South Seas Lace finished!

And a close up shot to better show the colours in the thread.

South Seas Lace by Debbie Draper Designs, featured in the May 2009 edition of The Gift of Stitching magazine.

Stitched on 28 count Jubilee fabric from Sugar Maple Fabrics called “Ocean Spray” using Hand Dyed Fibers silk thread called Paua Abalone.

Happy Dance and Giveaway

The Travelling Stitcher by Little House Needleworks – completed 29th September 2009.

In celebration of this happy dance I’m going to  have a giveaway of the chart for Travelling Stitcher.  I can’t imagine that there will be many stitchers out there who haven’t already got this chart, as it was extremely popular when it was released, but if there is anybody who would like the chance to win the chart just leave a comment to this post and I will draw a name out of the hat in a weeks time on 6th October.  The only thing I would ask is that you put a link to this post in your blog.  Also included with the chart will be what’s left over of the Crescent Colors threads needed to stitch the design.  One colour I completely ran out of (the colour used for the words) but there are certain colours which were hardly used.

Hopefully to come tomorrow – pictures of South Seas Lace and Celtic Welcome (if I remember to put my camera battery on to charge LOL)

Is That All Happy Dance (and a new project!)

After a VERY late night last night, I’m proud to present “Is That All?” finally completed.

The backstitching was a little fiddly, but to be honest I’m a little out of practice as I have been stitching so many projects recently that do not require any backstitching at all.  I really didn’t want to stop once I had started though, because as soon as this was finished Claire and I are starting our next SAL, which is South Seas Lace.  Roll on next Thursday!   I’m definitely paying for the late night now though, but it was well worth it!

Claire has finished her’s too, pop over to her blog to see her pic, so there’s happy dancing on both sides of the English Channel today!

The new project isn’t anything to do with stitching (for a change!).  Hopefully, on Sunday this little bundle will be joining our pet family.

This is a quick pic taken by my sister Sheila, who works at her local vet’s practice.  She phoned me this morning to tell me that she needed a home.  She emailed me this picture, I emailed it on to Phill, he said yes (after just a little bit of persuading LOL).

We’ll be driving up to meet Sheila halfway between her place and our place to pick her up.  Perfect timing really as I am off work for the whole of next week so will be able to settle her in to her new home.

I am a little behind on my blog reading again – I normally read them during my lunch hour at work, but I have been without my computer for the last two days as it died on Tuesday afternoon.  I have beenn floating around the office using whichever PC was free at the time, so I had very limited internet access for a couple of days.  My PC is now fixed and I’m back “home” at my desk.  It’s surprising how hard it was to work at someone else’s desk, it completely threw me for a loop and everything seemed to take me twice as long for some reason LOL

Happy Dancing!!

Cirque des Triangles - Completed

Cirque des Triangles – Ink Circles

Started on 24th January 2009 – Finished on 28th June 2009

Stitched on “Butterfly Wings” by Dyeing 4 U

Thread:  Cherry Vanilla by Threadworx

Moonlight Garden

Not much stitching for me this week (again!),  it’s been extra extra busy in work trying to catch up with the work that wasn’t done when I was off last week.  Also, when I got to work on Tuesday something made me check the firm’s holiday spreadsheet where details of days taken, days left to take etc are stored.  I discovered that the two days I was off work last week for the colonoscopy had been taken away from my holiday entitlement for this year.   I appreciate that my employer is not legally obligated to “give” me those days off however, I have worked for this small firm for 22 years and in fact for the same person within that firm for the last 18 of those years, the same person in fact who is in control of entering information into the holiday spreadsheet.  I have also worked far above and beyond the call of duty on numerous occasions and without trying to sound big-headed the place (and in particular my boss) would probably run to a standstill if I was not there for a prolonged length of time.   I would guestimate that I have probably worked at least two weeks worth of unpaid overtime so far this year.  To be honest, this made me feel horrible (again) about my employment situation.  I wish I could afford to give up work or at least find another job, but jobs are scarce and at the moment Phill’s business is going through a quiet patch and he may have to lay his apprentice off if things don’t pick up soon so we really do need every penny I can earn, and the only good thing about my job is that I am very well paid.   Anyway, I immediately confronted my boss, who despite being a successful businessman, and a lawyer to boot, hates confrontation and gave him a couple of home truths – I now have my two days back.   Phew, if you’re still reading, thanks for listening and sorry for boring you all with my ranting!

On to prettier things altogether now.  If you have a look at Claire’s blog you will see a little suprise I made for her a little while ago – a mattress pinkeep.  She has named him Quills and has far nicer pictures over there!  The chart is a freebie from The Workbasket.

I stitched a bit more on Growth Rings and I also stitched on Moonlight Garden by Drawn Thread.  

Phill has just left to go to an open mic night, where he plays guitar so I”m going to find a good film to listen to and get some more done on Is That All?

Back from the framers.

My two latest finishes, back from the framers.

New World – Papillon Creations

Lettres a mon Chat – Isabelle Vautier

Lettres finished!

I put the final stitches in Lettres last night, ironed it this morning and here it is (crease free for a change )

I really enjoyed stitching this design and have an evergrowing wish list of more Isabelle Vautier charts I would love to do.  So Claire, if you (or anyone else for that matter) would like to do another SAL some time, just let me know and I’ll be right with you!

It’s another wonderfully sunny day here in Swansea, Phill is already out the garden putting up a fence,  I have to do a couple of hours work, which I can do from home, while I wait for the sun to dry out the grass in our front garden before I get the lawnmover out and give it a cut.  Then I’ll probably work in the back garden for a couple of hours this afternoon.  Luckily we have no grass in our back garden, Phill designed it to be easy maintenance when he landscaped it seven years ago.  You can see pics here.   They were taken when it was first finished. It’s weathered really well though and a lot of the shrubs and trees are more than double the size they were then, also we don’t have as many planters full of summer bedding plants now,  they are a lot of work and we can’t always find the time to keep them looking good, we don’t have so much colour but we try to make it interesting with easy maintenance shrubs and trees.  

There are also some pics there of Ginger and Louis when they were tiny, just a couple of days before Ginger’s accident.  It’s hard to believe that they are six years old next month, how time flies!

I hope everyone is enjoying their weekend, and that the weather where you are is as lovely as it is here.

What a Hoot finished!

I took advantage of a day off work today by finishing What a Hoot.  I had finished the stitching about a month ago, but basically got cold feet about finishing him off.  Today I got up early, thanks to our very kind neighbours who are doing some home improvements which have been ongoing for about three years because he only ever seems to do any work there between the hours of 7am and 9am on bank holidays  I took my time, all in all it took about three hours, and managed to do quite a good job (even if I do say so myself).  There are a few things I would do differently if I were to make another, like making the ribbon hinges a little shorter, but the instructions were good and easy to follow.  

I really enjoyed the challenge of putting this together and as soon as there’s a slot in my rotation I’m going to add Peacock Chair from Cat’s Whiskers, which looks far more complicated than Ozzie but it looks so beautiful I can’t wait to try!

Weekend update

It’s been a very busy week at work and at home so even though I have some progress pictures I haven’t done that much stitching in the last few days.  I did work on Cirque des Carreaux on Wednesday and the more I stitch this design the more I like it!

 

Cirque des Carreaux

Thursday was Lettres SAL day with Claire.  We are at almost exactly the same place on this design, she has stitched one more letter than me

 

Lettres a mon chat

Finally, I had a day off on Friday because we had a busy weekend in sight.  Phill’s mum was 75 on Thursday and his brother and sister in law were coming down on Saturday to celebrate, with us all going out for a meal last night.  We had a great time with lovely food, especially the Vanilla Cheesecake!   

Phill also made a bit of work for himself when he offered to do some work in our spare bedroom, which is little more than a box room really.  At the moment there are odds and ends of furniture in there, the ironing board (which doesn’t get used that often and all of my cross stitch stuff.  The room is so full of stuff that it’s hard to find anything.  I have been trying to organize my stash a little better so that it doesn’t take me so long to find everything so Phill put his thinking cap on and has planned a craft room for me!  We have bought some kitchen units in a lovely walnut colour, and some black worktop and he’s going to put them up for me today.  I can’t wait to see it done as I’m going to have so much room in there I’ll be able to organise everything exactly how I want it.

Today I am out all day, my mum and dad are picking me up at about 10 o’clock and we are driving to see my sister Sheila who is staying at a cottage in West Wales for the weekend.  Today is Sheila’s birthday and I have a little suprise for her, which is safe to post here as she doesn’t have her computer with her.  The suprise is the Hearts and Flowers tuffet which I finished up on Friday.

I’m looking forward to seeing how she is getting along with her HAED project and I am taking a few of my WIPs with me for her to see in real life and also a few goodies I found yesterday when I was clearing out the bedroom ready for Phill to start work in there today.

Have a great weekend !!

Chocolate Shoppe happy dance

Lots of photos to share today!  

Firstly my order from Sew and So arrived which included the thread I needed to finish off Chocolate Shoppe.

 

Chocolate Shoppe - LHN

Also, I got my order from Univers Broderie, which contained the long awaited threads I need to start my SAL with Claire.  I am using plain white Belfast linen for this, as the red threads will look stunning.  Here’s a floss toss.  We are starting the SAL on Thursday, so Lettres a mon Chat will replace my UFO slot in my rotation.  I’ll stitch on my UFO’s on Fridays instead.

 

Lettres floss toss

On Monday I carried on stitching on New World and it stitched up really really quickly.  I have almost finished two pages of the chart (there are six in total but two of those are quite small pages compared to the rest.

 

New World - 9th February

This picture really shows off the colour of the fabric well.

Finally, if you aren’t bored already, I treated myself to a new chart from Sew and So.  My Dad gave me some money for Christmas which I hadn’t spent yet and I saw this design from The Drawn Thread and couldn’t resist.  It’s called Moonlight Garden.  It has a LOT of speciality stitches so will be quite challenging to stitch!  I have only stitched one other Drawn Thread design, An Open Heart, which I really enjoyed and the explanations of the speciality stitches seem very clear so I should be okay.  I ordered the fabric and threads at the same time as the chart, the fabric is called Stoney Point from Wichelet and the threads are a mix of NPI/Northern Lights and Dinky Dyes.

 

Moonlight Garden floss toss

I’m putting this one away until later in the year, but just wanted to buy everything before I spent the money on something else

I did actually get some stitching done during my lunch hour today.  Inspired by a recent entry on Claire’s blog I dug out an old UFO” Too Pooped” which I think I will leave in work to occupy my lunch hours.  I’ll take it home at the weekend and take a photo of it.  I started this ages ago and it came as a kit, which included Aida.  It’s a long time since I stitched on Aida, and it felt like holding a piece of cardboard compared to the linens I’ve been using recently  

Time for me to leave the office now and make my way home!  Tonight I’m going to stitch on Cirque des Carreaux.

Have a good evening!