Thursday 7 April 2016

At Last!

Well it's been a while since my last post but I am happy to say that I've been stitching up a storm. Well on some things at least lol. I also have a few charts for sale above on the for sale page if anyone is interested please do have a look :)

I am even more happy to say that I have finally finished this!


Country Cottage Needleworks Countdown to Christmas

32 count fabric

Suggested threads.


This was my New Year's start on the 1st January and I finally finished it yesterday.  I have to say the longer I stitched it the more I didn't like it and mistakes were made as some of the French knots are the wrong colour!  Maybe it's a good job it won't be on display until 1st December then I may have fallen back in love with it again!

Another finish was my March ornament for the SAL with Barb and Chris and Lisa may be joining us too :). I don't know if Barb has guessed what it is but I'll tell her now!

Hands on Design Plenty ( from the 2015 ornament mag )

Unknown fabric.

DMC.

Of course April is here which means another ornament. This one is from 2007. Any ideas Barb?! I'm not sure of the fabric colour and the picture doesn't show it very well.

Do you remember my Arsenic and Old Lace afghan that I was knitting? Guess what?! I've finished it!! Yay! I can't tell you how happy I was to get it all finished up! It's been along time in the making with me putting it away for a year but it's done and on my bed. The photo isn't great as I couldn't get it all in.

I have cast on an aran jumper now but forgot to take a photo!

I was making good progress on HAED SK Dragons History andam about halfway down page 2.


However I'm not sure I'll get much done on it over the next few weeks as there's a new challenge started on the Official Heaven and Earth Designs Facebook group and I'm taking part in that. You may remember that the last one was to stitch 10  10 x 10 blocks diagonally and I stitched on Mini Jolly Old Fellow. Well that one was pretty easy but this one is going to take some doing as this challenge is stitching a FULL PAGE of between 7,300 and 7,600 stitches,  cross country stitching one colour at a time over 10 weeks! Yes I did say a full page! Well let me tell you it's a long time since I completed a page on a HAED in that time frame lol! As I'm not near the next page on SK Dragons History I decided to do Mini Jolly Old Fellow. I haven't finished page one yet ( nearly there ) so I've gone down and started page 4. Here is my progress on that page since Saturday and the progress on the first page since my last post. I'm very happy so far with my progress! That is 12 colours on page 4!

Oooh I have finished AotH Evergreen Lane except for  finishing the personalisation and started Elizabeth Jane:).


Final stitching ( seen as I forgot to take a photo of tne SB fold piece ) is our sheepy SAL. Poor Barb scrapped hers and restarted it. Here's my progress. Still a fair bit to do yet!

A few weeks ago DH and I went to see Heather Small in concert and he took the following day off work in case we were late home. The concert was brilliant and we thoroughly enjoyed it. Anyway the following day we had decided to drive up to Pickering in North Yorkshire as the Flying Scotsman was on the North York Moors Railway. Abi came with us and we had a lovely day out.  It was such an honour to see the Flying Scotsman. We then went for a drive round and ended up on the North York Moors . Such a beautiful place to be! I took a few photos.









That's it from me for today. I hope to catch up with you all soon. Thank you for visiting me and for all your lovely  comments.

With much love,

Sally xxxxxx

29 comments:

Tricia T said...

Ooo - good for you doing the new HAED challenge! I chickened out. I just can't stitch a full page cross country without totally losing count!! Did I tell you that my dd gave me the HAED Robin that you stitched?? I've started it and love it!! : )

Vickie said...

Your stitching is so sweet Sally. You have accomplished much. Your afghan is so lovely. Wow. You really took fantastic pictures.The last one is my favorite.

Southpaw Stitcher said...

You have gotten a lot of stitching done, Sally. It all looks marvelous. You're very ambitious (moreso than me) in tackling those HAED challenges. Your photos of North Yorkshire are beautiful!

Chocolates4Breakfast (Terri Malinovich) said...

What a newsy, wonderful post! I hope you love your finish again on December 1, I think it looks great. All your progress pics and ornies are wonderful but that afghan.... swoon..... it's gorgeous! Thanks so much for sharing. Beautiful.

Cindy's Stitching said...

Lots of great pieces. the blanket is beautiful. such pretty pictures.

Needles Everywhere said...

Fantastic work! I really like all your projects.

Shebafudge said...

Wow! What a gorgeous post with lots of lovely things to drool over. That quilt looks lovely and I like the subtle colouring of it too. Great stitching too; the HaED's look great.

It also looks like you had a gorgeous day out too.

Linda said...

Congrats on all of the lovely finishes Sally. Great progress on your WIP's. I loved the pics of your day out.

Linda

Justine said...

Lovely stitching Sally! The HAED challenge sounds...challenging! It's a lovely design though so best of luck. I love your SAL piece with Barb too.

Rachel said...

Well done on your finish and other stitching. The HAED Challenge will definitely be a challenge - good luck! :)

Christine said...

You've been busy Sally. I love the advent calendar piece and your knitted blanket is just beautiful

Mii Stitch said...

Great finishes Sally! The Countdown to Christmas looks really sweet and was worth all your hard work :)

Carol said...

So good to catch up with you, Sally, and see all that you've been up to... I am so impressed with your blanket--it is truly lovely!! And your Advent Calendar is so cute, too...

Really loved your photos of the North York Moors--those leaping lambs are particularly adorable :)

gominam said...

Oh my, you really have been busy! Congrats on the beautiful finishes, wish you had a closeup pic of Countdown to Christmas, looks so adorable. Great progress on the WIPs too!

... said...

Beautiful stitching. I love your 'Countdown to Christmas'. Everything I seem to stitch always seems to have at least one mistake in and I am the only one to ever notice so you shouldn't be worrying about any mistakes!! It will look gorgeous at Christmas and I am sure you will love it a lot!!

Mary - Lecoeurceltique said...

You've been so busy, Sally. I love your knitted blanket.

Clare-Aimetu said...

Congratulations on your finish on Countdown to Christmas, as always your stitching is beautiful. Fantastic pictures of the Flying Scotsman.

Andrea said...

You certainly have been busy. Wonderful stitching and knitting.

Great photos of Yorkshire too.

Maggee said...

Congrats on finishing the Christmas Countdown--it is so sweet! And that ornament by Hands on Design... I have had my eye on doing that one... just don't have any appropriate fabric yet. Yours is nicely done! Wow--that afghan you knitted is so very beautiful! I would be showing everyone that... it is quite an accomplishment! Good luck on the HAED Challenge! You and hubby went for a nice adventure... great pictures! Thanks for sharing!

Julie said...

A post full of delightful things. The blanket is stunning, a super finish.
I love the moors and am off there for a short break real soon.

Heather said...

Hi Sally! All of your stitching is so lovely! I loved your pictures from Yorkshire. I am finally back to stitching. I am hoping to have time to blog soon.
I love you blanket, you did a lovely job!

Amy said...

Congrats on the stitchy finishes, and on the blanket finish too!

Penny said...

You have some lovely finishes! Looks like lots of knitting involved in your afghan but it's beautiful! And I always love to see what you are working on. Thanks for sharing pictures of your trip. Hopefully, I can get over my fear of flying over the ocean and visit your beautiful country someday. : )

Brigitte said...

Oh my, Sally, so much stitching gorgeousness to be seen here. It is for sure that you were stitching ups storm. And nice advent calendar finish and you will certainly love it when you pull it out in December. Nice ornament finish and great progress on your other projects. Good luck with the HAED challenge.
That knitted blanket looks wonderful. And you pictures from your day out are wonderful.

Angela said...

Lovely finishes Sally and that blanket is gorgeous!

stitcherw said...

Congrats on your finish of Countdown to Christmas, it turned out beautifully, and will be such fun to put up next Christmas. Arsenic and Old Lace turned out lovely as well.

Love your little SK Dragon History, I have the History of Chocolate in my stash to do at some point. Good luck on the HAED challenge. I did the last one, but the current one needing to be the full page is just more stitching that I can really get done in that time period with other commitments. I thought about trying, but figured I'd be more stressed about meeting the goal, and feeling I "needed" to work on the challenge piece than any enjoyment I'd get from it. Challenge 1 I finished and enjoyed, and hopefully I can jump in again on challenge 3.
Sue

Maggie said...

What a lot of lovely stitching, it all looks wonderful, as does your afghan, beautiful :-)
x

Jeanne said...

It's been awhile since I had time to catch up with my blog reading and commenting Sally. I saw back awhile when you finished up your HAED robin but I didn't have time to comment at that time. It's awesome and framed it's a masterpiece! I'm so impressed. You have been stitching some lovely projects and I see you've started a new HAED project too. I've never done one but I'm tempted. I went to an 'open stitching' night last month at my local shop and there was a woman in her 70's working on a Santa Claus one -it was awesome! I figured if she could do it so could I! Congratulations on finishing your afghan - doesn't it feel great to close out an old project?! I'm trying hard to be disciplined this year and finish up some old UFO's....would love to someday have a clean slate of only current projects with none of the guilt from old projects dragging me down LOL. Happy stitching Sally, love seeing your progress.

Karoline said...

Lovely finishes, your afghan is gorgeous. Great progress on your other projects.

Gorgeous photos from your trip onto the moors