Birthday Stitching

Two of my lovely friends have had birthdays this month so I was busy stitching wee gifts for them. I always find it so difficult to know what to stitch but this time for my friend Gill's birthday I had the perfect chart in my stash. In fact it had been in my stash for several years, a gift from Karan, so I'm very pleased that I have finally got around to stitching it. Gill loves it and says I couldn't have stitched anything better for her.

JBW  Designs To The Beach

Unknown fabric but possibly vintage country cream

DMC

Birthday gift for Gill

Next birthday gift was for lovely June and I chose to stitch this one. June loves it so I'm very happy.

La D Da Tis Better

Leftover scrap of unknown fabric

GAST

Birthday gift for June

My dear friend and SAL partner Barb is not too well at the moment so our Friday SAL of the 12 Days of Christmas is on hold for now as I don't want to carry on without her. So I have just been stitching on anything on Fridays and this week I decided that I want to try and get Brightneedle Lo How A Rose finished as soon as I can. Gill came on Thursday morning for a stitching session and chat so I got it out then as well and Saturday evening too. There seems so much still to do yet I have loads done!

My Needlework Shop is building up quite nicely and I'm hoping for the grand opening soon. I've been stitching on this a little more than just Wednesdays in the parlour with the ladies at Needlecraft Haven. Must pop my pic up there too before they lock the door and don't let me again!

My SAL with Shirlee has been on hold for a couple of weeks as Shirlee had run out of some thread and was waiting for it to arrive. She said I could keep going but I wanted to wait for her. So this Thursday we picked it up again. I didn't get much done but every little stitch helps!

May's Lily of the Valley is going well even though I had to frog some. I'm really enjoying this series. They are so lovely to stitch and so pretty when finished.  

Finally from the Frosty Forest series an update on Snowy Deer. Fingers crossed it'll be finished on Monday.

My dear friend Barb sent me these two charts. She purchased two of the With Thy Needle Sweet Violet chart so that we can SAL later in the year and she has recently finished the Snowman Trio so passed the chart onto me :) 

I would really like to get back to my HAED QS Spirit of Winter Robin soon. I've been thinking a lot about my HAEDs lately, wishing I hadn't started so many, bought so many and could get on with them without getting bored! The problem is they are so time consuming and unless you stitch on one and one alone take what seems like forever to finish one page let alone the whole thing! So I'm going to try and sort a slot in my rotation to fit the robin in and see what I can get done. I may have to just abandon a couple I've got started but I don't really want to. Maybe once my blanket is too much to take to craft group I could take one there with me that is not confetti heavy!

My DH was on holiday for 2 weeks and we had days out planned. Unfortunately the weather let us down so out of doors trips had to be abandoned except for one as we did get one exceptionally good day so we headed off to the Yorkshire Wildlife Park. We went last year and loved it so much so had to go again. We had a brilliant day so here's just a few photos. We also went to The Deep but the photos are not so good from there.

That's all for now. I'll be back with my June Stitch From Stash report soon. I've behaved this month!

Until next time take care everyone.

With much love

Sally xxx

Been Doing Some Finishing!

Well I was intent on blogging sooner but I was kind of putting off mounting my With My Needle Quaker Hornbook onto the hornbook incase I made a mess of it but now it's done and dry and I've also finished up something I stitched in 2007 I am here!

So, without further ado, here is my Quaker Hornbook!

With My Needle Quaker Hornbook

36 count flax linen

DMC Variations 4120

This was a lovely, quick stitch with my absolute favourite DMC Variation ( well who doesn't love red?!!! Lol! ).

Back in 2007 I stitched La D La Love is Patient and it's been in my stitching drawer ever since as I didn't really know what to do with it ( yes shame on me!). Anyway the other day I came across it and decided I really must do something with it. I didn't want to frame it so I decided on a hanging pinkeep type finish with a gathered ribbon edge. I used two colours of ribbon. I have to say I am delighted with the way this turned out.

Now onto my WIPs. Shores came out to play again Friday/ Saturday and block two was duely finished and block three started. Guess what??? I made the same mistake on block three that I did on blocks one and two. One stitch short on the border!!! I seriously need to learn to count! Anyway I had to frog all the white on the right hand side and the chimney on the house at the same side but thankfully I did get it all resitched!

Sunday I decided on Blue Ribbon Designs Peppermint Twist and made a little progress. I do love this piece even though I have made a boo boo on it and did not realise until I was stitching the cardinal's legs and realised I should have stitched the border of two of the snowflake borders the same colour! Anyway they are staying as they are!! I'm being a rebel! Lol!

Last night was JN SAL night and you may or may not notice on the piccie that I've missed the last band on the Summer bit and that is because I did not have enough DMC 932 to even start it! So I really need to remember that I have to go back to that! I have loads of DMC but none of that colour spare! How typical is that? Lol!

Last week I had another new start. Now that I've stitched Shepherd's Bush Shepherd's Purse I couldn't resist starting the fob to go with it. This piccie is pre today's stitching so I've finished this bit of it barring the beads and made a start on the other side but ended up frogging what I'd stitched on there because I did it in the wrong colour!! Lol! I sometimes actually wonder why I bother stitching!!!! But I enjoy it and I have some beautiful pieces at the end of it so I think that's good enough reason!!!

I've also had some new stash this week. I really shouldn't have but I've been good for quite some time and the stuff I ordered from Fobbles ( not arrived yet as they were out of stock but should be arriving any time soon) I had the money for. Anyway in the piccies are Little House Needleworks Needle and Thread with CC threads and Impie, Hattie and Bea Scissor Bed and Pin Pillow and Blackbird Designs Love in the Air stockings chart with GAST and CC threads needed for those and the JN humbug Lisa and I are going to be stitching. One of the stockings will be stitched for a gift.

Well that's all my news for now. A huge thank you for all the lovely comments you left on my BRD Winter Wingding finish. I had some new commentors which is always so lovely as I love finding new blogs to visit. Thank you for your continued visits and comments. I treasure each and every one of you xxx

Hugs

Sally

xx

Christmas in July and a Gift for a Friend!

I received some new stash from Amy at Down Sunshine Lane on Monday. As soon as I saw the new Lizzie*Kate Christmas Double Flips Merry Christmas By The Letter I just had to go on auto for them and also the new Country Cottage Needleworks/ Crescent Colours thread packs Winter Wonderland.

Last week , not shown in the picture, I finally received Midsummer Night Designs Remember Me Stitching Pocket. I ordered this about 6 weeks ago from a UK site but they had to order it in, which I expected seen as it was new out. About 4 weeks later I received an email saying it was in stock and they'd sent it out. Imagine my disappointment when I opened it and the wrong chart! So I emailed them and they were very apologetic and said either they'd ordered the wrong chart or Hoffman had sent them the wrong one. As luck would have it they were due to have an order dispatched from another place that day so they'd emailed them to put the chart on that. I have to say it's the first time I've had a problem with this place.

Of course I really want to start them all but for now I started Merry Christmas By The Letter. There is no hope for me and my startitis at the moment but life is too short and stitching gives me so much pleasure. As always I seem to have a bit of a conflict with white-ish shades! The conversion on the chart suggests DMC 712 but I decided it wouldn't show up on my flax linen so I'm using DMC 3865. I think it'll be fine when it's used in big areas so I'll keep on and see how it goes. This is how far I got after an hour or so yesterday afternoon. I may pick it up again this afternoon depending on what else I have to do!

Here's more progress on The Sampler Girl In The Garden With Jane Austen which I am loving so much:) It's such a joy to stitch and I can see me stitching more of Tanya's designs.

I can now show one of my recent finishes. Today is Karan's birthday and I decided to stitch her a little something. This was quick to stitch and I'm really pleased with the way it turned out and how I made it up. The fabric it is on is the one I backed it with. Hope you like it, Karan, and hope you're having a fantastic day!

La D Da Tiny Sampler

Unknown fabric

DMC

Stitched for Karan

If you are still with me here's my progress from Sunday evening on Blue Ribbon Designs Winter Wingding. This is stitching up quite quickly really and I think I may have finally found a solution to the white problem! Thank you to everyone who made suggestions. I decided to try the metallic option and found some Rainbow Gallery in my stash so I tried that. What do you think?

This week on Monday Bea came out to play. I didn't get too much done but every stitch is one less to do next time:) When I was looking at the chart this time I realised that I am over half way there!
I think that's all my WIPs for now. Tonight I'll be stitching on HAED TT Purple Dragon and hoping to get page one finished. Not sure when I'll pick the SK up but Lisa seemed to think it was the SAL for it this weekend so I will have to look on the forum and see if I can find out.

Tomorrow night is the year 9 celebration evening which we're really looking forward to. Abi is so excited to find out which award she has got! DH was supposed to be working late but he's managed to get it changed so he'll be home in time to go.

That's it from me today. I may be back Friday to show another gift and let you know how it went for Abi!

Take care everyone. Thank you for continuing to visit me and for all your lovely comments.

Love

Sally
xxx

My First Flanged Pillow and a Contest:)

Yesterday morning I decided to try my hand at making a flanged pillow so out came my material, thread, sewing machine and stitched piece and here is the final result:) I am really pleased with the way this turned out for a first attempt and I will certainly use this finishing technique again. I used The Big Book of Finishing for the instructions and it was much easier than I expected! So, as promised a while ago, I am offering this finished piece to say thank you for visiting my blog:) If you would like to have a chance of winning please add a comment to this post saying you would like to be added to the draw and I will pick a winner in about a week's time:)

My Christmas ornament for the exchange is on hold at the moment as I'm stitching on 32 count linen and it's driving me mad! Now I remember why I dislike linen and prefer evenweave! I stitched on it for two evenings and became very frustrated so thought I'd leave it for a day or two before picking it up again. So last night out came Chatelaine Christmas Mystery IV so that I could make a start on part 10 which is another star. I actually managed to stitch all the silver of the outline of the star and have it meet which is a miracle as that didn't happen with last month's star!

This week in my rotation it is the turn of Just Nan Spring in the Air which I am really looking forward to. I may even have another finish if I get my finger out and nothing stops me stitching! Next week it's Papillon Creations Serendipity and I may get that finished too so the next round of my rotation will be all change:) Helen and I are hopefully starting our SAL on Just Nan Queen of the Needle on 19th November and stitching it on Monday evenings so I'm really looking forward to that. I haven't got my fabric yet but have chosen a Polstitches one called Dusky Rose so I'm going to order that on Wednesday when the postal strikes are over for this week. Only about another 7 weeks and I will be off the chart wagon too and I can treat myself to a chart or two ( or three or four!)!

I have now got the HAED charts I have for sale listed on my for sale blog but there are only three left now:)

Just want to say Huge congratulations to Yorkshire man James Toseland for winning the World Superbike Championship yesterday:) his last championship before moving to Moto GP next year! He comes across as being such a lovely bloke and DH and I are delighted he won. Just need Lewis Hamilton to win the Formula 1 championship now:)

That's all from me today but I thought you might like to see some sketches my daughter's did before I go:) The first one is one Abi did of Lara Croft.

And the next one is by Jess and it's Captain Jack Sparrow:)

Bye for now:)

A Small Finish:)

Thank you to everybody for your well wishes:) I am feeling better, not quite 100%, but my stitching mojo is back so that is a good thing! Lol! I had my ears syringed yesterday but I still have pain for all there's no infection so I'll see how it goes over the next few days.

I have had a small finish so I'm happy:) It feels good to have a small finish once in a while in amongst all the bigger stuff:) It's not made up into anything as yet but I have plans to maybe finish it up into a flange pillow. It is a La D Da freebie called Rose and it's stitched on 28 count Polstitches Nature's Grace using GAST. I enjoyed stitching this one up as it was so quick and easy. No real using the old brain! Lol! I'm not sure when I'll actually get it made up as I need to see what fabric I have I can use.

This week I'll be stitching on Chatelaine Summer Afternoon and, hopefully, get it finished. I picked it up last night but didn't get much done as my heart just didn't seem in it somehow. I think I've lost interest in it a bit. Don't get me wrong it's a lovely piece but I think I've been stitching it way too long! I also need to get started on a birthday present for a friend who is 40 early next month. I have no idea what to stitch as yet so I need to get looking through my charts and get my mind made up! It'll be here before I know it!

We'll be getting a new front door in about 3 weeks time! Yay! No more drafts and no more having a door that sticks in winter! It took us a while to decide which one to have as there were so many different ones to choose from but we got there in the end. It'll certainly make a huge difference to the house. We actually had UPVC windows put in 16 years ago but couldn't afford the doors as well at the time:(

Hope everyone is having a good week and that everyone where there were tornados etc yesterday in the UK is safe. We are certainly having some freak weather this year.

A Finish!

I have another finish to share with you today:) I didn't think that I'd get this done completely this week but here it is in all it's glory!

This is La D Da Love is Patient stitched on Sassy's Fabby's 28 count Cheryl's Wild Rose using Crescent Colours. I love the way this had turned out after all the frogging on the heart I had to do plus there was no alphabet or numbers for adding your initials and the year and it was charted for the designer's initials and the year she designed it so I had a bit of changing to do there. I think this will end up being framed but I may well do it myself if I can find a suitable frame. Next time on this slot in my rotation I will have a new start and I think I will make the smalls week:) I need to start thinking about Christmas!

Another photo to share is, at long last, of HAED QS Dragonette framed. I finally managed to take a decent photo of it using the digi camera! Jess chose the frame and mount with the help of the framer.

And last but not least is a picture of Just Nan Royal Blossoms made up into a card for DH's auntie.

This week in my rotation it's HAED Winter by Sara Butcher. I haven't stitched on her in what feels like ages ( and it probably is!) so I'm looking forward to getting back into it and, hopefully, getting page 3 finished!

Jess' first week in 6th Form seemed to go OK apart from a slight hiccup early on in the week. I did not know until Wednesday when she got in that she had been crying on Tuesday night when she'd gone to bed. I knew there was something wrong on Wednesday morning but she said she was OK so I didn't push it. Anyway she was worrying that she wasn't going to be able to cope as she had already had a lot of homework and, let's face it, it's a bit of a shock to the system when you're not used to being bombarded with such a lot of work. Anyway she felt much better about things the next day and once she gets into a routine I am sure she'll be OK. She did decide that she wanted to drop General Studies so that she could concentrate on her other four subjects and use those two hours she gets G. S. to do homework and study but some of the students have already tried to drop it only be told no you can't or you'll be "ruining your life if you do" and one of her best friends had gone to see about dropping it and the head of the subject had ranted at her for 20 minutes ( Jess was actually there with her) so she daren't broach it! So DH and I have discussed it with her and have decided we are behind her 100% and have written a letter to the head of the subject so Jess is going to see him with it today. Keep your finger's crossed that he doesn't start ranting at her! Please!

Abi was in the wars Wednesday evening as she fell in the bath and hurt her back in the region of her ribs. I am sure I should wrap her in cotton wool as she can be so accident prone! Thankfully she didn't do any serious damage to herself although she is still a bit sore. She decided she was going to be brave today and have a go at PE:)

Hope everyone has a good week. Thanks for dropping by:)

Very Proud Parents and Other Stuff!

GCSE results day is here and DH and I are very proud parents today! Jessica's GCSE results were nothing short of brilliant! She got an A* in History, 9 A's ( 2 in IT, English Language, English Literature, Maths, Chemistry, Biology, RE, and French which she did last year), 2 B's in Physics and Citizenship, a C in Italian ( which was only about a 6 month course) and a D in Art. She is very pleased but disappointed in the D in Art as she thought she might get a C. So she is now clear to go into 6th Form and study Maths, Chemistry, Physics and Biology starting 10th September. She has to go in on 4th September and enrol and have a 10 minute meeting with the head of the 6th Form. We'll be celebrating her achievements at some point but it won't be tonight as DH is going to a speedway meeting at Sheffield which is a benefit night for Garry Stead who was recently paralysed in a speedway accident.

The holidays have been a bit of a wash out really as far as going out is concerned but we have managed one day out so far! On Tuesday we went across the country to Knowsley Safari Park and had a fantastic day out. I will have some photos at a later date when we get the films developed. Unfortunately the digital camera batteries ran out before we had a chance to take any decent photos! We were lucky enough to see a new born buffalo out in one of the fields. It was still very wet and very wobbly on it's legs! Lol! It was lovely too see all the different animals in as natural a habitat as possible. I will add some photos when I get them back.

Tomorrow we are going into Hull as I think the girls would like a bit of a shop up and we still need to get some uniform bits for Abi and stuff for Jess. Saturday we're going to Cruckley Farm. As old as they are the girls still love seeing farm animals etc and it's years since we last went there as we've always gone to Honeysuckle Farm which is just outside of where we live. Keep your finger's crossed that the weather is good!

Some of you have asked for piccies of Abi's bedroom so I took a few with the digi camera. Wish we had a better one as the pics are not brilliant!

I haven't got a great deal of stitching done this week due to a tension headache plus I found a mistake on La D Da's Love is Patient when the heart border did not meet at the top. When I have had my stitching out I've been unpicking a bit then stitching it back up until I found where the mistake was, which, as it turned out, was about 3/4 of the way back round the heart! As you can imagine I was not too pleased but it's done now and I'm onto the wording. This is stitched using one strand of Crescent Colours on 28 count Sassy's Fabbys Cheryl's Wild Rose which a beautiful colour. I might do a bit more on this tonight or I might get HAED Guardian back out. Tomorrow is the start of the New Start SAL on the HAED board so I'm taking part and starting quick Stitch Girly Gothic. I am all ready to go barring gridding my fabric so I might do that tonight too!

Well I had better go as I think DH is in a mood with me:( Hope everyone is having a brilliant week and thanks for reading and commenting:)

Love is Patient WIP

As I had finished Papillon Creations Simple Little Quaker I started La D Da Love is Patient on Friday evening. This is stitched on Sassy's Fabbys COTM Cheryl's Wild Rose, which is a gorgeous colour, using Crescent Colours. The colours I have used so far are Manor Red and a black which I can't remember the name of! This piece will now be in the first week of my rotation.

This week's piece is Heaven and Earth Designs Winter by Sara Butcher. I'm looking forward to getting on with this again and getting a few rows done! I know it's going to take me years to do but I'm long past being able to stitch one piece at a time, finish it then start something else. I'd get very bored if I did that and would possibly never finish any larger pieces. It's OK stitching one small piece at a time but with larger pieces I know it wouldn't work for me. Having said that I probably have too many larger pieces on the go:)

And speaking of HAED the people who signed up to the newsletter received a lovely surprise for Fairy Day of the chart of Jessica Galbreth's Believe in Yourself. I think this will be one I stitch for Abi as it would look gorgeous in her bedroom when we get it decorated! So thank you Michelle and Bob for a gorgeous Fairy Day gift.:)

Thank you to everybody who posted well wishes for Abi. The visit to the doctors for both her and Jess went OK. Jess has an infected toe so has cream to put on that which will, hopefully, clear it up. If not she has to go back on Friday. I'm just keeping my finger's crossed that it clears up otherwise it may well mean she'll have to have her toenail taken off. Ouch! Abi has a sinus infection so has antibiotics for that. I've kept her off school today but hope to get her back tomorrow but will see how she goes.

What horrible weather we are having! It is throwing it down and is very windy out there. I need to go to the post office to post out some Ebay stuff but I will be soaked before I reach my front gate! I think I'll wait a bit and see if it slows up a bit.

Stay safe and dry everyone!