Feather Stitching

Country Cottage Needleworks, Cross Stitch, Friends & Family, Photo Hunt, PhotoHunt, skiing, snow, Wishlist

New to the wishlist & Photo Hunt

19 June, 201025 February, 2012 Anne S

Oh boy, I just browsed a blog or two while I was waking up, and found the latest design by Country Cottage Needleworks … I sooooo HAVE to have this one!!! Hmmm, I wonder if they’ll let me add it to my order from NIAH?? 😀

PhotoHunt | PhotoHunt

This week’s theme is ”Six” and following on from yesterday’s theme, here are six of us braving the elements on Tukino skifield once again. Dunno why, but I just love this photo – it’s quite candid, and I love the ‘whiteout’ effect from the falling snow 😀 (I’m the one in the blue jacket in the middle … I adored that jacket, but alas so did the thieves that broke into our home one day boohoo.)

Cross Stitch, Mirabilia, Works in Progress

Halloween Fairy update

18 June, 201025 February, 2012 Anne S

I may not get another chance to post this weekend with an update piccie, so here goes with a really quick drive-by post and piccie – I’m moving along slowly but surely with Mirabilia’s Halloween Fairy. Once I’ve finished the pumpkins I’ll be able to complete the green swirls on the bottom half of the design and perhaps some of the beads, then I’ll be flipping her over onto her ‘head’ to start stitching her upside down to complete her upper body … then she’ll have to sit on the shelf until her missing threads arrive, as I think it’ll be at least a month before they turn up …

Home & Family TO BE FIXED, Mt Ruapehu, skiing, snow, Travel, Travel - New Zealand

Volcanoes for Dot

18 June, 201025 February, 2012 Anne S

Dot left a comment on my Santorini photo that she adores volcanoes, so here are a few more just especially for Dot!

Here is the club skifield I used to go to regularly (I used to be the Club Secretary) – this is Tukino skifield on Mt Ruapehu in the north island of New Zealand … and an active volcano! After one particularly active period we had to spend hours and hours cleaning out the club rooms … you would not believe how hard ash is to remove, and how invasive it is, it gets everywhere!! I have some wonderful memories of my times on that mountain with my skiing buddies … from back in the days when I was fit!

The photo of me here, is my first ever skiing experience – what a hoot! 😀

In the next photo you can see a wee bit of steam up at the top – this is from our ash cleaning weekend … now you know what a skifield can look like in summer (note that our skifields in New Zealand are at a higher altitude in mountainous regions, and don’t have lush trees to ski around – they’re generally beautiful wide open spaces, often with exquisite views).

And this is how we’d have to get up the mountain in the first place – no tarsealed roads here, we had to dump our cars at the bottom then pile everything into our ‘mountain goat’ trucks and take a slow drive to the top. I few times we’d have to bring the bulldozer down and clear the road ahead of us due to heavy snowfall, and one night we finally had to give up and grab our backpacks and climb the rest of the way in thigh-high snow – I remember we arrived at the top just as the sun was coming up … that was an adventure and a half!

And the next few are ‘just for fun’ … not sure I should really be posting a piccie of our R18 snowman, but it has a nice shot of the volcano behind him! 😛 This is also from my first week’s holiday at the skifield, and was the start of oh so many afterwards! This photo is of Doreen, myself and Brenda … and our anatomically proud snowman! 😛

Here he is “in progress” …

Of course he doesn’t just look gorgeous from the front, he also had the cutest butt cheeks in the world LOL. Here’s Vicki’s Dad, Ross, and our snowman surveying the view and pondering the meaning of life… (I LOVE this shot!!)

And here is where we spent most of our time – our club rooms on Tukino … this is a photo of myself and Ross, Vicki’s Dad, off to the slopes 🙂

And … lucky last … “the gang’s all here” … a mandatory group shot of us from my first skiing week – here’s one of my adopted families, that of my very best friend Vicki. Sadly, Ross is no longer with us, but we had the BEST holidays and adventures when we were growing up – I’m incredibly blessed for having known them, and they’ve helped to shape me into the confident person that I am today 😀

Ruby Tuesday, Travel - Hong Kong

Ruby Tuesday – Hong Kong

15 June, 201025 February, 2012 Anne S

Here is my choice for this week’s Ruby Tuesday – from a temple in Hong Kong.

Blue Monday, Books & Reading, Santorini, Travel - Greece

Blue Monday – Santorini and Lover Eternal

14 June, 201025 February, 2012 Anne S

It’s been a long time since I’ve participated in the various photo memes, so here’s a blast from the past. Blue Monday … a favourite blue photo, and a new book to read (book #2 in the Black Dagger Brotherhood series) … guess what I’m off to do now? 😛

I managed to finish off the skirt of Mirabilia’s Halloween Fairy tonight, but can’t be bothered taking a progress piccie … I’ll take one during the week some time, as I may not get chance this weekend seeing as I’m off craft fairing then off to the other side of Sydney for dinner and an overnight stay 🙂

Anyway, without further ado, here is my choice for this week’s Blue Monday – Santorini.

Books & Reading, Cross Stitch, Finishes, Sweetheart Tree

Dark Lover and a Simple Sampler

14 June, 20106 April, 2014 Anne S

The joys of having a public holiday today means today I could be totally selfish and lazy and not get out of bed or get dressed until the afternoon! Instead I spent the morning reading half of J.R. Ward’s “Dark Lover” and getting it finished … and have to admit I’m looking forward to book number 2 of this series, “Lover Eternal”.

After being relatively disappointed with the Twilight vampire series, I’ve been pleasantly surprised with this book … although with the ‘adult’ scenes, it certainly isn’t comparing apples with apples with the Twilight series … I think the only similarity is that they both contain vampires! It’s taken me literally a couple of months to read this book, mainly because I keep putting my stitching first – I get the impression from the end of the book, though, that my book reading may soon have to take a priority on the odd weekend and my stitching will have to take a back seat! That’s the only downside to reading a ‘real’ paperback, I can’t do both of my passions at the same time 😛

The rest of the morning has been spent finishing off my Sweetheart Tree project that I started last night – it took longer than expected, as I’d forgotten just how much of a nightmare all that backstitching is … but worth it in the long run! I managed to watch 4 episodes of The Ghost Whisperer (3rd season) while I stitched. Sorry for the crappy photo, as it certainly doesn’t show up the nice warm buttery linen!

“A Simple Sampler” (kit) by The Sweetheart Tree
stitched on 32ct cream Belfast linen
with DMC threads and Mill Hill petite beads

Offer: Seeing as I’ll never ever stitch this one again, I’m happy to offer up the chart to anyone who wants it. If you leave a comment in this post that you’d like to go into the draw for this chart, I’ll draw a name out at the end of the week. I’ll also send the leftover beads – I’m pretty sure there are enough left over to complete the project again.

Now it’s time to finally shake off the cobwebs and jump in the shower and get dressed – I need to pop over the road to the supermarket to buy supplies to bake some banana muffins … then it’ll almost be time for bed again LOL.

Christmas Ornaments, Cross Stitch, Finishes

New start/finish

13 June, 20106 April, 2014 Anne S

Unfortunately my back was killing me while I was out shopping yesterday, so I drove Katie over to Epping for the 50th birthday, but I left after 1 1/2 hours so I could come home and put my back to bed early. After chewing Nurofen last night/this morning the edge has been taken off the discomfort and I’ve been sat up in bed this morning with my needle in hand clearing TV shows off the TiVo. Here is the end result of a few hours not moving:

“Reindeer” by JBW Designs (Christmas Keepsakes II)
stitched on 32ct natural Belfast linen
with a mix of GAST, WDW and DMC threads

That means I’ve now stitched all three designs from the Christmas Keepsakes II chart – I’ve really enjoyed stitching these ones up.

As for what’s next, I’m considering picking up Sapphire Star again this afternoon and looking at thread choices to substitute for the horrible one that made me put this one on hold. I’m thinking of just using a DMC pearl cotton, but I’m not entirely sure whether it will look OK …

Otherwise I’m tossing up between two new starts for my bedroom – “Sky Blue” Sampler Accent by Periwinkle Promises or “A Simple Sampler” by The Sweetheart Tree, both of which are ready and waiting and all kitted up for starting. Plus of course I still have my little birth sampler to stitch for my work colleague, and I’ve finally made my decision for my next PIF victim 😀

Cross Stitch, Exchanges, Finishes, Mirabilia, scissor pockets, scissors, Stitching Smalls, The Cat's Whiskers, Works in Progress

Weekly Update

12 June, 20106 April, 2014 Anne S

Another week has gone by, and not much stitching has been completed in that time – the only thing I’ve been working on this week has been my Halloween Fairy with a few more stitches put in Mon-Thu this week. I’ve made OK progress on this one, but it’ll be a few weeks yet before she’s finished (not just stitching-wise, but I realised I’m missing two Kreinik braids which I’ve had to order and wait because they’re out of stock – I had a store credit to use up with Needle in a Haystack, so I decided to put it to good use with my braids). I have to admit I’m enjoying stitching her with her decent sized blocks of colour 🙂

The only other news is that my Scissor Pocket Exchange arrived safely at its destination during the week, and thankfully Lillie likes it, which is the important thing 🙂 It was supposed to be a no-extras exchange (love those exchanges), but I couldn’t resist adding a little pair of scissors that I’d bought at the last craft fair we went to, which I used as my basis to choose a thread from my stash to match. I didn’t think to take a photo of the inside flap, where I stitched both our initials, so I’ve borrowed one of Lillie’s photos (hope she doesn’t mind).

“Alyssum 2007 Ltd Ed Scissor Pocket” by The Cat’s Whiskers
stitched on 32ct Bo-Beep Pink Belfast linen
with Needle Necessities thread 196

Rightio, time to head off and do something – I need to kit up a Lizzie*Kate Welcome Baby sampler for a colleague’s new daughter, and find a Halloween cape in the depths of the garage for an upcoming fancy dress party for Katie, as well as head out to a shopping mall to actually find a top to wear tonight!

Christmas Ornaments, Cross Stitch, Finishes, Just Nan

Ladybug Santa

6 June, 20106 April, 2014 Anne S

I’ve been working on this little piece in my bedroom over the last week – it never ceases to amaze me how long it takes to stitch up such a little project, but that over-one stitching and all those colour changes really slows things down. All-in-all, though, I’m quite pleased with this one, and now all that is left is to finish-finish it into its little WhimZi Frame.

“Ladybug Santa” by Just Nan
stitched on 28ct Misty Blue Cashel linen
with recommended threads (DMC & Kreinik #4 braid)

That’s the entire stitching update for this weekend – the rest of the weekend was spent having a handyman come to visit to put the hot-water tap back on in the shower, then driving over to the other side of the world for a few hours to visit with my best friend’s Mum, Doreen, who’s here visiting for a couple of weeks. As we have a ‘date’ tonight, and we’re out Fri/Sat next weekend, this was the only opportunity I had to say hello – it was really lovely to see her again, albeit briefly 🙂

Tonight we’re off to the movies with a couple of hot guys … the most sexy and gorgeous gay couple we know (beautiful both inside and out) … first up is a quick bite to eat, then we’re off to see the Prince of Persia. The two boys and Katie can drool over Jake Gyllenhaal while I just enjoy the action (Jake just doesn’t do it for me, alas … although even I have to admit he looks better than normal in the trailer for this movie).

As for what else is happening – my new job finally got announced last Thursday night, and I went to my first offsite meeting with my new team members on Friday morning. Even though I don’t take on my new role officially until 1 July, it was good to get a heads-up of projects that are currently underway that I’ll be involved with when I start.

Weatherwise we’re all pretty sick of the torrential rains this week in Sydney – I don’t usually mind it too much (and it’s been raining on and off for a few weeks now), but this week has been especially horrendous. Have to admit, if we weren’t meeting Peter and John tonight, I would be very tempted to bail on going out to the movies … it’s totally yucky outside!

Anyway, there’s just enough time to watch another old episode of The Mentalist before I have to start getting ready … so I’d best get cracking …

Cross Stitch, Exchanges, Works in Progress

Scissor Pocket exchange received

5 June, 20106 April, 2014 Anne S

And oh boy, what an exquisite exchange piece it is!! I was absolutely gobsmacked when I opened my little parcel at the post office this morning – inside was the most gorgeous stitched and finished scissor pocket ever! This is a design I have lusted after for years now, and have attempted to buy a few times, but I’ve never managed to get hold of it … well now I don’t have to, as I have an awesome finished piece instead! I honestly did get a bit choked up when I opened up the box, as it was so amazingly perfect for me. Thank you Michelle from the bottom of my heart – I will truly treasure this always! 😀

My apologies for the piccies, but it’s almost midnight in a wintry Sydney and I couldn’t wait to publish them 🙂

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