Raise a Glass of Cheer for 2012

I hope everone had a very blessed Christmas and enjoyed time spent with family and loved ones. We had here a reasonable quite time, and that was rather enjoyful. :)

With the old year rushing to it's end,  I would like to wish everyone now already a Very Happy New Year and hopefully the new year will bring only good things to you.  Let it be a healthy year, and a year without worries.  Let's all raise a glass of cheer on this wish shall we?

 Raise a Glass of Cheer

Designer: Black Bird Designs

Fabric: 32ct Belfast "Country Cream"

 Fibers: Gentle Art as recommended with one exeption

Replaced GA Old Red Paint with Threadworkx Cherry.

This design was laying was laying around in "almost finished" stage way too long. Trying to fool Santa into that I'm a good girl I quickly took the needle up (impressions are worth a lot after all).....

Alla Turca

Designer: Pelin Tezer

Stitched over one on 25ct Lugana White

with Threadworkx Bleeding Heart

It kinda worked. Got lots of stash for Christmas,. Lots of charts, but also.....ohhh sooooo happy.....

A color card of NPI silks. With real thread - finally I can mix and match to my hearts desire. SO happy with that. 

 

And then there also the Kangaroo scissors!!!!

Enough of that, may I introduce you to my newest bestest friend ever - the lovely Miss Charlotte Clayton. We're inseparable at the moment. 

 

 Charlotte Clayton

Northwest Sampler Guild

36ct Lakeside Linen Vintage Sand Dune

recommended NPI silks

Lastly poor little Frederik is trying to get a bit stitching on him done too. But you know how it is when girls get chatty. Not much done here yet.

 Frederick

Designer: Carriage House Samplings

Stitched on 40ct Lakeside Linens "Vintage Pearled Barley"

with NPI silks

Mary Allen 1818 and some other finishes

It's amazing what one can achieve if one's computer is having problems and shuts down all the time. When not being able to sit much at the computer, miraculously stitching seems to speed up. No clue how that comes. Still baffles me...lol.

The good thing about it is though (Insert Happy Dance here): Just in time for Christmas, Mary Allen is finished. Here she is:

Village Square Sampler - Mary Allen 1818

By Samplers Remembered

Stitched on 36ct Edinburgh "Buttercream" from Silkweaver

with NPI silks 

Also finished is:

With Affection

Part one of "A Petit Sampling Etui

Designer Louise Henderson by Cherished Stitches

Fabric: 36ct Silkweaver linen "Heritage" 

Recommended Crescent Color Threads

 

 And I finished 2 ornaments for my aunt and uncle who adore their schnauzer and cat.

 

Designer:  Ladybug Lane Designs

Design: "Plaid Greetings"

Just Cross Stitch Ornament Issue2009

Fabric: 32ct opalescent Lugana from Silkweaver in the color "Forest"

Fibers: Gentle Art, Threadworx and Silk n Color

  Designer: Bittercup Designs

Design: Get into the Spirit

Just Cross Stitch Ornament Issue 2009

Fabric: 32ct Belfast from Silkweaver

Fibers: Weeks Dye, Crescent Colors and Gentle Art

On Christmas Eve I traditionally start something new. This year it will be the Charlotte Clayton Sampler from the North West Sampler Guild. I'm looking SO forward to stitch this beautiful sampler. I lost count of the times that I went to Margaret's blog to drool over her Charlotte Clayton.

And there is good news on the puppy front. Ashley sort of recovered. She will now need heart meds twice daily but all by all she is doing fine. Not that she got spoiled. Spoiled might really not be the right word....lol. It's something beyond that. Oh well, I'm just glad that she's better. Here she is with my aunt. 

That's all from sunny warm Australia. I wish you and your loved ones a Merry Christmas and leaving you with an impression of Christmas in sunny Australia :)

Couple of finishes and a sick puppy :(

First of all, an ornament exchange I took part in. 

This is the ornament Marie stitched for me. Isn't it gorgeous? I put a pair of scissors next to it to show how small it is.Such a delicate stitching, and perfect finishing.

 Designer: Birds of a Feather

Peace Angel

stitched over one on 32ct linen

by Marie

The ornament I made for Carla:

Designer: Fancy Work

Design: Jingle all the Way

from 2009 JCS Christmas Ornament Issue

Fabric: 36ct linen from Silkweaver in the color "Purely Primitive"

Dinky Dyes Silk and Silk n Color

Frederika is finished... and waiting for me to start her man so that she won't be lonely.

Designer: Carriage House Samplings

Design: Frederika

Fabric: 40ct Lakeside Linens Vintage Pearled Barley
NPI silks

The vacation project got finished as well....

Dimension kit " Scenic Farm"

Artwork from Mildred Sands Kratz

Cotton floss on 18ct aida

After coming home from Germany,  my husband and I took the dogs and went up the coast  for some fishing and walking. Of course we treated both dogs with anti tick drops. Sadly that didn't work. Ashley got 3 ticks, and barely survived that. Because these ticks were paralysis ticks, and they do have a rather deadly result for dogs. Only an anti tick serum might save an infected dog. We had to rush Ashley to the vet were she got the serum and was hospitalized. Being back home for now, she is still sick, has still trouble breathing and walks as if drunk, but she will recover. Although it all has worsened her heart, because from now on she needs daily medication for her heart. :(
.

 A very sick little cuddle bunny, with chopped hair to make sure there are no nasties left behind

Someone else also shaken by the events and missing her sister

Sadly my online time is still limited. Although I do enjoy reading all blogs on my bloglist, I mainly do that from my phone. But I plan to somehow find some more time to sit at the computer and leave some comments on the gorgeous work I drool daily over. :)

A sad time....

Sadly enough I have to say good bye to blogging for a while. My stepfather passed away, which was rather unexpected, and I am in a hurry to fly out to Germany to attend the funeral and give my mother a helping hand for couple of weeks.
It's unlikely I will be able to be online often, although I take my laptop with me. No clue when  I'll be back and be able to visit yahoo groups, forums and blogs. My mother is 82 years old and has first priority in this sad time. Not sure what to say else, it's all quite upsetting.

On a more cheerful note, I just drew a name for the  chart and Giovanna is the winner. Congrats :)

Finally back (picture heavy)

It's a month ago since my last post and it was a pretty busy month. First my husband had a surgery followed by a rather painful recovery. Thankfully he's better now and back at work. Then I got a nasty eye infection and looking at a monitor was not an option. And above all I'm a bit stressed because my step father is since 3 weeks in ICU and the situation is worrying.

I'm so very sorry that I hardly visited any blogs, yahoo groups or bulletin boards, but I just don't function well under stress. Things that come easy normally tend to get too much and I fall back to the basics.

On to more cheering things....

A finish!!!!

Birds of a Feather

Desinger: Brenda Gervais (With Thy Needle and Thread)

Fabric: 35ct WDW linen in Confederate Grey

Recommended WDW fibers

The two changes were changing the color of the house to Cappuccino and  stealing the idea of the red letter shamelessly from Edgar. 

I'm giving away the 3 charts for this design. If you're interested in it, just state so in a comment. If there are more then one person wanting it, I'll draw a name. :)

There is also some progress on Mary Allen:

Village Square Sampler - Mary Allen 1818

By Samplers Remembered

Stitched on 36ct Edinburgh "Buttercream" from Silkweaver

with NPI silks 

 

Worked on the birdie....

Frederika by Carriage House Samplings

Stitched on 40ct Lakeside Linens "Vintage Pearled Barley"

with NPI silks

Joined a SAL for "A Petit Sampling Etui" held by Nataly.

With Affection

Part one of "A Petit Sampling Etui

Designer Louise Henderson by Cherished Stitches

Fabric: 36ct Silkweaver linen "Heritage" 

Recommended Crescent Color Threads

Finished the scarf for my daughter. She was quite happy with it and was even willing to pose without make up for me !!!

I got also 2 lovely gifts. A gorgeous tissue holder which I carry around everywhere and some beautiful floss together with a darling chart. I'll post pictures next time :)

Wishing you a great time wherever in the world you are (and hopefully better weather then we have here right now...it's pouring)

Come dance with me!!!

Finished and wrapped up!!!  Waiting to be framed ...

Amsterdam by Thea Gouverneur

Stitched on 35 ct linen with DMC

Started Christmas Eve 2010

Finished Aug 26 2011

And here is my newest bestest friend. Meet Mary Allen, who is such a  pleasure to stitch that I can't pull myself away from her. The planning was to finally start part 3 of the Birds of a Feather Mystery. But Mary insists on us spending some more quality time together and who am I to deny it to her? Can't do a thing about it.

Village Square Sampler - Mary Allen 1818

By Samplers Remembered

Stitched on 36ct Edinburgh "Buttercream" from Silkweaver

with NPI silks

There is not much else to to report. Except maybe that we spent the weekend in Melbourne looking for cars for my oldest daughter Saskia who got her drivers license last week. We got her in the end a nice car of her choice and she's happy as can be. Of course I forgot to take a picture. But she comes home in the weekend and we'll fix that then.

Funny thing is that I joked she should get a red car (my favorite color) and she insisted that she would NOT buy such hideous thing!!!! It was silver or black!  She ended up with a  red one...LOL...and I'm innocent (for once) She chose it all by herself.  And I was even polite enough to not point it out (YET)

Wishing you all a nice week with lots of stitching time :)

Getting close...

Getting very close to finishing Amsterdam. Not sure if I make it this month, but I can smell the end!!!

Lately I'm really getting into reproduction samplers and spending  hours of admiring those on other blogs.  Dreaming of having a sampler wall on my own. 
That's why I'm so exited to start  Mary Allen soon, also known as the Village Square Sampler, designed by Samplers Remembered. I'm drooling over this sampler now for quite a while.


And here the fabrics I considered.

From left to right

36 ct Lakeside Linens Vintage Luna

36 ct Lakeside Linens Vintage Cornsilk

36 ct Silkweaver Buttercream

Favorite is right now Buttercream.


To the total amusement of my youngest daughter, I got myself a foot. That girl is daughter of her mother and easy to amuse.  I mean what's a foot more?
And since I'm going to fill the tip of it with lead shots, it will be really a lead foot too.
Here is my new (soon to be lead) foot with half a sock on it.

Update on Frederika

Thank you for all for your encouraging comments about the missing packet. Which has arrived meanwhile. Without even making a trip over Europe. It must have taken a break somewhere...lol. Not complaining here. I'm just so very happy it arrived and didn't get lost.
The new BBD chart called Summer is just lovely. And I can finally go on with the last part of the Mystery sampler as well. But I think this week Amsterdam is calling my name loudly.

Last week I mainly stitched on Frederika, who now has a border. No sign of herself yet.
It's the first  time for me to stitch on 40ct and after a day of getting used to it, it's working out fine. And the NPI silks are gorgeous to work with. Although I won't abandon DMC and other cotton threads completely, I'm pretty sure I will stitch more often with NPI. My husband just hopes that there isn't a new addiction looming. (He might be out of luck though)

Frederika by Carriage House Samplings

Stitched on 40ct Lakeside Linens "Vintage Pearled Barley"

with NPI

Put also a bit time into Amsterdam:

Next to stitching I took up my knitting needles and put couple of rows in a scarf for my daughter, plus started a pair of socks.

Hope everybody has a great time where ever in the world you're situated. Here it's all fine. Spring is on its way and in my garden the daffodils start to flower. Not sure what it is with daffodils, but they always make me happy :)

Frederika

Frederika is my comfort food....sort of. Because I might have lost couple of charts in the mail. (insert pout here): part 3 of the mystery sampler, the newest BBD Summer and a LHN ornament. Lost or landed in Austria. Fingers crossed that it took a trip over Europe.  Oh well, there are worser things in life. Can't think of anything right now off the top of my head, but I'm sure there are. Yes I know I'm a sook...lol.

Edit to add: I'm not in a bad/sad/grumpy  mood, I'm just a tad impatient  as usual 

Instead of grabbing some  more chocolate I decided to stop stalking the poor postie and start something new. I have a basket full of kitted up projects just waiting for me, and the choice fell on Frederika by Carriage House Samplings.

Stitching her on 40ct  Vintage Pearled Barley with the recommended NPI silks. It's my first time using NPI and I love it. That's seriously gorgeous stuff. Almost better then chocolate. Almost.


Getting closer to the finish with Amsterdam....
The houses look whacky on the picture, but they are not. They are really straight. Problem is to get a good picture of a 40" wide piece of linen hanging off the floor stand.

The Red House and some framing

The red house is finished!!!!  And I'm really happy about that.

Amsterdam by Thea Gouverneur

Another thing I'm pleased with  is that I framed two pieces. At first I wasn't overly happy with one of the frames (I ordered both online) but after a while it grew on me and now I do actually like it.
Framing  is less easy then I thought it would be, it took me ages to get the fabric stretched and straight. Finding Vonna's tutorial helped a lot in the end. Still, there is a learning curve involved (it makes now somehow sense why framers ask so much money for it) But never the less, I'm determined to learn and will try it again next time. But only small to medium sized pieces. 

And here they are...

Their Song

by Blackbird Designs

Blessings Be Thine

by Blackbird Designs

And the winner is...

Thank you to everybody who took part in this give away. What an amazing amount of participants.
To draw the winning number I used a number generator on my phone.

And the winner is Carissa !!!!

Congratulations :)

Where my Heart Blooms :)

It's finished!!! Having here a major happy dance and can't wait to go to Melbourne and choose a frame for it.
That was an addictive piece to stitch and I loved every moment we spent together. Tomorrow the chart will start it's travel back to it's rightful home. I'm still so very grateful that Carol allowed me to stitch this beautiful chart. Some stitching friends are really generous.

 Stitched on 32ct Belfast

hand dyed over existing Light Mocha color

using the recommended fibers

I did made couple of changes though.
The Shaker White didn't show off as well as I hoped on the fabric. After playing around with some options I found one that worked well for me. For the flowers I used a single strand of WDW Confederate Grey and did a half cross stitch over the existing one.
The house is stitched as charted but back stitched  with 2 strands of Sage and the roof with 2 strands of Gingersnap.
And I mirrored some of the birds.

Hopefully you're having a great time where ever in the world you are :)

Let's have a give away to celebrate my blogoversary

It's almost my blogoversary!!!  And lets celebrate that shall we?

Because it's party time I'm giving away a gift voucher of $100 to spend at Anita's Little Stitches!!!

Actually of these $100 only $50 will come from myself. The rest is sponsored by Anita herself. How cool is that?

Anita's Little Stitches is one of my favorite online shops.  She has a great assortment of charts, fibers, fabrics, scissors, embellishments and more for pretty good prices. Add to that a great customer service. If you don't know her have a look at her shop here

Here are the rules:
1. Be a follower and comment on this post gives you one entry.
2. Post about it on your blog or website  for a second entry and tell me in a second comment about it. :)
3. Make sure that I have a way to contact you. :)

That's all that there is to it. Good luck and I'm getting out the party hats and bake the cake meanwhile.

The drawing itself will find placeon the 29th of July. Which happens to be the blogoversary itself. :)

Birds of a Feather Part 2 and other things

Here is part 2 of this Mystery sampler all finished up. Although I did change the eyes of the birds a bit. They were meant to be a straight stitch, but somehow that didn't do it for me After frogging and replacing them with French Knots I was happy again. Can't wait for the last part to be released.

For the rest I did mainly stitch on Amsterdam

Lisa stitched for me a gorgeous snowman ornament for an exchange at "Hooked on Exchanging". It's lovely stitched and finished. Lisa stitched a design by SanMan Originals on Summer Sky Jobelan. I love it.

And look at the backside. Isn't that a darling embellishment?

 2 GIVE AWAY'S

Deb is holding a fantastic give away for a Go! Baby. Which is a device I'm drooling about since I first time saw it in action. It is SO fantastic to cut out shapes. I LOVE LOVE LOVE it. . If you want to have a chance of winning it, then hop over to Deb's blog, which is a great blog anyway to visit, no matter if you're after the Go! Baby or not.

If you're a scissor addict or sampler lover like I am, then you should visit Jennifer's blog as well. She's giving a way a fantastic pair of Gingher scissors and also a sampler she designed herself. And her samplers are all looking gorgeous. This give away is dedicated to a little girl, Caylee Anthony.

And lastly I would like to announce that I'm holding soon a give away on my own to celebrate my blogoversary. But details about that another time :)

Wishing everybody a great time :)

Two blooming hearts

Two blooming hearts,that's right. Both are lovely enough to make my heart spitter spatter. Little things can exite me...lol.

First I started "Where my Heart Blooms" by Blackbird Designs and loving it. It's such a lovely design and a pleasure to stitch.

After ordering and waiting for ages for the recommended fabric to arrive I decided I don't like it. So I went into my stash, grabbed some Belfast Light Mocha, made some week coffee and dyed it myself. . Although I'm quite pleased with the result, I hope the white will show off enough. If not, I can backstitch it can't I? At least I'm happy with it...lol


And the next heart IS a blooming heart. Isn't it lovely? I got that heart from Sarah who stitched it for me for the Prairie Schooler Seasonal exchange. I LOVE IT. It's gorgeous, from front and behind.  Receiving this gorgeous heart surely made my day bright. Sarah took the design from PS "Garden Blooms" and the tulip looks just fantastic on the heart. Love that little bee too.

And at last one more thing that made my day. A new flower frog for my scissors. It's not a new one of course, it's an old one, and I was after one just like that for a while. Found it at the other end of the world..in Canada. Featured with some of my newer scissors....