And a Morris Dance for Pretty Little London

Which is the larger of the two London designs, the other one being Pretty Mini London.

Pretty Little London is a Satsuma Street design I have been stitching every Tuesday along with Linda and Kate.

Scanned picture to show the colours

Close up of the cloud.  

I added the silver metallic because "every cloud has a silver lining"!

Framed for my scrapbook to co-ordinate with Pretty Mini London

Closer photo:

The curved top is to give the effect of a snowglobe.  Rainglobe?

And here is a nice collage of all the iconic sights in the design:

Top - The Rain, Coldstream Guardsman, Houses of Parliament Clock Tower, Tower Bridge

Middle - A Black Taxi, The Gherkin, A Red Bus, The Shard

Bottom - St. Paul's Cathedral, Buckingham Palace, Railway Arches, London Eye

I stitched Pretty Little London on 32count antique white linen because it was the only white I had at the time and "Stitch from Stash" but with hindsight, it was not the right fabric for this design.  I have some 32 count white evenweave I will probably use that for the next "Little" design.  But for the rest of this year, Tuesdays are going to be WIPocalypse days in an effort to make progress on my list for that SAL.  Satsuma Street will recommence in January!

I did have new start this week, to celebrate two finishes (London and the Mail Art Exchange which I can't show yet).  The new start is one of those designs getting great publicity on FB.  Glendon Place decided to give a free chart when they got 500 members of their FB group.  It must have worked because they now have over 1100!  The chart is great, a mandala design called Friendship Compass.  They aren't giving a colour key, you have a completely free choice.  There are some lovely schemes appearing on the FB page so far.  I have gone with purples, starting with  my favourite 333 and working down the shade chart from there.

Here is my progress so far:

Stitched on 32 count white evenweave

Finally, Hallowe'en is fast approaching so it must be time to launch the Hallowe'en Trick or Treat Blog Hop.  Regular followers will know the format.  Leave a comment here saying you would like to take part in the hop as a Picture Poster.  When I have everyone signed up I will choose a Mystery Phrase and allocate each Picture Poster a letter of the alphabet.  On 31st October they must make a blog post showing their letter and a photo of something they have stitched on a Hallowe'en theme.  On my blog there will be a list of all the contributors so people can hop around and collect the letters to work out the Mystery Phrase.  You don't have to be a Picture Poster to collect the letters and join in with the competition but all Picture Posters do get an extra entry in the competition.

, 

You Can Tell It's Term Time Again...

My Blog Comments email folder has gone over 100 emails to answers, my Reader had 200 posts to read (got that down to 140 now), it took all week to stitch an ornie I could have done in one day and I'm feeling a little "peopled-out" having done two days at work, one parent support group, two friends visits and a Toddler Group too.  I need to hermit this weekend!

I chose the themes for the Hallowe'en Ornie SAL blog back in November last year so they tend to come as a surprise to me by this time of year!  I wasn't sure I would easily be able to find something for this month's theme"Spooky Words" but as I looked through my issues of JCS I realised there were loads of designs I liked!  Which is probably why I chose this as one of the themes in the first place.

I found a nice design which said Hubble Bubble Toil and Trouble which reminded me of another chart I owned.  When I found that one it was too large for an ornie but in with it was this one which was the perfect size stitched over one.  I do love my over one stitching.

stitched over one on 28count light beige evenweave

This is the debut design from 2009 by Tammy who has a blog called Witchy Stitches.  It's not easy to see if she has many other designs because there's no page for her own stuff.  But there is a sweet Wynter Witch.

Anyway, I stitched this one using the recommended DMC conversion except for the lettering and mug which I subbed 3799 for plain black.  I thought it was closer to the Gentle Art thread the model stitcher used.  Because I stitched the design over one I was able to cheat on the border and stitch it over two which saved so much time hahaha.  I also added some little starry stitches around the word "hex" just because I wanted to.

I'm not sure whether to scrapbook this with the others or frame it and put it next to the kettle to drop a hint to my family!

I managed to put a few stitches into Satsuma Street's Pretty Little London for my Tuesday SAL with Linda and Kate.  White, cream and dark blue added.

stitched on 32 count Antique White evenweave

I'm also progressing on Book of Spells, I do enjoy stitching words and as I took this one to work with me one of the days I got quite a bit done in my lunchbreak:

stitched on 40 count Jewel Butterbeer linen in need of an iron!

Finally, the Summer Postcard Blog Hop is all done and dusted for another year!  The final card came to me from the lovely (and very patient) Leonore from Needle, Pen & Sword

I had pets when I was younger, and I loved them, but to be honest, I was never really up to the responsibility, and much of the actual work fell to my grandparents, with whom I lived. Now that I'm old enough to decide if I want pets of my own, I'm also old enough to fully grasp what it really means to be responsible for another living being, and I sadly realized that I don't have that kind of time at the moment. But I sincerly hope that I will in the future, and until then, stitching cute little critters will have to serve as a subsitute :)

Leonore

I have to agree, he is totally adorable!  I have never owned a guinea pig but the Large Boy had a cuddly toy bought for him when he was a Small Boy and I did stitch a picture of the creature one year:

First postcard from Cheryl goes to Noni at Fireflies and Cats in the Garden

Second postcard from Vickie goes to Katie at Jeremiah's Mom

Third postcard from Noni goes to Julie at Julie's Stitchyknitter Journal

Fourth postcard from Katie goes to Anna at Stitch Bitch

Fifth postcard from Julie goes to Bea at Thoughts and Musings
Sixth card from Narita goes to Kaye at Kitten Stitching
Seventh card from Anna goes to Vickie at A Stitcher's Story
Eighth card from Kaye goes to Jocondine at Jocondine
Ninth card from Jocondine goes to Cheryl at Today I Found
Tenth card from Bea goes to Leonore at  Needle, Pen and Sword
Final card from Leonore to me!

August Smalls SAL

The Smalls SAL is hosted by Heather from Stitching Lotus

This year I am going to have two monthly challenges:

1. The Primitive Hare Hallowe'en Cubes SAL

2. The Hallowe'en Ornie SAL themed blog.
and a third one added from August:
3. The Christmas Ornie SAL themed blog

This is the first E from Hallowe'en:

stitched on 32 count Vintage Grain linen

The theme for the Hallowe'en Ornie Blog is Black Cats.  I have so many charts with black cats it was hard to pick one.  In the end I decided to start a larger piece and just stitch the part with the cats then continue it later on.  This is part of Just Nan's Ghoulies and Ghosties.  You can see the whole design here - JN180 Ghoulies and Ghosties

stitched on 32 count tan evenweave.

And now for a new monthly challenge - the Christmas Ornie SAL Blog hosted by Kaye.  She has chosen themes for the rest of this year and August's was Mr and/or Mrs Santa. 

I've had my eye on this design for some time (2012 in fact!) and this was the perfect chance to stitch it.  It's from the JCS Christmas Ornie Special 2012 and is by Knotted Tree NeedleArt.  I used the DMC conversion on green linen making a couple of changes.  The parcel is a brighter green as are the yellow stitches in the border.  I alternated them with the bright red from the hat (817) to make it look more festive.

This isn't really a small but there was only a small piece left to stitch!  I started it back in January for the DUCJC and haven't picked it up since.  All I had to do was chart and stitch the name which I finally did this morning.  It's for my cousin's baby daughter.  Her first Birthday is at the beginning of September so it will arrive in perfect time.

The design is by JBW and is called Hobby Horse which is puzzling because it is clearly a Rocking Horse.  I stitched it using my favourite DMC 115 variegated red on 32 count Antique White linen and framed it in the perfect frame from my frame stash box.

And here is Tuesday's Satsuma Street progress on Pretty Little London.  I finished Buckingham Palace on the left and thought I'd start on the long boring grey arches underneath the whole piece.  If I leave them until last I will get dispirited I'm sure!

stitched on 32 count Antique White linen.

Finally, we are approaching the end of the Summer Postcard Blog Hop, if you haven't already been to Jocondine's blog you must visit to see her delightful cartoon drawing of our hop.  She is a very talented cartoonist.

First postcard from Cheryl goes to Noni at Fireflies and Cats in the Garden

Second postcard from Vickie goes to Katie at Jeremiah's Mom

Third postcard from Noni goes to Julie at Julie's Stitchyknitter Journal

Fourth postcard from Katie goes to Anna at Stitch Bitch

Fifth postcard from Julie goes to Bea at Thoughts and Musings
Sixth card from Narita goes to Kaye at Kitten Stitching
Seventh card from Anna goes to Vickie at A Stitcher's Story
Eighth card from Kaye goes to Jocondine at Jocondine

August 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:

And this is the part I worked on this week:

This is Pretty Little London from Satsuma Street my Tuesday SAL with Linda and Kate.  Or, for this week, my USAL (Un Stitch A Long).  You can possibly see the holes in the area between the two red columns?  That is this week's reverse stitching.  The problem was that when I started the project I was missing one colour.  So I decided to substitute it for another which looked fine in the first area I used it.  I duly noted the new number on the chart and continued.  However when I used it for the Gherkin it looked awful, totally wrong for that area.  So I bit the bullet and paid out 95p for the proper colour.

However, when it came to the latest building (Buckingham Palace) I inadvertently used the substituted colour.  Which looked OK until I added the red columns and then it looked awful.  So I'm restitching in the correct colour which you can see attached to the needle in the photo!

The rest of this week was taken up finishing my exchange piece which has been parcelled up and sent off to my partner.  It may even have arrived by now!

Short post today.  I've been at work all day and sat down to read a few blogs and noticed the TUSAL posts.  Darn!  Hadn't realised it was today!  So a quick post to make sure I'm on time.

Finally, the Summer Postcard Blog Hop:

First postcard from Cheryl goes to Noni at Fireflies and Cats in the Garden

Second postcard from Vickie goes to Katie at Jeremiah's Mom

Third postcard from Noni goes to Julie at Julie's Stitchyknitter Journal

Fourth postcard from Katie goes to Anna at Stitch Bitch

Fifth postcard from Julie goes to Bea at Thoughts and Musings
Sixth card from Bea goes to Narita at The Twilight Thread (not up yet)
Seventh card from Narita goes to Kaye at Kitten Stitching
Eighth card from Anna goes to Vickie at A Stitcher's Story (sent today)

The Summer Holidays Continue

As does the stitching!   I complete the A from Brooke's Book Alphabet, all except the petite beads which I don't have.  I thought about using the standard size which are used in some areas but having added those, I can see they would overpower the piece so I will wait.  Of course, you can't just order one packet of beads, you must make it worth the postage as I've made a list of the beads needed for the next couple of letters and will check which DMC I am running low on.

Then it was Tuesday which is Pretty Little City Day, a series of designs from Satsuma Street.  Here is where I am on Pretty Little London:

stitched on 32 count Antique White linen

(not that you can tell from the dreadful photo!)

I finished the London Eye and started on Buckingham Palace.  I also stitched the pale blue in the Embankment Arches along the bottom.

I've also been making steady progress on Book of Spells by the Goode Huswif:

stitched on 40 count Jewel Butterbeer linen

I've completed all the border for the front cover of the book and just have the coloured parts to fill in, then I can start on the back cover.  Woohoo, over halfway completed now!   I have been working on this one since April so it could be a finish by the end of the year.

I've been doing some secret stitching which I can't show yet because it's for an exchange.  It was fun going through my friend's blog to try find something she hasn't stitched for herself yet but would like.

Gracie has been organising a lovely card exchange all year.  Each month we sign up and send cards to some of the other people on the list.  It means you get some nice post each month, not just bills!  Here are the three I have received so far this month.  Usually I get about six and I've been keeping them all in an album along with their stamps.  It's so nice to look back through the year.

Which brings us rather nicely to my Finally for today:

Finally, the Summer Postcard Blog Hop:

First postcard from Cheryl goes to Noni at Fireflies and Cats in the Garden

Second postcard from Vickie goes to Katie at Jeremiah's Mom

Third postcard from Noni goes to Julie at Julie's Stitchyknitter Journal

Fourth postcard from Katie goes to Anna at Stitch Bitch

Fifth postcard from Julie goes to Bea at Thoughts and Musings
Sixth card from Bea goes to Narita at The Twilight Thread (not up yet)
Seventh card from Narita goes to Kaye at Kitten Stitching (sent today)

July Smalls SAL

The Smalls SAL is hosted by Heather from Stitching Lotus

This year I am going to have two monthly challenges:

1. The Primitive Hare Hallowe'en Cubes SAL

2. The Hallowe'en Ornie SAL themed blog.

Here is my W block which is not quite finished:

Stitched on 32 count Vintage Grain linen

The theme for July on the Hallowe'en Blog was Haunted Houses.  There have been some great finishes this month and here is mine:

This is A Little Hallowe'en House from the JCS 2013 Hallowe'en Special designed by Jamie Kile of Knotted Tree NeedleArt.  I choose a nice muddy green for the fabric.  It's a 32count linen called Dark Reed Green from Willow Fabrics.  I used the recommended DMC conversion with a couple of minor changes.  I blended two shades of purple for the house rather than use a variegated thread.

I don't enjoy stitching plain borders and this had a double row of plain stitches.  So I changed them to extra large Xs stitched over four threads instead of two.  Then I changed the corner blocks to twelve-legged eyelets instead of plain Xs.  They look a little web-ish to me.

I have just realised that I haven't added the chimney pots!  Oops, back to the needles for me.

Another Little project I've been stitching every Tuesday is Pretty Little London by Satsuma Street.  I am plodding away around the London Eye at the moment:

Stitched on 32 count Antique White linen.

Linda likes these partial shots because it looks like we are the same stage as each other LOL.

Heather did suggest we might like to stitch a "Christmas in July" small which I thought was a great idea what with the launch of Kaye's new Christmas Ornie Blog and Claire's Joy Ornie Collection too.  Unfortunately I just ran out of time!  So we will just have to have Christmas in August instead.

Another word for Small is Mini.  Lynn B from Happiness is Cross Stitching has been designing several Mini Cats for some time now and this year has been posting a free monthly themed Mini Cat each month.  They have been so popular that she has set up a special blog just for them.  So if you like Mini Cats why not pop over to The Mini Cat Blog and admire Peggie's 27 finishes!  I've posted my one and only finish which is the Valentine Cat:

Finally, the Summer Postcard Blog Hop.  Five cards have been sent and posted online so far with another one due to go out this week.  You can see them all here:

First postcard from Cheryl goes to Noni at Fireflies and Cats in the Garden

Second postcard from Vickie goes to Katie at Jeremiah's Mom

Third postcard from Noni goes to Julie at Julie's Stitchyknitter Journal

Fourth postcard from Katie goes to Anna at Stitch Bitch

Fifth postcard from Julie goes to Bea at Thoughts and Musings

First Week of the Summer Holidays

and of course, we have had steady and heavy rain since yesterday lunchtime!

The Large Boy is at High School (age 11+ here) and they broke up at 1pm last Friday while the Small Boy lucked out and didn't finish until Wednesday afternoon.  So we took advantage of the time together and went on a Dragon Hunt!  Norwich is our nearest city and one I know well as I worked there for 17 years pre-children.  They have had a couple of these hunts before (Elephants and Gorillas) and this year it was Dragons.  More information can be found here but essentially there are 84 large dragon sculptures dotted around the city.  Each one is decorated by a different person to a different theme.  You visit each one and collect a letter or symbol which then spells out a message.  Sounds rather like my Hallowe'en and Easter Blog Hops!

They are also selling postcards and here is a collection of our favourites:

The bottom left was made by the staff at John Lewis (department store) and is lots of small fabric pieces embellished with buttons.  I'm going to go back and take some decent photos of it later in the holiday.  The bottom right is entirely covered in 2p coins, plus a few 5p and pennies.

It was a good thing that the Small Boy finished later in the week because I was still beading the final teacher gift on Tuesday evening!  Hope was beset with a plague of frogs.  At times it felt like Pandora's Box where I had to fight through all the winged nasties until I found Hope at the bottom!  Here it is all framed to match Believe:

Hope by Joan Elliot - from the Bewitching book

stitched on 28 count Robin's Egg Opalescent by Silkweavers

The Small Boy's school is a little unusual in that the children don't change teacher every year, quite often they do two years with the same teacher.  So I didn't realise last year that he would be moving up a class until it was too late to stitch anything!  So this year I was more prepared.  Believe is for his current teacher and Hope is for the teacher he had in Nursery and Reception.  I didn't see them because Hubby does the school run but he said both teachers were incredibly touched by their gifts.

I did see the teachers at his other school though, the Kingfisher Class.  They had a little leaving ceremony for him which was lovely.  All the children in the class had made a huge card with drawings of each of them and they let him choose his favourite song for them all to sing.  Then I gave them the Kingfisher picture.  One child was nominated to open it and they all craned over - "It's a picture of you", "it's a bird", "it's a kingfisher"  "IT'S US, WE'RE KINGFISHERS".  You can imagine how excited this made a bunch of five year olds!

The Headmaster had been watching all this and then the Chair of the PTA appeared with gifts for me!  A framed photo of the class (including the Small Boy) and a lovely engraved pen to thank me for all my hard work over the last 9 years.  That was unexpected!  We don't usually make a lot of fuss when people leave because it happens regularly as children grow up so it was nice to be appreciated.  I think she's keeping me sweet in case she needs to pick my brain in future LOL

So, end of an era there.

With all the busyness, I didn't stitch much of Pretty Little London, just some blue in the London Eye:

stitched on 32 count antique white linen

The last two days have been dedicated to Hallowe'en Ornie SAL blog's July theme which was Haunted Houses:

This is a Knotted Tree design from JCS Ornie Special 2013

I'll show a close-up and more details when I finish it, which won't be long now.

Many of you know that I have been very involved with the Scarlet Letter Year blog set up to celebrate Nicola's special birthday a couple of year ago.  Later this Summer a group of the stitchers are meeting up at the Cotswold Manor House which houses the Fellers' collection of samplers.  There is still room for a couple more people.  The trip is on Wednesday 26th August and costs £30 including a lovely buffet lunch.  If you are interested then send me and email and I'll pass your details on to Nicola.  More information about the collection can be found on Needleprint's blog.

Finally, the Summer Postcard Blog Hop.  Four cards have been sent and posted online so far with a fifth today.  You can see them all here:

First postcard from Cheryl goes to Noni at Fireflies and Cats in the Garden

Second postcard from Vickie goes to Katie at Jeremiah's Mom

Third postcard from Noni goes to Julie at Julie's Stitchyknitter Journal

Fourth postcard from Katie goes to Anna at Stitch Bitch

Fifth postcard from Julie goes to Bea at Thoughts and Musings

July 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:

And here is July's project by itself:

Stitched on 32 count Antique White linen

This is Satsuma Street's Pretty Little London, my Tuesday SAL.  I haven't stitched on this one since May when I switched to Pretty Mini London on black.  I have mounted Mini for my scrapbook now:

and here's a better photo than the last post:

Finally, on to the Summer Postcard Blog Hop where the theme is Pets.  So far it seems that stitchers love their cats!  I do have some other animals too and it would be nice to have some more, there's still plenty of time to join in. The third postcard has been sent out to Julie of Julie's Stitchyknitter Journal, so go and stalk her blog as it will be appearing there soon.

May Stitch from Stash

Month: May

Spent: £ 14.67

Earned: £ 0.00

Stitch from Stash is hosted by Mel from Epic Stitching

Essentially the idea behind Stitch from Stash is that we are limited to spending US$25 (or £15) per month. There are various exemptions (Birthday money, existing mag subs, clubs etc) but the idea is not to try and pervert the rules and to stitch some of that stash!  I will be posting on or around the 20th of each month because that is when I get paid!

January Budget	£ 15.00
January Spend	£   0.00
February Budget	£ 15.00
February Spend	£   5.50-
March Budget	£ 15.00
March Spend	£ 32.46-
April Budget	£ 15.00
April Spend	£   4.99-
May Budget	£ 15.00
Just Nan Spring Typography/Scream Girls	£ 13.72-
DMC	£   0.95-
Current Balance	£ 17.38

The Just Nan Spring Typography chart was a reward for finishing Winter Typography and the Scream Girls chart was just because there was a 10% off everything and it was only a couple of quid anyway.  The DMC is because when I added all my DMC to my new X-Stitch Inventory app I discovered there were two new colours added into the middle of the other numbers since I made my original list back in the 1990s.  Anyway the Pretty Little London chart needed 967 which I didn't have.  So in the interests of attempting to have a complete set again, I bought a skein at the huge price of 95p from the department store.

And here is Pretty Little London:

Stitched on 32 count Antique White linen

I haven't stitched much at all this week.  Unfortunaly the first three days of this week have been rather busy with work and school.  So all I managed on this was finishing the pink in the Gherkin and adding some of the little pods on the London Eye.  Never mind, it will give Linda a chance to catch up!

Next week is Half Term here in England so I should be getting some more stitching time with no work scheduled until the second weekend.

Finally, I have been nominated by a few people now for the 

I am very appreciative of all the people who have nominated me for this award and have directed everyone to this post where I answered the 7 Things question:

7 Ages of Me!

Winners Galore!

It's exactly a month since my Fourth Blogaversary so I guess I ought to announce the winners of the Grand Giveaway?  To enter you needed to leave a comment on the Blogaversary post telling me your top three of the seven charts I was offering.  If you had entered the Easter Treasure Hunt your name got put in twice, if you had been a Picture Poster for the Easter Treasure Hunt you got another entry and if you linked up for April's Gifted Gorgeousness SAL then you also got another entry.  So that made a maximum of four entries in the draw!  And a rather complicated spreadsheet too.

But the Random Number Generator did its duty and the following people were chosen to receive the following charts:

Evalina - This and That

A - Lizzie*Kate Friends are Angels

plus Peace, Love and a Cure (not shown)

Ariadne from Greece 

B - Christmas Number 1

Annette - California Stitcher

C - Christmas Number 2

Christine - The Alchymyst's Study

D - Christmas Number 3

Carla - Alaska Wolf Pack

E - Told in a Garden - The Courting

Noni - Fireflies & Cats in the Garden

F - Told in a Garden - Piecemakers I

Vickie - A Stitcher's Story

G - Told in a Garden - Voice of the Shepherd

I have addresses for some of you, but not all, so if you are reading this then please email me your address.  If you are not reading this, then don't worry because I will email you!

So, apart from organising spreadsheets and draws, what have I been doing this week (and apart from my civic duty yesterday too)?  Stitching of course!  Tuesday was the day for Pretty Little London to have another building constructed:

Week 10

Added a bus and a guardsman

Week 11

Added The Shard on the left

I have also been diligently stitching on The Book of Spells each evening.  This one isn't just black, there are areas of grey and brown too!  The original is charted in GAST and WDW but she provides a DMC conversion.  I am using her conversion for some colours and my own for others.

Stitched on 40 count Jewel Butterbeer linen.

The fabric is very wrinkled but I rather like that because it makes it look more leathery, like the cover of an old book.

I've also been doing a little framing and scrapbooking:

Lizzie*Kate - Friends are Like Angels.

I really wanted the page with that famous painting with the two cherubs looking up at the sky but they didn't have it anymore so I got this cloud paper and some cherub stickers.

Just Nan - Winter Typography.

Raw wood frame painted with a test pot and a couple of snowflake stickers added.

Finally, thanks to the D.E.S.I.G.N. SAL I discovered yet another new-to-me designer - Elli Jenks.  She does a range of cross stitch rugs for dolls' houses and a 3D village called Brightsea.  Of course this design just called out to me:

She has an Etsy shop found here and there is free postage if you order over US$15.  So now I just have to wait to save up enough SFS budget to able to treat myself.  I have promised that when I finished the Nutmeg Cottage design I can have one of these.  So there's an incentive!