Category: Cross Stitch

Cross Stitch, Exchanges, Home & Family TO BE FIXED

Still around

Anne S

I have some big deadlines coming at work that have just been dropped on me that I now need to do before I go on leave … along with the fact that our team has been told we need to help out the other half of the team with their day-to-day duties because they’re swamped and not coping … this is really funny seeing as I’d just walked out of a meeting with my own boss and she’d just raised concerns that I wouldn’t be able to get through my own workload before I go on leave!  Oh well, I see some massive working days coming over the next two weeks, so not much stitching is going to get done I guess, except for the weekends when I’ll just be sat on my bottom and stitching like mad. 

Oh well, 2 weeks from today and I’ll be on 3 weeks holiday … with absolutely nothing planned yet (apart from my ticket home to NZ) … yippee.  Not sure how many days we’ll stay in NZ, but then we’ll probably come back to Oz (Mum and I) and have a wee holiday somewhere nice.  Mum was keen to go to Adelaide for a quick visit, and we also wouldn’t mind either going back up to Cairns/Port Douglas once again, or drive down the coast and stay at a place which right now the name escapes me!  I’d rather not stay at home in our flat much during the visit, hence the idea of tripping away somewhere nice, which also gives me a true break before going back to work again 😀

A GP visit this week to get a whole raft of blood tests done – mind you my 3 weeks leave will probably do a whole lot more for my mental and physical health than anything else 😛  I’ve already started thinking about what stitching to take with me, and so far have the list narrowed down to about 6 months worth of stitching time hahaha.

Then the other day at Spotlight I came home with these:

I’ve always wanted to learn how to crochet, so I figured with all the tutorials available these days with online videos I should finally give it a go and cross one thing off my bucket list.  So into my shopping basket went an el cheapo set of crochet hooks to try out, along with a ball of 8 ply wool and 8 ply cotton blend … when I bought them I had no idea what to make, so I just grabbed wool/cotton that I like the colour of and was relatively cheap!

Add to that something even more strange, that I’m hankering to knit a washcloth/dishcloth!  Yeah, Mum, don’t faint over THAT one!!!  Mum will attest to the fact that I get really bored really quickly with knitting – I can do basic knitting stitches, and can generally follow a pattern (and even finished a jersey/jumper once!), but I get halfway through the first ball of wool to knit a scarf and I’m bored to death … and Mum ends up pulling it all out and starting from scratch and knitting it for me (bless you Mum for all the knitting you’ve done for me over the years!).  Anyway, this in itself was enough to send me to the GP – because obviously my mental health really is suffering … I mean, ME, with an urge for KNITTING … I mean, COME ON! 😛

Of course when I DO eventually get keen and try to knit my first washcloth, I have a whole heap of potential patterns on the wishlist to look at and decide from … God bless the internet!  The only thing is I gave all my knitting needles away to Mum so I might have to borrow some back again!  Mum would be horrified, but I do use the washcloth that Missy sent me years ago, and just love it – and it does feel nice to use things that have been made 🙂

Hopefully in a few days time I will be able to share my latest finishes – but I can’t show them until they’re received, as they’re from my Autumn Exchange.  It won’t be long before they’ve arrived, though, so I should be able to post piccies in a few days I hope … in the meantime I’ll leave a little teaser …

Cross Stitch, Gifts TO BE FIXED, Stash

Stash day!

Anne S

I had some wonderful mail arrive on Friday night that I drooled over on the weekend.  First up is a gorgeous and very thoughtful gift from Karen.  I’ve never seen a Hinzeit design ‘up close and personal’ and this one definitely looks like a perfect design for me – I love the colours, and love all the little charms that go with it!  That design is perfect for just about every stitcher, I think!!  The notepad is already hanging off the fridge ready to be used, and I love the extra little touches of postcards and stickers from Canada.  Thank you so much again Karen for a really awesome parcel that brightened up an otherwise very dull week for me – I love everything!! 😀

Next up was a parcel containing the JCS Christmas ornie preview magazine and the missing Kreinik braid that I need for Halloween Fairy.  The other Kreiniks and Caron Collection threads are an added treat for me for Laura J Perin’s Mallard Collage (gee, I dunno why I want to stitch that one! – Duckies!!! haha).  The final part of the order was some Gloriana ribbon in Cranberry to complete my ‘ingredients’ for Strawberries So Faire by With My Needle.  Seeing as I have everything else kitted up ready to go, I figured I really should start thinking of stitching this one up sooner rather than later!  Yeah, OK, I could say that of many projects really, but I really am trying to make a priority of those projects that I’ve spent the most money on in getting them kitted up, especially as most of the threads etc aren’t used in other projects.  The only problem is there are still LOADS to choose from LOL.

And that’s it for me really – I’m still waiting for my buttons to arrive for Summer & Winter Snapperlands … while Summer is just sitting here patiently in the corner of my WIP basket waiting for the border buttons to arrive (since being ordered in January no less hmmm), Winter Snapperland isn’t started yet, and I don’t want to start until the border buttons are in my hot little hands.

My flatmate is off work at the moment with tonsillitis etc that she’s had since last week … and this morning I’ve woken up with a touch of vertigo … thankfully the longer I’m sitting up, the vertigo is wearing off, so I’m going to attempt to go to work shortly … fingers crossed it stays at bay, ‘cos I can’t afford time off work at the moment!  Plus I have stitching deadlines to get my exchange into the mail next week, so vertigo is something I definitely do NOT want or need right now!!

Cross Stitch, Finishes, Home & Family TO BE FIXED, Quaker, Sampler Cove

A finish!

Anne S

It’s been a while since I’ve had a decent sized finish, but on Saturday night I put the final stitches into Quaker Huswif – yippee!! 😀

Sampler Cove-Quaker Huswif
“Quaker Huswif” by Sampler Cove
stitched on 36ct hand-dyed Edinburgh linen –
Moon Shadows ~ Dove Grey by Stitches and Spice
with Vikki Clayton’s Hand-Dyed Fibers Premium Silk Floss in Midnight

I’m sure whether to get this one framed, or to turn it into the Huswif it was designed for … seeing as I don’t have any wall space free, that’ll probably end up being the decider 😛

The only other news is that I had some great mail arrive, but I need to send a quick email of thanks before I post the piccie 🙂

And right now I have to run, because I need to pick up my laptop from the ‘doctors’ … it’s costing me a brand new hard drive, but it’s only $130 plus labour (total of $213, which is relatively reasonable, considering they also transferred ALL my old files AND programs to the new hard drive!!) … and I now have a 500GB had drive, compared to my old 120GB one!  Can’t grumble … and it means I can go back to blogging from the comfort of the lounge chair or my bed … which also means the likelihood that I can get back into the habit of regularly blogging and blog reading … add to that I have a trip back home to Auckland coming up in 3 weeks time for Mum & Dad’s 50th wedding anniversary (of which a company travel bonus of $250 pretty much pays for my ticket!) … life is kinda good right now 🙂

Cross Stitch

Local prices

Anne S

I just happened to follow a link this morning to a ONS here in Australia.  As a matter of interest I jumped into the area for Shepherd’s Bush kits, and got a nasty surprise.  In the past I’ve always tried to spend part of my stitching money each year in local stores – but when money’s tight, I just can’t justify the price difference with items such as this.  I thought it would be interesting to compare … so here’s a little comparison of SB Needlerolls:

Here in Australia (only one store, mind you,
but I’ve seen them for sale for over $40 in another store!!):

Over there in SB’s home, in the USA:

Considering the exchange rate:

AU$37.90 = US$34.17
or US$30.74 sale price!!

Is it any wonder we sometimes look offshore for our supplies?  Even if you throw in US$12 postage prices, you’re still ahead, especially when you bulk buy a few items at a time.  I will still continue to buy some items locally, but if I had to pay these sorts of prices all the time I’d have to give up stitching pretty darn quickly!

And on that note, I’d better hurry up and get dressed so I can earn my day’s pay that allows me to continue stitching…

Cross Stitch, Flowers Trees & Gardens, Paris, Quaker, Scenic Sunday, Travel - France, Works in Progress

Sunday stitching & Scenic Sunday

Anne S

No housework or excitement here today – just my little size 28 tapestry needle, Vikki Clayton premium silk floss, and Season 1 of ER on DVD … can you say “happy as a pig in mud?” 😛

Not a great deal of stitching done, but it’s still one step closer to an actual finish. With any luck I’ll be finished with this one by the end of next weekend, and then soon afterwards my missing threads will have arrived so I can go back to picking up some of my older WIPs once again (although the urge to stitch a million new things is still around!) 😀

Quaker Huswif 29Aug10

And I’ll finish with something I haven’t done regularly for a while … here is my choice for this week’s Scenic Sunday – a Parisian garden.

Paris_0015 (2)

Scenic Sunday

Chinese Garden of Friendship, Cross Stitch, Flowers Trees & Gardens, Framing, Photo Hunt, PhotoHunt, Sydney

Photo Hunt – Framed

Anne S

Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket
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This week’s theme is ”Framed” – this is the view through a ‘window’ in the Chinese Garden of Friendship, Darling Harbour, Sydney, providing a natural framed view.

2008 05 25_0240

And here are some Framed photos that are stitching-related, from my very first attempt at making my own frames and framing my own work.

P1020977

P1020989

Cross Stitch

Is it just me?

Anne S

I really do struggle with some of the ONS (that’s Online Needlework Stores for your benefit, Mum).  I’ve had the border accessories for Summer and Winter Snapperlands on order since approx 13 January – at the same time I requested ordering some hard-to-find charts of designers that are also showing available on their site … believe it or not, I JUST received an email to advise that my Summer Snapperland border pack has arrived … nothing else, just that one …  Now I’m normally very patient, but that does seem excessively long (and I’m not telling you about the numerous email sent chasing this issue)!

I have also had some other Kreinik threads on back-order from yet another ONS for my Halloween Fairy – while it was on backorder CCN brought out the Summer at the Shores chart … I quickly emailed to ask if they could ask that to the order (note, it had only just been released), along with the pre-Christmas JCS magazine.  Two days ago I receive an email to advise the order is on its way (back-ordered from the first week of June), but no mention of the magazine or chart.  On questioning it, they have sent the magazine but not the chart that I was so lusting after … but no mention of it being on backorder yet again, just that they had run out of the chart by the time they filled my order.  I’ve just written back to cancel the chart order, and I’ll now just find it locally because I can’t justify the overseas postage just for one chart.

The last time I had a deadline to meet I ordered some graziano checked linen and advised that I had a deadline to meet – the linen had to be backordered, which took 2 months, only to find that they’d ordered the wrong linen colour (they only worked that out because I sent them a chaser email after 2 months to ask where the “pale” blue linen was at in the order process) – which meant the ordering process had to begin all over again.  Of course I missed the deadline well and truly, and yet another ‘bad experience’ was added to the list.

Not to mention a local store that I placed orders with on a couple of separate occasions and they’d run out of the item – but the order was never ever filled, with no refund of the value.  Because the owner had been good to me previously (and she’s just lovely as a person), I didn’t make a big fuss about it, I just don’t go back there anymore.

I used to complain about a certain ONS that always seems to have sales happening, and refused to deal with them anymore … but considering all the experiences I’ve had since with other ONS, it looks like I’m going to return to the fold once again for my once or twice-a-year orders … ‘cos the competition isn’t much better to what I can see 😦

My dream is that one day I will place an order and it will arrive in the same calendar month, all in one piece, with no hassles and chasing required – communication will be prompt and thorough and not because I have demanded a response after not hearing a solitary thing for 2 months or longer … I know, I have big lofty dreams, but I do still fantasise that it will happen one day …

And now it’s time to go write back to the original ONS to ask what is happening to Winter Snapperland border pack and the remaining charts on order … because alas dreams aren’t reality just yet …  But it WILL be awesome to finally get this little beauty into a finished state before 12 months of languishing around in my WIP basket are up!  I’m not starting Winter Snapperland until those border pieces arrive in my hot little hands!

Summer Snapperland whole

Cross Stitch, Quaker

Is it Friday yet???

Anne S

Let’s just say that ‘cranky’ is currently my middle name … alas, I still have one more week of testing left to go for my project launch, and testing isn’t quite going as well as planned, which is super stressful (not to mention the fact that I lost almost an entire week of testing time last week having to write test plans for the site testers … I cracked a wobbly and refused to work over the weekend, and thumbed my nose at the whole thing).  Add to that a certain time of the month arriving and PMT being today’s companions, I haven’t had much tolerance for anything today …

Anyway, this is what I decided was highly needed when we walked in the door from work … I made Katie and I super-alcoholic Frozen Mango Margaritas … took our heads off, but raised our spirits 10-fold!!!

Frozen-Mango-Margaritas-17A

And surprisingly enough I still managed to complete a few stitches while we sat and watched Criminal Minds and City Homicide … and even more surprisingly I didn’t have to frog everything at the end … which means Quaker Huswif is now almost 80% completed 😀

Quaker Huswif 17Aug10

And on that note, I think it best that I call it a night, ‘cos I might get up and go walking in the morning (I did that this morning, and it felt great to get some fresh air before work).

Beaches, Cross Stitch, ocean, Port Douglas, Queensland, Theme Thursday, Travel - Fiji

Theme Thursday – Palm

Anne S

Here are my choices for this week’s Theme Thursday, where the theme is “Palm”. First up is Four Mile Beach, Port Douglas, Queensland.

Four Mile Beach 2

In order to keep with the ‘normal’ theme of this blog, I’ll attempt to do some photo memes with a link to stitching where I can …

Therefore this week my next choice is my first designing attempt in cross stitch – this is the song of farewell in Fijian (Isa Lei).  I remember it always used to amaze the Fijian locals at the resorts that I could sing the whole song along with them in their native tongue … it was always my favourite song when I was visiting, even though it was always sad to actually say goodbye to our Fijian friends each time.

I took the top section out of a XS magazine, then designed my own borders that are Fijian in origin (the side ones are stitched over-one yikes) – I charted out the words myself (all in Fijian), then stitched the little shell on the bottom right using a commercial chart but stitched over-one, then designed my very own little kava bowl and coconut shell cups on the bottom left (also stitched over one). I was incredibly proud of this little attempt, and it was given as a gift to the resort owners of the resort we used to go to in Fiji … shame about the quality, but I’m unable to go back and take another photo as it is now missing in action (and this photo was taken way back when digital cameras weren’t ‘the norm’) 😦

Isa Lei (Fijian)