This week's stitching

I took spring break off of work to relax and, as it turned out, recuperate from yet another cold. The down time gave me a chance to get some stitching done, and here are some of the results:

First is the Hedwig Four Patch freebie from The Sampler Girl. I stitched it on some of my Silkweaver purple sparkly fabric and used DMC variations thread on the border and letters.



The second small that I did was another freebie, this time from Cyberstitchers.com. Since I love penguins and Italian food, I decided that my kitchen needed this:



And finally, an update on the Heritage Stitchcraft dragon. This is actually from last week, so I'll have to post another picture with the progress that I made this week.



I also did my first hardanger piece this week, but I haven't taken a photo of it yet. It's not great, but it was a first attempt after all!

Dragons, framing and fabric

I actually did this framing over a week ago, so I'm a little behind. This piece has had the stitching finished on it for about 4 and a half years, and now it is finally in its frame. I didn't get the tension exactly right, so there is a slight bump visible, but other than that, I'm pretty happy with it. (And the bump doesn't show up as much as it does in the photo, since there was bright light to the side.) Right now it is sitting on the mantle in the living room since I haven't figured out where I want to hang it.



Next up is a progress photo of the Heritage Stitchcraft dragon, although it's a but out of date. I've actually done the top band now too, but no photo right now.



And last but not least, my first batch of Silkweaver "Fabric of the Month" fabric arrived! I'm on the rotating schedule, since I wanted a variety of counts, colors, types and sizes. I don't have anything in mind for the pink fabric, but I know just the thing for that sparkly light purple fabric! Stay tuned, since I'll probably stitch it up during Spring Break, when I'm planning on taking a lot of time of off work.

New stash!

This actually came in a couple of weeks ago but I'm just now getting around to posting it. I saw on another stitch blog that Designs by Lena Rose were closing up shop and selling off their stitching supplies in a "grab bag" of basically how much stuff could be crammed into a priority mail box. Below are the items they put in my box... all of which I got for a grand total of $22 (including shipping). There were only a couple of things that I probably won't use, so it was a GREAT deal. I was really happy to get some more sizes of pearl cotton so I can play with hardanger embroidery (and I got a huge piece of white 22 ct. fabric for it too!). I also now have my first overdyed Watercolours thread to play with!

Belated photo of a finish!

I meant to post this ages ago, but I've been very busy and then I had some computer issues (back light went out on my laptop... which makes it pretty useless!). But now everything is back up and running.

So, here is the completed Texas Panorama, although the mounting and framing still needs to be done. I have in mind the kind of frame that I want for it, but I need to write down some measurements and then catch a sale on frames.



I did a little Mill Hill beads snowflake ornament kit last weekend, but I haven't finished it yet (I'm thinking about doing a fabric backing on it), so no photos.

My next big project is a Heritage Stitchcraft kit that I bought a few years ago. It came with 14 ct. Aida, but I've switched it out with a 28 count evenweave (just a generic one from Michael's, I think). I actually started it over Christmas, but I'm going to wait until a bit more is done to post a picture.

Cross stitching finished on Texas Panorama

Now on to the backstitching. I finished most of the backstitching around the "S" last night, but my eyes were burning so I didn't get far. I had a horrible allergy attack late Tuesday/early Wednesday and I'm still recovering. At first I thought it might be a really short cold, but then several people at work were having the same symptoms at the same time and the pollen count was high during this, the notorious "cedar fever" season in Texas. (I put that in quotes because it is actually not cedar and you rarely get a fever from it!) So, I'm finally starting to feel better and the weather is supposed to be nasty for the day off tomorrow for MLK's birthday, so I hope to get a lot of stitching done.

Another Texas Panorama update

Just a quick post with Texas Panorama, now with the T complete... so I guess it's TEXA panorama at the moment. :)



I've started into the S just a little. After that, lots of backstitching to finish! The X in particular has a bunch, so it's going to take a while to get to the point of putting in that final stitch.

Last finishes from 2007 and Texas Panorama update

I made a few ornaments late in 2007 to include with some gifts, but being sick and having a broken computer conspired to keep me from posting pictures at the time. Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture of one of them before I wrapped it up in its box, but here are the other two. The poinsettia ornament was sort of my trial and error one that I was going to keep for myself. The other was a gift. I was really happy how the stitching came out on the Santa, since I was trying really hard to keep the white stitching clean and even. Both of these designs came from a book of quickies (sorry, I don't have the exact title handy!).



This is another ornament that I finished at the end of the year that I thought I had posted, but I didn't see it. It was originally a little kit that came with a plastic round frame, but I decided to make a little pillow out of it instead. The design also called for French knots as the garland on the tree and I substituted some old leftover red beads instead. I also stitched the yellow accents with some Kreinik gold braid instead (I have several partial spools left over from Celtic Christmas).



And last but not least, here's an update on Texas Panorama, although it's already out of date, since I finished the "T" last night. I'll post that picture later.

More old stitching and goals for 2008

I'm almost done posting all my old stitching (well, the stuff that I have photos of, since I've given some away over the years). It's nice to have an almost complete record of all my projects! I'll probably post photos of some of the old large projects that still need to be framed (or re-framed in some cases) when they are finally totally finished.

First is a DMC kit that I stitched mostly while on vacation in Maine on vacation a couple of years ago. It's still in the unframed pile.


Next are two Cross My Heart cottage magnet kits that I got at the Spirit of Cross Stitch festival many years ago... they were both on the little refrigerator in my office, but unfortunately one of them was lost somewhere along they way (the one on the left). Someday I'll have to get a replacement for it, since I like the Tudor-like half-timbered design.


Next up are the remainder of the various Textile Heritage miniatures that I've bought on various trips to the UK over the years.

The one of the left are the four national symbols of the British Isles - the rose for England, shamrocks for Ireland, a thistle for Scotland and a daffodil for Wales. The picture on the right are (clockwise from upper left) - the crown of Scotland, the White Tower of the Tower of London, bagpipes, Hampton Court Palace and a Welsh dragon.


And this final image is another of the Textile Heritage bookmarks that I've stitched. I still haven't finished this one or the Tudor rose one with a backing fabric or ribbon, but that is part of the goals for next year. More about those goals below.


So, now the stitching goals for 2008. The goals are two-fold... the first is to put the finishing touches on some of the unfinished projects that I've been posting about here. There are a lot of things that need to be framed or otherwise completed beyond the stitching. My other big goal is to start working through the kits in my stash. I have lots of leaflets and magazine patterns that I want to stitch but the kits take up a lot more room. :) I have four fairly large Christmas-themed kits, so I'm sure I'm going to be stitching one or more of them at some strange time of year (like July), but that hasn't stopped me before (most of Celtic Christmas was stitched watching baseball).

Texas Panorama update and a recent finish

First up, a progress report on "Texas Panorama":



The "A" is finished now (although still no backstitching) and I've begun the "E" (although no photo of that yet). This project has been on hold for a week or so as I've stitched up some Christmas ornaments to include with some gifts... at least I hope so! I have been pretty picky about choosing patterns and I might not get them finished at the rate I'm going.

I was originally planning on doing 3 or 4 of Teresa Wentzler's "Peacock Tapestry Ornament", but the first one took me long enough that I was pretty sure that I wouldn't be able to finish all of them in time. But I do have one! And I think I'm going to keep it for myself. :)



This is actually the first TW I've ever stitched, although I have several of her leaflets in my stash, along with most of the excellent freebies from her website. I love how it turned out, and it certainly won't be the last of her designs that I stitch! Now to figure out how to finish it... I'm leaning framing, even though I was really hoping to start trying some other finishing techniques. But I think this would look great in a frame (and on the wall in my office!).

Texas panorama - first photo

Here's the first photo of the progress on "Texas Panorama" after about two weeks. A lot of it was done this past weekend. The flower parts on the lower section of the X took a while, but the rest has gone very quickly. I still have all the backstitching to do, but I might wait until all of the cross stitches are done first. I've never actually done that on a medium-to-large project before... I'm usually a "backstitch as you go" type.

Recent finishes

I've been meaning to post these for over a week!



This is one of the last of my Textile Heritage miniatures that I've bought on my various trips to the UK. I think I only have one left and they'll all be stitched!




And this is the Winter piece of the Four Seasons design, all finished.



(here is the leaflet and the previously-finished Fall section)

I'm now working on Texas Panorama from Bestitched. I bought this at the LNS years and years ago and I have been intending to start it for ages, but just now finally got around to it. I'm starting with the letter X in the middle and I'm about 60% through that. I might even get the X finished this weekend, but it has a lot of backstitching around the flowers in the bottom half, so maybe not. Maybe I'll scoot over to the E or A next and go back and do the backstitching later. :) I'll post a picture of the current progress soon.

Some Tudor-themed designs

Since I'm supposed to be finishing my Tudor podcast right now and I'm procrastinating, I figured I would post a few of the Tudor-related Textile Heritage kits that I've stitched.



First is the "family" of Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn and Elizabeth I. The kits are supposed to be cards, but I'm planning on framing them together.



And these two are Tudor roses. I haven't finished bookmark yet, because I've been trying to decide whether or not to use the ribbon backing that came with the kit or to put some nice fabric on the back. The coaster is all finished and sits on my bedside table. (I took the picture before I put it in the plastic so there wouldn't be any reflections.)

My largest project to date

... and probably still my favorite.



Sorry for the not-so-great picture. This obviously isn't a professional framing job either. I bought the frame before I finished (maybe even before I actually started) this design, but when I saw it in the store I knew it would be perfect. I did a temporary framing job on it a few years ago so I could have it up for Christmas and I still haven't taken it in to get it done professionally. Someday!

The design is, of course, Celtic Christmas from Told in a Garden. It's still the largest project that I've done, and it was my first large linen project. I think I had only done two very small linen projects before tackling this one.

More old projects... still waiting to be framed

And I really don't have any excuse on this first one, since I have the perfect frame. I just need to get off my butt and mount the darn thing.



This is a Welsh dragon that I bought as a kit from Cambriana Designs, who have a whole line of Welsh symbols, castles and scenery pictures.



This is the frame for the dragon. I was thrilled to find it, since it looks like it's covered in scales!

I have a goal of stitching pictures of most of the places I've visited in the UK, so I was really pleased that Cambriana had a design of Criccieth Castle, which is certainly not one of the better known castles in North Wales (being overshadowed by the big Edwardian Castles like Harlech, Caernarfon, etc.) That is stitched up below:



In both of these, I switched out the kit fabric for choices of my own. The dragon is on 28-ct mushroom Monaco and the castle is a natural (kind of linen-like) 28-ct that I bought a full yard of a couple of years ago. I really like this fabric since it adds a nice rustic look to pictures of crumbling old castles.

And one more for today's post: This is another kit I bought in the UK, this time down in Portsmouth, England and it is of Henry VIII's ship The Mary Rose



I thought this one would be appropriate to add since yesterday was the 25th anniversary of the raising of the ship. If you're ever in the south of England I highly recommend a visit to Portsmouth and The Mary Rose (you can see the HMS Victory there too!)

More recent finishes

I finally found some cute little bows to finish off the bottoms of this set of ornaments that I've posted before. So these are ready to hang now!


This next one is still not completely finished, but it is one step closer to being a completed project. The pattern is from an issue of New Stitches (pretty sure). I had this old green aida cloth and wanted to see how a light thread would look on a dark fabric, so I stitched this one up quick. I was originally just going to toss it, but I was was inspired by some of the finishes I've seen on other needlework blogs and stitched this into a little pillow. I'll probably wrap some cording around it and put a tassel at the bottom and make an ornament out of it.



The next two are some little kits that I picked up... The ribbon sachet was a kit that I bough during the short time that I was working at a craft store to make ends meet after college (the research job that I continued in after graduation was only part time). Ribbon embroidery was really taking off at the time and I wanted to try some. I finished the ribbon stitching fairly soon after buying the kit, but only made up the sachet a couple of weeks ago. I can't believe that I've had things sitting around that long!



This next one was another kit that I bought at some big-box craft store a few years back and was mostly stitched at the house of friends that my boyfriend was staying at until he found a house to buy. I spent most of the weekends there too and stitched this on some of the lazy evenings at their house. I love how seeing some of these older project have strong memory associations with where I stitched them.

Some recent finishes and a couple of framed items

First up, a few older projects that I finally framed (!!):



This one is a Jane Greenoff design that I bought as a kit on one of my trips to Britain (probably the 1998 one, so that means it took me nearly 10 years to finish it!)



And this was another kit that I bought on a trip to the UK, this time north Wales. This is a small design of Conwy Castle that I bought at the castle giftshop. At least this one only took me 7 years to finish. If I remember correctly, I did most of the stitching on it on one of my trips to Maine.

Here are a couple more old cover kits from the mid-1990s that I finished up a few weeks ago. I think all of these are from Needlecraft magazine. The leaves one had some lettering that I left off, since I liked the design without them. The wreath and egg were punched card designs, which I had never done before. I like the results, but punching 6 strands through those holes can be a little hard on the fingers (actually 12 strands where they double up through the eye of the needle!).



And last but not least, here is my progress on the Winter section of the four seasons design. The photo was taken early on Saturday and I did a bunch of work on the upper pine needles yesterday (and I'm about to finish another snowflake this evening). I generally don't set monthly goals (since I know I mostly won't meet them) but I'm thinking I'll get this one finished by the end of October. I wanted to do a Halloween piece this month, but I'm trying to not have too many things going at once right now.

Where has the time gone???

You know, for all the physics and astronomy classes that I've had, I still have no real grasp on the concept of time. It still amazes me how you can look up and all of a sudden you're flipping the calendar over to October when you're sure you just got back from a July 4th cookout the day before.

I've been really busy over the past two weeks and it is only going to get worse until about Thanksgiving, but I've been jealousy guarding my evening and weekend "downtime" to so some stitching and finish up some old projects.

First up, a couple of recent finishes:



This one was sort of a finish of an old cover kit. The materials (including the lavender inside) were from a cover kit on Needlecraft Magazine (I think) in about 1994. It originally called for a little embroidery design of a lavender plant, but I decided to use this little lavender sprig from Needlecraft's September 2000 issue instead. To make it fit, I did it over one on 32 count fabric. I love to stitch small but I made a big mistake starting it on an evening that I had a terrible headache. It certainly didn't help any. The finished product is now residing in my underwear drawer. :)



And yes, the infamous (to me anyway) 15-years-in-the-making Christmas ornaments are finally done! I stitched the backing on and stuffed the remaining two over the weekend. Now I just need to actually put up a Christmas tree this year so I'll have somewhere to hang them (hopefully out of the reach of puppy and kitty!).



This is another recent finish. The stitching had been done for ages on this one, but I hadn't finished it into the little potpourri bag until a week or so ago. I have long since lost the potpourri that came with the kit (I think it was a Cross My Heart product that I picked up at the Spirit of Cross Stitch festival), so it is currently empty. I'll probably get something with a nice cinnamon smell for the holidays.

I've got a pile of large and small items that are still awaiting framing. Here's just a sampling: (I'll post more about some of the individual ones eventually... maybe when I finally get them framed!)



And finally, a little bit about a medium-sized part of a larger project I'm working on. This is the Fall section from the Dimensions leaflet pictured next to it:



Instead of working it as one large picture, I decided to do it as four separate ones. I'm planning on framing them separately as well, but arranging them on the wall like they are in the overall design. I'm currently stitching the Winter one, which is the largest project I have going at the moment. I'll post some pictures of my progress in the next few days. Pretty much everything else I've been doing is finishing the old projects above and working some Textile Heritage miniatures, which I'll also post a picture of soon. I'm about 60% of the way through their Tower Bridge miniature at the moment.