Finishes – Page 18 – Feather Stitching

Cross Stitch, Finishes, Queensland, Travel, Works in Progress

A couple of finishes … and some holiday snaps …

31 August, 200925 February, 2012 Anne S

Just a really quick post, so I can upload some holiday snaps, as well as my latest stitching finishes. Here goes …

First up my latest finishes from yesterday and today:

“Hannah Purington, 1796” by Little House Needleworks
stitched on Ice Blue linen with DMC

“Stitching Leporello” by Chatelaine
Only one more piece to complete, and all the stitched sections will be finished 😀

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Next up are some piccies from the Mossman Gorge in Tropical North Queensland from last week’s holiday – a wonderful spot just a short drive from Port Douglas … love, love, LOVED it there:

Next are some of the critters we came across on the same holiday … don’t scroll down any further if you don’t like crocodiles and/or snakes!!!

Kangaroos, Koala and Wombat

Fiji Crested Iguana, Frilled Neck Lizard, Iguana

Crocodiles with one lone alligator in the top centre

Black-headed Python, Pilbara Death Adder, Coastal Taipan, Green Python

More piccies will follow shortly … of the gentler feathered friends we met while away, as well as some general piccies of Cairns, Port Douglas, and the general surrounding areas 🙂

Christmas Ornaments, Cross Stitch, Finishes, Friends & Family, Hunter Valley, JBW Designs, Prairie Schooler, Sydney

Great weekend & A bit of stitching for a change

3 August, 200925 February, 2012 Anne S

I’ve been offline most of the week thanks to feeling really crappy again during the week – this week, though, I’m making an appointment for a CT Scan for my sinuses and having some allergy tests done, so fingers crossed we can finally work out why this stupid sinus infection is hanging around for so many months and making me feel like death warmed up!

Last weekend, though, was a lovely treat for the month – I went to the Hunter Valley in NSW with Alison, Amanda and Sue for a stitching weekend away. Amanda kindly came and picked me up on Friday afternoon and chauffeured me – it was a lovely change for me, as I’m always the one driving. We arrived at about 7pm and walked into ‘our’ house to be greeted with a roaring log fire and dinner being prepped by Alison and Sue – the weekend was starting out on a blissful note already! The rest of the weekend didn’t disappoint either, it was a fantastic weekend away where we managed to combine some stitching (yes, we actually did do some), chatting, shopping, wining and dining, and I even made my very first scissor fob sale … to a lady vintner at one of my favourite vineyards up there (her white port is to die for in my opinion!). All-in-all it was a really awesome weekend, and hopefully we can make this an annual event, ‘cos I’m signing up for next year already!! Here’s a photo of our accommodation and home for the weekend, along with my fantastic company for the weekend 😀

The week before the retreat I managed to finish a little ornie stiching, and got the following ornie finished – it was supposed to be for the Yahoo group CYOO challenge, but I got a bit cranky during the month and couldn’t be bothered posting a photo on the board (and for once didn’t even bother doing the JCS monthly challenge one). I still hope to stitch an ornie a month, I just probably won’t be posting it on the board.

“Joy, Love, Peace” by JBW Designs
stitched on 32ct natural Belfast linen
with WDW Garnet and GAST Dried Thyme

During the weekend retreat I managed to put a reasonable amount of stitching into Prairie Schooler’s 2005 Limited Edition Santa, and during this weekend I’ve been able to put the final stitches into it after having a marathon stitching session on Saturday. The only thing I changed is to leave out the “2005” which is stitched in Black Coffee Crescent Colours below each side of the green letter blocks, and added a couple of random snowflakes instead.

“Here Comes Santa Claus 2005” by The Prairie Schooler
stitched on 28ct natural Cashel linen
with kit Crescent Colours threads

I love how the snowflakes lift off of the fabric – hard to see in the photo

Now I’m off to try to create my soon-to-be Etsy store, as I’ve also got a whole heap of scissor fobs to load up into the store. I had another beading session yesterday while Katie and I watched Supernatural Season 4 on DVD (that was after we had a few hours out at Miranda shopping centre where we saw the latest Harry Potter movie). I’ll do a separate post of the latest ones that I created yesterday, plus a couple of close-ups of my latest favourites …

Beading, Finishes, scissor fobs

Scissor fobs (part 2)

19 July, 200925 February, 2012 Anne S

Here are the next group of fobs that have been completed – I’m just in the middle of creating a few more then the bead boxes will be going away for a while and it’ll back to stitching again:

Beading, Finishes, scissor fobs

Scissor fobs galore (picture heavy)

19 July, 200925 February, 2012 Anne S

Here are the latest collection of beaded fobs for the collection – some of these will be winging their way to friends home soon, but some may end up in an Etsy shop … maybe …

The next group will go into a separate post.

Chatelaine, Cross Stitch, Finishes, PhotoHunt, Stitching Leporello, Works in Progress

No Photo Hunt this week

12 July, 200925 February, 2012 Anne S

… Because the week’s theme is “Garbage”, and to be honest I don’t feel like taking photos of rubbish bins or its contents, and I can’t think of anything clever that’s not actual rubbish … so for me this week’s theme is garbage and I’m not playing …

Instead this weekend I took Thursday and Friday off, and caught up with a friend from Melbourne on Thursday night before she flew out to Tokyo – then on Friday I managed to pick up yet ANOTHER blasted viral infection and over the last 2-3 days have had a blocked nose, raging sore throat, and today have added sore ears into the mix … never ever in all my life have I had such a rotten run with viral infections – I’m starting to think the boy in the bubble had a brilliant idea!!! At least I have plenty of cold & flu tablets left over after the last bout, so I’m well set up!

Due to feeling not too crash hot over the last few days, while my stitching has been relatively non-stop during the day, my pace has been very very slow – I have, however, managed to meet my UFO challenge for this month by completing the final of the 4 larger pieces of Chatelaine’s Stitching Leporello. I have to say this is definitely my least favourite piece of all of them – I really don’t like much at all about this section. The colours, in my eyes, are quite washed out, and an odd blend, and I really detest the acorns and leaves – they seem almost ‘clumsy’ in the middle there. Unfortunately I wasn’t clever enough to try to replace them, and by that stage pretty much “over” stitching it, so I just wanted to get the darned thing finished and off the Qsnaps to be replaced by something else. Only two more ‘medium’ sized pieces to go and it’s all finished. I’m a bit tempted to just keep stitching until it’s finished, but after the totally unenjoyable stitching session I’ve just finished, I feel like something simple to cheer me up in the meantime.

I’ll leave you with photos, before I head back into the warm cozy confines of my bed once again …

Ackworth Friendship Book, Chatelaine, Cross Stitch, Finishes, Quaker, Round Robin, Round Robins, Stitching Leporello, With My Needle, Works in Progress

A Little Bit of Quaker

6 July, 200925 February, 2012 Anne S

After finally charging my camera battery up on my point and shoot, I can show piccies of KarenV’s Quaker RR – this is round 3 of our RR, which means we’re just over the halfway mark, with just 2 more rounds left to go. Unfortunately not true to life colour, but the best I can do on a dark winter’s night with no natural lighting. I have to admit I found this a challenge trying to work out which bits classed as which bits for the designated colours, and it’s definitely slower to stitch this way, but it really is worth it in the end result! Karen does an awesome job of selecting colours! This is one really pretty Quaker!! 😀

(Sorry, but it’s also quite blurry … my hands obviously weren’t entirely steady at the end of the day!!)

If you want to see the other finishes for this month and previous month you can check out our blog here.

As well as taking photos of the Quaker pieces, I also snapped a couple of new photos of Chatelaine’s Stitching Leporello, which are as follows (and shows the stitching and colours much more accurately):

As for what project I decided to pick up next, I opted to make a start on the final ‘large’ piece of the Stitching Leporello as this month’s UFO challenge … which I think means after this one there are only two medium-sized pieces left … and then I have the major challenge of finding some lining fabric and attempting to put it all together – perhaps a job I’ll save up for when the Dragon comes to visit next month, with an excuse to go fabric shopping 🙂

Following is the paltry start I managed on the final large section tonight – woohoo, hold me back! 😛

At the moment I’m struggling to make a decision on my new start project, and the choices in the pile are currently:

LHN – Ladybug, Ladybug
LHN – Travelling Stitcher
LHN – Home of a Needleworker 2
LHN – Dear Diary, Abigail Winslow (I think – don’t have it in front of my right now – the one with the lighthouse/ocean theme)
Sampler Cove – Quaker Huswif
Just Nan – Winter in the Square (just need to coffee dye the fabric first)

Ah, decisions, decisions … Mind you, at the rate I’m stitching these days, I’ll be lucky to get my Chatelaine square finished by month end, never mind anything else … I’m feeling a “stitching RDO” coming up (and definitely a stitching weekend away at the end of the month – yippee!!).

Anyway, time to hit the pillows for the night before the alarm clock screams its head off at 5.30am (yucky!!) – I’m loving my gym workouts already … perhaps next week we may even start doing some of the classes like body pump etc … 😀

Christmas Ornaments, Cross Stitch, Finishes, Imaginating Inc, Works in Progress

Missing in Action … Again

5 July, 200925 February, 2012 Anne S

Finally over the last two weeks I’ve been feeling ‘normal’ again – after two months of being as sick as a dog, it feels great to finally get some of the old energy levels back and feel like doing things again.

Two weeks ago Katie’s Mum came up to visit for the weekend, so I drove us down to Bowral and Berrima for the day. I managed to pick up some darkish fabric to complete the set of fabrics of a potential quilt top … now I just need to find the original pattern for it, or work out how to use my quilting software that I bought years ago to replicate the design – one day…

This week saw me getting up before the crack of dawn with Katie to head out to the gym before work – which then had the effect of seeing me in bed exhausted at 9pm every night … which hasn’t been particularly conducive to stitching of late! It will, however, (assuming I can keep this up) be conducive to shifting some of this weight and getting me healthier overall … which will also help to give me added years to do my stitching with any luck 😉

Unfortunately my camera battery died over a week ago, and I keep forgetting to charge it up again, so the following stitching finishes are compliments of my scanner, which means they’re truly, truly dreadful photos! These were finished over a week ago, with the Christmas ornie just finished in time for June’s monthly challenge. Once my camera battery is charged up, I’ll take proper photos of them and replace the ones below.

Chatelaine’s Stitching Leporello

“Heartfelt Harvey” by Imaginating, Inc
from 2008 JCS Christmas Ornament issue
stitched on 36ct vintage blue evenweave
with Gloriana silk in Deep Blue Sea

Last night I put the final stitches into KarenV’s Quaker RR piece, but I’ll wait and charge my camera battery up today before I show a photo.

Friday night saw farewell drinks and dinner for the member of our team who was made redundant in the recent job cuts. He’s been one of the few people in the office that has helped me to keep my sanity – he’s a bit of a geek, and very introverted, and reminds me a lot of myself … we’d both often work late and that’s when I’d get to know him more, when others weren’t around. I will miss him incredibly … and wish him all the very best for whatever direction life takes him into next. The room spun in his honour on Friday night when I got home … so I guess we gave him a good send off!! 😛

Rightio, that’s about all the news here – not very exciting at Chez Feather Stitching at the moment … I am, however, really itching to start a new stitching project, I just can’t decide which one for now. Perhaps I should put a poll up, or just draw numbers out of a hat … either way, the month will be spent on more of Chatelaine’s Stitching Leporello (I only have a couple more pieces to stitch now), the next instalment of our Quaker RR, and two Christmas ornies for this month’s challenges, and starting whatever new project screams the loudest (or is the luckiest to get drawn out of the hat!).

Beading, Finishes, Finishing, scissor fobs, Stash

Beaded Scissor Fobs and some Stash

14 June, 200925 February, 2012 Anne S

I’ve just managed to pop into the lounge to take photos of the scissor fobs I made last night – as you can see from the main photo, they ended up a real mixed bag in terms of length … there definitely will be more coming ‘cos they’re so much fun to make! Now I know why some of my other stitching pals (Hi Cindy!) find these so addictive!! 😀

And here’s an individual photo of each fob so you can see the bead choices more clearly.

I really do need to go shopping to get more clear beads etc, though, as I have an over-abundance of blue beads (funny that!) but not so many ‘fillers’ … I’m soooooo tempted to go back to the craft show today!! 😛

And finally, here’s all I have to show from the Craft & Quilt Fair yesterday – including a piece of the world’s largest ric-a-rac, and some more Swiss lace for Shepherd’s Bush needlerolls (can never have too much!!), and my squillions of ‘pandora’ beads … many of these beads are destined for other uses, eg fobs, but I did buy a bracelet while I was there yesterday too … and yes, there is rather an overload of turquoise and blue!! 😉

Finally, here’s the sum total of my week’s stitching – one more tiny addition to Chatelaine’s Stitching Leporello. I just had the border left to stitch and the beads/metallics on it’s companion piece, which will hopefully be finished by the end of tonight … after that I will be trying to make some more progress during the week of my Sweetheart Tree UFO, Wildflowers Needleroll (which I started here in the flat while waiting for my furniture to arrive!).

And now I’m about to, sadly, mark all my feeds as read in my feedreader, as it’s depressing the heck out of me – I’ve been trying hard to catch up on the backlog, but still have over 1700 unread feeds … I’m finally going to bite the bullet and wipe the slate clean, so I can continue to keep up with everyone’s news without feeling overwhelmed every day. I’ve been meaning to do this for a while but couldn’t bring myself to do it … but today is the day! I want to get back to commenting regularly again! So, in advance, I apologise if I’ve missed any major personal news, but I look forward to reading about you all regularly again 😀

Christmas Ornaments, Finishes, Heart in Hand Needleart, Mill Hill, Needlerolls, scissor fobs, Shepherd's Bush

Couple of small finishes

8 June, 200925 February, 2012 Anne S

After having one whole half week of feeling fantastic and over my viral bugs, on Saturday morning I woke up with a sore throat, and have been a snot factory for the last 48 hours yet again … too much information, I know … fingers crossed this round won’t hang around for quite so long! Having a ‘cold’ for the last 6 whole weeks was just a teensy tiny bit too much, especially when two of those ended up being without pay 😦

Anyway, over the last week or two I’ve been sitting and stitching a few tiny projects, and here are the results:

First up a freebie from IHLE-Design, stitched in a DMC variegated floss:

Then a wee freebie from My Aunt’s Attic, stitched in a Carrie’s Threads floss:

Afterwards, in need to something else to stitch, I decided to finish off a Christmas ornament that I started when visiting Mum in Auckland back in April:

“Christmas Cheer” by Heart in Hand Needleart

Next up this weekend was Folk Heart Needleroll by Shepherd’s Bush:

“Folk Heart Needleroll” by Shepherd’s Bush

And lucky last, Ice Blue Snowflake ornament by Mill Hill:

“Ice Blue Snowflake” by Mill Hill

Long weekends are great, especially when you sit up in bed all day with the sniffles!! 😀

Cross Stitch, Finishes, Indigo Rose, Just Nan

Latest finishes

19 May, 200925 February, 2012 Anne S

Following are my latest finishes, thanks to me damaging my ribs further after another coughing fit yesterday morning, and having to be escorted over the road to the doctors by my flatmate … the only way I could get comfortable is sitting propped up in bed … perfect for stitching … (sorry for the dreadful photos – all taken at night under indoor lighting)

“Spring Garden” freebie by Indigo Rose
stitched on 32ct white Belfast linen
with recommended threads (DMC)

This one is a typical Just Nan special … lots of colour changes and details – certainly not a quick stitch! This has taken me a couple of full days stitching. The colours are definitely not true to life in this one – might have to try taking a new photo in daylight …

“Autumn in the Square” by Just Nan
stitched on 28ct Light Mocha Cashel linen
with recommended threads (DMC)

Now it’s time to put some clothes on and walk over the road to pick up the repeat script of my antibiotics – and time to take some more Voltaren and Panamax … bless those darned drugs, is all I can say (it’s a killer being allergic to codeine and digesics, no decent heavy-duty painkillers that I can take … when I had my eyes lasered I could only be given Paracetamol, and that’s two days I never ever want to repeat in this lifetime!).