Manchester show and stitching update.

Well I went to the Manchester Show and it was rubbish! There were only 3 or 4 stands selling cross stitch items. The rest was mainly card craft. I did spend a pleasant 10 minutes speaking to a lady about her Japenese embroidery which was amazing. Have a look here to see some of their work. In the end, I only picked up a few bits and bobs from Trudy Anne Designs. There were lots of stitched models of L*K, CCN, LHN and others in the same vein. I absolutely adored all the LHN and CCN and I can now see why they have such a huge following. I succumbed and bought one for now but have a couple on order too. I also bought some double sided tape, card for the children, 4 little plastic craft boxes and 2 ribbons. The charts are LHN - Snowflakes, The Trilogy - Gardening and L*K - Winter Crazy.

Yesterday, when Rachael was at her party, I finished this teddy design into a glitzy ornament for her. I had bought some pretty ribbon but she preferred the tinselly look.
I also received the mount for Colin's Sunday Cricket from Smartart-mounts. I was really pleased with this. They sell on ebay but didn't have what I wanted. However, the guy got back to me with a price for it being custom made which was really good. £6 including packing and postage. Well when it arrived yesterday it was in a jiffy bag with about 2 metres of bubble wrap round it and sandwiched between 2 generous sized pieced of mount to protect it. The mount was absolutely perfect and one piece of mount board packing was easily cut to the right size to lace the design to. I was so pleased with their service!

WE'VE GOT SNOW!!!

OK, ok ok, I admit it.............where you come from this may not be much.................but for us it is the most snow we have had in 13 years according to the local radio station this morning. I measured it tonight and we have 2"..........that's right...........a whole 2"!!!! WOOOHOOOO!!

I told the children to not bother with their homework tonight. Neither of mine have ever handed homework in late so I decided not to worry tonight. For how often we actually get snow, I thought a bit of snow fun was far more important!! We built a snowman and had a few snowball fights, Rachael made a snow angel and so a good time was had by all (and it was much more fun than putting spellings into sentences!)

One of our cats, Smudge, decided he rather likes snow too and came out for ages. I didn't think he would like it as he hates the wind and I thought that would put him off. Biskey was very funny though. He sat by the patio doors, on the inside, trying to catch the snowflakes but when we opened the doors so he could do it for real, he ran off upstairs. Silly animal!

Oh and on the stitching front, I started and finished a little Mouseloft kit yesterday for February's ornament. I haven't yet finished it as an ornament.

How does your garden grow part10

I have finished part 10 of this now with the exception of the beading. As part 11 sits in the middle, I thought it safer to leave the beading until this was done too.

At the moment it is trying its hardest to snow. I keep hoping but not much is happening and the little bit we have is not enough to settle.........grrrrr!

My mum's friend is getting married next year and she has asked if I will make a ring cushion for them. There are some lovely designs there but I haven't quite found the perfect one yet! I would like some fabric swatches really so I can get a better idea about their colour scheme and preferences for the theme.

Giveaway - Manchester cross stitch show ticket

Just a very quick post.

I have won tickets for the Manchester cross stitch show next weekend. I will be using one ticket but if anyone would like the other one please leave a comment below. First to reply gets it!! I will need you to email me your snail mail details and it can be in the post that day. The ticket is valid for any of the 3 days (Friday, Saturday or Sunday)

CSC Stitchathon

This week has been the CSC SAT (what a lot of initials there!!). I have worked on the Cotswold design from Cross Stitch collection this time. In fact I think this is going to be my SAT project this year as I want to get a good chunk of it done by December. I know I should start from the middle but I don't have a frame big enough for this one so I am stitching it in hand. If I start from the left, I don't have to hold the fabirc anywhere I have already stitched. (Yes, I'm a leftie!) The whole design is 30" x 8" when finished. When I started this week I had stitched 0.5% of the design, now I have stitched 6%.

This is my before SAT...............
..........and this is after. I have given up on the SAT now despite today being the last day. I MUST do some of my coursework. I am absolutely thrilled with the progress this week although I was missing a few threads which is why there are a lot of gaps in the stitching. I have been very fortunate to have some of the kids activities cancelled which naturally equals more stitching time!! I don't suppose I can be that lucky every month!

I just wanted to say thanks for all the offers of help for finding the TW chart. I am hoping that something is sorted for it now but if not, I may be taking you up on your kind offers.

Teresa Wentzler design help needed

I'm sorry for the begging post but I have seen a design that I have fallen in love with and NEED! It was discontinued YEARS ago and the only place I have found it is an ebay seller in US who will only ship within the US. If anyone knows anywhere I can get it or anyone else that is selling it or has it to trade, I would be ever so grateful if you could let me know. (edited to add - I suppose it helps if I tell you the pattern. It's TW's Floral Bellpull)

On the stitching front, not a lot has been happening lately. What with the children back to their activites now the holidays are over and trying to get some coursework done too, there doesn't seem to be much time. I have been working on How does your Garden grow and am about halfway or maybe a bit more through part 10.

This week is the CSC stitchathon and I am going to work on the Cotswold design for the week. The before picture is in my post for my yearly goals a bit further down the page and I will post after pics next weekend.

Luke had his Beaver's belated Christmas party last night. His Beaver's group closed down a while before Christmas but the leaders decided to organise something so that all the children could get together again. We had a really lovely night with lots of games organised for them and a lovely buffet. Luke is adament that he doesn't want to join another Beaver group and we are currently fighting to get the group reinstated.

Sparklies fabric arrived

I ordered a couple of pieces of Sparklies fabrics the other day after seeing them on the blog. They arrived yesterday and are gorgeous. They feel like they will be really nice to stitch with. I only ordered the small cuts of 9 x 13 as I wanted to try them before committing to a bigger piece. The 4 I ordered are Thalia, Shades of Autumn, Pumpkin Patch and Fire. The service was great, with lots of communication at every stage of my order. I was impressed to receive it so promptly and would highly recommend using them.

Also today, I finished part 9 of "How does Your Garden Grow?" Only 3 more parts to complete now. I have decided to focus on this now until it is completed.

Oh dear.......I have been BAD today!

Well actually you can blame my hubby for this one. A while ago, I left my gluegun on the side in the kitchen to cool down. he didn't move it before cooking dinner and burnt the lead. As I thought it probably wasn't a very good idea to use it, it got binned. I had forgotten this and when I came to make up my ornie this morning spent half an hour searching before the penny dropped. A quick trip to Hobbycraft was called for as theirs were on special offer at the moment. To cut a long story short, I ended up buying a new gluegun, sticks, backing fabric, felt, mountboard, 5 Mouseloft kits, some new DMC perfume threads and some stitchbows. Ooooops!

Ok, I admit it...............it was my fault for leaving the gun there after it cooled and I deserve to go without. TOO LATE!!

My mum gave us a Wii and some games as a family present this year. Rachael was doing absolutely rubbish at bowling, getting really upset because she couldn't do it. After a little gentle coaching in how to change the angles etc she managed to get 8 strikes on the trot. WOW. Her final score was 267. I'm not playing HER again..........lol. This is a screen shot of her 8th strike.

Anyway, whilst she was busy annhililating her brother, I was in the kitchen finishing off the ornie I stitched last night and here it is............

(Mine's the Christmas Tree not the angel!!) That's January's ornie stitched and finished.
Well I suppose I had better think of something nice for tea to sweeten hubby up a bit.........lol.

Woohoo...........first finish of 2009

This afternoon I got a little stitching time and as I still don't have my light until I get my stitching corner back (tree comes down on Saturday, so normality will be restored). Anyway, I thought it would be easier to stitch something on white aida to ease the stress on the eyes. I started a little Mouseloft Christmas Tree kit. It was a very quick stitch, probably taking about 3 hours including backstitch. Tomorrow I will make it up into an ornament but the decision then is do I put it on the tree for a day or put it away safely for next Christmas?

WIP and new start pics for 2009 - part 2

This is the second part of my WIP's and starts for 2009.

This flower and bear card has really naff floss with it. In fact I think it would be nicer stitching with tooth floss than this so I plan to frog it and start over with some DMC.

These are some of my new starts for 2009. The 2 mouseloft kits would make cute ornies and the unicorn card is for my good friend's birthday in November. Summer in Sussex will be my first 3D kit and looks fun.

This unicorn design will also be for Debbie's birthday but I need to change the colours as she wants it in blue and not pink.