Hallowe'en Trick or Treat Blog Hop 2014

Welcome to the spooky hallowe’en mystery phrase blog hop!

All you need to do is visit each of the following blogs in order, jot down the letter displayed with their Hallowe'en stitched picture then return here and leave a comment telling me the Mystery Phrase.

It'd be nice if you left a comment on their blog too, especially if it's new to you.

I've enabled "moderate comments before publishing" for the next week so no-one can copy anyone else!

There will be a small prize for one person picked at random from the guessers.  People who posted a picture  will get one chance for that and another chance if they make a guess too.

So without further ado,

start the blog hop – enter if you dare…

A Patchwork of Crafts
All XXs
The Alchymyst's Study
Crafty Weasel
Cross Stitch Fantasy
Ishkabibble
Jocondine
Justine's Cross Stitch
Kitten Stitching
My Journey
My Little Corner of Cyberspace
Needles Pins and Dragonflies
Needleworker's Samplings
Stitch Bitch
Stitch Witch Hazel's Stitchy Musings
Today I Found
Hallowe'en Ornie SAL Blog

and then finally back here for this letter:

S

and this design:

Blackbird Designs - Spell of the Moon

stitched on 32 count Cognac linen using DMC

The moon is stitched n DMC 4090

Don't forget, some of us are on different time zones so if you visit a blog and can't find a letter or picture yet, pop back later in the day.  The competition is open for one week closing 00.01 hours 7th November GMT.

happy hunting!

        

all from Hyraea

Finally, Theme-a-licious and the Just Nan Updates will follow on All Saints' Day tomorrow.

Spooky Counting Down

I've been counting down to Hallowe'en with my Primitive Hare Spooky Countdown tree this year.  Here are a few photos of the tree so far:

All the ingredients laid out ready to start

The scrapbook paper I used to make the markers from

First Eight Days

Days Nine to Thirteen

Regular readers may recognise that tree from last year's Advent Calendar!

I have been stitching away in black the rest of the time, on the Blackbird Designs Spell of the Moon which Kaye sent me recently.  I finished the black this afternoon during a Game of Thrones marathon TV catch-up session for my husband's birthday!

There is some grey and a yellow moon to add as yet.  It's a nice fun design although quite large on 32count.  Too big for an ornie really.  I bought a little canvas and easel during the week which I can stretch the fabric round and display it like that.  I like the way the border varies, it's not all the same zig-zags all the way round.  Much  more interesting to stitch,

Finally, it's time to sign up for the Hallowe'en Trick or Treat Blog Hop.  Just leave a comment on this post (making sure I can contact you via email) and then a few days before the 31st October I will contact you with a letter to display on your blog on the 31st along with some Hallowe'en stitching of your own.  I will list all the blogs in order and people will hop around collecting the letters to SPELL out the Mystery Phrase.

To see how it all works, check out last year's Blog Hop here  

500 Followers Mini-Blog Hop

I acquired my 500th follower recently and decided to host a mini blog hop instead of a giveaway.  So we all give some love and receive some comments and new followers!

Several people signed up and over the weekend I emailed them all the name of a fellow blogger to research and dedicate a post to today.  The posts should be appearing over the next 24 hours depending on where you are and whether people remembered to post!  Here is the full list of participants so you can pop over and see who they have dedicated their post to:

A Stitcher's Story

Stitching with Summer

A Patchwork of Crafts

I Love to Stitch

The Alchymyst's Study

Ishkabibble

Wisdom with Needle and Thread

Stitch Bitch

This and That

Finding Flapjack

Kitten Stitching

The Southpaw Stitcher

Don't forget to leave a comment on their blogs!

I had a lovely weekend in London with the Large Boy, we decided to visit The Art of the Brick exhibition in Brick Lane of all appropriate places!  The exhibition features the work of artist Nathan Sawaya who works in Lego.  All his artworks are made entirely with standard Lego bricks.  It was a fascinating exhibition, it started with some reproductions of famous works of art recreated and reinterpreted in Lego such as the Mona Lisa:

and The Scream:

This one really made use of the 3D nature of the bricks.

The other part of the exhibition was Nathan's own concepts, often expressing how he felt trapped in his career as a corporate lawyer such as this piece which shows the Lego builder escaping from his shell:

You could reproduce this in cross stitch with the stitching bursting out of the everyday you.

This one is a classic piece already as it has been used in the publicity for the exhibition:

I've got about 80 photos of all the pieces so if you want to see more, let me know!!

We also visited the Science Museum and had a quick look round the Natural History Museum too.

The Science Museum had an exhibition on Materials which was very interesting and included this massive sculpture:

The back of the feature: 

I am envisioning something similar using all the shades of DMC now!!

Finally, I suppose there ought to be some stitching in this post.  So here is the piece I worked on during the train journeys to and from London:

Blackbird Designs - Spell of the Moon

stitched on 32 count Cognac linen

(which is less orange in real life)

Day 7 on my Hallowe'en Tree

edit to add - As well as 500 followers, I blew through the 200,000 page views mark today!!  yay!!

March Challenge Reveal and the Easter Bunny Comes a Hopping

This is the Needlecraft Haven March Challenge, a Blackbird Designs piece called Souvenir de France:

When I was deciding how to finish the piece I remembered that Giovanna had recently spent some time in Paris.  She is a great stitcher and blogger who always leaves nice comments and very kindly sent me the charity charts from last year's earthquake fundraiser.  So I thought I should send her a special "Just because we're friends" card.

I stitched this on pale blue 28 count evenweave using a DMC variegated blue.  Seems like blue was a popular choice if you look on the forum!  I mounted it on some nice Eiffel Tower card (the back has sepia schematics on it) and made a simple card, popped it in an envelope and off it went.  Then I returned home, plugged my camera into the computer and realised... no photos!  So this is one that Giovanna kindly sent me.

Look what I won!  Many of you know that we've been having internet problems and last week I plugged the mobile phone dongle into the laptop to find it was all used up.  So off I trudged to the corner shop to buy a top-up.  The assistant persuaded me to buy a raffle ticket, and the very next day I got a call to say I'd won!

The small piece in front of the basket is one of my March Madness starts, a San Man Originals design called Easter (how do they think up these names?).

I stitched it on yellow 28 count evenweave, over 2 using the recommended DMC but changing the words and border to variegated DMC.  Aren't the little buttons cute?  This will be mounted along with the other Easter / Spring pieces in my scrapbook once they're all finished.

The Easter Treasure Hunt Blog Hop is still open, competition closes 8th April 2013.  See post dated 29th March for all the links.

Finally the lovely picture was shown on Needleprint's blog recently.  I'm not sure if I can copy the picture, so here's a link, I guarantee it will make you smile.

August WIPocalypse Number 1

Here's the round-up for the progress since the last Full Moon.


Part 1 - My 12 in '12


Stonkin' progress this month!


I completed not one but THREE of the projects on my list of 12 which actually quadruples the number of finishes!  I have started five more and only have three which haven't got any further than buying fabric.


Here are this month's three finishes:

This is a Blackbird Designs chart called Bluebirds which Margaret sent to me along with Madame Muriel.  I tea-dyed a piece of 28 count evenweave and used the DMC conversion provided.  Mostly.  I blended the hill then used one green for the leaves and the other green for between the flowers.  I also used 931 for the birds rather than 930 which was a little dark.  They look quite bright in this photo because it was taken in the conservatory rather than our lounge.  The colours are a little more muted in real life.

And here are the two baby samplers you've already seen:

Cross Stitcher Mag Elissa Hudson

JBW Designs Noah's Ark

The chart for the Noah's Ark is off to Cucki as she admired it so much and said her son loved it too.  It's Cucki's Birthday this month so it'll go off to the Stitching Cove with a card.


Part 2 - Just Nan-a-thon


Not so good, in fact nothing again!


Part 3 - Theme-a-licious Jolly July


See yesterday's post for my single holiday themed finish, BRD Woodsy Winter.


Finally, back on this post I asked if you ever send pictures of your work to the designers.  This is something I've started doing this year and I'm so pleased I did.  I got a lovely email from Belinda the Blue Ribbon Girl who is now a follower.  She's even posted my Woodsy Winter on her FB page she liked it so much.  So if you've loved stitching a design, let the designer know, they love feedback and photos.  And guess what, they love stitching and blogging too LOL.

Something old, something new and something(s) exchanged

Firstly the something old.  While sorting out our rather grandly (mis)named Library I found these three old samplers:

1996 - This one was in a magazine from the time.

1997 - This one was from a chart by Anchor which a friend lent me.

1998 - And this one was designed by me!
Using borders, alphabets and motifs from a cross stitch book I borrowed from the library.

All three are stitched on 14 count aida using DMC 3041, one of my favourites colours.  Each features a mixture of cross stitch and blackwork.  The mounts are actually lilac to co-ordinate (not blue).  The photos are clickable so you can enlarge them if you so desire.  Not all my photos are clickable anymore as I've discovered it's quicker to "copy and paste" than use the "insert picture".  So if you want to see more detail then pop over to my Photobucket Album (link on the right).

And here's the something new, the continuing progress on Blackbird Designs Bluebirds:

Stitched on tea-dyed 28count.  

Which seems really HUGE compared to the 40count for my Three Hearts design!

And the something(s) exchanged?  Earlier this year Sarah-Beth suggested a little exchange with me.  Here's what I sent her and here are the goodies that she sent me:

This pic show the book and lots of lovely papers for scrapbooking plus some postcards and the cutest ladybird mini-frame.  And LOTS of little prezzies.

And this pic show the inside of the book (open to my favourite project - a doormat with strips of fabric wound round to make a giant cross stitch!) and the contents of the little prezzies.  Notelets, charms, embroidery patterns and the cutest mouse button.

Thank You Sarah-Beth for sending me Christmas in July, opening all the little prezzies was just like having a stocking full on Christmas morning! 

Finally, a Public Service Announcement - back in March Blogger discontinued Google Friend Connect for all non-Blogger blogs which basically means some of the blogs I was following fell off my Reader.  I recently re-discovered Reflections in the Pond by Silver Lotus via a comment on someone else's blog.  So if you used to follow Silver Lotus and wondered where she went, the Good News is - you can find her again!!

Happy Baby Dance and a small start

I finished and framed the ABC Sampler for my friend's baby this week and here it is:

The design was in Cross Stitcher magazine issue 249.  The original design was by an illustrator Elissa Hudson and was charted by an anonymous person for the magazine (I couldn't see a credit anyway!).  I stitched it on 32count white evenweave using the recommended DMC.  I moved several of the letters and motifs around so I could fit in the baby's name and that of his big sister.  This was a lovely quirky stitch, being able to do one or two letters a session made progress seem rather fast.  There was a thick plain turquoise border all around but it would have taken at least a week to stitch if not more and frankly - life's too short to stitch straight lines in one colour!

I have given the sampler to baby's Mum and she loved it, as did Big Sis.  Baby not so sure LOL.  But he is only 17 weeks old. 

This is the new start:

When Madame Muriel arrived she came bearing gifts, one of which was this delightful Blackbird Designs chart.  I'm stitching it on 28count evenweave which I've tea-dyed.  I'm using the DMC conversion they gave but may change the colours of some of the scattered flowers so they show up more on this fabric.

I also stitched another one of my back-stitch only flower cards.  This is July's Delphinium or Larkspur:

Question - which name would you use?  Delphinium or Larkspur?  Either name is right but which is more widely used?  Delphiniums always remind me of the AA Milne poem about the Dormouse and the Doctor.

Finally, another postcard was sent out in the Summer Postcard Blog Hop.  Julie's card went to Julie!!  Julie Bagpuss to Julie and Yes Dear that is.

Here's a full list of links so far:

First Postcard sent to Grasp the Stars
Jennifer's postcard sent to Tales of a Stitching Mouse
Mouse's card sent to The Southpaw Stitcher
Southpaw's card sent to Julie's Stitchy Knitter Journal
Julie's card sent to Julie and Yes Dear
Julie (and Yes Dear)'s card to go where......?

There are plenty more postcards to go out and still lots of time to join in.  Just click on the link to the right and read the rules first!