Finally Fully Finishing Fun for June

Hosted by Rachel the Ten Hour Stitcher

This new SAL is designed to motivate us all to do something with that box of Finished pieces instead of just storing them under the bed.  We will all be linking up on Rachel's blog on or after the 10th of each month (10 Hour Stitcher - 10th of the month).

Over the last month I have been very unseasonal!  I have continued with my progress on some older pieces which were all finished in the same way - Put It In A Bag For Twenty Years.

First up is a jolly little Santa from Mill Hill:

It took a massive amount of work to FFO him, two pieces of double-sided tape:

He looks a bit lonely so at some point I will stitch his friends:

I only have the charts and some leftover threads as these came from my friend who was destashing a few years back.

The next piece was also a Santa, look how well he matches the paper I had in my stash: 

You can see how old this one is, issue 8 of Cross Stitch Collection from December/January 1993!  The card mount came with it.

Now for something a little bit more recent, although still an older magazine:

Not a Creature Was Stirring by Dragon Dreams

from Just Cross Stitch Ornament Special 2001

The little card frame came from an old Christmas card

Finally, there will be a Summer Blog Hop this year.  We will have an International Theme for the Postcards this year.  Each person emails me a photo of something they have stitched on an International theme which is suitable to send to a fellow stitcher along with a short message of the kind you write on a postcard.  I will forward the photo to another participant who shows it on their blog.  The photo can be anything which fits the International theme, let's see which countries we visit this Summer.  If you'd like to take part then leave a comment or send me an email.

A couple of people have asked "what do you mean by "International"?"

To which I replied "Use your imagination!  If you don't have something which represents a country or an area of the world, how about a mode of transport?  Or something designed by an international designer?  Or gifted by an international friend?  Or stitched on French Navy fabric? LOL!!"

The Hop will run over the whole of the Summer with a few cards going out each week.  Final deadline will be the end of August, just in time for Back to School!

April Smalls SAL

The Smalls SAL is hosted by Mary's Thread

For this SAL I am showing the monthly project for the Christmas Ornie Blog.  I am choosing from the back issues of the Just Cross Stitch Ornament Specials.  This month we could chose any ornament from the 2002 issue.  I am a big fan of Dragon Dreams so I went for this cute little design of a baby dragon cuddled up to a sparkly Christmas Bauble.  This is Not a Creature Was Stirring:

stitched on 32 count green linen

added metallic threads to the bauble 

I have just realised that April was supposed to be the 2002 design and this was the design from 2001.  ooops!  Never mind, 2002 is also a Dragon Dreams design so maybe no-one will notice!

I also added some stitches to my Spooky Conversion of the Enchanted Alphabet by Lavender & Lace.  This month I chose some bats from here Brigitte Dadaux:

stitched on 32 count Murano in Tiger Lily by Sparklies

I started a new Just Nan Small and have almost finished it.  The white is the perfect thing to stitch on my Crafty Coffee Mornings.

Just Nan -Butterfly Lace

stitched on 32 count Lavender Evenweave

The Easter Treasure Hunt Blog Hop was the perfect time to squeeze in another small.  This was a beaded Mill Hill kit which was passed on to me as just the chart.  So I stitched the DMC conversion on 16 count yellow aida:

Finally, thank you to everyone who took part in the Easter Treasure Hunt Blog Hop and everyone who has hopped around to visit the blog and guess the mystery phrase. All the links go direct to the posts now so you have plenty of time to try and guess the phrase. Happy Hopping!

8th Blogaversary on the 8th

It's my 8th Blogaversary today!  Where has the time gone?

That's me when I was 8.  Once again you can just see my little brother to my right wearing pink and green.  That was a very fetching mustard and green knitted tanktop,  My little sister was at the other end wearing a brown/orange toned dress with a blue ribbon trim.  In the 1970s it was All The Colours For All The Children.  None of this pink/blue nonsense we have now.

We'd had a fairly stable homelife that year.  I moved into the Juniors at School and Mrs Butler's class.  I actually saw her earlier this year and recognised her so it was nice to let her know what an influence she had been.  I read my first Charles Dicken's story in her class - A Christmas Carol.

How has the blog done over the past year?   Readership has held steady, my pageviews have increased but comments have decreased.  I suspect that this is connected to the way people read blogs now.  It's much harder to comment using a mobile device.  If you are a regular silent follower, why not make this post your first comment?  It would be amazing to push those comments to 20,000 by this time next year!

Here are my blog stats:

*

8 years

865 posts

645 followers

17,952 comments

1,000,909 pageviews

WOW

Yes, I burst through the 1,000,000 mark this week!

I'd also like to wish my Blog-Twins Susan and Calamity Jr a very Happy Birthday too!

What have I been working on recently?  I had a quick look back at last year's Blogaversary post and all the pieces there have been finished which is encouraging.

So far this month I have worked on my Hallowe'en and Christmas pieces.  The Christmas piece is very close to a finish but here's a photo when I had just started:

This is a Dragon Dreams design and the fabric is actually Reed Green not grey.

I added some bats to my spooky conversion of The Enchanted Alphabet by Lavender & Lace.  They were a freebie found at this blog - Brigitte Dadaux

I took this little Just Nan Butterfly Lace along to my Crafty Coffee Morning last week and got the purple finished and all this white border too:

stitched on 32 count lavender linen

Having worked on my Christmas and Hallowe'en pieces for 3 days each, this is where I would usually pick up my Chatelaine but I decided to do something different this month and work on another of my "19 in '19" choices. As we are close to Easter I chose Gathering Eggs by Nora Corbett.   The first picture is with my TUSAL jar so I can link up with Daffycat for this month.

I worked hard on her hair and face for two days.  The frog had attacked her last year so it was nice to get this part finished.  Lots of different colours and blended threads too.

stitched on 35 count Vintage Country Mocha

Hasn't she got a sweet face?

Last year I asked you all what was your favourite blogging or stitching moment of the last year so it seems like a good idea to revisit that question this year.  Leave a comment and let me know.

A new blogging year also seems like a good opportunity to launch a new blog.  I've been showing my painted rocks recently and everyone seems to enjoy seeing them so I thought I would start a specific rock blog -  Serendipity Rocks UK.  It's still a work in progress, I'll be adding posts over the next two weeks so make sure you follow using a Reader so you see them all, or just pop back from time to time.  I decided on a blog rather than Instagram or Facebook because I can add Labels to the posts and find specific themes if I want to.


Finally, I will be hosting my Annual Easter Treasure Hunt on Good Friday the 19th April. If you would like to take part this year, just leave a comment here. The week before Easter I will send you a letter of the alphabet which will form part of the mystery phrase. On Good Friday you will post that letter along with a photo of something seasonal that you have stitched (could be Easter or Spring or just something cheerful and sunny or floral). We all hop around like little bunnies to find the Mystery Phrase!