Cross Stitch – Page 44 – Feather Stitching

Garden Recipe update

21 September, 200825 February, 2012 Anne S

I sat superglued to my stitching all day yesterday (plus Friday night), inbetween doing a couple of loads of washing – I was sorely tempted to pick up a more ‘fun’ piece of stitching after a few hours yesterday, but have a feeling if I put this one down I just won’t ever get around to finishing it. So, perseverance is the name of the game right now – once this one is finally finished, I can choose something more “me”.

In the meantime, though, here’s the current progress … which is substantially different to the last progress piccie! 😀

Thankfully that means I’m now halfway through this piece … fingers crossed one more week of stitching plus a session next weekend, I will see this one finished 🙂

C A Wells, Stash, The Drawn Thread, Uncategorized

Anyone seen my mojo???

19 September, 200825 February, 2012 Anne S

‘Tis quite pitiful the amount of stitching I’ve been getting done of late … the following is the sum total of 4 nights of stitching – I’d normally get this done in one night!! Just pitiful, it is 😉

My current stitching (The Drawn Thread’s Garden Recipe) is something that was intended as a gift for someone some time ago, but I never got around to stitching it … it’s not ‘my thing’, so perhaps that is also holding me back from blatting through the stitching, or it could just be that I’m too darned tired at night these days and don’t feel like stitching a the weekends either (which is usually my stitching haven time). Oh well, one day it will be finished, and every little stitch counts, right? I’m going to have to swap out the pale apricot thread on this one, because you can’t see it on the fabric – it’s supposed to be stitched on a darker neutral colour, but I chose Flax Belfast … oh well, finding an apricot colour that will show up won’t be difficult 🙂

As for other news, I heard yesterday morning that I’ve got a “stay of execution” at work for 3 more months … that means I get to stay in Sydney until the middle of February. My colleagues at work think it’s disgraceful that they’ve only extended it for 3 months instead of 6 or 12 … but I’m remaining positive, ‘cos it’s better than “0” months! To be honest the job itself doesn’t jangle my bells heartily, but I DO love being here in Sydney – and having an extension means I can start looking at alternatives after Christmas within the company (if there are any). I’ve already had a chat to my “big boss” down in Melbourne and told me my preference is to stay in Sydney – I thought it was only a courtesy to let him know my plans, although he’s also aware it might not pan out that way … but hey, I have 5 months left to worry about it 😉

I received my class projects this last week for my CA Wells class in May next year – this will likely be the last one I’ll attend, as it really is an expensive weekend away, even with discount travel … and I could be spending the same money and visiting somewhere further afield, such as the US or somewhere tropical. So, this is likely to be my final CA class for the time-being (although I also said that last year too, until I saw the two projects that were going to be stitched!). This time, though, I’m thinking of doing a ‘good job of visiting’ and bringing Mum over with me for a week’s holiday – we can then hire a car and see a bit more of what Perth and surrounds has to offer. I’d also love the chance to catch up with other fellow stitchers one weekend too, if possible – it would be lovely to finally put the faces to names of some of my WA pals 🙂 Anyway, here are the supplies of the two projects:

First up is the Mermaid Bag – with Annie colours!!!! Yippee!!!!

And then there’s the Acorn Etui – wanna guess what I’ll be doing with all that pink silk???? Yep, I sure ain’t gonna be stitching with it LOL. Just have to decide what colour would work best to substitute … of course my preference would be blue, but I thought perhaps I should do all the other stitching first, then make a decision … and I may change my mind and just ‘go with the pink’ … but maybe not – a rich gold may also work nicely 😛

My name was drawn out of the hat for the August Xmas ornie challenge, which means I have been very lucky to receive some gifts donated by very generous ladies – the first prize arrived yesterday … 5 skeins of very scrummy silks from Jo at Dinky Dyes – I could sit and stroke them for hours! I haven’t spent my other prize yet as I’m still deciding – I also won a gift certificate to spend at Colours Down Under … another very generous offering by Janine. I have to say I’m really impressed by Janine’s selection of goods on offer, and I have a feeling I won’t be spending just the gift voucher when I finally decide to go shopping LOL.

And lucky last, something completely different … this one is for Mum – on Wednesday night I was thrilled to see the final episode of the US “So You Think You Can Dance” … but also very sad it’s now finished. The dancing this year was absolutely incredible, and this show remains one of my all-time very favourites and not to be missed (right up there with NCIS and ER!). The winner was Joshua – and I’ve borrowed the shot from Fox News’ website so you can remember which one Joshua was, Mum (although I think you’d remember anyway). I loved watching Joshua dance, especially when he was partnered with Katee … and it was fantastic to see him win! 😀

And on that note, I’d better get into work!!!

Cross Stitch

DMC on sale!

14 September, 200825 February, 2012 Anne S

Just in case any of my fellow Aussies are interested, Riot Art & Craft have DMC on sale this month – normally 99c a skein, it’s down to 69c a skein … stock up while you can!!! Here’s a link to the online ad.

Mum – let me know your list if you want me to pick some up for you 😀

And after that public service announcement, and staring at the computer screen for the entire day, I’m off to bed! 🙂

Cross Stitch, Finishes, Just Nan

Just Nan’s “Evening Star”

12 September, 200825 February, 2012 Anne S

Yippee, I can finally post a “finished” piccie of this piece. This time the photos are crappy because they’re taken at night instead of early morning haha. I still remain very disappointed in the finished result purely because of the colours involved – I love some of the bands, but it just doesn’t “do it” for me.

“Evening Star” by Just Nan (class project)
Stitched on 32ct white Belfast linen
with recommended threads and beads (embellishment kit)

Going by some of the comments I’ve received during the stitching progress it appears there are a few people out there that do seem to like it, so I am pleased to finally be able make the “big announcement”…

This finished project is “free to a good home” – if anyone would like to go into a prize draw for this piece, please leave a comment stating this clearly, and at the end of September I will draw one name out of the hat to send this piece to.

I will finish it as a quilted wallhanging so it’s ready to hang in it’s new home (you will just need to provide the hanger itself). While it is quite lovely, I guess, I just don’t feel compelled to display it on my walls, and probably never will, so I’d rather it went to someone who would appreciate it 🙂

Now I guess it’s time to work out what to stitch next … I’m seriously considering going back to a mini-rotation, as I have some BAP’s that need to be worked on, so I’ll have to put some serious thought into that soon … for right now, I have no idea what I feel like stitching on next. Might have to sleep on it and see what the new day brings … 🙂

Cross Stitch, Works in Progress

Slap me on the forehead now!!!

12 September, 200825 February, 2012 Anne S

I was wandering through the lounge last night undoing my ‘chart holder’ of my floorstand to see if the screw would fit my lapstand, when I looked over to the clamp part … well, duh!!! The clamp part is identical to that of my lapframe, right down to the knob … do you think I could’ve perhaps worked that out on Monday night and not 4 nights later?? What a blonde!!!!

However, that means I did finally put needle to fabric last night after two weeks of doing nothing … and in the hour and a bit I stitched last night I managed to finish the beading of two more bands of Just Nan’s Evening Star. That means only one more band left and it’s all finished woohoo! Then it’s going to be finished into a quilted wallhanging. Here’s the bit I finished last night (sorry for the lousy photo but it’s taken in the wee small hours of the morning):

Once the finished piccie is up, there will be an announcement some of you might be interested in … 😉

Cross Stitch, Home & Family TO BE FIXED

Photos added

11 September, 200825 February, 2012 Anne S

Thanks so much to Alison, who kindly sent photos over to me last night – I’ve updated the previous post with some fun photos from Sunday. 🙂

Thanks again ladies for an awesome day out 😀

Cross Stitch, Get-Togethers, Home & Family TO BE FIXED, stitching pals

No stitching … again (updated with photos)

10 September, 200830 June, 2018 Anne S

I sat down in bed for an hour’s stitching on Monday to commence a new routine for me … putting at least one strand of thread into my stitching on a daily basis … only to find my ‘knob’ dropped to bits on me! I am loving sitting up in bed and watching TV and stitching away to my heart’s content instead of sitting up in the freezing cold in the lounge, and was mortified to find my lapframe in pieces in front of my very eyes. Unfortunately the wooden part has come away from the screw part, but this part of the screw is actually the ‘top’ and doesn’t have a normal thread to it so I can’t just get away with whacking a lugnut or anything on the end. This is NOT what the knob should look like!!!

So for now, there is no stitching … zip … nada … I get cramp in my hand when I hold a Q-snap etc for more than a few minutes at a time hmmm. But the good news is that I contacted Artisan Designs straightaway, and it’s only going to cost me US$5 plus postage (I think), and they take PayPal, so hopefully it will only be a few weeks before I get a replacement in my hot little hands (once they finally give me a payment amount and place the order!).

Even though I have no stitching to share, I DID have some stitchy-related fun … on Sunday Alison kindly picked me up in her car along with her daughter, and chauffeured me to Amanda’s place where we had a hoot of a day drooling and fondling charts, kits, and threads … and “literally” rolling around in her stash of fabrics! I have never seen such a fabric collection in all my born days – she should charge admission fees to come and visit it 😉

Anyway, Alison kindly took a whole host of photos from the day, so I hope to be able to share with you the great time we had after pilfering some photos. Updated: Here are a couple of my favourites (thanks for the copies, Alison!!):

You have to imagine the Gollum voice impression, while playing in the “precious” – see what I mean about that fabric stash? LOL – You’re the QUEEN, Amanda, I tell ya! 😉

Probably my favourite photo of all – the looks on our faces just sums up the day – hilarious fun!
From left to right: Alison, Amanda, Anne (AAA packed full of fun)

And finally a “nice” shot of the three of us! Apart from the fact my Weight Watchers obviously isn’t working ‘cos I can’t fit in the photo haha

I haven’t laughed that much in ages … those two are the BEST company and an absolute riot! I’m looking forward to the next catch-up already, and we haven’t even planned anything yet! In fact after the weekend visit Amanda finally got coerced into starting her own blog (Confessions of a Fabric Floosy), so make sure you go pay her a visit … she does some beautiful stitching (as do both these two ladies)!

On the work front, today we had a ‘burning issues’ meeting, which is basically a get-together of the “team” without the boss being present … and we got to chatting about the secondments coming up to finishing deadline etc. It turns out that one of the ladies is thinking of giving up the whole job at the end of her secondment in January, which means it’s likely they’ll have to readvertise again later … but one of the reasons this lady put her had up to the boss officially today to tell her is so that it might make a difference to them extending the secondment for me (and Lisa if she’s interested). I only have about 8 weeks left to go but still have had no indication whether they will allow me to stay longer or whether I have to start thinking of uprooting myself again to go back to Melbourne … which is a bit stressful in the back of my mind all the time (especially after the debacle of moving up here with Dodgy Brothers R Us etc – I really don’t want to have to go through all that again). So if you can all stitch with your fingers crossed over the next couple of weeks, that’d be great! I’m hoping now that this lady has raised the issue with management they might finally start to discuss their options in earnest, and fingers crossed it goes in my favour (although there are never any guarantees!).

Rightio, time to go hit the hay and forget about work for the night … and pout at my Evening Star project … hmmm, maybe I should drag in my floorstand from the the lounge for tomorrow night … LOL. If not, I guess you won’t see any stitching again until after the weekend has been and gone, ‘cos I don’t want to sit out in the lounge all on my own in the cold … I must prefer my cozy beautiful bed! 😉

Cross Stitch, Works in Progress

Old French Alphabets

5 September, 200825 February, 2012 Anne S

Joanne in Perth, if you’re reading this by any chance, I just realised yesterday that I had an email saved as a draft for you with the Sajou links – I tried sending to you, but may have written your email address down wrong! Here’s another link in case anyone else is interested and hasn’t seen them before!

French alphabets (Sajou)

Then there is the complete list of old needlework books re-published on the ‘net you might find of interest.

And there endeth my foray into ancient designs today …

Now I’m back to play with my scanner, scanning in photos for the upcoming photo hunts – Mum very kindly brought a box full of my old printed photos with her on the last visit, and there are some really good choices for upcoming themes that I can use … I still have a ‘lump in my throat’ today after spending a lot of the night with my head over the toilet bowl, so I’m having an easy day at home today blobbing out. I can only put it down to a dodgy Turkish meal we had for lunch yesterday, either that or it’s just another symptom of these stupid viral bugs that are all the rage at the moment!

In fact, I might as well also show you a sneak preview of my Just Nan piece, seeing as I still haven’t touched a needle in the last few days (oh mojo, wherefore art though?) … I’ll take a decent daylight photo if I can when it’s all finished – so far this is the bottom 2/3 of the design … I thought I’d leave the top 1/3 off the unveiling until it’s totally finished 🙂

I have to admit I was really disappointed when I started stitching this one – the cover photo looks very blue and purple … whereas in real life there is no blue at all, just purples and greens, so not what I was expecting. Thankfully it’s started to grow on me, and the colour scheme, while not “me”, is quite complimentary I guess if you like purples and greens 😉

Cross Stitch, Flowers Trees & Gardens, Home & Family TO BE FIXED

Spring is here!!!

3 September, 200825 February, 2012 Anne S

What an incredible feeling it was on 1 September to realise that winter is over (not that it’s been really bad, it’s actually been relatively mild compared to what I’m used to in Melbourne!) … what I’m excited about is that the days are getting longer again and daylight is returning to my mornings (and my evenings too now that I’m leaving work at ‘normal’ hours). The above photo was taken in Melbourne about this time last year.

With that comes the idea of spring cleaning … well, those that know me well will know that any form of cleaning is a “dirty word” (no pun intended), but I have made a realisation today that I need to ‘let go of baggage’ and start afresh with a few things. With that in mind, I’ve also come to realise that every time I open up my newsfeed reader to catch up on blogs I feel incredibly depressed and overwhelmed. This feeling builds up more every time I see this pop up on my screen:

This is after I’d managed to clean out 700+ unread feeds over the last two weeks, but I’m so so far behind and there are still over 1000 left to read … I don’t want to do it, but I think for my sanity’s sake I’m going to have to mark all as read and start again afresh. At least that way part of the blogging pressure is removed and I can hopefully keep on top of new posts on a more regular basis again.

Still no stitching to share yet … I almost completed Just Nan’s Evening Star on Saturday, and decided not to bother with a WIP piccie seeing as it’s so close to completion … um, 5 days on and it’s still no further on … perhaps this weekend I’ll see it finished, then I’m going to pull my finger out and probably try to get my In the Dark Needleroll finished off … and get some gifts made up that I’ve been wanting to do for a while now. Although I’m heading down to Woollongong for a SAL with friends on Sunday, so perhaps it won’t be as productive as I hope haha.

In fact, I’m home early tonight, so maybe I should pull my finger out earlier and drag out the needle and thread tonight instead of sitting staring at the screen playing computer games for the evening (such as I have done for the last 3 nights running). Maybe a happy dance will follow before the weekend … maybe 😉

Christmas Ornaments, Cross Stitch, Darling Harbour, Finishes, Finishing, Friends & Family, Home & Family TO BE FIXED, Lizzie Kate, Stash, Sydney, Val's Stuff, Works in Progress

Ah, Bliss …

27 August, 200825 February, 2012 Anne S

Today I walked out from work at 5.10pm … and felt like a little kid skipping out of school early! It feels really fantastic! Helped that today was the first day that I haven’t been pulled in a million different directions due to urgent things being thrown at me, I managed to actually get some of my own work done for a change … serious bliss!

My rant did me good last night – on top of the productive day, and normal working hours, I feel much brighter today. Apologies to Mum, as this is not how it sounds ‘cos I love having Mum visit, but it’s been really nice to come home to an empty place and not having to have a conversation – I have been anti-social for two days and have found it a great chance to unwind properly at the end of a stressful day without having to chat. I’m hoping by the end of the week to be a bit more back to normal again 🙂

Mum returned home on Monday morning, but we had a wonderful weekend before she left. On Friday we spent the afternoon visiting craft stores – although neither of the stores we visited were really ‘fantastic’ we did manage to find something at each one to spend a couple of dollars on. At Lyn’s needlecraft I managed to buy some pink and cream fabric (yeah, me, pink!! LOL) … and a duck!! (I don’t have space for the ones I currently have, but that makes no difference LOL). At Hobby Sew I bought a smaller version of the wire hanger I use for my embroidery scissors – this one is to hang my junk jewellery on, and was proudly hung on the side of my computer desk tonight.

Friday night saw us having dinner with Brenda and Nigel, and it was really wonderful to catch up with them again. I’ve had to promise to visit again soon and stay the night – that’s no hardship, as I’m looking forward to it.

Saturday morning saw us up bright (OK maybe not) and early (most definitely) and driving into the city. That’s my first attempt in driving into Sydney city itself, and I have to tip my hat to my TomTom GPS ‘cos he managed to instruct me perfectly and painlessly to the parking building I wanted. We picked my friend Jason up at the airport then went to Darling Harbour in the freezing cold where we stuffed ourselves on a cooked breakfast, followed by the compulsory stop at the Lindt cafe for takeaway delices and a Mochaccino … yum!! It was really nice to see Jason again, and I’m really glad we changed our plans to visit with him (he was transferring through Sydney on the way to Asia on holiday).

As soon as we showed Jason the way to the train station for his return to the airport we hot-footed it down the motorway to Rosehill Racecourse to the Stitches & Craft Show, where we met up with my good pals Alison and Amanda, and met some new ladies Karen and Rowena. It was really awesome to catch up with these ladies again – they’re always such fun to spend time with. I was pleasantly surprised with the contents of the show … we parted with a fair amount of cash, although when we got home we didn’t seem to have as much as we remembered 😉

My biggest splurges were two pieces of hand-dyed fabric – one from Peppermint Stitches (for Mirabilia’s Enchanted Mermaid hopefully), and one from Stitches & Spice (36ct mottled/vintage neutral colour), plus a big Santa for my main Christmas display this year (thanks to Dodgey Brothers R Us removalists, I no longer have my beautiful ceramic Christmas tree centrepiece, as it arrived in a squillion pieces). Here’s a photo of the full stash haul (combining both mine and Mum’s purchases). I nearly squealed with delight when I saw a butterfly charm (Susan Clarke design) that will match my Just Nan Dragonfly scissor purse … I didn’t care about the $27 price tag, I HAD to have it!!! (The Christmas items aren’t in the photo as I can’t be bothered unpacking them from the box.)

Other purchases were some metal charms for scissor fobs, some Dress It Up buttons (snowflakes and stars), cheapo scissors for travelling, and the most adorable metal hanger for my Christmas quilted wallhanging. Doesn’t it look perfect?

Crikey, I barely blog for two weeks and now I can’t shut up!!!

I’ll finish for the night by showing my very minimal stitching from the last week or so – here is my latest finish:

“Life’s a Stitch” by Lizzie*Kate
stitched on 32ct natural Belfast linen
with recommended GAST threads

And here is my current work in progress – I’m trying to stitch predominantly those charts that I’ve bought special threads and embellishments for and are essentially kitted up. Once I get through a few of them, I’ll add the designs to my trade list (I’d better hurry up and get stitching or you’ll be waiting for a while!). This project is Just Nan’s “Evening Star” which is a retired class piece. At my current stitching rate it should be finished some time in the middle of September haha.

Last night I was in such a cranky mood I vented my frustration by doing the finishing on my August Christmas ornie – if that’s the result of being angry with work, I should keep it going every night!! LOL. I added a little white pom-pom-thing with glue once the pillow as finished 🙂

And now it’s time to settle in and get some stitching in (after once again lugging up my next round of laundry washing – I figure the more I get done tonight, I won’t have much to do at the weekend).