Interesting day

What a day!! My little car, which is very old but still fairly reliable, was hit today. I was on a roundabout turning right and another car came onto the roundabout whilst I was still on it and smashed my light and a bit of the bonnet in. I was very nice about it. I really hate it when I see people shouting and screaming at each other on the road. My insurance company have told me that the car will probably be wrote off which means I will only get the bottom value of the car. So we will see what happens. Thankfully no one was hurt and my dd was not in the car at the time. So for the time being I will be on foot. Hopefully the weather will stay nice for a bit. It has been glorious the last couple of days.

On to a nicer note - I phoned Thread Bear up and have ordered A Most Noble Pursuit and the thread pack and the linen. Also the La D Da chart Polly Wolly Doodle. It uses NPI silks three of which are in the thread pack and I will need three more. Kate at Thread Bear said she would order the three threads in for me but agreed I could probably get away with substitute colours from the thread pack. I have a few NPIs at home too. So what I saved in not buying the extra threads, I ordered a blackbird chart Glad Tidings.

I have also joined the Loose Feathers club and ticked to get the linen cut as well. Apparently I got the last space!! So that is something to look forward to every other month. Okay I'm going to chill out now!
xx

An afternoon at Chatsworth

We had a lovely day today. After Church, the weather was so beautiful we decided to go for a drive out to Chatsworth house.

It is only about 40 mins away in the car and is a beautiful piece of the English countryside. The have animals there that you can touch and handle and a great play area so fab for Lily!! I think DH enyoyed himself on the play equipment too! Here's a pic of Lily holding one of the guinea pigs called Bracken.



Heres one of Lily on the roundabout.

A fun day in all even though it cost a fortune - £15 for the three of us to get into the adventure playground and £15 for lunch which was a kids box, a sandwich and a bowl of salad and 2 cakes!! No drinks!!! Anyway it was a lot of fun.

Stitching wise I have been very naughty as I have not touched Dreaming Mermaid in ages and I am not going to meet my monthly goal again for the second month running. However I have been busily stitching away on Cheryl's Buquet as its so nice to do so I am nearly halfway through it now. I think I will keep at it and make it a quick finish then get started back on Dreaming Mermaid. Still not heard about the NP silks from Thread Bare and don't want to place my order till I get all the information off them and order all the stuff together. Here's a pic of Cheryl's Buquet update:


Hope everyone has had a happy weekend and thanks for reading my Blah! I still cannot believe folks are even vaguely interested in anything I have to say!!

I just can't resist!

I have found a wonderful supplier in the UK for all American folk/whimsy samplers! They are called The Thread Bear and I am experiencing wondeful, fast service from them. I wanted to know if they could get hold of this:
"A Most Noble Pursuit" Collaberation sampler plus the linen plus the thread pack of NPI silks. I had a wonderful email off them within a few hours saying they could get the chart and sort out the linen with very reasonable prices and they were also looking into the thread pack prices for me too. They also were very thankful to me for bringing this sampler to their attention! If they haven't got what you want on their website they can still get it to you and their prices seem very very good.
I am wanting to get La D Das Polly Wolly Doodle and the threads to go with it and I am also thinking about joining Blackbird Designs Loose Feathers Club which cost £5.25 every two months for an exclusive design and for an extra £7.25 you can get the R&R Reproductions pre cut fabric to go with it which is a good price I think. I have been wanting to do a Blackbird design so this may be a good opportunity. If you are in the UK (sorry if I sound like I 'm spamming lol they just seem darned good!) you should definately check this company out. Will let you know what I order and how fast I get it. They said about a week for orders from the US which again is pretty good and postage is reasonable too. Will keep you updated but I have a very good feeling about them. Yay!!!

Now I can reveal..

I made this biscornu for Tracy (maddixie) as a special thank you for the lovely Eterna threads she sent me. She got it today so I can now reveal it. It is stitched on 28 ct Quaker cloth using VCs Flame silk. I filled it with lavender so it smells nice (well cos I don't have any other stuffing really lol!)

Been doing a bit on Cheryl's Bouquet but still not touched my Mermie and time is running out for me to meet this month's deadline with it. Just to make things worse Fudgey has given the link to a gorgeous mystery stitch :
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/TranquillityMysterySamplergroup/
I really want to do a mystery and this one is soo lovley but it is so similar to Patchwork so I think I might pass on it. I would like to do a traditional sampler mystery or something more "folksy" I think. Does anyone know of any up and coming mysteries? By the way, would love to know what your favourite sampler designers are. Which ones are the "Must Stitch" ones? I reckon Little House Needleworks and Carriage House are pretty good. Thinking about doing a Long Dog too. Any suggestions for a future shopping list lol.
Happy stitching.
x

Stitching update

Had a wonderful weekend. Mother's day for us in the UK on Sunday and it was fab! I bought some chocolate croissants for my breakfast on Saturday and DH took DD out on Saturday to get me something whilst I had coffee with a friend in Borders. On Sunday DH heated up the croissants and brought them to me in bed - a first i think!! Then I went downstairs and he had got dd to colour me in a card he had bought from church a couple weeks before. He is learning!! She had bought me these fab wellies lol and a bottle of Angel Perfume by Thierri Mugler.
Went to visit my mum and my brother and my two sisters were all up with hubbies and kids. She loved the biscornu. So that was a nice day all in all.

Stitch wise been a busy bee lately. Can't say everything as some is secret for now. Here's an update of Cheryl's Bouquet. I have done a quarter of it now. This will really be a quick one and its so nice to do.


Been having a browse on ebay for buttons. There are hundreds of them! I had a bag of buttons somewhere but I can't find them since we moved. I really love buttons. I love looking through them and sorting them. It must take me back as a child or something.

Nice night tonight to look forward to. Just bought the new James Bond DVD so me and hubby are going to cuddle up and watch it tonight with some Nachos with cheese and salsa and soured cream and chocolate cake and those scrummy Lindt choccy bullet thingys. Yeah I know, just as I am doing so well with my diet but hey one night off is fine!! So enjoy your stitching week everyone and thanks for reading and commenting and I love new people commenting too. Everyone welcome!
xx

Cheryl's Bouquet Started

Here is a pic of my progress on Cheryl's Bouquet. I am stitching it on Polstitches 32 count "Fallen leaves" 2x2 using Carrie's Autumn Leaves threads. I am having a lot of fun stitching this and I really don't think it will take me too long if I don't leave big gaps in between stitching it.

So I really need to get cracking on Mermie and Half Sick - too many BAPs thinks I.
Hugs to everyone reading.

What flower am I???

mmmmmmm this is interesting. Quite like me I think.

I am a Snapdragon What Flower Are You?

"Mischief is your middle name, but your first is friend. You are quite the prankster that loves to make other people laugh."

Twilight Shimmer started

Okay here's my pic of my HAED Twilight Shimmer qs started as part of the SAL Challenge. I am only going to be working on this one weekend a month during the SAL challenge so it may be a bit of a slow to complete one. However I think I did a fair bit of it for the first month. It just looks so boring and blue. Not my favourite colours I must say. Anyhoo I am quite glad its over with as now I can stitch on something else. I really got to get ahead on my mermie and my patchwork and my Half Sick. Oh where do I get the time???

My First Biscornu!

Well here is my first ever biscornu but it will certainly not be the last. I can't believe how easy it was to finish this. I always struggling with the finishing of stuff and this technique gives a really neat finish. I have stuffed it with lavender and am going to give it my mum for Mother's Day (We have it early in the UK). I stitched it with Carries Creations thread "banana split" on 28 count quaker cloth.


Been having a good go at the SAL this weekend for Tha HAED SAL challenge. Have managed about 800 stitches so far but will post pics after Monday when the SAL is finished.

Also here's my Draeming Mermaid. I am so excited about this as I am starting to put some colour in that tail of hers. I think I am going to call her "Joleen" after Dolly Partons song as there is a line in it that goes.. "With flaming locks of Auburn Hair"!!!


Also did a bit of internet window shopping at Wyndham Needleworks yesterday and the cart was at $170 and I hadnt even started!! So will leave it for now lol.

Hope you are all well and have a fun stitchy weekend.

What a lovely day!

and it isn't even my birthday!! Today I received a beautiful gift from Tracy. Four Eterna silks and a VC silk!! They are soo beautiful. I have never seen Eternas before. Here's a pic.


I can't wait to try them out on my Patchwork. They are so silky soft and shiny. Gorgeous colours too. But that's not all. I also received my little package from Jayne's attic as well.

This is the Polstitches fabric Fallen Leaves and the Carries threads Autumn Leaves that I'll be doing the tribute to Cheryl on. As you can see I also succumbed to buying the Ink Circles Cirque de Cirque chart so I can knock that off my wishlist now! I have yet to decide on fabrics and threads for this though so I am not starting it yet! Also in the pic is the VC thread which Jayne sent me for 1p! Bit confusing though as VCs arent stocked by her so I'll maybe email to check that one. Be great if they were, although I got to say that Vikki is very fast at getting her threads out!
But that is still not all.. Ages ago I completed Rapunzel on some opalescent fabris from silkweavers. It's taken me ages (due to house move etc..) but I finally got it into my lady who makes my stitching up into cushions. I got it back today! The pic doesn't do it justice. It's for my dds room and she wanted it very girly. I think she has done a fab job. Here she is.


Can it get any more exciting?? Yes it can. My DD wanted me to make her a special cake named after her. Now I'm not great at cake making let alone designing one so don't laugh at this. This is her Lily cake! It's lemon sponge with chocolate buttercream and lemon icing with chocolate buttons on the top. Not tasted it yet. I got a feeling it will be a very sweet one.


Now, I phoned my sister up and she remined me that it will be Mother's day on Sunday 18th March which is so close!! I thought it was the end of the month. So I have decided to try out the Biscornu. I have printed off some patterns and will do them in some variegated threads. The cross stitching is the easy part, it's the finishing bit that I always find difficult. However the instructions make it look easy (don't they always) so I'm going to give it a go and fill it with lavender.

Okay that's me done. Happy Stitching everyone. Thanks for all your comments, they brighten my days no end.
xx

Okay My arm's been twisted!

I have had my arm twisted (you know who you are!!) to start the HAED SAL Challenge where you work on one project for one weekend in each month for a minimum of ten months. This month, being March, is the last month by which you can join. So I have decided what better occasion than to have a New Start to go along with it. I have decided to stitch Rachel Anderson's Twilight Shimmer which was a RAK given to me by Louanne (Thank you Louanne!) and I'll stitch it on the 25 count dublin linen that Tracy RAKed me with (Thank you Tracy!!). As I'll only be stitching this for ten weekends I decided on this design as there is a lot of block colour in so I reckon I'll get a half decent amount done. Here is a pic of the end product.



So I will be making my first few stitches on this starting this weekend as it happens the second weekend in every month. Although I don't have all the threads I need for it, I do have some to start off with and I'll get more as I go along. Oh I need help remembering all this.

On another note, I have been invited to a stitch along in Nuneaton. Its quite a drive from me and don't know if I'll be able to go. It would be nice to meet some of the folks I have chatted to online and see some of the gorgeous stitching for real instead of thumbnails lol. Is anyone going to this?

The Bouquet for Cheryl SAL has started and I haven't got the fabric or threads for it yet!! I feel a shopping spree coming on. I also want to do a biscornu with the help of the link Tracy sent me. Where will I get the time. I think I'm definately in need of doing a rotation.

Whilst I'm on I may as well do my March stitching goals.

March Stitching Goals

1. Finish page 4 of Dreaming Mermaid
2. Start Twilight Shimmer 9th - 12th March SAL
3. Work on Patchwork
4. Work on Half Sick of Shadows
5. Get fabric and threads kitted up for Cheryl's Tribute.

Thats it.
Happy stitching this week folks.xx

I got Tagged!!!

I got tagged by Polly Extremely gentles blog. Here are the rules, as she explains them in her blog.

Five Questions.. and Five Things…

For the first part, 5 Questions - my dear readers can ask me five questions–either in comments or feel free to email them if you’d prefer. I’ll answer them in the blog as soon as time allows.

For the second, Five Things About Me:

Here are the rules:
1. Get tagged.
2. List five things that have not been revealed on your blog.
3. Tag five others.

Ok then five things ermmmmm....
1. I am a Christian. Became a Christian when I was 17 years old. Not just in name - the real mcCoy.

2. I used to be a witch before I was a Christian and I was really depressed. I had a breakdown and left home with nowhere to go. I talked to a christian woman about witchcraft and Satan and she showed me clearly from the Bible who was really in charge. I gave my life to Christ and started a brand new life. Truth I tell you no lie.

3. I lost three stone with Slimming World last year and did hardly, if any, excerise.

4. We have one little girl and hope to adopt a child from China in the future.

5. I hate mornings. I am sooo not a morning person. I can stay up till 12 or 1 but cannot for the life of me get up early. How did I ever manage when I worked??

I tag Maddixie plush Louanne Jenn Carol

Dreaming Mermaid update

So this is her as of 3rd March. Not got an awful lot done but now I can see the outline of her tail.

Thought I'd take some pics of one of my cats. This is Poppy. She was acting rather coy actually and I found it difficult to get a good one of her. She is such a love but a pest at times. No chance yet of catching the other cat as she is a bit scatty and is probably out playing.

This daft computer...

I love this blogging thing. I really do. It's better than magazines which in my opinion have gone a little downhill recently (same old same old). I love the way you can see all the gorgeous designs that people are stitching. Things that perhaps you'd have never seen stitched before. I love looking into the lives of these serial cross stitchers and realising they're all as nutty as me!! No really its really lovely and I'm enjoying reading everyone's blog and trying to add as many to my list as I can. The problem is... it's soooo darn addictive! I can't get off the comp to do any stitching. It's like I am glued to it and just when I'm ready to switch off and go and sit down with my latest wip, I spot something new. Something that I have never seen before, something that makes me think, "I could do that, woudn't take that long" and before you know it I'm off on an ONS spree searching for the new thing I just gotta have! The thing I'm thinking of right now is all the lovely mystery stiches that are going on!! These are wonderful and just want to look into this some more. Also, so many RRs! Nope have never done one. Just exchanges. RRs seem like too much pressure and too much stitching but hey, I could still look into it, couldn't I? And what of the lovely biscornus I have been spying recently? I am ingnorant, I confess. I don't even know what they are but they are so very pretty and know they would make perfect gifts for someone.

So, now I have finished my blog, no pics today obviously, and so to browse the web for all the afore mentioned. Thanks for reading!
xx