Happy Dance Giveaway

I have finally had my 5th finish of the year and it is one that I have mixed feelings about.  I loved this design when I first saw it and felt that it summarised my marriage to Colin.  Clearly, he didn't and so that is why we are where we are today!  If you are a regular reader, you know what I mean, if not it doesn't matter!

So, that is the reason that I have decided to give away the finished stitching.  I am not going to finish it into anything, you win it as it is. If you would like to have it, please leave a comment telling me why and I will do a random.org thing on 21st April.

Good luck!!!

Wipocalypse 2015

I have signed up for this again this year and hope to make it further through the year than I have previously.  The projects I am going to choose for WIPocalypse this year are ones that I would REALLY like to finish this year.  In no particular order, they are:

1. Honeysuckle Courtyard - Patricia Ann Designs
2. Gardens of London - Chatelaine
3. Oh Christmas Tree - All Through the Night
4. A Place we Call Home - CCN 
5. Halloween Town SAL - The Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery

So that should be enough to get me started!

I would like to make some serious progress on projects this year and be a lot less flittery fluttery with what I stitch.  I think racing to finish Debbie's unicorn last year showed that actually I don't stitch quite as slowly as I thought I did and that when I make an effort to work on just one project I can actually record a decent amount of progress.

Honeysuckle Courtyard

A Place we Call Home

Halloween Town SAL

Gardens of London

Oh Christmas Tree

This is where I am on all my projects at the moment.  Hopefully there will be some progress on each of them this month. 

I think that people probably know about me but if you don't and there is anything you want to, just ask!

Gifted Gorgeousness projects

Our Serendipitous friend, Jo, is hosting a Gifted Gorgeousness SAL this year.  As she notes, we all have received gorgeous gifts, giveaways etc from other stitchers and this SAL is to encourage us to actually stitch them!  Follow the link to her blog to get the full rules.

I have been gifted or otherwise given quite a few things and have pulled some from my stash to work on this year.  Some of these are also going to form part of my DSDUCJC starts too.

I don't have a photo of Penguin Parade but just imagine a line of penguins!  The fabric was gifted to me by Jo.

gifted the chart and button

gifted the chart

gifted the chart

gifted the chart

gifted the chart

gifted the chart

gifted a gift certificate which I used to buy some of the threads

gifted the chart

As Jo is Queen of Shoehorning, I feel quite justified in saying that this fits the Gifted Gorgeousness by being something gorgeous that I will be gifting to Colin's parents in April.  That's my theory...and I'm sticking to it! (edited:  Argggghhhh...just re-read the rules and Jo has already allowed this...rats!)

March Madness - Theme-a-licious update.

Well, it did start off quite well...at least I think it did.  I'm pretty sure I stitched a little on each of these in March but there is absolutely no way on this earth that I managed to do 31 different projects.  That was due to it being assignment time and lots of reading for the module.  I can't wait to have all this free time to stitch!

Joan Elliott - Unicorn

All through the Night - Oh Christmas Tree

CCN - Santa's Village

JBW Designs - A Very Merry Christmas

CCN - A Place we call Home

Nora Corbett - Faerie Spring Fling

HaED - Santa and the mouse

Mirabilia - Touching the Autumn Sky

 

Praying Hands - Footprints

I think I stitched on all of these in March.  Hopefully April will be a bit of an improvement!

Turtle Trot for March

Well this month I have made a bit of progress on the following projects...

A Place we call Home
CCN

On  A Place we call Home I have stitched the 'we' and 'ome' as well as the border to the bottom and right hand side.  I have also done the strange shape to the right of the house and the strange shape to the bottom left as well as the leaves also in the bottom left corner.  It's looking so pretty and I love the pastel colours too.

This is my progress on Midnight Unicorn.  I love stitching this as it is so quick not having to keep on dangling my thread as it doesn't twist like using 2 threads does.

Midnight Unicorn
Durene Jones

This is where Cinderella is at the moment.

Cinderella
Joan Elliott

WIPocalypse 2014 - January

This is my list of projects that I am focusing on as my WIPocalypse stitching.

Cinderella - Joan Elliott

Around the World - Papillon Creations

Cut Thru Stable - Bothy Threads 

Honeysuckle Courtyard - Patricia Ann Designs

Santa's Village - CCN

There is no photo of Honeysuckle Courtyard as it's not started yet.

For anyone who doesn't know me...I am really Sharon, 44 years old from Manchester, UK.  I have 2 kids - Rachael, 14 and Luke, 12.  They are both amazing (most of the time) and I am so lucky that they are 'mine'. I also have 2 demented cats - Biskey and Smudge who rule the roost.  Biskey is a soppy so and so and loves to be curled up on someone's lap.  At night, he sleeps on my feet although he often has more of the bed than I get!

I started stitching in 1995 when I wanted something different for my then boyfriend (now hubby) for our first Valentine's Day together.  I walked past a cake decorating shop every day going to and from work and noticed these cute little cross stitch cards they had.  I went in and the rest is history.

There was no charting for the initials in the middle.  I just decided to do them myself.  Thankfully my stitching has improved a bit since then!!

One thing that I am looking forward to this year is finishing my degree which will then free up around 20 hours a week for housework and jobs round the house stitching.  I am going to make up for the last few years where the coursework has stopped me from enjoying myself.

I have loads of favourite designers so won't bore you with them all.  Just have a look through my WIP's/UFO's list on the right hand side of my blog to see what I am into!  Favourite fabric is jobelan by a mile and discovering Sparklies, Crafty Kitten and Steph's Fabby's has greatly enhanced my fabric stash. 

One thing that I really love doing is being online and reading lots of different stitchy blogs.  There are several people that although I have never met them, I class as friends now who I have met through blogging.  One day I would love to meet up with them all!

Anything else you would like to know, just ask!!

Lovely stitchy post/mail

 I got some lovely stitchy post today.  A few weeks ago I 'discovered' an unknown to me Nora Corbett design from the Cross Stitch and Needlework 2010 Keepsake Calendar - Snow Queen.  A facebook friend very kindly sorted me out with a copy of it and it arrived today!!!!

Just in case you're like me and have obviously been on Mars for the last 3 or 4 years, here is a photo of Snow Queen.  Now I am trying not to start it, but I keep thinking that if I got my backside into gear I could finish it by Christmas...

I have done a little stitching on something I haven't stitched on for a while.  I miscounted the fabric count on this when I started and it has about an inch on the right hand side and slightly more on the left.  I still don't know what I will do when I finish it.  Still how long I have been stitching it, I don't think I need to worry about finishing it just yet.  I plan on working on it at least once a week to get it finished.  It really shouldn't take too long :)

Blue, Smudge, Bradford

No not me!  I've had some stitching time so I'm not blue!  But look at this ↓

Cinderella - Joan Elliott

All I have done in the last 3 days is stitch one of three shades of blue.  It's not even made for half the skirt being done...arrrggggghhhh.

I also decided to pull out Maggie the Messmaker who hasn't seen the light in years.  After about 10 minutes I remembered why - don't like the fabric and don't like the Dimensions threads either.  I think this may have to become a 2 strands a day project if it is ever going to be finished!

Maggie the Messmaker - Dimensions

I also stitched the snow on Santa's House too.  Well technically I stitched, unstitched, re-stitched, re-unstitched and finally re-re-stitched the snow on Santa's House.  I cannot believe what a hash of it I made. So if anyone wants a frog, you can have mine with pleasure.

Santa's House - CCN

The weird cat - aka Smudge - makes a reappearance.  Seriously, this is the position he was in yesterday.  No duct tape or superglue was used.  His rear end was right up the back of the sofa.  He is such a strange one!!

Colin took Rachael and Luke to Bradford a couple of weeks ago.  The went to the National Media Museum which we hadn't heard of before but he found it on Trip Advisor.  It spans 8 floors and they had a brilliant time.  There was a dalek - luckily no one got EX-TER-MIN-ATE'd.

There was one of the sets for The Wombles. (I loved this programme as a child!)

A set from Wallace and Grommit.

Morph!!!!

An Andy Pandy set - who remembers Andy Pandy?

And they both got to read the news in the 'studio' with the autocue.  If you fancy going it is well worth a full day there.  Admission is free but you do have to pay for some of the films they show if you want to see them. There is enough for a full day without the films though!

Belated (for a change) Turtle Trot update

These are the pieces I have worked on for my Turtle Trotting this month.  First up is LK's 6 Fat Men.  The new bit is the blue for his scarf in the top left picture and the writing in the box next to it.

A little bit of progress has been made on Santa's House.

I think that the outline for ATW is new since my last update but I should have checked first really.

A little progress for John Clayton's Racing one.  I ran out of DMC928 though which is a pain - I will just have to put an order in with sewandso.co.uk now ;)