Acanthus Stitch-a-Long, part 2

Hi everyone! We're away snowshoeing today, so I'm writing this quickly in advance.

Here's where I was at the last check-in:

and a view of the back, since it's a little challenging to see the stitching against the brightly printed canvas:

I've been trying to make time to stitch an hour once every few days. And I do feel like I'm making progress, though it's difficult to see. 

Here's where I am now, three weeks later:

I actually had to roll the canvas a tiny bit so I could reach the top of the "blue-green leaves" ... but not so far that I couldn't reach the bottom of the "gray-green" leaves. 

Here's a shot of my progress from the back; you can see that the canvas roll is so small that I haven't "rolled up" any actual stitching yet:

Despite having an OttLite (that makes me SO HAPPY); it's still really difficult to tell what color to stitch based on the canvas. For example, this section of "gray-green leaves" should have 5 shades of green.

The veins and the "dark shadow" are obvious enough, but the fact that there are three more shades of green here... well, it's a challenge.

But, again, if it's that difficult to tell on the canvas, I'm going to say that it's not crucial when the actual wool is pretty close, too. 

I'm pleased with my progress, though of course I wish I was getting more done! By the time we reach our next check-in, I want to finish the lower gray-green and browny-green leaves and roll the canvas for real. At that point I'll feel like I've completed 1/3 of the leaves (even if I'm not starting on the background stitching...)

The other stitchers in this stitch-a-long have undoubtedly been even more productive as I have this term, so check out everyone's blogs to see what they're all up to.

Avis, Claire, Gun, Carole, Sue, Constanze, Christina, Kathy, Margaret, Cindy, Heidi, Jackie, Hayley, Megan, Deborah, Mary Margaret, Renee, Carmela, Jocelyn, Sharon, Daisy, Anne, Connie, and AJ.

See you on February 16th for our next check-in!