Messy... but MINE!: First Post

I really need to stop jumping from blog to blog.  I find so much fun stuff to stitch!  I found a bunch of free Dragons to stitch over at Dragon Dreams.  They're great!  I'm definitely going to have to stitch them.  I might have also bought of few of their charts as well.  I guess when you're a fantasy freak and you come across a place called Dragon Dreams you're doomed.

Here's my first Dragon Dreams x-stitch.  I've never been the neatest person in the world, so Messy...But MINE! is the perfect project for me.  I have decided to make a minor change or two.  Grasped in the dragon's claws is a brown teddy bear.  I have my own teddy bear.  I've had him since I was 5 years old.  His name is Whitey (don't laugh at his name, I was five!), so I'm guessing you probably figured out that he's not a brown bear.  I'm going to change the pattern to look like him, and since Whitey will be 28 years old this Christmas he's not really white anymore.  Instead, he's going to be a combination of grays and beiges.

I've also decided that, despite my distaste for it, I'm going to add some gold blending filament to all the yellow that's supposed to be gold.  I think it'll add a nice little kick that will be worth the little extra time it'll take to stitch.

Last change is I've decided to stitch it on some 28ct DMC Linen that I bought back when I worked at Michaels.  I think it will add a little extra medievalness to it.  So I've gotten pretty far on it, ready for the ton of progress pictures I took?

First Color
Added one more green
And yet another green
Two more... GREENS!

And here's the final pic of the post (and possibly blurriest):

The dragon is done except for the black of his pupils and nostrils.  I will do those right before I start playing with all the backstitching.  He looks a little demonic without the black, but know it won't be long before that black is added.  Well, I'm off to play with a little treasure!

Project Stats:
Pattern: Messy... But MINE!
Pattern by: Dragon Dreams
Started Stitching: November 8, 2012
Fabric: 28ct. DMC Linen
Floss: DMC 2 over 2, or 1 over 2 Kreinick #4 Braid
Percentage: 73.79% complete
Stitches: 1,886 out of 2,556 complete