I made progress over the weekend...

...on multiple fronts. Before I go into that, here is today's picture:

When I first took pictures of the tomatillos, I didn't realize that they were going to turn purple. They are ripe now and in different shades of purple. The Husband plans on making purple salsa...that should look interesting!

This weekend, my highest priority was to clean the floors. Between the dirt tracking in from gardening and the normal wear-and-tear, they were looking pretty bad. The Husband took a long bike ride on Saturday, so I was able to mop (steam) them and let them dry. Did the vacuuming and a couple of other chores before the heat got too intense.

Because it was hot on both days of the weekend, I put aside any thoughts of quilting or knitting. I did check out my quilt bating stash and found that I already have plenty of batting for the Paint It Red quilt (and probably for another quilt, too). I also took another look at the borders of the quilt and decided that there was one small section that needed to be replaced. I ripped it out and located another strip that will provide a better contrast. It was too hot to do the actual sewing, but it will be a simple thing to finish before sandwiching the quilt.

I warped the loom on Sunday for some mug mats. I used the 4/2 Cotton Weaving Yarn as the warp and I'm using Patons Classic Wool and Lion Brand Fishermen's Wool for the weft. I'm trying a couple of new techniques on the first one and so far, I'm not liking it. I've put it aside for the moment while I think about what to try next.  I might stick to horizontal stripes for the first batch and leave the "fancier" stuff for larger pieces.

Mostly I worked on the Queen Mermaid cross stitch piece. I spent a good deal of time comparing what I've completed to the chart. I have a working copy of the chart that I marked up. This working copy is multiple photocopy pages of various sections, taped together—the chart is huge and won't fit on one or two pieces of paper. In the process of comparing, I found a few places where I'd missed some stitches, so I fixed those. Like most Mirabilia designs, there are lots of areas where it's one stitch of this color, two stitches of that color, another stitch of a third color two stitches of a fourth color...you get the idea. It's easy to over look a few!

My goal is to get her tail and the surrounding areas stitched so I can move on to her upper body. Once I finish the stitching, I can wash and block the piece in preparation for the beading. And this piece has a ton of beading. It will be a while before I can call this piece done!