Philosophy of Mistakes

We are currently
Reading: The Anatomists Apprentice by Tessa Harris (audiobook)
Watching: How I Met Your Mother (tv series, Netflix)

Dear Reader,

My Boyfriend Gandalf and I have already made a few mistakes in our currently short, but long term relationship. It's brought some thoughts to my foremind on how I prefer to deal with mistakes, how society tends to deal with them, and what the benefits and detriments are in addressing them.

We all make mistakes. Some are reparable. Some are not.

My Boyfriend Gandalf is on Evenweave whereas I normally work on Aida or waste canvas. I didn't realize when I started the project exactly how difficult it would be to fix my mistakes, and I've found that even when I am able to fix it there is sometimes a ghost of threads left over. I've found that no matter how healthy a relationship is, that ghost can hang around for awhile, but there's always the opportunity of stitching over it. It then becomes part of the stronger fabric, rather than contributing further mistakes down the road. Sadly, that is one of the easier corrections to make.

But what happens when you discover one further down the road. One that you've based other decisions on that either also have to be corrected, or must continue as they are. Well... That depends on the mistakes, where they are, what they relate to, and whether or not you can see a way of working around them.

So far the mistakes I've made with My Boyfriend Gandalf have been fairly minor. The mistakes I've left include a couple of stitches where the cross is in the wrong direction, but since the stitches are insanely small and they're on the edge of my stitching I left them. I also made one extra stitch in the wrong color for a particular color block, but that was easy enough to work around and so I incorporated the mistake into the pattern. Others I've caught early enough to address and found that they were worth fixing.

I've had to be careful in addressing these problems because Evenweave is a bit more delicate than Aida. It's easier to warp and tear, so picking out stitches is more of a pain in the ass than usual. Still, despite the mistakes, progress is being made. My Boyfriend Gandalf and I are happy with it so far.

Progress, 22 May 2014

Progress, 23 May 2014