Challenges & SALs – Page 14 – Feather Stitching

January Challenge – Day 5

5 January, 201125 February, 2012 Anne S

I was very naughty today, as I was in the mood to stay home and do some chores … and lots more stitching … so when it was time to go into work I called the office and asked if I could have a last-minute RDO … no pressure, as I could just as easily jump in the car and come to work, but I’d really appreciate having the day off. It got approved (yippee!), and I’ve spent the day mostly stitching, but also catching up on some blog reading, helping my elderly neighbour move her paintings around on her lounge room walls (bless her), doing 3 loads of laundry, ironing all the linens for the rest of the January Challenge pieces, and attaching the canvas to the stretcher bars… and did I mention lots more stitching? … so, all-in-all a very productive day haha.

Seeing as the canvas was nicely tacked down today, I opted to spend a great deal of the day stitching on my canvaswork piece – and I’m amazed at just how fast it’s been stitching on this one, the piece grew at a most phenomenal rate!! It’s one of those designs that is pretty much entirely in satin stitch and in a consistent pattern, which means once you’ve got one set of stitches done you can pretty much continue the repeats without having to check the pattern … sheer bliss! So without any further ado, here is the MASSIVE progress on today’s challenge piece (designed by From Nancy’s Needle).

The blank spaces above are for a pearl cotton that I’m missing … but it’s on order so hopefully will be arriving over the next couple of weeks … hopefully …

I’m not sure which project will get started tomorrow … we’ll just have to see which fabric falls into my hands tomorrow night, but I’m out for dinner at a friend’s farewell party so don’t expect too much progress tomorrow, I’ll be lucky if I get a dozen stitches in for a change!

One other thing I did do today was to put Sapphire Star back onto the stretcher bars to tighten up the tension, so that’s not ready to be picked up once again after the 16th of January … 😀

Crazy January 2011 Challenge, Cross Stitch, Little House Needleworks, Stash, Works in Progress

Crazy January Challenge – Day 4

4 January, 201125 February, 2012 Anne S

You can tell I’m back at work when I don’t get to sit down with my needle and thread until 9pm … on normal days I’d pass on the stitching, but seeing as I’m committed to doing this challenge, I forced myself to pick up LHN’s Ladybug Ladybug and managed to put in 2 3/4 hours into it 😀

I was also thrilled to see a recent purchase arrive in my PO Box this morning – the great thing about ordering locally, even though it’s more expensive, is that it doesn’t cost much more to pay for Express Post and even though last Friday was a Post Office holiday, and I didn’t order the items until last Thursday, even with yesterday being a nationwide public holiday they were still waiting for me! The service from Janine at Colours Down Under really rocks!!! While I still have one pair of Qsnaps and a couple of threads on back order (needed for the border of Winter Snapperland), I’m absolutely thrilled that I now have another couple of Qsnaps to use for my projects and not having to remove every project every night (especially those that won’t take long to finish) – oops a couple of charts jumped into my shopping basket as well … Scatter Christmas by Shepherd’s Bush and Simply Halloween by Waxing Moon Designs … gotta make the most of the postage right? LOL.

Rightio, on that note it’s time to call it a night and hit the hay … a bit later than expected, but that can be blamed on Season 2 of Fringe and the need to start today’s challenge piece (but more so on Fringe, as I wanted to see the last episode on the DVD, which means only one more DVD for Season 2 to go!) 😉

Crazy January 2011 Challenge, Cross Stitch, recipes, Shepherd's Bush, Victoria Sampler, Works in Progress

January Challenge – Day 3

3 January, 201125 February, 2012 Anne S

I couldn’t resist putting a few more stitches into Shepherd’s Bush’s Baby Bug Ball this morning – I can’t believe how much I am in love with that design! It is soooo not my normal choice of stitching project, but I absolutely and totally adore it! I didn’t stitch the next few alphabet letters as it’s supposed to use a thread colour that is way too pale on the fabric – I thought I’d wait to see what colours were left over at the end, and I would replace that colour with one of the darker greens (but I don’t want to use it yet in case I run out!). After the 15 days are up, this is is going to be one of the first getting revisited, I think! 😀

I was good, however, and didn’t continue stitching on BBB, and continued to meet the challenge goals by putting a few stitches into Victoria Sampler’s Crimson Fire Sampler. This one is a major challenge for me, as it’s been forever since I stitched any hardanger or pulled/withdrawn thread stitches, so it will give the grey matter a run for its money this year! I wanted to get this stitched up, though, so I can pass the chart on to an online pal who showed interest in it a couple of years ago (assuming she still wants it, of course!).

Seeing as I’ve handled pretty much all I can cope with today with these specialty stitches (probably thanks to the 3am finish this morning), I thought I’d put it to one side and pick up something simple, and I’m hoping to get a few more stitches put into the Autumn freebie by the Stitcherhood that I started late last year 🙂

Over the last few days I’ve also been working on a couple of my listed items on my 1001 things in 101 days – including putting together a custom recipe book. I went with something simple, and just put together a ringbinder with plastic sleeves and subject dividers – that way when I find a scrummy recipe in one of my books I’ll re-type it up into a one-page format and will add it to my favourite recipes folder. Seeing as I’m also trying to cook something out of every cookbook I own, hopefully I’ll also find some new favourites to help fill out the sections. The great thing about this format is that I can take pages out individually to cook from, and the sleeves protect the recipe and can either be wiped down in case of spillage or just replaced with the recipe left intact 🙂

I think I may also try to make a quilted book-cover for this at some stage, but that may not be this year … the goal of putting the book together in the first place is good enough for me to tick this challenge off the list as “achieved”.

One of the latest recipes I added was some simple finger food sandwiches from the Aussie Women’s Weekly book “Finger Food” – these were wolfed down recently at our work’s shared morning tea … I thought I’d share the goodness with you here (AWW books are some of my absolute favourites on my bookshelf):

SMOKED SALMON, CAPER AND DILL TRIANGLES

Triangles can be made 2 hours ahead. Storage: Covered in refrigerator.

200g packaged cream cheese
2 t lemon juice
1 T fresh dill sprigs
¼ t drained capers
12 slices white bread
180g sliced smoked salmon

Blend or process cheese, juice, dill and capers until well combined. Spread 1 slice of bread with cheese mixture, top with a layer of salmon.

Spread a second slice of bread with cheese mixture, place cheese side down on salmon. Spread top with cheese mixture, top with a layer of salmon.

Spread a third slice of bread with cheese mixture, place cheese side down on salmon. Trim crusts from sandwich, cut into 8 triangles. Repeat with remaining bread, cheese mixture and salmon.

Makes 32

Crazy January 2011 Challenge, Cross Stitch, Works in Progress

Challenge Day 1

2 January, 201125 February, 2012 Anne S

Before I started my Crazy January Challenge yesterday morning, I decided to locate some missing threads from previously kitted up projects, and making an inventory so I knew where they were when if I needed them again – this was in part due to the fact that I knew I had two skeins of NPI silk that were needed for The Goode Huswife chart in my challenge, and sure enough I found them hiding in the kit for Drawn Threads’ Three Friends design. I now have a lovely Excel spreadsheet showing where each thread is located. This has partly come about from when I was housesitting 3 years ago and had all my stash put into storage for 9 months – I kitted up many, many projects with the fabric already cut out and ready to go, and as many of the threads as possible, and they were placed in individual sealable plastic bags and then in boxes within easy reach of my storage unit … the idea was that all I had to do was put my hand into the box when I needed something to stitch, and just had to pull something out and start stitching!

Well, I’m ashamed to say that there are STILL 3 drawers full of those projects (plus the equivalent of another drawer that is out and about in my room awaiting stitching), not to mention all the new ones I’ve since kitted up since moving to Sydney (ahem) … I’m slowly starting to work my way through them, though, and intend to make a decent dent into the Christmas ornies that were kitted up ready with their working copies from previous JCS ornie magazines. (Previously there were 4 big file boxes so it has been condensed somewhat.) I was surprised how many needlerolls were in there ready for stitching, though – this stemmed from a SAL that Katrina was doing a while ago stitching a needleroll every month … maybe that will become my challenge for 2012 … 😛

Anyway, back to my 2011 challenge … I eventually picked up my first project for the challenge, DMC’s Rainbow Lorikeets. I decided that I refused to do housework all day, and intended staying in my jim-jams all day watching TV and stitching … which I did {{insert happy sigh here}}. Alas, I was so engrossed in watching TV it took me a while to realise that I had made a big blue with the kit threads – what I thought was Yellow Green Lt thread was in fact the Moss Green (although why the hell you would call something moss green that actually IS yellow-green is beyond me) … I didn’t realise until I had stitched a huge amount of the adjoining green, and then looked and thought “what the…?” – sure enough, a quick review of the chart piccie confirmed my worst suspicions …

Now I do hope the old wive’s tale isn’t true, that whatever you do on 1 January you will continue to do all year (which is partly why I chose to stitch all day in the first place) … ‘cos I really don’t fancy frog-stitching every single project I start this year! Oh well, I persevered and unpicked and restitched straight away while watching Dirty Dancing (sad I can even remember which movie sparked the frogging), and by the time I switched off at 1am this morning I’d made pretty good headway! Thankfully the thread I had misjudged and had to be frogged is a DMC thread, so I can replace from my stash, as I had used every strand up in the original stitching … phew! Ah, the joys of stitching from kits 😉

Of course now I’m champing at the bit to get it finished, because it’s so close to being finished I can taste it … so I think I’ll do that this morning, then I’ll start my next project immediately afterwards, which will probably be another small one – and tomorrow I’ll start one of the bigger designs.

Cross Stitch, Goals, Home & Family TO BE FIXED

January 1 and feeling good!

1 January, 201125 February, 2012 Anne S

I feel really good that I stuck to my guns and didn’t go out last night among the thousands of people celebrating New Year’s in Sydney – I woke up this morning at 6am and feel fantastic! Those who know me well know that that’s a minor miracle in itself, as I don’t “do” 6am’s or any early mornings particularly well … but today I just feel, well, kinda “good” about the world and everything in it 🙂

My only resolution this year is to get my health on track – I signed up for Weight Watchers (again) a couple of weeks ago just so I would have the tools to start properly again, and have been improving my diet since my return to work last Wednesday. I’m constantly amazed at how quickly you can put a healthy meal together during the week with the help of quickly steamed veges done in the microwave with a piece of fish, chicken or steak. My dinner last night, for example, was just a bed of mixed lettuce leaves, sliced capsicum and mini roma tomatoes, with some steamed snow peas, fresh asparagus and lightly sautéed mushrooms, topped with half a dozen sautéed scallops and a balsamic dressing … perfect and light and beautifully healthy. I felt very virtuous just tucking my fork into it’s richly nutrient and healthy goodness! 🙂

The other good thing is that I finally have a diagnosis I can work with that is causing my leg and back pains – I am showing some degeneration and arthrosis in my lower back (I’m obviously going to look forward to some decent arthritis there in my upcoming years darn it) … that’s causing inflammation, which is causing swelling to constrict the nerves, and causing my problems elsewhere. And because of the pains I haven’t been walking regularly etc, which means the muscle has weakened badly, so it’s a catch 22. It means that I now need to build up the strength in my lower back and get more exercise to loosen up the discs – I have some physio sessions to book in for to help with the loosening up, then I need to get back into the gym for some gentle sessions on the bike for a while (and my return was always in the cards for early this year). With any luck getting rid of the constant pain and stiffness will really help with my overall demeanour – but at the moment it just feels good knowing what I’m dealing with 🙂

Which brings me on to the fun part of the year … on 1-1-11 (love that date!) I guess I should be setting stitching/crafty goals for the year, so here goes … I hereby declare I will complete the following by the end of the year … hopefully … 😉

Complete the Crazy January 2011 Challenge (15 new starts and finishes) – the list is up in my sidebar, along with progress bars
Complete at least 24 Christmas ornaments (this might be a challenge, seeing as I didn’t even get 12 finished last year LOL)
Complete another 5 projects over and above those completed in the Crazy January Challenge (can be WIPs from 2010 or new starts)
Make a full-sized quilt for my bed (yikes, that will be a challenge in itself!!)
Complete at least one of my UFOs
Complete a non-cross stitch project (eg stumpwork, hardanger, schwalmwork)
Finish-finish a minimum of 12 items (including framing, but excluding Christmas ornaments)

And that’s pretty much it for the year – it’ll be interesting to see how much got completed when I look back on 31 Dec 2011! 😀

And on that note, I think it’s time to crack open the Crazy January project bag, and pull the first project out for stitching. I’m thinking of starting one of the smaller ones first, so that I can have an early finish … also the great thing about starting the challenge on a long weekend means I have 3 days of perfect stitching time to make a decent dent into 3 of the projects … all I have to do is work out which ones to start first!

Actually, I forgot I do have one other thing to share, which is for my Mum … here’s a comparison of my frangipani plants sitting on the balcony – please excuse the dead plants and empty pots in the bottom photo! haha. Believe it or not these were bought at about the same time, from the same shop, and both get fed and watered at the same time … what a huge difference between the two! I think the larger plant is getting more sun hours during the late afternoon, and seems to be thriving on it! I do absolutely ADORE frangipani flowers, and have my fingers crossed the bigger plant will provide a few more this year (I got one whole flower last year) – I also really adore my geranium there, that was a recent addition to my plant family 🙂

Now, where’s Season 2 of Fringe to keep me entertained while I’m stitching??? 😀

Cross Stitch, Goals, Home & Family TO BE FIXED, New Year

Happy New Year everyone!!!

31 December, 201025 February, 2012 Anne S

My eyelids are drooping, so I’ll be seeing the New Year in by looking at the back of my eyelids very soon – but I wanted to quickly jump on and wish everyone a very happy New Year. Thanks for your friendship and support throughout 2010 – here’s hoping 2011 is the year where all your hopes and dreams come true (all those that are legal, anyway!). I look forward to spending 2011 with you once again 😀

As for stitching, I don’t think I got anywhere near reaching my 2010 stitching goals, and haven’t even thought about 2011 goals yet – there’s plenty of time for that tomorrow. Here’s how I went with my 2010 goals:

Complete at least 3 of my existing WIP/UFO projects (Works in Progress/UnFinished Objects) (4 WIPs and 0 UFOs completed – technically I met this goal, but really wanted to include at least 1 UFO in there)
Complete at least 10 projects in the kits/charts stash pile (21 completed)
Complete at least 12 Christmas ornaments (minor fail with only 11 completed)
Complete the finishing of at least 12 items – either framing or actual finishing (excludes Christmas ornaments) (12 completed from my ‘old’ finishing pile, plus 4 pillows with new Halloween/pumpkin finishes)
Start at least one EGA correspondence class project (please note I didn’t say “finish” here LOL) (started “Gracie” stumpwork GCC)

In hindsight, I actually did well with my goals, and met all of them except for the Christmas ornaments. And to finish off the year, here’s a pictorial sampling of all those 2010 finishes 😀

Blue Ribbon Designs, Crazy January 2011 Challenge, Cross Stitch, Finishes, Halloween, Heart in Hand Needleart, valentines, Works in Progress

Christmas finishes & Crazy January Challenge

28 December, 20106 April, 2014 Anne S

As mentioned in my previous post, thanks to season 1 of Fringe and a very lazy day yesterday where I didn’t even get dressed, I managed to finish both of my WIPs from Christmas:

“Valentine Bird” by Heart in Hand Needleart
stitched on 32ct Lambswool linen by Wichelt
with recommended threads except subbed DMC 926 for GAST Straw Bonnet
added a gold heart charm as I didn’t have a suitable heart button

“Perched on a Pumpkin” by Blue Ribbon Designs
from JCS Halloween issue 2010
stitched on 32ct Willow Green Belfast linen
with recommended WDW threads but subbed DMC 310 for Mascara

I also had time to start one more that I’m about 2/3 through (Autumn freebie by The Stitcherhood) – another few episodes of Fringe and I’ll see this one finished as well:

Then it’ll be time to pick up Bittersweet Seasons once again – although I now realise that I don’t have the Mill Hill beads for this one (I really am useless!!!!!), which means I guess it won’t be a 2010 finish like I’d hoped.

I’ve also been updating my stitching list for the Crazy January Challenge 2011 – I’ve decided I might stitch Jardin Prive’s Christmas chart for Brenda and Nigel one Christmas, so I opted not to start it on Christmas Day (which was my original stitching plan), and have added it to my January stitching list as well. I’ve also added Katie’s Christmas gift (Prairie Moon’s Christmas) and a teddy bear group that I want to stitch for Brenda’s birthday this year … not entirely sure I’ll get all these done this year, but it’ll be fun trying! I think the hardest thing for me will be to not start any other medium/large designs until I’ve finished these ones – there are still a good dozen or so that are screaming to be started on top of this 15 (not to mention the minimum of 12 ornies I want to stitch next year!!) 😉

1. Waxing Moon Designs – Halloween Short Stack
2. The Goode Huswife – With My Needle (modified, without the wording)
3. From Nancy’s Needle – Lavender Blue Celtic Knot Quilt (canvaswork)
4. The Victoria Sampler – Crimson Fire Sampler
5. Bent Creek – Winter Snapperland
6. Dimensions kit – Tiger Reflections
7. Judy Odell – My Treasures Workstation
8. Little House Needleworks – Ladybug, Ladybug
9. Jardin Privé – Christmas
10. DMC – Baby Lorikeets
11. Prairie Moon – Christmas
12. JBW Designs – Autumn Harvest
13. Shepherd’s Bush – Baby Bug Ball
14. Leisure Arts – Teddy Bear Reunion
15. Forget-Me-Nots in Stitches – Raphael’s Raspberries

And on that note, I’d better get my A into G and get my first load of laundry into the washing machine (as it’s washing day for me today), and pick up a few groceries, as it’s back to work for me tomorrow (no rest for the wicked) … then I think I’ll just have to finish off season 1 of Fringe and finish off that Autumn freebie 🙂

Crazy January 2011 Challenge, Cross Stitch

Crazy January 2011 Challenge

13 December, 20106 April, 2014 Anne S

Yep, I’ve decided to throw my hat into the ring and complete the Crazy January 2011 Challenge, as started by Minna. I’ve chosen designs that are a reasonable mix of designers and stitching styles, and also of medium size so that the challenge is do-able. I’m hoping that these projects will also still allow me the flexibility and time to work on some existing WIPs at the same time, plus at least one Christmas ornament a month, as that’s another challenge I’m picking up again next year.

Anyway, without any more waffling, here are the current choices for my 15 projects for January – I can’t say with 100% certainty that one or two won’t change before January 1st, but I’m relatively happy with this list so far. And here they are:

1. Waxing Moon Designs – Halloween Short Stack
2. The Goode Huswife – With My Needle (modified, without the wording)
3. From Nancy’s Needle – Lavender Blue Celtic Knot Quilt (canvaswork)
4. The Victoria Sampler – Crimson Fire Sampler
5. Little House Needleworks – Ladybug, Ladybug
6. Dimensions kit – Tiger Reflections
7. Judy Odell – My Treasures Workstation
8. Bent Creek – Winter Snapperland
9. JBW Designs – Autumn Harvest
10. DMC – Baby Lorikeets
11. The Prairie Schooler – When Witches Go Riding
12. Just Nan – Trick or Treat Box
13. Shepherd’s Bush – Happy Pumpkin Needle Roll
14. Shepherd’s Bush – Baby Bug Ball
15. Forget-Me-Nots in Stitches – Raphael’s Raspberries

On the short list are also the following that I’ve love to complete sooner rather than later:

Rosewood Manor – Quaker Diamonds
JBW Designs – English Plum Pudding
Lizzie*Kate – Needle Nick
Linda Barry – Elizabethan Treasures
Northern Pine Designs – Ebb Tide
Forget-Me-Nots in Stitches – Golden Garden Sweet Bag
Fancy Work – Lavender Rose Sewing Case

Cross Stitch, Finishes, Freebies, Great Pumpkin Challenge 2010, Halloween, Homespun Elegance, Twisted Threads

Halloween continues

23 November, 20106 April, 2014 Anne S

Thanks to the dreaded lurgy I’ve taken one extra day off work to catch up on some R&R, and catch up on some stitching. I have to admit it was the best thing I could’ve done, as I feel 10 times better already just by relaxing and chilling out in/on my bed. When I haven’t been sleeping, I’ve been stitching, and have managed to get another two small finishes under my belt.

“October Boo Mini Gingham” by Twisted Threads
stitched on 28ct beige/cream checked Graziano linen
with recommended GAST threads
(except Black Crow which I substituted with DMC 310)

“Boo Tyme” freebie by Homespun Elegance (available here)
stitched on 32ct hand-dyed Lugana by Countrystitch – in colour “Acorn”
with the following thread choices:
Crescent Colours – Cocoa Bean
Crescent Colours – Pumpkin Harvest
GAST – Brandy

Cross Stitch, Finishes, Great Pumpkin Challenge 2010, Halloween, Just Nan

More Just Nan finishes

21 November, 20106 April, 2014 Anne S

I managed to get a whole heap of stitching done yesterday – I put the finishing touches into Scream Girls, then started and finished Pretty Wicked, also by Just Nan.

“Scream Girls” by Just Nan
stitched on 32ct hand-dyed Belfast linen by Countrystitch – Kiwi Illusions colour ‘Pipi’
with recommended DMC threads

“Pretty Wicked!” by Just Nan
stitched on 32ct hand-dyed Belfast linen by Countrystitch – Kiwi Illusions colour ‘Butterfly Dance’
stitched with recommended DMC threads

This afternoon I intend having another lazy afternoon stitching, as I’m still trying to catch up on a month’s TV viewing from when I was on holidays – hopefully by the end of today I’ll be relatively caught up!

And while I’m catching up, I just may pick up one of my old WIPs to try and get one finished (only only has buttons left to be sewn onto it!)