Author: Anne S

A quick post before I head off to bed ready for my 4.50am wake-up call … I’m breathing a heavy sigh of relief and contentment tonight for a couple of different reasons:

1. Mum will be here after only 5 more sleeps
2. I only have one more week of phones before I’m back on the Supervisor Hotline for 6 whole weeks (until the end of January)
3. I received some lovely mail today (more later)
4. I don’t have to wear business clothes for a whole month – as we now have casual dress right up until the middle of January … welcome to 5 weeks of trackies and jeans yippee! (especially good for those late/early shifts)
5. For the last 2 nights I have been overjoyed to witness flocks (?) of rainbow lorikeets – my favourite Aussie birds – flying over my little flat on their way to roost at the end of the day … it takes my breath away, and is such a joy to witness (I’m a big softie at heart)

and, last but by no means least …

6. I got all the stitching done on the front of my little gift piece tonight!!!!!

Yep, it’s true – it’s all ‘finished’ … I just have to do the actual finishing, and it’s ready to go in the post. I’ve scanned a photo of it, but I can’t unveil it until it reaches its recipient – as usual, though, the scan doesn’t do the piece justice with those lovely sparkles … but I can give you a little sneak preview of how blending filament should actually look … ie shiny!! 😉 I have to admit, I’m glad I persevered with it – it does look pretty cool once it’s finished … can’t wait to show you!

As for my mail, today I received some trade fabric from Karen – and it’s the most gorgeous hand-dyed Belfast by Silkweaver called “Fern” … totally scrummy – thanks so much for that, Karen … hopefully you’ll find your return trade OK once I get it in the mail:)

I also received my FOTM from Country Stitch, which was a bit more disappointing (just normal linens, not hand-dyeds), and something I’m probably going to cancel from next month. Unfortunately my recent stash splurges were a bit of a stuff-up, in that I worked out the conversion all wrong, so ended up spending a LOT more than I should have … so now I’m having to make a few budget cuts to offset it. Oh well, such is life … At least I have plenty of stash to keep me going in my days of poverty LOL – and I can always live on tuna for a couple of weeks hahaha.

Which reminds me – my last stash haul from SB&B has finally been shipped … it left on the 5th, so with any luck it will be here within the next week … woohoo!!! Then I can enjoy drooling over it, and get the guilt over and done with before Christmas LOL 😉

So, tonight I’m heading to bed with a smile on my face – all-in-all it’s been a good day. Hope your weekend is going well too 🙂

Well, the heading is aimed towards my lovely gift piece … I managed to frog stitch all that blending filament and the backstitching – but it took me all night! BF is a pain in the butt to remove anyway, without it being nice and crinkly 😉 Then to top it all off, I managed to stitch my first big replacement piece of stitching … and found I was one row out in counting – I think I’m doomed with this piece! The air round here last night matched my decor beautifully … it was very very blue! LOL. Never mind, I’m on 6am shifts this week, so hopefully I can get a few stitches in each afternoon in daylight. I have to admit, I’m usually really careful when I’m ironing, and usually do have a towel underneath it, and a cloth over the top … I was just feeling so under the weather I just wasn’t thinking. Never mind, by hook or by crook I’ll master the damned thing before the week is out! haha.

Thanks everyone as always for your comments – they’re always so welcome 🙂 And an especially big howdy to my cousin Anita, a new reader all the way from Canada – it’s so nice to see you! {{waving}} You’re right, Anita, I’m usually appalling at keeping in touch, so popping in here is a nice way to see what I’m up to … especially as you’re a stitcher too, ‘cos that’s usually all I talk about 🙂 I’m teaching Mum a bit more about emailing and the internet when she comes over to visit next week … so there may be blood on the carpet – either hers or mine hahahaha – no, she’s actually pretty good ‘cos she writes everything down 🙂

I’ve also decided I need to brush up my minimal French (by minimal, I mean I know about 4 whole sentences … “Comment ca va?”, “Je m’appelle Anne”, “je ne comprends pas”, and “je parle le francais petit peu seulement” haha – but there are some wonderful blogs out there written entirely in French … and Google translater really isn’t earning it’s salary at all – I can barely understand the english versions, never mind the french ones! So, perhaps I have a new task for 2006/2007 … improve my language skills LOL.

Rightio, enough dawdling on the computer – off to the “infamous project” … let’s see if I can actually do some stitching that will remain in the linen for more than 60 minutes haha.

Crikey, my fingers feel as though my arms have been cut off … they haven’t touched a needle … or needlework … all day! In an attempt to find my rotary cutter to cut the fabric strips etc for my ornaments, I ended up unpacking all the yet-unpacked bags and boxes in my bedroom … 3 wine boxes and about 6 various sized bags – yikes! And after all that, I still hadn’t found my cutter … but boy, oh boy, my bedroom looks a bit better for it – you can actually walk round BOTH sides of the bed now LOL. As for the cutter, I had a brainwave while I was unpacking – and lo and behold, when I looked into one of the big unpacked boxes in the spare bedroom, there it was …

I also found some quilting things that I really must add to my UFO list too hmmm – a wallhanging quilt of golliwogs that I did as my beginners introduction to quilting – but I hate the design, so it doesn’t enthral me too much to get it finished … but it only needs the binding to be done, and it’s finished – maybe I’ll give it to a charity or something … As for the others, one was a patchwork quilt for my best friend’s son – and the other is a quilting bag for my mat boards etc … it would be nice to get that finished – maybe I’ll enlist Mum’s help with that one while she’s here, as she’s the sewing guru, and that’s all that’s left to be done with it, I think.

I also finally managed to remember today to put a money order I’ve had sitting around for a while actually into an envelope, to send to Lauren Sauer at Forget-Me-Nots In Stitches – I fell in love with her design “Never Enough Berries” in the Fine Lines magazine, then found it had only the pindisk in that issue, and that the magazine is no longer being made … b*gger! The good news is that I decided to contact Lauren directly, and she’s making the chart in all four parts available for sale directly from her – so I’m finally going to the Post Office tomorrow/Friday to post it off to her (as well as check my mail – you never know, miracles may have happened over the last few days since I’ve not been at work – my Stitching Bits & Bobs backorder may have arrived!! … yeah, OK, that might be pushing things a little bit haha). Anyway, here’s the Never Enough Berries chart, seeing as I have nothing else to offer today in the way of stitching progress:

Sorry, but I gave up trying to upload the photo using Blogger today – I’ve used Photobucket instead, but that means you can’t click and enlarge sorry 😦

The night is still young, though – so I may still get chance to pick up a needle yet 😉

And now for something different … taken from Sharon’s blog:

You reflect the wisdom of the spirit. You shine as
a wise and anicent sage who values intellect
among the most. Your spirit brings guidence to
those around you. You have accomplished your
strength with age and time. Don’t let your wise
advice go to waste. Share it with all who are
willing to listen.

Reflections of the Spirit?

Well, I’ve had a fantastic stitching night/morning – and managed to almost complete another Christmas ornament … thinking I had all the buttons etc on hand, I figured I might as well get this one stitched before I start my first ever ornamentifying session … well, that was the plan! As you can see from the piccie, there is just one thing missing – the snowman’s carrot nose!! The one that turned up is too small, so now I’m not sure what to do – I can either place an order locally and hope to heck it turns up before Christmas … or satin stitch something instead (but I think I’d prefer to use a button) … or I could try buying some Fimo and make my own … has anyone tried to do this? Oh well, it still looks pretty good – it’s the first time I’ve changed the threads around to use what was in my stash … instead of using Crescent Colours (of which I don’t own any), I used Gentle Art Sampler Threads that I already had … instead of CC Apple Fritter I used GAST Cherry Wine, instead of CC Sassy Brass I used GAST Summer Meadow, and instead of CC Toasted Marshmallow I used GAST Oatmeal. The rest of the threads were as listed. It is a design by SamSarah Design Studio from the 2005 JCS Christmas Ornament issue. It was stitched on a small ‘Kiwi Pearls’ – a hand-dyed linen from Country Stitch. I’m pretty pleased with it all-in-all … just wished I could’ve finished it today …

Another great reason to have Mum come over for a holiday is that she’s bringing me black canvas for an upcoming project in the New Year – two canvaswork pieces by Jen’s Jems, a NZ designer … here’s a scan of the main threads being used – yup, they sure are bright!!! Hurry up and come over Mum, I’m dying to get starting on one of them!! 😉

Thanks for everyone’s comments about Mum’s tree – I’ll post one of my little baby one once it’s finished … I feel great today, so I might try and get a bit more done tomorrow – I had the Christmas tree lights on last night in the lounge while watching DVD’s … it was lovely 🙂 In fact I was enjoying myself so much, I nearly died when I looked up from my stitching and saw it was 2am!!! As for my migraine, thankfully it’s disappeared in its entirety – I’m not that good, Carol … I only stitched when my migraine was at its calming down stage – I started stitching which is what sent it over the top … so I just lay down and slept for a few hours, then tried again at night 🙂

It’s been a great relaxing couple of days – with a very eclectic mix of DVD’s to listen to while stitching … League of Gentlemen (very sick English comedy series – hilarious but twisted sense of humour!), Tears of the Sun, Big Fat Greek Wedding, and Men in Black 1 and 2 … yep, a woman of variation, that’s me 😉

Hope everyone is having a good week …

(Edited to add Christmas tree piccie)
Well, here it is – I decided to just bite the bullet and get it finished so I can get the box of ornaments off the sofa … here’s my baby version of Mum’s – kinda like a ‘mother and daughter’ set of trees haha. It’s a bit dark ‘cos I tried to get the lights showing up – looks quite cute in the corner of the room 🙂 I guess it must nearly be Christmas – it’s starting to really feel like it! 😉

I’ve been plagued with another migraine last night/today so that’s put the brakes on getting much stitching done – I did manage to get a couple of hours done, though, and did the stitching on a Mill Hill Christmas ornament – just need to do the beaded tassel and finish it off … another one of the finishing pile for later in the week 🙂 Instead today I’ve done exciting things like tidying the kitchen up and doing the dishes … and something a bit more fun, like getting the Christmas tree half-finished. It’s only a small one, so didn’t take very long at all … lights are on, and so is the tinsel and angel … just the Christmas balls and it’s finished. It’s only 4ft in height, so my soon-to-be-finished Christmas ornies won’t fit on it until I can afford a bigger tree – so they’re going to be hung from the window sill, from a ‘teddy chain’. It’s definitely feeling more festive now there’s a bit of decoration in the flat – even though I’m living on my own now, I was still determined to put my tree up … I adore Christmas trees – and I always swore my Mum’s tree was the best in the world … I used to start nagging for her to put it up as soon as 1 December came – and Dad used to love sitting in the dark, with just the tree lights on … one of my fave Christmas memories :))

Here’s Mum’s tree – that puts mine to shame …