A word of warning!

This is to the sick chinese pervert who keeps trying to put sick sex links on my posts - DON'T BOTHER! I moderate all my comments so you are wasting your time.

Look who made me cry again!

This time it was Brigitte. About a year ago I sent Brigitte some Maltesers through the post as she had never tried them before. That was all. Just a bag of Maltesers. It was a biggish bag but just a bag all the same. So you can imagine my surprise when Brigitte sent me this parcel through the post. I was overwhelmed. She wrote me a lovely card that said she was sorry I had been having a rough time of things and that it was "payback" time!!! Seriously Brigitte you have outdone yourself!



She sent me all these lovely goodies including the sweetest egg shaped pinkeep ever. She also sent me 3 peices of linen - you know how I love linen! and have had such a lack of it until these recent raks! She also sent me lots of chocolate - the Toffifee have gone already :-O. She also sent a lovely PS chart which I will definitely stitch up soon. Thank you so much Brigitte. This was a wonderfully, unexpected surprise and it DID make me cry but in a happy way. Here is a close up of the pinkeep:



Yesterday also brought something I won from the One World One Heart blogging event. This was a pendant I won from Tina. Her work is exquisite! I wore it last night on a chain. It is beautiful. I have no idea how you made it but you're very clever! So thank you for that.



Some were asking about the Besem soap I purchased. Well, so far so good. The soaps are all made from natural ingredients and essential oils and 10% of the purchase goes to charity. They smell lovely and have not dried my skin at all. They foam up really well. Here is the link to her Etsy shop if you are interested:

Besem Natural Scents

I have also been inspired by Sharlotte's punchneedle this week and have decided to order a small starter kit and a punchneedle and see how I get on. It hasn't arrived yet but will let you know how I get on with it.

Things are starting to look up a little. DH had a day off yesterday and although he has gone back this morning, he will be back on Tuesday for a couple of weeks so coming to the end of it all I think. The Japan trip will be hard when he goes but glad it is nearly over and we can get back to some normality. Thank you for all your kindnesses in thoughts, words and deeds! xx

Wow!

I got my Stitch Red for Heart exchange through the post today and what a parcel it was. Look what Janet sent me:



This is the beautiful front of the heart pincushion/scissor holder. It is stitched very neatly over 1. I turned it over and this is what I found:



Stunning back including all these hand dyed threads by Janet herself held on by mother of pearl heart threadkeeps and a pair of scissors held on with some ribbon. Wow!

But that is not all. She sent a bunch of extras. I cried. No less than 9 pieces of linen in various counts and sizes and colours. Beading needles, gold needles (spoiling me now), glissengloss threads, beads, charms, pen, and chocolate (which the darlings ate).



But to top it all off was the heartwarming letter she wrote to me. I cried again. I was so touched by your thoughtfulness and your generosity Janet. This came in the middle of a bad, depressed slump I have been in. People have asked if I have been depressed and I can honestly say that I haven't been, until now. DH being away has hit me harder this time than it usually does. Perhaps the extra child? I don't know and I know I will be okay but this parcel really gave me a boost. Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Also got some lovely soap I ordered from the US today. From Besam hand made soaps. I got the link from Edgar and these soaps do smell good. Very natural and not the synthetic smell you can sometimes find with similar products. I will let you know how they are.

Thank you for all your lovely comments. I am adding people to my following list every day which makes it even harder to get through blogs and comment but I am trying to pass your way soon. Have a good weekend.

xx

Stitch Red for Heart exchange received

I learnt today that Sharlotte received her Stitch Red for Heart exchange I sent her from the HoE blog. Here is what I sent her:



I stitched this lavender heart pomander using Amon Ami Pierre freebie and also made this bookmark using stamps and embossing powders and inks. The bookmark says "Stitch Red" on the top of it. I learned fro Sharlotte's wishlist that she likes Christmas fabrics and rasberry chocolate so popped in some of those too. I wanted to keep the exchange simple but send something from my heart and I believe she likes it. She has much better pics on her blog including a lovely handmade card that my sister made.

Thank you so much for all the beautiful, encouraging comments about my bad week. It brings me to tears to read the kind, thoughtful words. I love you guys soooo much. I don't know what I'd do without this blog, I really don't.

Edited to add: go here for a great giveaway!!

DRUMROLL..................................

And the winner of the One World One Heart scarf giveaway is...........


comment 200

Barbara

Well done Barbara. I will be emailing you soon and if the prize isn't claimed withing three days I will do another draw. I used the random number generator for this.

I have thoroughly enjoyed being a part of this event and looking at lots of new and different blogs. There just wasn't enough time to look at everyone's though and I am sorry I did not get round to all of them. On the other hand, I will be glad to get back to my usual blogging buddies as I have missed my inspiration.

It's no wonder I'm grumpy!

I have held it in long enough and now I want my moan time! My dh is away for a long time (I consider 3 months a long time) and I am left alone with my two children. Last week we were hit very hard. It started snowing again and no sooner it did when my heating broke down again. We went a week with out central heating and we were freezing. So last weekend, off I trotted to my sisters to stay over and keep warm. At 3 am the boy was sick - all over his travel cot and sheets! Nice. So there I was at 3am trying to mop up copious amounts of sick and trying to stop him crying and waking up my sister's family. I had to rob my sister's towel cupboard to lay down towels for him to sleep on. YUCK.

So weekend over and off I trotted back home. One near miss collision on the motorway (my fault) and finally we arrived home to our freezing cold house. But wait... the story doesn't end here. Why? you say... Surely it couldn't get any worse? Oh yes indeedy. I had gone out especially to buy my cats an extra litter tray (a larger one even) so they would have plenty of litter tray space while I was gone. Except.... I had shut both the trays in the office and they couldn't get to them (my fault again!). So I came home to a pile of poo all over the kitchen floor. Well good cats, thought I. They haven't done it on the carpet. Good, good cats. NOPE. They had weed all over the cushions on my couch!! So out went the cushions but the smell was lingering. So on went the bicarb of soda. Seems to be gone now. Urgh!

So happy ever after tale.... no. Then my washing machine broke. That all.... NO!!!! Then someone came round to give me a fan heater to keep warm. I aimed it into the dd's bedroom and then started smelling smoke! It melted the front of it and nearly set the carpet on fire.

Okay so it ends there right...... NOOOOO. Then I gets sick. Puking in the early hours and in the morning. During the same which my ds decides he needs to be in bed with me because after all, he is stressed too!!! So when I wake up in the morning, I then find he has wet our bed. Even with a nappy on. What???

So you see folks, I have had a rather stressfull week. All on my own and without my dh. Can you understand my grumpyness?

So you can understand why I was so happy to receive this lovely gift from Marjorie through the post. She was having a giveaway for this chart and I won it. But she also bought me my favourite brand of threads to stitch it in (Crescent Colours of course) and didn't she do a great job of choosing the colours?



Design - Canon
Designer - Whispered by the Wind

In case you were wondering... the heating is fixed, the washer is fixed, we are all well and it has stopped snowing!

Dearest readers and followers...

Please note... you are all very welcome to join in my giveaway for the One World One Heart thing below. You don't need to be a ticket holder yourself to enter ie you don't have to offer a giveaway yourself. I am a little dismayed that very few of my regulars don't want to enter my giveaway :-( So here's me giving you the heads up and saying PLEASE enter if you would like to win. :-)

A winner and some stash!

And the winner of my magazine giveaway is....



Arlette! I'll be in touch soon to get your address. Thanks for participating.

I decided to go on a stash enhancement trip last week and ended up buying a few charts to add to my ever growing collection. I ordered several beauties from Carol Ridyard from istitch blog. Can't wait to stitch these up and I also got the following which didn't take long to get over here at all. I was very surprised!

Two from The Sampler Girl:



and three from Heartstring Primitives (now Heartstring Samplings):



I got these from Beth's etsy shop as she is selling them at a reduced price as they are old inventory stock. Lovely samplers!!

My dh went away today for the BIG tour. Eeek. Sooo... lots of stitchy time for me.

Thank you so much for all your lovely compliments about my Baktus scarf. I have decided to join in the fun on the One World One Heart event and am going to knit one in blue for the giveaway. See seperate post. Feel free to add your name to the list on THAT post if you'd like to win it.

Happy stitching everyone. x

One World One Heart event!

Lisa Swifka created this blog in 2007. "The original idea behind this giveaway event was to bring bloggers together from around the world who may never ordinarily meet. It closes the gap of the blog community and enables us to interact, discover new and wonderful people, and in the process possibly win a prize or many prizes along the way."

If you click on the link you can see what it is all about and you can be still be involved as the deadline for entering is 8th Feb.

So the idea is to give something away so I got to thinking....

Remember this:







The Baktus scarf - Pattern found on Ravelry here. See post below for more pictures!

and remember this wool:



100% Blue Faced Leicester Wool
Hand dyed by Skeins.

For the giveaway I will knit a Baktus scarf in this wool for one lucky reader. I can tell you I have not had my Baktus off since I have finished it - it is very warm and snuggly and just right for this cold weather.

This giveaway is open to active bloggers only ie you must have a blog! So if you want to be entered just leave a comment below and make sure you leave your email address so I can email you if you are the winner if you don't already have it linked on your blog. If you don't get back to me within three days I will draw another winner. The draw will take place on the 15th Feb! So check back here then.

Woohoo Baktus!!!!!

Yarn - Skeins hand dyed yarn

50% Merino 50% superfine alpaca

100g 220mtrs

Pictures say it all. I love my baktus!!

Givaway, thank yous and a new me!

Wow! Thank you all so much for your caring and sensitive comments. I have decided that this year is going to be a good one for us. I am not going to spend time thinking about or dwelling on people or events that have hurt us. I am going to think about all the good plans I am making for this year. I want you to know that I appreciate every single one of your comments from the bottom of my heart. I have never known such a wonderful community of people. We are all different in so many ways, I grant that, and we probably all deal with our problems in different ways as well but the love and affection spoken to me through comments and emails have provided healing and relief in these dark days.

Hence the new look blog! Do you like it? I finally worked out how to put a banner up. The pictures are so very me - esp the cakes (ahem). I love the soft muted colours and the country/victoriana feel of it. I think I'll be keeping it like this for a bit. I'd quite like my house to look like this actually. Hmmm... more plans for this year.

My dh went away to work yesterday. He is working for a band called The Lost Prophets. Their album went straight to no. 2 in the UK charts today. I think they are better known in the US than the UK even though they are a UK band. So he has gone away till Friday, then home for a few days, then away till end February. Then home for a couple of weeks and then back off till the end of April! That's a lot of going away. Thank goodness the snow has finally cleared off. That would have really been bad - coping in that on my own. It is predicting more snow for Wednesday but I am hoping it will not be much and will just disappear.

Sooooo...... lonely nights means...... more stitching. And more knitting. Woop! I found this great new shop in my town called Skeins which sells her own hand dyed yarns. I went and bought a couple of her lovely skeins:





The blue one is for Lily. Her choice!

After seeing Staci's Baktus scarf, I ran right over to Ravelry and got the pattern. So with yarn in hand and pattern, this is what I have done so far. A very easy knit.


Yarn 50% Merino, 50% superfine alpaca

No, I haven't finished it but I don't think it will take too long, even with two children driving me crazy in tow! The lady at Skeins was very friendly and has offered to help me if I get stuck on anything. Just so happens.. haha. I also mentioned to her I was wanting to learn to knit socks (yes, Staci's influence again) and she told me she is doing a workshop on socks in March!!! Woop Woop!! So I am planning on going there when Rick is around.

Stitchwise, I have been busy busy. I made this for Rachael who won the draw over on the Beatrix Potter SAL.



Paula Sibbald was already giving away a lovely prize of some of her products but I wanted to make something as well. I stitched Rachael a needlebook and a scissor fob using some motifs from the design and Victorian Motto threads.

I also got this pretty ornie from Ranae which I won in her RAK giveaway. I love it! It will be going on my stitching tree next year for sure.



I have been working on "Stitch red for heart" exchange so can't show pictures of that yet and also the "Stitch and pass on" exchange so no pics there either. I have done a little on Cirque de Cirque but not much to show. And, here's where I am up to on my Just Nan.



I am loving this! I have too many nice projects on the go that it is hard to decide what to work on next.

Okay and finally I am starting to have a clear out of some unwanted magazines. These may or may not appeal to you but it's a free mag to read right?? So here are three up for grabs. If you would like to win them please say so in your comment. You must say so or you won't be entered. Open to anyone but it would be nice if you are a follower/regular commenter. I will be putting more up for grabs in the near future so keep your eyes peeled. I will leave it up till a week on Friday. That's the 29th Jan.



Needlecraft mag Jan 1999 (includes free kit)



Celebrations in Cross stitch May 1999



Cross stitch Quick Issue 1 June 2003

Right, off to put kids to bed and then it's online chat night with Tracy and stitching. See you soon. xx

Another year gone

Well that was one heck of a year. It started badly and ended rather badly too. I thought this year would be a better year for my and my dh than the previous two years. We have suffered vast amounts of rejection at our church last year so we ended up leaving there. Then this year at the start of the year, our "best man" turned against us and sent us hate mail for no other reason than he had issues in his heart toward us. Then there was all the problems with Rick's ex employer - I'll say no more about that. We tried another church but again just didn't seem to fit in. Then one of my closest friends, is having a midlife crisis and has cut us off! She is being completely selfish and hurtful to all the people that love her including her husband and daughter. I even took her away (cost me £150) to try and help her see things differently but it didn't help. I would have much preferred to spend that money on secret Santa gifts for all my online stitching blogger friends.

Crikey. I seem to have suffered so much rejection in the last three years. I am so fed up of so called friends thinking they can pick and choose when they want to be friends with you and dump you for another few months. I keep asking myself how I should protect myself from it and make steps to do just that next year. I do not want to get to the end of next year saying the same thing. So next year I will be throwing myself into stitching and exchanges and SALs and stitching forums and generally getting to know you guys better. I am going to stay away from hurtful people who I know will do me no good. I guess I am going to have to get a bit hard faced about it all really. I'll have to burn a few bridges in the process and that might include in the blogging world too but I just can't handle any more rejection. My husband has a saying. "I don't deal with nutcases". Maybe I should make that my motto. Obviously, trying to be nice all the time to people isn't working for me.

As well as all that I have really struggled with motherhood this year. Really not enjoyed it and as a result I am sure i have wasted precious moments with my kids. Lack of sleep and feeling tired all the time doesn't help. Not having my dh around when he is working away doesn't help either. Not getting any support from extended family, again - doesn't help. I feel completely insignificant and wonder why I am still around. Gosh I am moaning now aren't I? Do I sound depressed? You know what, I'm not depressed. I don't think I am anyway. I have a zillion blessings to thank God for and I do - daily. I am content with what I have in life at the moment. I have a nice house and I have plenty of stitching stash. My kids are healthy and happy (I hope) and although my relationship with my dh is far from perfect we have a good laugh at life and are happy to be together. We have food on the table and clothes on our backs and more besides. I have a really REALLY nice cat! I live in a nice area and am surrounded by lovely, supportive friends. Really, what more could I want? I am full to bursting. I lost my weight and got to target just before Christmas (ahem - not going to jump on the scales just yet to check where I am now) and I started running which is something I have never been able to do. However, all I seem to want to do is curl up in a ball and go to bed for a week. Not motivated to do anything at all right now. Feel like a bit of an island.

Anyway, enough of all that boring stuff. Let's stay focused.

So onto next year. Goals and challenges.

I'd like to lose a little more weight so at some point I will reset my target weight.

I'd like to get to the end of the couch to 5K plan (running). I am on about week 5 at the moment.

I would like to embrace my kids more and make better use of my time with them - maybe go outdoors a bit more with them. National trust visits and the like.

Wips - get some finished for goodness sake!! Okay, lets talk wips.

Here is where my wips are at. I am going to post up pics of all of my wips and at the end of next year they better have progress on them all!!!!

Mary Wigham



Not done a great deal on her and I feel terrible seeing as I am Head girl for the sal in the UK. I am stitching it on 25 count lugana over 1.


Just Nan Snowfire Christmas



Nothing done on this yet. It will be a new start for the Just Nan sal on Jane's Attic.

Haed "L" fairy QS



Very pleased with progress on this and think I will finish it very soon. Then I want to start a new HAED "Breaking Dawn - CC Kuik".

La D Da alphabet sampler



I have made a small start on this. I am doing it on Sassy's Creamy Cocoa 32 count Jobelan with NPI silks.

A Most Noble Pursuit.



Ack! I was so excited when I got this and there was a problem with the NPI silks so I had to wait what seemed like forever for them and I have hardly touched it!! Must make progress on this next year.

Ink Circles CdC



Working this on 32 count mulberry linen with Thread Gatherer silks in Spring Frocks. Really struggling with this one so have joined the Ink Circles SAL to help me get on with it.

Jan Houtman Patchwork



Woohoo! Look how much I have done on this and it's so pretty too. I really do need to work at getting this finished. I am using any threads for this - some cottons, some silks. Anything goes. Great fun.

Marie Rose Marquior



Really like this one and I think it will come together quite quickly once I get into it.

Loopy Lou Tranquility



I'm thinking maybe hardanger is just not my thing. There's a mistake in this that I need to correct before I carry on with it.

Well I suppose the year has ended on a good note after all. Today I got the most gorgeous RAK from Ruth (Musing Badger). I had won it on her blog and had completely forgotten all about it until this arrived on my doorstep today. Thank you so much Ruth. I love it and it has made my day!



Have a great New Year everyone and please don't mind my moaning. I am just using this blog as a way of release. Thanks for all the friendship and love and hope to spread it around some more in 2010!

Oh and just to add - a great giveaway over at Calico Prairie here