to work on their camouflage routines.

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I hope those in the grips of winter storms and bitter temps stay safe and out of harm's way.