Hectic month with not much stitching!

Sorry it has been so long without an update from me but I have been cat sitting for my parents and they are not very good stitching buddies as they will ignore me until I pick it up and then once in my hand they are desperate for attention. But you have to forgive them as they are very cute 

So now to update on what progress I have actually made

Firstly on my HAED, this project I find very strange as I can either get lots done in one sitting or not much done in a whole week, so a weeks progress can be done in one evening rather than spread over a few days.

Then:                                                              Now:

I only have about 1400 stitches to go to get to the end of the page so fingers crossed I can finish before the end of the month!

next i have also been working on my unicorn as it is a lot easier with the cats to work on something in hand rather than set up my stand for the HAED. I had put this away again as I hated stitching with the DMC metallic thread it was horrible to use and kept splitting, it was only when I watched a Youtube video did I realise that metallics were not all equal in quality and that other stitchers found DMC to be particularly bad. Because of that I decided to but the kreinik equivalent threaads and I find it a lot better to stitch with... its not easy but compared to DMC it is almost perfect

Then:                                                                Now:

 

thats all from me for now, will try to get a couple more updates before I go on holiday in a little over 3 weeks 

TTFN and happy stitching x

 

Finally got to start!

Hi Guys

So this weekend I finally got to start "So many books so little time" By Randal Spangler.

As promised here is where I have left Siberian gold as I packed it away on Saturday, It may go into a rotation at some point but for now it is being put away so I can focus on So many books!

I know I have gone on about this project since I got the chart but finally I have begun stitching :) on sunday I finished charting 2/3 of the fabric after finally completing my baby blanket. And set myself up to work on Monday as it was the bank holiday weekend here in the UK

So after about 3/4 hrs of stitching on monday I managed 500 stitches, I think the is quite successful considering it is the first time I have worked on such a small count.

I decided to use 1 over 1 on the 25ct as I think it gives nice coverage and the 2 over 1 test I did seemed very bulky and difficult to stitch, as this will be a labour of love I wanted it to be enjoyable rather than a tough stitch!

Yesterday after I came home from work I managed a couple more hours work and managed a little under 500 stitches, after working in 10x10 blocks on the sunday I decided to try working in 20x20 blocks and it works up really nicely and is easier to stick to than the 10x10 blocks. 

I also stitched the first row up to the edge of the first page as the 2 colours were only needed on the row, and this was easier and neater than parking 

At the end of Day 2 this is what I have

The sad thing is I got very excited that I can now see the edges of the first brick, but if the small things keep me happy Im sure that the project will be enjoyable :)

I also added to my stash, I got to kits from Hobbycraft that I love and couldnt resist when they had their half price sale :)

On that note I will love you and leave you :)

Happy stitching 

  

   

More crochet than stitching!

Hi Guys,

so last week incorporated both WIPocolypse day and IHSW but to be honest I was more focused on my crochet than my cross stitch as I wanted to finish the baby blanket.

Well good news :) the main stitching is finished!

So all that is left is to sew in the ends, which I did half of last night so just half to go, and then I need to wash it!

This has definitely been my favourite thing that I have crocheted since I began a little under a year ago and I love the look and colour of it :) Now I just need to wait a month before I can give it to my work colleague and I hope she loves it as much as I do!

So stitching wise I have done very little and hardly picked it up since last monday, I will be focusing on it more tonight and I am hoping to put Siberian gold away for a while and start on "So many books" at the weekend as I will then have finished 2 projects as promised to my OH. 

I will post an update on how Siberian gold looks before I put it away and I am sure that I will work on it a little at times to give me relief from the HAED confetti!

Happy crafting :) 

Lots of change!

So last week I told you that I had got myself a seat stand as I wanted everything to be set up for when I start "So many books so little time" and I wanted to test it out one Siberian gold to see if I like it. 

Well the answer is that I love it, it makes stitching so much easier and I am more comfortable as I dont have to hold the frame anymore :-)

In just a couple of hours the first day I had it this was my progress of Siberian Gold :-)

I managed all of the blue and a little of the grey!

So I am now a big fan of stands :-)

My second change is my method of stitching... with my HAED after gridding the fabric I realised that stitching one colour at a time as I have been doing with Siberian gold was not going to work unless I  only stitched one page at a time, but the idea of digging through the piece towards the end of every page filling in the confetti was not so appealing. As I want this project to be perfect I decided to research different methods and discovered "Parking" Inititally I was skeptical and thought that it looked messy (I hate when my stitching looks disorganised - a major reason that I remove threads from presorted kits onto bobbins is I dont like the threads being tangled) But I thought there was no harm in having a go... if I hated it then I hadnt lost anything than maybe a couple of hours.... so on friday I had a go starting in the top left corner of Siberian gold

After an evening of stitching I had done about 200 stitches, slowly but then I was using a method that was very different from my usual stitching... I enjoyed it but wasnt completely convinced...

So on saturday morning I set myself up to give it another go, I decided that if I didnt love it after that then I would leave it and go back to one colour at a time, so I started stitching at about 9am and after a few hours I decided to stop for something to eat... I was amazed to see that 4 hours had passed and that I had been so completely absorbed in my stitching, the parking was a lot quicker and with every 10x10 block I was eager to move on to the next... it was so addictive and there was a small sense of achievement with every block... this was the progress on saturday.

So now I am a very different stitcher than the one who began this blog in February, back then I was a one WIP at a time stitcher who enjoyed working one colour at a time... now I have multiple projects and love the parking method... seems strange that it has happened so quickly. 

So my progress so far after another stitch fueled day yesterday is almost 1500 stitches in 3 days... for me that is huge and I cant wait to get back to it... Roll on the weekend :-)

For the rest of the week I will be focusing on my crochet and getting as much as I can done on the baby blanket. 

The sooner I get it finished the sooner that the OH will let me start So many books... also the baby is due in June so I need to get it finished by the end of the month. 

Happy stitching all x

I have a finish :-)

Hello my lovely bloggers :)

So yesterday I had another finish :) The excitement of having 2 finishes so far this year is great, I have loved all the stitching and crochet this year and it is showing with how much I am getting done.

My finish was the kittens in mugs piece:

This is what is was like when I last spoke about it on 22/04/2014

An this was the finished piece yesterday after being ironed:

And I love it so much every time I look at it it makes me smile... I love all the little details and though it may seem silly my favorite part to stitch was the little bumble bee as it finishes off the piece perfectly :-)

Another reason I am excited is that I am now 1 step closer to being able to start my first HAED. I promised my OH that I would finish at least 2 of my current projects before I started it and this is the first. I also plan to finish the baby blanket which seems to be taking quite a while atm... I just need it done by mid june. 

Another reason for me to be excited is that today the final threads for my HAED arrived :) so I need to spend a little time sorting through them tonight.

My seat stand also arrived this morning and I cant wait to test it out :-) after a long time searching the web I decided to go for the Elbesee 10" Seat frame. 

Finally I decided to also buy a magnifier to help when I start my HAED... I have always thought that I have very good eye sight and I have never felt the need to have a magnifier before however after spending several nights gridding the 25ct fabric for my HAED I have realised that a magnifier will definitely help and hopefully stop me getting eye strain. 

Happy stitching 

x

Happy Easter and April IHSW

Hello again, 

I hope you all had a lovely Easter, it was lovely for me to get the time off with my OH as we actually got to spend 4 days together. Our usual weekends together are only the Sunday as the OH teaches martial arts on Saturday mornings so he is up at 7am. We were able to enjoy a day of shopping, visiting family and some downtime =) YAY for a long weekend!

So IHSW this month amazingly landed on Easter weekend which for us in the UK is a 4 day weekend =) this meant that despite all the jobs and plans we had this weekend I still had lots of time to stitch.

So the first thing I did was finish off the second kitten from Kittens in Mugs...he needed a face and some backstitching =)

Then on Friday while tidying and organising my craft stuff I found an old cross stitch that I began in 2010. This was only my 3rd ever project and I fell out of love with it, but when I took t out I realised how close I was to finishing it so it has now moved from an UFO for a WIP =) The design is Unicorn by DMC

This was how it looked on Friday:

And after a weekend of this being my main IHSW project this is where I left it last night:

I also worked on a crochet blanket for a friend from work who is having a baby, this is where I have got to on that:

So all in all I have had a very productive IHSW, its just a shame that every weekend cant be the same 

Happy stitching x

April WIPocolypse

Hi Guys

So its time for a WIPocolypse update, so as I said in my first post I was a one project at a time kinda girl, well this is a lie now, all you wonderful bloggers have given me an itch for new starts and so I have actually started a new project this month rather than work on Siberian Gold. But I have promised myself that I will only have 2 cross stitch projects on the go at a time and a couple of crochet projects. That way I wont have to ignore one hobby to do the other.

So here is what I have been working on :-)

Its my Kittens in mugs cross stitch that I got from Ebay about a month ago and it is soooooo cute...I love the expression on the little ginger cat. Once finished this will make its way to my desk in work and it will make me smile to myself. This is such a simple stitch and I am treating each kitten as a finish which is unusual for me as I generally prefer to complete each colour in the whole piece. 

This months topic is how do you keep your stash organised?

Unfortunately no picks as I forgot to take them this morning so I may try to add the pics tomorrow

I have recently decided to try out Bobbins and storage boxes as even though I am working with kits at the moment I want to get into good habbits for when I eventually try to undertake a HAED. I also moved to Bobbins as my ability to spread my crafts around the house is quite impressive (and drives my OH insane). I really like them as it is nice and  compact and I dont worry about the threads getting tangled on thread organisers (I know some prefer these but I'm not the neatest of people so sometimes I have ended up with a knotted mess)

My projects and future projects I store either on the old music stand I talked about in my last post or inside the foot stool. My crochet/knitting projects are all stored in reusable fabric bags/in boxes and all of these are dotted around the house depending on where I last stitched...I really need a craft room!!

Happy stitching and I hope you all enjoy a lovely Easter weekend :-)

Something a little different

Hi again,

So this last week as been a little stressful and very busy with work, which is not very god for my stitching as I was just too tired by the end of the day and wanted to do nothing but sleep! But although it was bad for my stitching I did pull out my crochet again and worked on a shawl that I started at Christmas. I find that I do not need to focus so much on the crochet and so it is good for the days I am too tired to stitch =D

This is a close up of the shawl, its using the crocodile stitch which I self taught myself from YouTube videos =D

The pictures done quite show the colour properly as it is a little more purple than the picture shows and has small flecs of red and blue. The wool is Sirdar Hayfield Aran Tweed.

Im having to leave it for now as I need to order more wool, unfortunately crocodile stitch is a bit of a wool eater and although it ooks quite big in the pictures it doesn't wrap comfortably wound the shoulders yet. I am also planning to add a fringe  to the bottom alternating purple and cream, I hope it will look as good as it does in my head =D

TTFN!  

IHSW discovery

So on Friday I discovered IHSW oh and I had so much fun :-) a weekend dedicated to stitching

Saturday and sunday mornings were full of happy stitch time and TV catch up and I got lots done.

I worked solely on Siberian Gold and for my efforts I finished off the rest of the lighter orange colour on the second tiger

Before:

After

I also did a little of the half stitch on the sky but I didnt take a photo of this, I decided to do some easy stitching for a while and fill in some of the background as half stitch is lots quicker.

Now I just need such a weekend for my crochet and I will be flying though all my crafts :-)

Happy stitching x

March WIPocolypse

oooooh lucky people I'm updating my blog again :) 

So I kinda forgot about the full moon update on WIPocolypse (I know silly right)

So this months topic is about our stitching spots so this is mine 

As you can see its got everything I need. On the arm of my chair I have scissors, pencil for marking my chart and the remote control for the TV or DVD player :) 

I then have my pattern and frame (when im not stitching) sitting on an old music stand its perfect as I can't afford to buy a real stitching stand at the moment. On the foot stool I have all my threads and my other little stitching project  and I have a little table close by for my cuppa while enjoying my stitching time. 

Happy stitching xx

Building up stash

Hi again

So I have been a little lax on the stitching this week as I have been away and just not had the time to do any crafting. I have however been building up my stash. I am relatively new to the world of cross stitching and so I have only worked on kits and one at a time. But since reading lots of lovely blogs I have seen so many charts that I just love!!!

So in the last month I have been busy buying

First I got a lovely little Winnie the Pooh calender

I just love it and it is so cute, as I dont have any children I dont know who I will stitch it for but I love it anyway so it may just stay in my stash for a few years. 

Next I got a cute little piece that I will stitch and frame for my desk in work 

I love cats and I am a tea fanatic so this is the perfect little piece for myself. 

I have also got myself a few patterns, these will be the first that I kit up myself so I have a lot to learn and wont work on these for a while. I also dont want to start them until Siberian Gold is finished as I dont think I could cope with 3 very large projects on the go at the same time. 

The first was a free pattern of the exploding Tardis. this is perfect as both myself and OH love Doctor Who and my favourite artist is Van Gough so the style is perfect :) 

 The final pattern is a Heaven and Earth Design. Oh how dangerous it was for me to find this site I am in love with so many particularly all of the Randal Spangler designs. The hard part was a/ only buying 1 and b/ deciding which to buy. I finally settled on 'So many books so little time' 

I LOVE this pattern it is so full of fun and as I am an avid reader too it just sings to me. For now I it saved on my computer but one day I will begin stitching and I will be in my happy little bubble =D

Finally I have begun working up my stash of floss, oh how I love ebay, I have had a lovely little time bidding on lots of bulk lots of thread and have got over 400 skeins for less than £30. I have yet to sort them and see what I have multiples of but definitely the nest way to build up a stash quickly and cheaply =D 

I will update again soon 

Happy stitching x

Mini project

Hi again

So I haven't done much stitching on Siberian gold as I have been quite busy over the last week or so but I did finish a mini-cross stitch for my OH

He loves Giraffes and as he has recently started to read more I thought it was the perfect little gift for him. This is only the second small stitch I have done (This first being a squirrel card when I first started to learn to cross stitch) and I just loved how quickly it came together, it only took me 2 days to stitch and I really enjoyed how quickly it grew and progressed :) 

Maybe I will do a couple more small projects this year just so I can get the satisfaction of a finish as Siberian grows. Just so I don't get too bogged down thinking I will never get a finish :)

That's all for today but I hope you like my little Giraffe bookmark :)

WIPocalypse

Hi guys so I have joined the WIPocalypse 2014 and so thought I would combine the Jan and Feb topics now and then follow the full moon updates from here on in :-)

As for an introduction I think I covered it all in my previous post so there is not much to add.

So now onto my projects in a little more detail. As I said in my last post my current WIP is called Siberian gold it is a kit from Anchor that I started around  a year ago, but have not been stitching solidly. I only decided to photograph the piece when I picked it up again in the new year... This is what I had then

Since then I have progressed quite a bit and I have noticed that I have a very different stitching style to others in that I like to stitch all of one colour and look at the larger picture, this means that there is a lot more counting and also the risk of more mistakes early on but I love the way it slowly builds up over time and seeing what Im stitching from early on..Here is my progress to date. 

My aim for the year is to progress this project as much as I can, I dont think that It will be finished but we will see how much I get done :-) 

On to February's topic....

Number of projects .... Until recently I have been a one project at a time person, but that is because I have always jumped into the large projects and didnt really spend much time on small projects... this is typical for me, I jump in head first and then try often find myself too deep, but enjoy the challenge...however with a little extra funds I have been able to buy a few more kits and so this weekend I started and completed a bookmark for my other half, it was nice to do something quick for once and so I can see myself in the future being happy to have 1 big project and a couple of smaller projects on the go :-)

I will add a pic of the bookmark in my next post :-) 

Happy stitching x 

First Blog.....Lets get crafty

Hi Guys and welcome to my first ever blog post... 

Firstly a little about myself before I move on to what I hope my blog will be about. 

Im 25 and live in Wiltshire in the UK. I am a person who loves new hobbies and trying out new things and so as you can imagine I have fingers in many pies. However I never stray too far from crafts/art, that is were my first and true hobbies lie. I have always been a little creative and have spent time drawing, painting, cross stitch, knitting, crochet ... and would like to try many more crafts like quilting, card making etc at some point, but for now my preferences are crochet and cross stitch.

I have been cross stitching since I was about 19 and only been crocheting for the last 6 months or so but I am totally hooked (please excuse the pun) 

So now for a look at some WIPs I have at the moment, I try to limit my self to only a small number as I would like to finish the works as well as start them :)

The first is a crochet blanket for myself and my OH. Its super fun and fast to crochet and I love the colours :) 
This pic was taken several weeks ago so there are a few more colours now but it is the most recent pic I have at the moment 

My next WIP is a cross stitch called " Siberian Gold" it is a cross stitch kit that I got last year but have been picking up every now and then. 

I will update with my actual progress in my next post :)

So I will leave things here and be back to update soon 

Happy crafting 

xx