Gifted Gorgeousness May Link-Up Post

Welcome to the Gifted Gorgeousness link-up post!  The link-up date will continue to be the 15th of each month but I will keep the linky open until the end of each month so you have plenty of time to join in.

The format remains EXACTLY the same as last year so I'm sure you are all aware of what can be included - gifts to and from you; charts, fabric or threads; shoe-horns welcome!

Since my last GG post I have worked on a few gifted pieces:

Elizabeth Shepherd by The Scarlet Letter - a gift from Nicola:

stitched on 30 count linen

Counting Bats by Just Nan - a gift from Epic Mel:

stitched on 32 count lilac linen

Those scissors were a gift too, from Heather of It's Geek to Me.  The scissor chain was made by a friend of mine too.

We had a Happy Dance on Nora Corbett's Little Snowy Gray Cottage - a gift from Nataly's Needle:

stitched on 32 count Blue Hydrangea Opalescent by Crafty Kitten.

And continued progress on The Sweetheart Tree's Finger Fun 1 - a gift from Vickie:

stitched on 28 count Platinum linen

Here is the place for you to link up so we can see what Gifted Gorgeousness you have been stitching so far this year.  Please use your name or your blog name in the field NOT the words "May Update" so I can easily see who has linked up this month.

And link to the actual post, not just your blog.  It is easier if you copy and paste the link, rather than typing freehand.

Thank you.  I can amend links if you make a boo-boo though.

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I'm not aware of any GGG (Gifted Gorgeousness Giveaway) this month, I'm not hosting one myself but if you are, let me know and I'll add a link here!

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Finally, The Days of Jo's Life Big Birthday Blog Hop was been launched and is taking sign-ups.  The Hop will be on the 17th September.  To take part all you have to do is leave a comment or email me.  Nearer the date I will allocate you a Year of My Life and on the 17th September you do a blog post about that year or that life event in your life or what you were doing at that age (assuming you are that old!).  Also, post something you have stitched which you think I will like.

Friday Finishing Frenzy!

I was intending to post on Wednesday or Thursday this week to space the posts out but I was so close to finishing Little Snowy Gray Cottage I wanted to push on and have a Happy Dance post!

So without further ado, here is Little Snowy Metallic Gray Cottage:

Look at all the bling in that!

Design Details:

Little Snowy Gray Cottage by Nora Corbett

Started on 19th January, 2015 for DUCJC2015

Recommenced on 6th April, 2016

Completed on 13th May, 2016 (22 days stitching in total) 

Stitched on 32 count Blue Hydrangea Opalescent by Crafty Kitten

Recommended DMC and Kreinik except for the following:

B5200 for Blanc

Emerald Forest by Jodyri for the Caron Waterlilies

Kreinik 001HL and 014 blended for snowflakes instead of RG Arctic Rays

The Rainbow Gallery Arctic Rays is weird stuff, it's like metallic Whisper and likes to form hairballs on the back of your fabric!  Where the two sides of diagonal stitches meet in the middle the fabric is a little puckered (you can see in the last photo) but hopefully it won't show so much when it is stretched and framed.  

It will need a deep rebate on the frame because of those huge beads on top of the wall posts.

The nicest thread was the Kreinik 9294 used for the walls of the house, I love the colour and ir was so easy to stitch with, a pleasure!

I finished the Cottage this morning which left me some stitching space for the afternoon.  The second Friday of the month is for the Christmas Ornie SAL which is usually my Primitive Hare Christmas Cubes.  But there isn't a Cube which fits this month's theme of Reindeer.  So that gave me the excuse to finally start a series I have been hoarding for about five years!  Daffycat's annual reindeer freebie!

Jinglebell Reindeer from 2008

I didn't stitch him twice but I couldn't decide which photo looked better.  The colours are more accurate in the top one but you can see him better in the bottom one.

I stitched him over one on 28 count silvered white evenweave using the following colours:

Brown - 801

Green - 3346

Red - 815

Beads - 40557

I changed the red and green because colours can look different when you stitch over one and I wanted them to be a little brighter.

The reindeer himself took exactly one hour to stitch.  I timed myself.  The border took longer because my son came home from school and there were snack interruptions and I was needed to read the subtitles on a YouTube clip to him!

I have enough fabric to stitch eight of them, there are nine so far.  I plan to stitch six of them and finish into a cube ornament and hope that Daffycat does three more so I can have two cubes!  If not, then I will "flip" three of them and stitch them reversed.  I will have to get some more fabric though.

In the evenings I have been working on this sweet little chart from Sweetheart Tree:

stitched on 28 count Platinum linen

I am pleased with how well the blackwork shows up in the photo.  It is quite time consuming, the top border took two evenings to complete (doing about 30 minutes per session).

Finally, I joined a new-to-me FB group called Cross Stitch Finish Line which is all about celebrating different types of finishes, encouraging WIPs to become finishes and they host themed events too.  My shoe horn and I do enjoy a good themed SAL (I still miss Theme-a-licious).  The first one will be Sing Me a SAL starting 15th May.  Anything song-related will fit.  Now, I have completed another one of my 16 WIPocalypse projects so I will be continuing with one of the others.  Gathering Honey is earmarked for a later SAL and I have three dragon-themed projects to choose from!

So any suggestions for Dragon-themed songs APART from the obvious Puff the Magic Dragon.

May TUSAL

It's TUSAL time again!  For those of you new to blogging, the TUSAL is a project run by Daffycat, click on the button on the right hand bar for more details.

Here is my ORTS jar posing with the current stitching projects:

On the right we have Nora Corbett's Little Snowy Metallic Gray Cottage:

stitched on 32 count Blue Hydrangea opalescent from Crafty Kitten

The white walls are very boring but once they are done I can move onto the more interesting hedges which are stitched in a Jodyri thread called Emerald Forest.

The piece on the left is a new start for the evenings, a giveaway prize from Vickie called Finger Fun 1 by The Sweetheart Tree.  I had no idea why it is called Finger Fun, that sounds more like a knitting project than stitching.  Anyway, the centre is all over one and then there's some blackwork and some borders and it's very pretty and quite tiny.

stitched on 28 count Platinum linen.

Here is the reason I got a new start - a finish!  This is Byzantine Ornament Number 1 by Teresa Wentzler which I am stitching as part of my 16 Series in '16, part of the Smalls SAL and to fill the Fifth Friday portion of my rotation.

stitched on 28 count burgundy linen.

The photo shows the original ornie as designed by Teresa and you can see I made a couple of changes!  The fabric being the big one.  I used the yellows as charted but changed the accent colour to DMC321 and all the backstitch to DMC's gold 5284.  I also changed the beads to 42011 because I didn't have enough 40557 and I thought they were prettier too.

I also did a little framing this week:

Just Nan - Spring Typography

Because I wanted to get this one up on display now Spring has finally arrived!  I bought a raw wood box frame and painted it using a tester pot of emulsion.  It's a method I've used several times.  Then I added a few stickers to the edge.

Finally the postman delivered a nice surprise:

A postcard from Jocondine who is on her holidays in one of the lacemaking regions of France.  I expect we will hear more on her blog soon.

April TUSAL

It's TUSAL time again!  For those of you new to blogging, the TUSAL is a project run by Daffycat, click on the button on the right hand bar for more details.

Here is my ORTS jar posing with the current stitching project:

This week I have been stitching different things almost every day.  On Monday I finished another project from my 15 in '15 - Joan Elliott's Cherub from the 2013 Diary.  Tuesday was Satsuma Street day.  On Wednesday I went on a train journey so took Trick and Treat because it's all one colour, on Thursday I picked up Just Nan Winter Typography and Friday saw another finish for a DUCJC project - Sweetheart Tree's Tudor Rose.  Today is Saturday and a work day so no stitching so far!

Way back in December 2012 World Of Cross Stitching magazine had their most popular cover gift ever, a diary featuring 12 Joan Elliott designs.  I intended to stitch one a month that year.  Then I revised that to exclude three of the more cutesy designs then I revised it again and actually managed three finishes and one start!  February was started in February 2013 and was in last year's 14 in '14 (unsucessfully) and now in 15 in '15.  As ever, the crazy thing is that it only needed three days stitching to complete it.  Two were pretty full-on days though, we're talking four or five hours a day.

Stitched on 28 count evenweave dyed with fruit tea

(which smells lovely when you are stitching!)

Mounted in my scrapbook.

I need some more gold heart stickers, I only had silver.

I used the recommended colours except for the heart because they were too pink.  I also left off the border of backstitched hearts.  That saved a couple of hours!

Tuesday is a SAL with Linda and Kate on Satsuma Street's Pretty Little London:

(It's the scanner that makes the linen look weird)

This week I stitched more of St Paul's Cathedral.

The Sweetheart Tree Tudor Rose was very nearly completed last week but I wanted to save the beading for a day when the boys were at school.  Beading and the Small Boy are not really compatible!  Here are several photos of the finished piece:

Stitched on 32 count Light Mocha linen.

I substituted plain DMCfor the border and used DMC throughout.

The beads and charm were supplied with the chart.

I had stitched the centre last (as instructed) and noticed that it was quite raised where the eyelets had pulled the fabric so decided to make a stuffed ornie.

With the intended backing fabric:

 

All finished:

And hanging in place:

The chart was a gift from Vickie and will now be travelling on to Gillie as a prize for leaving my 7000th comment a while back.  I gave her first choice before I chose the Giveaway charts and she picked this one.

Finally, the Giveaway of the other seven charts is continuing.  To be in with a chance, just leave a comment on my Blogaversary post.  Anyone who links up for the Gifted Gorgeousness SAL gets an extra chance.  You don't have to do anything to claim that, if you have commented and linked up then my spreadsheet will automatically put your name in twice.

DUCJC 2015 - completed!

The DUCJC is a very special challenge in memory of a very special lady.  SoCal Debbie was a prolific stitcher, blogger and commenter.  Sadly she passed away very suddenly last year.  One of her favourite challenges was the CJC:

CJC = Crazy January Challenge, one new start for the first 15 days of January

UCJC = Ultimate Crazy January Challenge, one new start for all 31 days of January

DUCJC = Debbie's Ultimate Crazy January Challenge, stitch 31 projects one per day for January

Linda Stitchin' with my Furbabies organised this all via a FB group.  Thankfully Linda is not making us all attempt the SDUCJC (Super Duper Ultimate Crazy January Challenge) or 60 starts throughout January and February which she did with Debbie in 2012.

I did it!  I stitched 31 different designs on the 31 days of January!  Here is a little collage of them all:

And details of the final four days you haven't seen before:

Day 28 - Anchor - Kingfisher (designer not credited - how rude of them!):

Stitched on 28 count blue evenweave.

I am only stitching the bird from this design and giving it to the Small Boy's teacher and TAs at the end of the year.  All the classes in his mainstream school are named after water birds and the Reception Class are Kingfishers so this will look good on their wall.

Day 29 - The Sweetheart Tree - Tudor Rose:

Stitched on 32 count Light Mocha Belfast Linen

I used DMC 223 for the border instead of the Caron Waterlilies which I don't have.

Day 30 - Nora Corbett - J is for Joanne:

Stitched on 32 count Love-in-the-Mist Murano evenweave by Crafty Kitten

Day 31 - Madame Chantilly - On the Beach:

Stitched on 32 count Kynance evenweave by Sparklies

This was a WIP I started last year to be a Birth Sampler for my cousin's baby.  Thankfully I noted the thread changes on my blog because I could not remember what they were when I picked it up again!  The colours listed are nothing like the cover picture.  Much more dull and muted so I am changing quite a bit.

A few stats -

8 WIPS

23 New Starts

5 Gifts for other people

22 Gifts from other people

Fabrics Used

25 count eveweave - 1

28 count evenweave - 10

28 count linen - 2

30 count linen - 1

32 count evenweave - 5

32 count linen - 9

35 count linen - 1

40 count linen - 2

stitched over 1 - 6

So right now I am stitching away On The Beach because it's nice to OAAT again!  I did enjoy the challenge more than I thought I would once I got over the first few days on wanting to continue with each project.  Moral - save your favourites until last.  It was a good idea to spend the time in December getting everything together in one place.  It was also a good idea to keep a list of the fabrics too.

My plan now is to stitch on the 15 which are in my WIPocalypse "15 in '15" and then fit the others in around them as we go through the year.  I also want to Giveaway a few charts as part of my Gifted Gorgeousness SAL so watch out for those posts throughout the year.

Would I do this challenge again?  I will have to see how many I manage to complete this year.  If I have several left I won't want alot more new starts in 2016 so I may just rotate the unfinished projects.  On the other hand it is a good way to actually start some much-wanted designs which have sat in my stash for too long.  We shall see....

Finally, I will be hosting the annual Valentine's Day Blog Hop this year.  See this post for more details.  Just send me a photo of your lovely stitching to be sent to another blogger on Valentine's Day,  I've added the Heart to my sidebar, please feel free to copy it onto your blog to link back here.

   

A Brace of Round Robins

I've been working on Rahenna's Band Sampler for the Round Robin and was taking some photos when I realised that I never posted about the previous instalment of this RR.  So here's a double dose of Band Sampler glory.

Rahenna had terrible problems making decisions about her Band Sampler until inspiration struck in the form of this little Pokemon:

Snivy is Rahenna's favourite Pokemon so she used the colours as inspiration!  She also sent us a lovely collection of Lesa Steele and Patricia Ann samplers to choose our bands from with strict instructions not to use any other colours other than those provided under threat of being attacked by an angry Pokemon!

(quick joke - how do you get four Pikachus on a bus?  You poke 'em on)

My bands chosen from Lesa Steele's Sweet Harmony

Side shot to show beads

The whole piece as it goes on to Kathy.

The previous RR was Karen's Sweetheart Tree Autumn themed sampler.  Here are my bands:

I chose my bands from Heirloom Roses but changed the flowers into acorns and added the squirrel.

The whole piece as it left to go to Kathy.

Finally, the Summer Postcard Blog Hop is underway.  It's not too late to send me a photo, in fact you've got until the middle of August to do so.  For more details click on the garden photo to the right.

First postcard from Marcy goes to Gracie at Needles, Pins and Dragonflies

Second postcard from Krista goes to Jocondine at Jocondine

Third postcard from Michelle goes to Sharon at Shebafudge

There's a Rat in ma Stitchin', What am I Gonna Do?

There's a title for the UB40 fans!

And the rat features in block 17 of The Spooky Countdown by Primitive Hare:

I am stitching-a-long with Giovanna on the one, she started in the middle and worked upwards.  Here's her latest progress - Giovanna's Stitches

I am working each block individually and the plan is to mount them on tombstone templates to fix to my Advent Calendar Tree as a countdown to Hallowe'en this year.  When Isabella of Primitive Hare saw me mention this on FB she kindly sent me a link to some free downloadable templates.  How cool is that?

The other piece I have been working on is the Band Sampler Round Robin for Karen:

I have this row to finish, a couple more to add and then the beading.  Karen chose Spring and Summer as the subjects for her first two round robins with us in 2011 and 2012 so this one is Autumn.

Here are the previous two:

Spring 2011

Summer 2012

Finally, I will be running the Summer Postcard Blog Hop again this year.  The theme will be Gardens.  Click on the picture of the stitching in the garden on the right for more details.  This Blog Hop lasts for the whole of the Summer so it doesn't matter if you are away on holiday for a week or two, you won't miss it!

Why are finishes like Buses?

You don't have one for weeks then two come along at once!!

Yesterday I finished both my daytime and my evening projects.  For those that don't know I have a smaller easier project to stitch during the day when the boys are about.  Then I have a larger more complex project for after bedtime when I can concentrate and lay my charts out to follow what I'm stitching.

This is a Thank You card for the Small Boy's Outreach Worker, she leaves us at Christmas.  It's based on a Joan Elliott design from the Women's Wit and Wisdom book.  I added the words using the alphabet provided and stitched part of the larger design.  I stuck a photo of the Small Boy inside.

The larger project is the latest in the Band Sampler Round Robin.  This is Kathy's piece.  She had all the Sweetheart Tree Hearts and decided now was the time to get them stitched.  I chose the Mayflower Heart.  I love the colours in this one.  They're actually quite similar to the colours used for the Joan Elliott card!

Here's my heart in close up:

And here's the whole thing before it goes off to sunny Australia then back to Kathy:

There's a little gap in the centre of each heart for Kathy to add a charm.

Finally, I hope you're enjoying the Advent Calendar each day and reading the blog posts of the participants.  This year I thought I'd ask the question "Stocking, Sack or Something Else?" to find out  what people leave out for Santa to fill with presents.  So far the score is Stockings 5 - Sack Nil!