Enjoying a sense of peace one stitch at a time
Here is my choice for this week’s Ruby Tuesday – a very old photo scanned from the printed copy of a brasserie in Paris … my favourite city in the world.
And in trying to keep with the ‘crafty theme’, here’s a redwork exchange I sent to Nicki five whole years ago in 2006 … probably one of my most favourite exchanges I’ve completed! (The photo was compliments of Nicki, she did such a wonderful job of the photography!)
I’ve been out of town for the last week with work, spending my time in our call centre in Brisbane (Queensland). It was grueling work, with some days being 14 hour working days, but it was really invigorating and rewarding for me personally, and the feedback I received from the staff I worked with was inspiring. Not to mention how wonderful it was to sleep in air-conditioned comfort for 4 nights. This was home for 5 days – and the great thing is there was a full laundry and kitchen, so aside from self-catering to keep the bills down (and healthy food to keep the weight down) I was able to do my laundry on Thursday night so I didn’t have to do it this weekend 😉
Alas the testing didn’t quite get completed which means I have to do a bucket load more myself this week – I’d booked an RDO for this week from weeks and weeks ago stating there was no way I was going to be doing project testing on my birthday … but alas it looks like that will have to be cancelled and I will indeed be doing testing on that day (unless I put in the hard yards Mon/Tue and keep my fingers crossed both days).
Oh well, I guess it doesn’t matter really, it’s just a day, and I didn’t have anything special planned for the day anyway … the night’s different, though, Katie is treating me out for dinner on Wednesday night to a local French restaurant that I’ve been wanting to go to ever since I moved to this part of Sydney. They have cheap mid-week set menus, and while the food certainly isn’t Weight Watchers friendly, it looks yummy and I can’t wait!! We’re also getting a bus up as well, which means I can have a drink or three for a change 😀
I didn’t stitch at all when I was away in Brisvegas, as I was generally found glued to massive Excel spreadsheets on the laptop every night, so yesterday I refused to move from my stitching chair, and cleaned out all the TV recordings from last week (and believe me, there was a LOT) – I may have had numb-butt syndrome, but I did manage to put the finishing touches into this (just don’t ask me when the actual needleroll finishing will be taking place, ‘cos I think that’ll be some time away yet!).
“Happy Pumpkin Needle Roll” by Shepherd’s Bush
stitched on 32ct Parkside (I think) hand-dyed linen by Silkweaver
with recommended threads
(I subbed my own button and beads as this was a 2nd-hand used chart)
Today I’m driving to the other side of Sydney to Concord for my first visit to a stitching group at the NSW Embroiderers Guild. I signed up when Mum was over here when I was feeling really motivated about my stitching, but of course they closed over the summer holiday period and this month it is finally reopened again properly so this is the first opportunity I’ve had to pop on over. I’ve found two groups that are mainly XSers that meet on the 2nd and 3rd Sundays of each month, so I phoned up and found out they both had spaces available … and today is my first visit to the first group. I’m feeling extremely nervous, as I’m very shy meeting new people, but this is something I just need to push through and get over! Hopefully it will turn out that I really enjoy it, and it gets me out of the house every once in a while 🙂
The theme on 9 October was ”Stripes” and here are some stripes on the skirts of a Maori cultural group in Rotorua, New Zealand. The Maori name for the skirt is “piupiu”, and it is a traditional item of clothing made from flax leaves. I love the swishing sound it makes when it swirls and the dried flax hit each other. If you want to see some traditional piupiu, you can find some here on the Te Papa Museum website.
And in keeping with trying to find stitching/needlework examples of the weekly themes, here is the unmade needleroll that I stitched for an exchange years ago – it was a self-made design by using some elements from other designs and making some parts up … I was quite pleased with the end result.
As mentioned in my previous post, I spent pretty much the entire day yesterday finish-finishing 4 Shepherd’s Bush needlerolls. Following are the fruits of my labour (including improved photos of my latest two needleroll finishes, as previously I could only scan them and the quality was dreadful).
During my needleroll ‘frenzy’ yesterday I decided to sit down in front of the TV and downloaded a couple of free TV episodes on TiVo, and watched Episode 1 of Season 1 of The Tudors and the same of The Guardian. After my finishing session I also decided to blob out in front of the gogglebox and did a teeny tiny bit of stitching on a new start … I’m thinking of starting a bit of a mini-rotation of all the projects that I currently have kitted up with DMC, as I’m constantly having to keep raiding them for new projects (although I’ve made it easier now by having all my kitted up projects with all their contents on a spreadsheet, so at least I know which project has which DMC now!). This was the result of my bit of TV viewing – while watching The Ugly Truth (a truly stupid movie I have to say!) and half of the Taking of Pelham 123. As you can see, I did a LOT! haha. (Sorry for the crappy photo!)
This will eventually be Just Nan’s Ghastly Ghostly Ghouls. I’ve been meaning to start this one for weeks, but I needed to tea-dye the fabric to give it a slightly darker look and it’s taken me this long to finally drag the tea bags out of the cupboard! The last time I stitched ghosts on Lambswool linen they disappeared into the background, so fingers crossed this time the slightly darker colouration will see them showing up more (I’ll find out soon enough, as they’re getting stitched next).
While I was tea-dyeing, I also threw in a piece of cotton lace that I needed to dye so I can complete my first PIF ready to be sent off to its new home. I’ve still dickering over what to stitch for my next two ‘victims’, but I do have some ideas brewing in my little mind and have some designs pulled out into a separate pile ready to start work. I also need to decide on which design to use for my Scissor Pocket exchange, as I need to start working on that very very soon.
As for the rest of my finishing weekend, the question I’m asking myself is “what now?” – I still have a large pile of finishing to do, I just have to decide what to concentrate on first. I have the following to choose from:
I did want to finish off a scissor fob tutorial with one of my pieces, so perhaps I’ll throw that into the mix this weekend, plus finishing off my Christmas ornie tutorial which is almost finished. If nothing else, I’m certainly not short of finishing items to be done!! Of course the sooner I get off this PC the quicker I’ll get to make a start as well … so perhaps I’d better leave it at that and go make a start! 😉
Before I continue, let me apologise for the dreadful quality of all of these photos – I have mislaid my little Lumix camera, and have had to rely on my scanner to show my latest finishes … and because of the beads etc lifting the fabric off of the glass, the focus is terrible. As soon as I find my camera, I’ll upload a cleaner photo.
“Millennium Roll” by Shepherd’s Bush
stitched with kit contents
“Pine Needle Roll” by Shepherd’s Bush
stitched with kit contents
On Friday I received my Pin Pillow Exchange from Sandra – I absolutely ADORE it. She chose one of the designs from my wishlist, and turned into the most gorgeous pincushion … I love everything about it, and will definitely treasure it always! Alas the scanner really didn’t like scanning something ‘puffy’ so this is even worse photography – once again, I’ll take better photos just as soon as I can. Thanks again Sandra for a wonderful exchange experience! 😀
I managed to complete some stitching today – here is my latest finish (my photography tonight was appalling, so I placed this one on the scanner):
“Halloween Roll” by Shepherd’s Bush
using kit fabric and threads (Tobacco linen and DMC)
Then I made a start on a Christmas ornament by The Victoria Sampler – with any luck this one won’t take too long to finish.
Stitching has been very cathartic for me today! 🙂
Thanks to my dearest flatmate leaving me her entire collection of Buffy the Vampire Slayer DVD’s to watch, my eyes are now square, and I think I have almost OD’ed on Buffy over the last few days (I’m now up to Season 5 – not bad going in two weeks!). For someone who’s lasted 40+ years without having Buffy in her life, I have to say I’ve rather enjoyed it! I’ve shed tears over the ‘Angel-thing’, and laughed out loud at poor old Spike, and slobbered a bit at good ol’ Giles (who I’ve always adored as the Prime Minister in Little Britain – had I known he was in Buffy, I would have started watching years ago haha). Anyway, watching all this slaying has been good for the soul, and good for the stitching – I’ve been doing a bit of slaying of my own today, and managed to finish two old UFO’s – I’m not quite feeling up to tackling the sewing machine just yet, so the needleroll will get finish-finished later.
“Wildflower Needleroll” by The Sweetheart Tree
stitched on 32ct Lambswool linen by Wichelt
using recommended DMC threads and Mill Hill beads
This really, really old one just needed to have one heart bead attached for it to be finished (after unpicking and restitching some of the beads in the outer border), so within 1/2 an hour today this one is also finished. Unfortunately it’s really hard to get a good photo of it, as it’s all pretty much monochrome. I’m going to attempt to frame this one myself, I think 😀
“Love and Affection” by JBW Designs
stitched on 32ct antique white Lugana (I think)
using recommended threads and beads
This “rotation” business is really helping me to keep focused on my stitching goals – no more dithering between stitching sessions, I know exactly what I need to be stitching next … although right now I can’t decide whether to tackle the start of yet another UFO, as I have a few hours of my rotation left, or whether to just move on to my next slot, which is my Boo Club focus piece … ah, decisions decisions … 😀
Still not feeling 100% today, I asked my boss if I could reinstate the two days leave I’d just cancelled last week, so I have the next few days off to recuperate more fully … which means more stitching, yippee 😀
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!! 😀
I managed to get all the finishing done on Barnabee’s Bride in time to drive her over to The Stitching Post tomorrow morning. She looks very cute (although I have a bit of wrinkling of the green wool when she’s rolled up, if I had more fabric I might have unpicked it and cut it a bit smaller, but it’s OK I guess), and I couldn’t resist taking a quick photo in the sunlight to show off her wee sparklies 🙂
Barnabee’s Bride (kit) by Just Nan
I forgot to take a photo of the needleroll opened out – I’ll take one later … if I remember … but I’ve run out of time to take one this morning, as I’ve now got to race off to work (I’m on the late shift today ‘cos I’m “on call” for the next 7 days in case of emergencies, which gave me time to quickly take these photos this morning).
I can’t believe how long it’s taken me to stitch up this little piece – mainly due to numerous attacks of the frogs! If it was my own piece I’d probably have left two of the errors in it, as the larger blue flowers were one stitch out in their placement (I was quite impressed I managed to do that same error in both of them!) … and the border was unpicked three times as I’d managed to get loops and knots in the pearl cotton and not realised … mutter mutter mutter.
Barnabee’s Bride by Just Nan (kit)
(once again apologies for the bad photo – I’ll take a better one
once it’s all finished into the needleroll)
Anyway the stitching is finally all done, and all I have to do now is the finishing, which I hope to attempt tomorrow. Then this will be driven back home to The Stitching Post where it will live happily with its owner (I’m stitching this as a model for Karen).
As for the rest of today, it will be spent making a beef stew in the crockpot, along with a big pan full of pumpkin soup ready for the freezer.
PhotoHunt
Feather Stitching 