Another finish & review of 2012!

Hi all, so after my last post, you're probably thinking why has it been so long between posts?  Well here it is:

I got it at the Knitting and stitching show in November, my hubby set me a task of completing it by Christmas! It's called Santa's House IV: Final Preparations Unfortunately that wasn't possible with all the card making and gift wrapping to do, but finished it on the 28th December.

Now onto the review, my first finish of the year was last year's SAL Curl up With a Good Book:

It was a very detailed design so not too disappointed about missing last year's target on this one!

My mid-summer design was A Good Marriage which I've stitched for my sister's wedding next June, granted it still needs a good iron and to be framed, but got plenty of time!

I then moved onto The Travelling Pattern:

I'm still trying to pass this onto the next recipient, but not received the address for them! Lesley Anne Smith - can you please e-mail your address to samantha.long@live.co.uk asap?  In the meantime if anyone else is interested and also has a blog, please feel free to send me a message as I need to get it posted soon otherwise Cucki (the founder) will not be happy! :(

Now onto my SAL piece this year, I got it finished in November so just in time for the deadline! Bookend Kittes wasn't my favourite design to stitch, mainly because of the 'samey' colours, but I'm pleased with the final result!

I also had one more new start, Ladybug Love which I loved stitching, but was started around the time of my 10 hour rotation, which i'm going to start again in the New Year.

I also worked a bit on some other WIPs, including this one, County Durham:

And this, Samantha, both of which I want to finish this year!

Oh and of course, another HAED, I finally finished page 1 of Snowy Friends!

So all in all an interesting year, to be fair I had a very slow start as I got addicted to one of those horrid Facebook games, which I'm never ever going to do again ever!

Happy New Year everyone

&

Happy Stitching!

Page 3 Complete!

So here it is!  Page 3 complete!

I decided to continue with this one as I'm so close to finishing now!  I've done another 200 stitches now and hope to finish it in November.

As I'm on holiday for a week mid November, I need to get the hours in now really so I can be put in the draw for the free chart!

I decided to buy the Hannah Lynn montage with my voucher and am currently working out how many threads I need so that I can start in the new year!

Good news for you guys is that I have decided to keep the rest and use as a giveaway once I hit 50 followers!  So tell your friends and enter as soon as I announce it!

Hope you all had a good weekend.

Happy stitching xx

Bookend Kitties Update and splurge wonderings...

I know it's been a long time, but here's my latest update on Bookend Kitties.

I've had a terrible time with the confetti in the paw and haven't even finished page 3 yet, however I'm hoping to get close by this time next week.  I really need to get a move on since even hubby has commented why I haven't finished when others have!

On the back of my win of HAED vouchers, I've been weighing up what to get.  Now I said no more big projects until I'd finished one, but love the Hannah Lynn Montage and as lots of my online friends are doing a SAL next year, I'm seriously considering it!

However it is a massive design so I'd need to tent stitch it and hope one day I have a little girl who will appreciate it!  I'm thinking her 16th birthday right!?

Well better get back to Kitties before hubby moans!

I'm so happy to have completed page 2 of Bookend Kitties:

With only a couple of weeks until page 4 arrives, I feel it is timely!  it did take me over the 10 hours for my rotation, but I am happy I extended it although my hubby did give me grief about it!

However, next is the Travelling pattern.  Still not sure how I'm going to do it yet, either something rustic, sparkly or cool blues in variation thread(s).

Happy Stitching!

County Durham and 10 hour rotation!

Here's my 10 hours on County Durham:

It's actually taking a bit longer that I thought due to all the back stitch, think that's the main reason I love HAED - NO backstitch! Yay!

So I'm back to Bookend Kitties SAL as I'm so close to the end of page 2, I'm going to keep going until it's finished, about 15-20 hours I think.

Oh and then the rotation gets a bit scrabbly (yes that's a word!) as I have the travelling pattern!  I've got some variegated threads by both Anchor and DMC so am going to see which combination works well.  As I don't have any special aida, it's going to be white or cream, but I may do it on 18 count as I have some really  small off cuts too tiny for a HEAD, but we'll see.

After that it will be Samantha or Bookend Kitties whichever is shouting the loudest!

Happy Stitching!

Kitty Update and Rotation

Well 10 hours later and this is what Bookened Kitties looks like, after this column there is only 1 and a bit columns and then page 2 is finished!  I may have to extend the next 10 hours on her to get the page complete.  

I must say though, I think the rotation is working, it makes me stitch faster knowing I only have a few hours on her.  Next on the list is County Durham Sampler.  It's a UFO that I dug out, I think I'll stitch it up quickly and it will be good to have another finish!

Happy Stitching everyone!

A new start & a new rotation!

Well, my perserverance of not making any new starts until Christmas disappeared last weekend and I decided to kit up and start Ladybug Love by Hannah Lynn.  This is what I did in an afternoon!  I'm loving the coulours and although I don't usually stitch HAEDs cross country these charts lend themselves well to it.

 

 

My new rotation however means that another 4 hours today and then move back to Bookend Kitties for 10 hours.  A more up to date picture for you:

I saw a rotation idea on another blog (don't you just love bloggers!) and thought it was worth a try, the idea is that you continually do a little bit (10 hours) on each design, encouraging finishes and getting rid of those UFOs.  So this is how it works: you pick 5 designs from your current WIPs/UFOs trying to get a mix of styles and colours, these are the designs I've chosen:

1. Ladybug Love
2. County Durham sampler (one of my UFOs that I revived last weekend)
3. Bookend Kitties
4. Samantha (Lanarte)
5. Think Pink

You then stitch for 10 hours on each in that order to keep you interested.  Because I have decided to make Bookened Kitties my focus piece since it's got a deadline, I will be alternating this one in between the others.  This also means I'll be blogging more so it's win win all the way!  Let me know if you've tried this type of rotation and how it has gone!

All change!

Just a quicky!

A note to say that I'm praying along with other stithers that Heaven and Earth Designs (HAED) stays open! http://www.heavenandearthdesigns.com/

W/C 10th September is Christened HAED appreciation week where everyone is encouraged to buy at least one chart to support the business! I hope you'll join me!

On another note, Kitties was starting to annoy me so I revived a UFO!!! Yay! It's a map of County Durham and made a lot of progress - when my hubby said "you'll be finished that one in no time" that I thought I had to accept that challenge!

I'm also making a new start today! QS Ladybug Love (HAED)!



To make sure I go back to them all I'm starting a new rotation which I'll talk more about at the weekend!

Happy Stitching!

Bookend Kitties progress!

Well after a long break from this one, I picked it up again, and I'm actually really enjoying it.  I think all teh confetti in page 1, but with no real detail just got me down.  However I'm loving seeing his face develop.  I've actually almost finished another column on this and hope to get close to finishing page 2 by the end of the bank holiday!



Meanwhile, I'm struggling against a strong desire to make a new start particularly as I got 5 RAKs in the past month! But I'm going to be good, finish Kitties and then Samantha.

I've also decided not to stitch the parenting sampler for my sister as by the time I've bought the chart, threads, fabric and got it framed it willbe over £50 and I'd rather spend it on some clothes and toys for the Christmas baby!  I may stitch it for the christening or her 2nd baby!

For now, my stitchy time is all mine. 

Have a great weekend everyone!

Page 1 finally finished!

 

Bookend Kitties is part of the HAED SAL, but I've been really struggling to focus on it this year.

 

I'm not going to be doing page 2 just yet as I've decided to use a randomiser to pick a design to encourage me to finish some UFOs and to make progress on some of my other WIPs too!

 

Also a quick Samantha update - just need to do her feet and the rest of the background!

 

 

So I have 2 UFOs, 5 WIPs and 1 new non HAED on my list.

 

And the randomiser has picked: Snowy Friends!

 

I'm really pleased about this as it was my first HAED and had to stop when it got too painful to stitch it.  I'm half way through page one so another update very soon - I hope!

Bookend Kitties Update.

Not much progress I know, but been busy at work, I hope to show you much more progress next month!  I'm hoping to have done a whole lot more by then and hopefully finished pages 1 and 2!

Happy Stitching!

Bookend Kitties

End of January - not as much as I'd have liked but done some all the same!