Giveaway!!

Okay first off I just want to say thank you so much for all the thoughts and prayers regarding the sister incident. Things aren't much better unfortunately but I feel stronger and more able to deal with what I consider the rejection coming from her. I tried yet again to text her only to get a defensive message back so I will be just leaving it now.

Right onto business. As I promised, I wanted to make a few gifts for readers of my blog just to say thank you for reading - I still can't believe anyone would be remotely interested in what I have to say. So I have come up with a few gifts.
Rules
I will be giving three of these away. If you would like one then all you have to do is leave me a post and say you would like one and I will draw names out of a hat. The first three names will will one of their choice. It is open to everyone, even if you are new to my blog and have never commented before. I will leave this thread open till 1st Sept to give everyone a chance to enter.



From Left to right: Tiny Little Quaker biscornu Papillon Creations using DMC Varigated
Serndipity Papillon Creations scissor keep using Needlepoint Silk
With Love Lady Periphaeria scissor keep using Six Strand Sweets - one for the girls!



From left to right : Ring o roses Lady Periphaeria scissor eep using Caron Waterlilies silk
Serendipity Papillon Creation scissor keep using dmc and sparkle
Tiny quaker motif scissor keep using Eterna silk

Well I hope everyone joins in and has fun. Like I said I will feel a bit stupid if no one wants one of them. Have a good week and a nice Bank Holiday if you are in the UK. xx

Feeling pretty low.

Just a quick one to let you know that I have been away ona family weekend to the Lake District. It is my parents' 50th anniversary so they took all of us away to a hotel for a few nights. It would have been great except that my sister and I have fallen out and we didn't speak a word to each other all weekend. I had previously texted her and she hadn't responded so it was obvious she didn't want to put things right with me. It is very sad as I don't generally fall out with people and never with my family. My other sister was sticking to her like glue and at one point they even wore the same outfit. It has always been the case that they go off together and leave me out of things and this is just what they have done. She upset me so badly the other week that I was in tears on my bed for over an hour and my dh was away and my dd was upset by it. The baby didn't move for a week after the upset so I was worried by that too. It's moving fine now though. I don't think she realises how bad she has upset me and I don't think it's something that will solve itself until she decides to put things right. So I am feeling very low and so I did not do much for the August SAL challenge but here is what I have accomplished. Very sorry to depress you all.


Jenn you are welcome to my chart. email with the snail mail details hazelhenry@hotmail.com and I will dig it out for you. xxx

Dawn's Gift

Just a quickie to reveal Dawn's gift I made her. It seems to have taken forever to arrive but I am glad it finally has!

Dawn said she liked greens and purples so I used some of the gorgeous fabric Tracy gave me and also the chart she gave me. I thought it was appropriate as the saying is so sweet. I put some petite beads on it too and added some lavender. I even made the tassels!! I'm not great at tassel making. I used different threads than the suggested ones and had fun dipping into my stash of hand dyes.
I really like this chart and it only took an evening or two to stitch it up. I was thinking if anyone would like this chart, leave me a post and I will send it on to you. It would be great if it could be passed around a bit like the sisterhood of the travelling pattern I have seen on another blog. If more than one person wants it then I'll do a draw for it.

I'm still making up gifties and I should hopefully have them done in less than a week. I only hope that there is something you like and want. I will feel very silly if no-one wants one of them!

Have a good week. Mine has been a bit pants up to now as I have had a major falling out with my sister but my dh is back today from being away so that's some consolation. xxx

Some stash, and a PIF offer!

I have decided to join my very first PIF. I joined Rachel's PIF and I copied this from her blog:

Here's how it works:
I will send a stitched handmade item to the first 5 people who leave a comment on my blog under this post. You will receive it within 365 days; you have my word. The only thing you have to do in return is Pay It Forward by making the same promise on your blog! Once you sign up, I will be emailing you for mailing address information and will keep an eye out on YOUR blog to see what designs, colors, designers you like.
Please do sign up; this will be my first time to Pay It Forward and I look forward to making new stitching friends near and far.

Please note, this is in addition to the giveaway I mentioned in my last post. I will be doing the giveaway as soon as I have made up my pieces - may be a week or two. But I want to leave this post up for a bit to give people a chance to sign up for the PIF.

And here's an update of Patchwork that I have worked a little bit on. I do enjoy doing this one but I find it slow going using hand dyed threads that you can only stitch oone cross at a time on.


And here's some new stash I got in the post yesterday. The first is the Loose Feather's no 26 chart which is lovely and such a lovely colour of fabric. I feel so ashamed as I haven't even started one of these yet. I don't know whether to just use DMC or the stated flossies they give.


Here's some fabric I bought from Jaynes attic. Now when I sent in the order I hadn't heard from Jayne about it which is unusual for her so I phoned her up. She was actually in the process of moving her store!! I told her that if she didn't have the colours I wanted in then she could send me alternatives that were similar. On her site, if you spend £15 or more then you can click on this link that says "add me for 1p" and she will normally send you a thread or something of that value. Because she only had two out of the four colours I wanted in stock, she sent me two alternatives and instead of sending me thread for the "add me for 1p", she very generously sent me two more fabric pieces!! How generous is that!! So here they are:

They are a mixture of Sugar Maple Fabrics and Polstitches.

So all in all a good productive stitchy week for me. Have a good weekend, xx

Look what Dawn sent me!

Here is the gift that Dawn made for me. She made it for no reason except out of the goodness of her heart. I have never owned, or even seen up close, a needleroll before and now I am the proud owner of one! It is beautiful Dawn, thank you. Dawn also sent me this pretty chart and these threads too - very unexpected extras. Thank you so much.

Some other news is that I have been excepted on the SBEBB!! Yay! I am so excited about joining this reputable group. There appeared to be two exchanges I could have signed up for. One was the Needlework Smalls exchange where you make a stitchers wallet or the Harvest exchange. I didn't look at the halloween one as I don't celebrate it. So I wanted to have a go at the stitchers wallet but decided it may be a bit ambitious for a first exchange so I have gone with the Harvest exchange. I love Autumn and all the colours it brings so this should suit me well. I am going to still make a stitchers wallet though to see how I get on with making one. I have seen one in the March Gift of Stitching mag which I would like to try out. I doesn't look too hard. I can do tiny slip stitches so I should manage it.

I have also been working on some scissor keeps/ needlecases but not sure how I am going to finish them just yet. At the moment I am just stitching the fronts and backs then I will finish them all at once. I am on my third front and nearly finished it. Perhaps if people like them I might do a giveaway so watch this space. I am feeling very generous all of a sudden.

We have our cell social tonight (sort of like a Bible study/house goup) so I have to go and cook up some food for it.. We are doing a bring and share foodwise so will be interesting to see what people bring. Okay, that's all for now. Thanks for reading and for commenting, I really appreciate every single one of you. xx