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

Great weekend & A bit of stitching for a change

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 😀

Hunter Valley accommodation

Hunter Valley stitchers

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.

JBW Designs-Joy Love Peace
“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.

Prairie Schooler-Here Comes Santa Claus 1
“Here Comes Santa Claus 2005” by The Prairie Schooler
stitched on 28ct natural Cashel linen
with kit Crescent Colours threads

Prairie Schooler-Here Comes Santa Claus 2
I love how the snowflakes lift off of the fabric – hard to see in the photo

Prairie Schooler-Here Comes Santa Claus 3

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 …

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

No Photo Hunt this week

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 …

Stitching Leporello 1

Stitching Leporello 2

Stitching Leporello 3

Stitching Leporello 4

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

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!!)

KarenV's Quaker Part 1

KarenV's Quaker Part 2

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):

Chatelaine's Stitching Leporello 1

Chatelaine's Stitching Leporello 2

Chatelaine's Stitching Leporello 3

Chatelaine's Stitching Leporello 4

Chatelaine's Stitching Leporello 5a

Chatelaine's Stitching Leporello 5

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! 😛

Chatelaine Stitching Leporello WIP 06Jul09

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 … 😀