Book Signing and Stitching!

As I mentioned in my last post Abi and I were going to our first book signing on Saturday. We were both nervous as we've never been to one before but when we got chatting to the author she was nervous as we were! Lol! I had seen her first book in WH Smith in Hull, not bought it then wished I had when I couldn't find it anywhere else. One day when we were in again we saw signed copies so bought one each. I read it pretty soon after and was totally hooked and thought I'd have to wait ages for the next book in the series. I was delighted when I read it was going to be the end of October. I was also excited to see she was doing a book signing.

So here is Abi and I with CL Coffey who is a local Hull author. I have a stupid look on my face as I was fed up of waiting for DH to take the photo with Abi's phone! Lol! 

And here is my book signed :)

Onto my stitching now. I have had two finishes and three new starts although I can only show one finish and two new starts. You will have to wait to see the others!

My new start was the next Anniversaries of the Heart which is Evergreen Lane. I managed to get a lot of the green bit of the border done. I am looking forward to getting on with this as it is so pretty.

New start no. 2 is my last cottage. Yay! I have loved stitching these but I am so ready to stitch something different! This is the December one. I'm not sure what I'll stitch after this but I have plenty of Little House and Country Cottage charts in my stash!

My finish is part 2 of the Shepherd's Bush Shepherd's Fold. I love these Fold pieces so much. I still need to get some fabric for my box! 

Shepherd's Bush Shepherd's Fold My Home Fob

As kitted.

I'll get it made up over the next few days hopefully.

Barb and I are, hopefully, going to get this ornament finished this evening then we can start Fa Lal La next week ( sheep!). Not many to go on these then we'll be starting ornaments from the JCS Christmas mags.

Finally my lovely little robin. I managed to get about 450 stitches done for the challenge so I was happy. Of course the more I do the nearer I am to a finish!

Not long now to Chris and I starting our December SAL. We have chosen LHN The Florist from the Hometown Holiday series. We have also chosen our December SAL for 2016! It's a new Country Cottage Needleworks one but I can't remember the name of it. Merry Christmas My Deer I think. 

That is all my news for this time. Hope you are all stitching, knitting or whatever craft you do, up a storm!

Until next time.

With much love.

Sally xxx

Clara Ellen is Done!

Yay! Lol! This week I finished Blackbird Designs Clara Ellen from Anniversaries of the Heart :) I don't know why I struggled so much with this one. Maybe the colours but anyway it is now done and I can now move on to Evergreen Lane!

Blackbird Designs Anniversaries of the Heart Clara Ellen

36 count Rosewood linen

DMC

This block is for Jess. I did have to leave off a bird to get her name in and then I added a heart motif as I had a big gap. I didn't add an initial to the basket and the initial on the right side had to be done over one to fit it in lol!

I don't have much to show this week as I've been stitching on an ornament for one of my private exchanges then I've stitched two nights on my November Cottage to get it finished. 

Country Cottage Needleworks November Cottage

32 count Natural opalescent linen.

DMC

Just one more to go now and I am so excited to get these finished :) Of course it's the December one and December is my favourite season of the year. I do love Winter / Christmas stitching and had loads of charts sorted to do through this year but it did not happen! 

Final piece I have to show if, of course, my lovely Robin. Now that I'm stitching on him two evenings a week I'm getting a good bit more done. I have just joined a challenge on the new HAED group on Facebook to stitch at least 100 stitches a week over 4 weeks which I'm sure I can do easily! 

Typing of Facebook Gaynor from Stitchers Anon has set up a new group for her designs and she had a giveaway for a £20 gift voucher for her shop and I was one of 3 very lucky winners :) I bought the 4 primitive heart ornaments as well as Season of Joy featuring the very cute Holmsey and Fergus and I sent an RAK of that one to Barb which I am hoping she likes and hasn't already got! Lol! 

More Facebook and the HAED group. HAED had sale on last week and I was sent an RAK by someone called A Cross Stitch Addict of Faces of Faery 193. It is just so beautiful and a piece of artwork I have loved since I first saw it. I am so greatful to whoever you are :) I don't know when I'll get around to stitching her though but I'd love to start her!

Before I forget the winner of the Potted Poinsetta chart is .................... Christine! Christine as I have your address it is already on the way to you. Enjoy!

Following on from SFS post and me saying no charts next year I am going to need some serious help in achieving this. I am thinking if I say no charts at all I am probably going to break it so I've thought about saying I can treat myself to one new chart if there is something I really want when I've had so many finishes. I'm thinking 10 finishes. What do you think? Too few? Too many? I just get more and more ashamed of myself when I see what I have and my To Stitch From list does not include my HAEDs but I see new stuff that really calls to me! I do keep telling myself that I don't drink or smoke or go out much but it' just gets too silly! 

Speaking of new stuff my final Shepherd's Fold piece arrived on Wednesday. Oh wow what a beautiful kit it is! It is a ruler pocket and it includes a gorgeous wooden ruler. I can't wait to get to stitching but I have do the others first. I didn't get to stitch on the fob this week as I wanted to get the November Cottage finished.

Tonight it's CCN ornament night with Barb and we're stitching on Merry Merry. Maybe a finish, maybe not lol! 

I had a great time catching up on blogs and seeing what you have all been up to. Of course I get enabled too! Lol!

That's all for this time. Have a great weekend everyone. Abi and I are going to a book signing tomorrow. We're looking forward to it. C L Coffey will be signing her new book Angel Eclipsed. Abi and I have the first book, Angel in Training, so we have to get the second one! 

Until next time.

With much love.

Sally xxx

October Stitch From Stash

It is that time of the month yet again for reporting our stitch from stash triumphs etc! So I'll get that bit over with and get onto my stitching. 

Month : October

Spent £44.55

Earned £30

Balance Carried Fwd: £92.44

I did spend a little more than I intended as I needed two lots of fabric. I have one more Shepherd's Fold to come probably next week and that is done. I am intent on treating myself to a few new charts before the end of the year then next year NO CHARTS lol! Just fabric and threads when I need them. I will need lots of encouragement though!

So I have had a couple of finishes since my last post. Finish no.1 was Christmas Birdhouse.

Merry Merry was started by both Barb and I. Love this one.

Finish no. 2 and a massive happy dance was December's Holly which is the final one in the series of the Garden Journal charts. I do still have the journal cover to stitch but I think I'll do that later.

I had a page finish on QS Spirit of Winter Robin and made a small start on page 2. I may do 2 evenings on this now to try and get more done.

Ooooh I can now show my square for Mouse's quilt.

Dragon Dreams A Spot of Tea

32 count white evenweave

DMC.

When I posted this to Mouse I also sent this.

Lizzie*Kate Night Before Christmas Sled Mouse

Brown perforated paper

DMC.

As soon as I saw this chart I had to stitch the Mouse one for her! I am happy to say that she loved both the square and the sled :)

My November Cottage is coming along nicely. I do love these bright colours in it.

I finished one side of the My Home Fob and started the other side. It is so pretty. 

A few weeks ago my lovely friend Chris broke her ankle and was feeling rather down. All her crafting supplies are in her loft so I decided to pop onto Patchwork Rabbit and kit her a little something up for her stitch. I chose Potted Poinsetta which is one of the Little House Needleworks Sampler Tree ornaments. Well imagine my surprise when an envelope from Chris arrived this morning and I found that she had also stitched it for me as well as herself and sent the chart to me. Thank you so much Chris. I love it. 

So if you would like to stitch this chart please say so in your comments and I'll pick a winner next time I blog :)

I have still not managed to catch up on blog reading and commenting. I feel so bad as it's something I used to do so regularly and I really must try so much harder. I much prefer blogging to Instagram etc and I most certainly do not want to lose the friends I have made. 

Until next time.

With much love.

Sally xx

PS I don't know what has happened to the writing on this post!

A Full Heart

So much for trying to get back to regular blogging! It just didn't happen did it?! However I have been getting some stitching done and I have had a finish or two but I can only show one for now.

Shepherd's Bush Shepherd's Fold A Full Heart ( as kitted )

I just loved every single stitch of this. It has taken me a while but it was well worth it as it is just beautiful.I now need to find some fabric to cover the paper mache box with then I can mount the stitching on the lid. Yes the proper box would have been nice but there is no way I can stretch to that much money! Anyway the chart and leftover threads are now for sale so do email me if you're interested. It is a lovely piece to stitch. I also have some Halloween pieces that I stitched for sale which I'll add to my For Sale page.

So last night I had to start part 2 of the fold which is the My Home Fob. One side is almost complete.

I don't think this will take long to stitch.

Barb and I have been stitching away on our CCN ornaments and she has finished Christmas Birdhouse. As you can see I have a few more stitches to pop in so I'll get those done this evening and start Merry Merry. I was sorting threads for Merry Merry earlier and realised I only had one of the hand dyes and I get them with the chart, fabric and button. I realised it must have been used on a previous one, which it had, but when I found what I had left there is not enough to stitch this one! I used it to make the cording on the other one. Arghhhh! So I'll use the DMC alternative instead.

Clara Ellen is coming along quite nicely. I think a couple more Mondays might see it finished. Margaret asked if I would show the whole piece so far so here it is :)

I have two Wednesdays to get my November Cottage finished and it seems to be going much better than it has in previous months! Love those colours.

Just a little more to do on December's Holly. I think I should have a big celebration when I've finished it. It's 2 years since I finished the first one of this series!

Of course no post would be complete without my lovely Robin. I still have not finished page 5 but it'll be finished this Saturday! 

Our PC ( well it is mine now as DH has had a laptop for a couple of years ) threw one this week. I used it Monday afternoon and it was fine but when I went to switch it on on Wednesday it was totally dead. It's rather old now and getting slow but I felt I couldn't warrant buying a new one as I don't use it that much. So we went to ask the advice of the repair place and he said it could be the switch, the power supply unit or the motherboard but he'd need to run a diagnostic to see what it was. So it turned out to be the power supply unit and it has a new one fitted at a cost of £20 so I'm quite happy with that. In the meantime though I have been trying to get Jess' old laptop updated as she reset it to factory settings so that I could use that. It is still trying to download the final 151 updates!

Thank you all for your lovely comments about our budgie Billy. We still can't over him being gone and we often look to where his cage was to talk to him. It is so quiet without him. I miss his frantic tweeting when we leave the room and when he heard the birds outside!

That's all my news for now. I'll be back next week with my October stitch from stash report and I'll hopefully visit you all over the weekend.

Until next time.

With much love

Sally xxx

Birthday Gift for Lainey

Last Thursday was my lovely friend Lainey's birthday. When I was searching through my stash to see what I could stitch for her I found the perfect thing as, like me, she loves sheep and snowmen! 

Shepherd's Bush Happy Snowman (  freebie that can be found on the Shepherd's Bush website)

32 count fabric

DMC

Birthday gift for Lainey.

OK I know it's not exactly the thing to stitch for a September birthday but Lainey loves it and that is all that matters! Besides since when I have stitched for the season lol!

I have also been trying to get some bits finished off to display. These 2 Christmas ornaments were almost finished last time I posted.

This one I got finished at the weekend along with The Snowflower Diaries Autumn Witch.

I was panicking that the October Cottage wasn't going to get finished in time and had I not stitched on it Sunday, Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday evening it wouldn't have been! 

A small start was made on November. Let's hope I don't have a mad rush on this one!

A while ago I finished stitching a little ornament for Clare's church tree and here it is all made up and ready to go in the post. 

Christmas Birdhouse is looking more like a birdhouse now!

I have finally sown all the grass on A Full Heart and look I've built a fence too!

Last but not least my lovely robin. Not too much more to do on page 5! 

A massive thank you to everyone who commented on my last post and has stuck with me even though I haven't been commenting. I actually caught up with everyone and really enjoyed seeing what everyone was up to. 

We had a very sad start to our week this week as our little budgie Billy passed away. The house is way too quiet without him and we all miss him very much. I have looked on my PC for a photo of him and am very sad that I don't have any on it but I am sure we have some somewhere. So I found this one from my blog when we first got him. He could be terribly cranky but also very sweet.

That's all my news for now.

Take care everyone.

With much love

Sally xxx

September Stitch from Stash

Well I seem to be getting a bit bad at this blogging lark. I keep saying I'll get better at it and commenting but it just doesn't seem to happen and I know I'll lose readers etc if I don't comment. I'm trying really hard but.....

So first off my  September SFS report.

Brought fwd :£67.25

Spent :£30.26

Earned :£20.00

Balance carried fwd : £81.99

I am done with my autos now except for the Shepherd's Fold. I just have 2 more of those to come then I will try even harder not to buy anymore charts/ kits! Having said that I do want to get some more sheepy ones before the end of the year as Barb and I are going to be doing a sheep SAL! Next year I intend to just buy fabric and threads. Yes it'll probably be famous last words as I seem to be useless and let myself down every time!

Plenty of stitching has been done since the last time I blogged. One I can't show as it's a gift and the the one I've just started is for Mouse's quilt so I won't show that until I've finished it and she has it :)

My lovely robin is growing steadily but if I am going to finish it for February I am going to have to stitch more than one evening on it. 

So as soon as this is finished my robin will replace it in my rotation. Lots of holly still to do yet!

I didn't stitch on A Full Heart for a couple of Thursdays but last week I got back to it and I have almost sown all the grass! It all looks so pretty and I am so pleased I finally decided to sign up for this.

Barb and I finished Holly Jolly but I don't have a photo yet as I just have to finish making it up. Last week we started Christmas Birdhouse and here is how far I got. Doesn't look much like a birdhouse yet does it lol? I am going to love this one though.

I am steadily making progress on Clara Ellen. I don't look forward to picking this up but I think that is because I have been away from it for so long. Mistakes have been made already but believe me there are lots of mistakes in the whole piece! 

No post would be complete without a cottage! So her's my October Cottage. Will it be finished for October? Hmmm we will have to see about that one!

I received the JCS Christmas ornament mag today and I have to say I am a little disappointed in it this year. Barb and I going to stitch an ornament a month from it and I am hoping I will find 12 that I want to stitch! I think I will as there are a few that caught my eye but not like other years where I've wanted to stitch more than I didn't want to! Still I will keep buying it every year as I enjoy collecting them and have every issue since the year 2000.

That's all my stitchy news for this time. 

Take care everyone.

Until next time.

With much love

Sally xx

A Happy Finish!

Hello everyone! Tuesday night I had a finish and it's a finish that I absolutely love. I enjoyed stitching this very much and it's been a lovely change as I have been a bit bored with my stitching of late.

Lizzie*Kate Happy ( bonus designs from Things Unseen )

32 count Nougat linen

DMC

I think I have become a little bored because I've had so many series going on as in the cottages and the garden journal.  Don't get me wrong I love them but I think stitching the same sort of thing for months on end is getting to me! I picked up my AotH again and I'm already fed up of that! I think once I am finished with all these I will have to rethink the way I stitch and make sure I have a better variety ( as in no series or only one series at a time! ).

Speaking of the garden journal I made a little more progress on December's Holly. It is looking rather pretty even if I say so myself. There does seem to be a lot more work in this one somehow.

As for the cottages I made a start on October. I hope to get on better with this one as I'm so last minute with them now.

Clara Ellen is growing a little week by week but it will be slow!

I didn't stitch on my fold last week as I wanted to make a start on the cottage ( I didn't stitch at all on Wednesday when I would usually stitch on it )  but I will be back to that this week. I only have 2 more of the fold to get now so my collection will be complete in October :). I bought a paper mache box last week to mount the first fold on and keep the other bits in but I shall have to cover it to make it look nice. As much as I would really like the proper box I can't justify spending all that money.

Barb and I are hoping to get Holly Jolly finished this week but I think I may have a bit too much to do to. Love this one!

Finally my lovely robin. Getting there with page 5 :)

Last week my DH and Abi were on holiday from work. Jess should have been but because she changed jobs she didn't have it. We worked round her though so she could come the wildlife park. We only normally go once a year but Abi desperately wanted to go back and see the tiger cubs again so we thought why not. It was a little chilly but we had a  brilliant day and between DH,  Abi and I we took well over 1000 photos! I'll show just a few of mine  here :).

That's all my news for now. I must some finishing done before I post again!

Take care everyone.

With much love

Sally xxx