Still plodding along with Taj Mahal Mandala

Hello my lovely stitchy friends :)  I hope those of you that are in the US are keeping warm in the very very cold weather you are experiencing and are hopefully safe and not snowed in too much.
Looks like you are all in for another super cold winter this year.  The perfect weather to stay in side and stitch! Unlike here as we enter  our summer we have just experienced a weekend of  very high temps of around 40oC or 104oF, makes for very sticky stitching weather.

I've been plodding along nicely on Taj since my last update and have made a heap of progress. slowly working my way through the middle section.
The detail in this design is simply  magnificent. I can see why many stitchers become hooked on Chatelaine's they are a challenge but a magical feast for the eyes as they develop.

My progress as of  14th November 2014

As you can see I have almost stitched a quarter of the middle square plus the left hand Taj Mahal is taking shape. The colours are simply glorious and I have really enjoyed learning some of the specialty stitches that I have never done before.  I worked some of the woven scotch stitch in the lattice type border around the middle square recently. While it  took me a little while to get my head around it, eventually with a little help from google and some tips online  I got there in the end :) I hopefully will get some close up shots next time I take some photos. 

Happy Stitching everyone, 

Deb