New beading project

I've started a new beading project and today finished the first part of it.

One of these will go on the lid the others are joined together to go round the main body of the apple

And a slightly out of focus close up of one of them (believe me this was the best of a bad lot!)

January Gifted Gorgeousness

Gifted Gorgeousness is a great idea thought up by the lovely Jo over at Serendipitous Stitching to encourge us to use those stash items that have been gifted to us over the years or that we intend to give as a gift (shoehorning is also accepted)

This month I have 3 projects that fit the bill 

First is one you've already seen, the front and back cover of the Quaker Sampler Book that fella gave me for Christmas

Second is a stitching fairy for the RR I'm taking part in, the design is from May 1998 but which magazine it was in I have no idea about so please don't ask!

I finished the fairy Wednesday afternoon so pulled out My Ark to work on, this is for fella's Grandson

Beaded CdC

I've been working on this again for the last few days and have now reached the half way point with it so I'm a happy bunny this evening :)  Fingers crossed it won't take me as long to do the second half.

Victorian Fan

Just a quick post to share the last couple of Friday's progress on Victorian Fan

It's growing slowly

My first beading finish of the year

A very odd thing has just happened as I came to write about my dish.

I went to my blog as normal and clicked on the B in the upper left corner to open my dashboard up and all I got was the Magnificent TW blog, now I can post there as well (I haven't yet) but all the others I can post have vanished :( of course the one I'm most bothered about is this one! Lucky for me there is a create post on the top right or you wouldn't be seeing this right now, fingers crossed it's just a whoops on bloggers end and they will fix it soon.

On to the reason for my post, the first finished beading project of 2017.

Last year a friend made herself a dish just because she could and posted a pic of the finished one on a facebook group we both belong to.   Folks there went nuts over it and she was asked if she would/could write a tutorial for it as a bead a long for this year.

I offered to test bead it for her when the pattern was ready which is was just before Christmas so I set to work and here is the result :)

I wrote a word pattern for it as I went so it took me a little longer than normal but I really enjoyed it and yes little oooops were discovered in the pattern

I've not decided yet if I'll make a second one or not

New starts

My January 1st start is the Quaker Sampler book from Jane Greenoff.

I've been lusting after this for a few years now but never quite had enough ££ to get it :( however fella stunned me at Christmas by gifting it to me to say I was happy is an understatement.

This is the front and back cover of the book 

And because they only took a few days to stitch I started my next project a few days early :)

This one is a DMC kit that's been in my stash a few years, it comes with black aida which I really don't like so I switched it for Fildas from Sparklies

2016 goals report & 2017 goals

For 2016 I said
Keep up with the TUSAL    Done sometimes a little late
Keep up with Gifted Gorgeousness    Done, again sometimes a little late (or with 6 minutes to spare)
Finish Santa's Village   Not even touched it :(
Get my PHD's to 20 or below   No, have the same number I started the year with but at least I've not increased them :)
Finish one project with no start year listed   Not done this one :(
Finish more than I start   No I started and finished the same amount
Finish a TW  No even tho I started 2 of them!
Finiah a Silver Lining Flower   No but I'm not far off
Stitch from my stash as much as I can     I'd say I'm about 60 % successful

For 2017 I'd like to
Keep up with the TUSAL assuming it carries on
Keep up with Gifted Gorgeousness
Finish Santa's Village (I'm fed up of saying this so def going to do it this year!)
Finish more than I start
Get my PHD's to 20 or below (I've been working on getting the number down for 10 years now and I'm doing well as I started with 47!!!)
Finish a TW
Finish a Silver lining flower
Get at least 6 kits stitched from stash


I stitched for 991 hours 21 minutes in 2016 which if you take off the 7 days I didn't stitch at all is about 2 3/4 hours a day, not bad going for someone that's out bowling 3 nights a week all summer.   I started and finished 25 projects which is also the number of PHD's I started both last year and this year with! 25 seems to be number for me this year, Mel turned 25 and I've been stitching for 25 years

December progress & January Goals

For December I said
Order the silk for Alchemical   Yes along with a few other things that fell in my basket but they were all on sale 
Finish Alchemical   Done
Work on hexie flowers   Done
Get the beaded gifts/ornaments done    Done apart from my one
Finish something else    I finished 2 other projects
Sell some stash   No I was far to busy 

For January I'd like to
Start the Quaker book I got for Christmas
Not go mad with new starts
Get my RR done
Work on hexie flowers
Sell some stash

I had a good month in December with 93 hours 24 minutes of stitching time a far chunk of which was in the last 10 days or so while I worked towards finishing projects.   I had no new starts and 4 finishes one of which was a model and I stitched every day

Current PHD total = 25
PHD = Potential Happy Dance