This and That!

On stitchy news, i have not completed the November month yet, i have a wee bit of one pumpkin and the text 'November' to stitch. Apart from that I am going crazy with the confetti stitches in the Lilies - am doing about 70-80 each night.

I received my eBay US parcel - after the payment hassle that my friend helped me clear. This was the kit that i won - the Dimensions Flowery Verse Stamped Cross Stitch kit.

I am yet to receive an eBay UK kit. I had bought this before my October vacation, and had requested the seller to delay the shipping for a week:( It so happened that there was a postal strike in the UK from 21st(I think) October till 5th November. So even with 15 plus days after the strike, the parcel still remains elusive. But this is what i am supposed to get, and i hope and hope and pray and pray that i recv it in my mail box. Pls wish me luck.

With this, i complete my eBay shopping for a WHILE now, of course there is another deal i was discussing with (which again the very same firend is helping me pay) an 123 MB member.

On the local shopping front;-), I am busy going through some mobile handsets. My current one (a Nokia old model i dont recall the number and the handset does not have it written on it) wants a break it says - at least the batter life is close to nil. I was almost 'locking' onSony Ericcson W595(for the camera and 3G features), but understand it cannot stand my son's treatment!! So now, i am looking at sturdy Nokia. When i am going for 3G, i might as well go for QWERTY keyboard right? That narrows down my search to 5?! models and the only handset that appeals to my eye is Nokia E71. I will have to live with lesser multimedia features (in E71) or take Nokia N79 which has good camera as well as 3G, but without QWERTY. Decisions, decisions!!

A Retro Post!!

One of my very early posts was about my lack of luck with Retro Kitchen Aprons cross stitch kit. You can read about it here. I had won myself this kit at a very good deal, but i was unlucky with the shipping. By God's grace, I was luckier with the seller though as she (truly an Angel) refunded the money.

That happened early this year. And then onwards, i have been checking in ebay diligently for a good deal. Either the bid was above my budget or the shipping rates were too high, every SINGLE time, so i was (m)uttering 'Pass' on each occasion. Each day, i do an ebay search for my wish list items. They keep changing, i know, but the first three searches are always the REGULAR ones!! And RKA was the first in my search.

As you know, for little over a fortnight now, i have been facing problems with Paypal. While i know i will not be able to buy these items, my daily 'search' regimen continued without fail. And then i see an auction (last Friday) for RKA *and* it is a US-only auction with a Buy It Now rate as well. I almost cry when i see US-only auctions. But this time round, i knew it was one and the same be it world-wide or US-only. I cannot PAY. Period. I then think (prolly for 10 seconds which is a shame), and then email my brother (in the US) about this auction and my current lack of luck with Paypal. And in the evening (of last Friday) i get the most sought-after email response of the day. He says done. Well he has typed 'Done dana done'!!! so you can apply your favourite tune to that:8)

The once-bitten-twice-shy sis waits for an email that says 'received'. Yes, i am in a relaxed and happy state as i type this post now, and thanks to my Dear Brother, i have another item in my stash, although still not in my hands:) Tra la la...

Thanks to all of you who take time to leave me comments, I love them. They are my stash too, thank you:)

Becoming Jane

On one of those rare moments of watching TV, i saw 'Becoming Jane' - from the cricket match onwards, on Sunday. I stopped watching when the 'elopement' part was being aired though. Somehow, i did not feel right. That cannot be Austen, i thought and made a note to myself to check it up in wiki. Well, now that i have checked wiki, it looks like i could have watched it till the end:( *groan* The chemistry between Austen and LeFroy was great, although i would have prefered someone else (similar-looking to Austen) playing Austen to Anne Hathaway.

Never mind, i can still give this a try (apart from being lucky again with the movie being aired again on TV) - read the book, Becoming Jane by Jon Spence on which the movie is based. The book is based on the letters Jane wrote to her sister Cassandra. Now this is one other project that i should take up - there are FAR too many books out there that are Austen-related. I know there are innumerable sequels to Austens' works and also fiction that connect to Austen. What i would like to do is do some internet research on both the varieties, and pick up the most near-to-Austen sequel of P&P, and pick up a couple of the latter. The Lost Memoirs of Jane Austen is one book that i wanted to buy - but could not get a copy of. Today i checked the ratings in amazon (7 1-star ratings though out of 56 reveiws, i do not like that) and not sure if i should still buy it. Probably not. If you are a Jane Austen fan/addict(!!!), do let me know your favorite Austen-based work, and i will look that up. Thanks in advance.

My immediate action item is to read (courtesy internet) her letters to Cassandra and derive my own meaning:D

Mid-Month Milestone

Here is my current look on the work-in-progress OHD January SAL. I had slightly changed my rotation plan - and decided will stitch OHD in my weekends in the November month. So i have completed both September and October in the past two weekends! I have brought in my own colors for both as you can see. This pic ( just luck and not my art) is probably the best of the OHD that i have taken so far. I had a lot of 'do and undo and some more' for the witch's face, finally settled with this:

If you can see at the top, there is a line of cross stitch - well i am gonna remove that, i have something else up my sleeve wrt this coverlet. But the time is not yet ripe for that! You can also see my toes (how did you get in there) and the very end of the foot rug(you too?).

I know! it has been AGES since my [mid-month] milestone of the lilies, so here is how she looks so far after 15 nights of stitching. You can also see the blue pillow cover which covers the top stitched row to protect the finished portion from dust. My calculator says i am about 30% done for the page and 27% done overall.

I had put in a PIF post couple of weeks back. Unfortunately there were no responses in the expected way?? So i am thinking i will still go with '3' ppl as mentioned in my post and do a surprise thingy. I will choose the 3 ppl myself from my circle of stitchy friends. More about that in another post!

My 'one of a kind' Lifetime Projects!!!

I was going thr the 123 MB, and found a post abt Herschners shipping code, and then just for the fun of it went through their weekly sale items. I find here something that catches my eye and yes, heart:) This Cut Thru item is being sold as a leaflet only and is a very good deal for those in the US. As for me, I am putting some sense in my own head, that even if I could buy this (say if Herschners had 3d secure!!) i still could not manage the international shipping charges anyway.

I had seen the Bothy Threads cross stitch kits in some or the other UK website, and well, i still find them too darn expensive to buy.. But i cant help drooling on this one... Amanda Loverseed is the designer for their Cut Thru kits, and i am loving all her designs!! The dictionary series are also cute, although no designer name(s) is mentioned.

I hope i do ONE Bothy Thread, and mostly it will be a Cut Thru design and that too the above one - in THIS lifetime. What say you!!! Let me list down what other 'One of a kind' stitchy things i want to do in this lifetime, apart from my [staple] stash of course, LOL. Here they are:

1. One cross stitch afghan
2. One quilt each for son, husband
3. One BOTHY THREAD work
4. One Applique project of Ganesha
5. One VERY INDIAN Cross stitch
   

The water lilies BAP that i am doing is a 'One of a kind'. It is in fact my very FIRST lifetime project!! Couple of these - 1 and 2 for instance - are very very nascent ideas. 3, 4 and 5 are in different stages of evolution. 3 most likely will be the haberdashery...

4 will be based on an oil painting of Ganesha that must have been displayed in the art exhibition. The painting appeared on the card (post card size that too!) that was in our mailbox intimating us of an art exhibition!! I never went to that exhibition. It is my LIFETIME wish to replicate that in applique. I have stored it in my closet somewhere, and need to bring it out for inspiration:)

As for 5, I still do now know what i want to stitch : landscape or painting or monument or people. All i know is when i see it, i will know. And in all probabilities, i might have to chart it myself using PCStitch or similar.

Adrenaline Rising!!

Here is the most recent cross stitch picce that pulled my heartstrings, LOL. This is from Just Nan. It reads 'In my little kingdom of stitches that cross, i am Queen of the Needle and Boss of the Floss...'. I am luvvving the words, and the pattern is also so beeeutiful.

I have seen this in couple of blogs, but somehow this caught my HEART just now. Yesssss, Just Nan Just Now!!!

You can choose to ignore the below Online Payment Rant
Further updates i have are that

=> Ebay India and Paisa Pay *have* the payments done via 3d Secure i.e. Verified by Visa and / or MasterCard SecureCode. This was effective sometime in September

=> Ebay UK also has a deadline of end of the year to get all the merchants 3d secure-enabled. You can read more about that here:

What i still cannot understand is why Ebay USA or Paypal.com are ignoring what i am talking about? Why does it appear that they have not heard about 3d Secure??? Any guesses?

Moving on...

for the time being that is. I have sorted out two of the three payments with help from my friend, for the third i am awaiting the seller to be back from vacation.

It really takes away the stress i had the past week. I have got to work on how to break through this impasse. But when you have asked for help and complained to FIVE different bodies, and have not got ANY way out, then you only have to wait right?

The FIVE bodies (in the order in which i approached or complained to them)

1. Paypal Customer Support

2. The bank that issued my credit card

3. Ebay Support (and their Answer Center)

4. Master Card Secure group

5. Reserve Bank of India

I have now put in a request in couple of message boards where i am a member, if i can at least get a list of popular websites where i can get GC's (Amazon and 1-2-3 stitch are *not* enabled with Verified by Visa or MasterCard SecureCode). At least i can offer GC's to ppl who have their charts/kits for sale. Of course ebay is no longer my shop:( ... for now. So, if you have an answer to this, please, please leave a comment on this post.

I am not upset, i guess - coz ebay has its India arm that works out the payment bit with PaisaPay. Ebay will either have to sort out this payment authentication on their site OR stop having Ebay India OR give us some workable solution:) Yes that is why i am not upset, and did i tell you i have a lot of patience:)

Also check this blog here - there have been a handful of complaints here as well. Tells me i am not alone. So like i said, it is only a matter of time.

I had put in a PIF post, so if you are interested pls leave a comment in that post.

A PIF and 2 PICs

Here's my first Bloggy PIF moment!! If you would like to receive a PIF from me, do comment on this post!! This is so easy. No sewing involved, and you get 365 days to send out your PIF's :) The "rules" are as follows:
1. Send no less than 5 stitching related items per person within the next 365 days.

2. Items can be DMC, other threads, stitching needles, straight pins, buttons, scissors, ribbons, etc. - a combination of items such as 3 threads, 1 pack of straight pins and 1 pack of stitching needles or just 5 threads.

3. Items must be new and not used. (Send things you'd be happy to receive.)

4. If you win, you must be willing to post this PIF on your blog and do the same for at least 2 people.

If you are interested in Paying It Forward, please comment on this post with your email address so that I can contact you. I will PIF three readers. If there are more than three comments, the names will go into a drawing to determine the lucky ones :) I hope there are more than three comments to this post!! Good luck! I'll announce the PIF recepients on the 14th which is celebrated as Children's Day in India. Each of us is a child inside, dont you agree? Let us see who the 3 lucky children are!!

Here is some history behind 'paying it forward' in this link from wikipedia - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pay_it_forward.

Here are my progress pics - I worked a lot many nights on Frederick this month after completing page 5 of lilies that is. I wish i had completed the bird as well, but that was not to be. Had a lot of black on black to do that took a lot of time than expected. Now i will have to check if i get time end of December to work on this project. Most likely no, as there will be guests at our place during Christmas time. Let us see. My rota plan went off kilter, so there is only BOINK that i worked on this month. On the first weekend of October, i did not have the OHD September printouts ready, so took up BOINK; the next weekend i did not stitch as my parents left:( and i was feeling very low; the weekend after was Diwali so no stitching only cleaning:8) and then Sat night i left to my parents'; and *sigh* the next weekend was spent in office on BOTH days; that gave me this weekend only and i spent that on BOINK. As i said earlier, i also stitched BOINK when on vacation for my night-time stitching, LOL. Sorry did you raise your eyebrows reading this?

I am thinking i will stitch on OHD in November and AT in December. So they know there was no discrimination!

Last night, i took up Page 6 of Lilies. Stiched 110 crosses:) Just to prepare you for the pic this mid-month - because of how dirty the fabric was getting, courtesy my Mother the finished row is now covered (running stitch) with a pillow cover, the portion below the 'row being stitched' is covered with another pillow cover. I probably have to wash the fabric after completing the project, but with these covers, i am minimising the dust gathering on the lilies. This explanation was just to keep you prepared!!

The CC problem still exists, i have now placed a question with the ebay Answer Center.