Over the border

OK, so I am now offically fed up with stitching the border on this design. I admit that it is looking lovely, but it is doing my head in! LOL I am so very nearly there with it though, so I am going to finish stitching the border before I get back on to the main design or else I feel that the border will stay unfinished for a very long time...

I will probably end up having a bit of a break from it tonight anyway as I have our 6 year old niece staying with us for a sleepover. Since it is school holidays she is allowed to stay up a bit later so we'll probably end up watching a movie before bed, once Little Miss is settled. She's teething at the moment so has been waking up early (4.20am the other day!) so I think I'll be taking the opportunity for an early night too :)



Hope you are all doing well with yur various stitching projects. Happy stitching!

Secret stitching

Judging by the progress he's making, I am sure hubby is stitching in secret :P I love the way this design is coming together - well done hubby!

I am amazed at how well the border seems to be coming along - it seems to be taking an age when I am stitching it, but when I look at the end of a stitching session I can definitely see the progress. I would like to get some of the left hand side of the border done before doing any more on the main part of the design. This will probably be the next couple of days worth of stitching as I am working tomorrow so no stitching time during Little Miss's nap time!

Good stitchy day

I ended up getting quite a bit of stitching time yesterday, so I made a good amount of progress. After lunch, I stitched whilst Little Miss slept and then I needed to borrow SIL's dryer so headed down to her place for a while with my stitching in my bag too. I left hubby in charge of Little Miss so he had some nice time to spend with her without me around. It was good sitting in the quiet with just the sound of the dryer going round. Maybe I should do it more often! Then last night once Little Miss had gone to bed, out came the stitching once more! I had the tv on in the background this time though and it was a struggle to decide what I wanted to concentrate on more! I ended up giving up when I realised it was closing in on 11pm.... Definitely a late night for me :S

I'm pleased with how well this one is going, although I am pretty sure I will have finished the central design before I even get close with the border!



I actually tried to post this earlier but it wouldn't let me upload the photo... I then had a little visit from the frogs during my lunchtime stitching session but thankfully it wasn't too bad - I've managed to recify it tonight so tomorrow I can continue like nothing happened at all!

I took pictures!

I finally got around to getting the camera out earlier on - woohoo! I also found the best spot for taking a picture was our bedroom - the natural light in there is fantastic... It'd be wonderful as a stitchy room. Hmmmm, wonder if I can convince hubby LOL!

So, here's Lizzie*Kate's Home Is... finished excpet for the names - I want to keep that a surprise until it is framed and given :D



It needs a darn good iron too, but again, that'll wait until after the details are put in. :)

I made a start on the first of the birth samplers on Tuesday of last week, so I have now been working on it for a week. I took the piccie before any stitching today, so it is already out of date! Some nights I haven't been ab;e to do any stitching, and some nights have been minimal with stitching time, so I feel like I've made a good start. After confering with the stitchy girls, it was decided that I start on the pink sampler first, so here it is:



I've decided to stitch the border in stages as I go, due to the fact that there is so much of it. I think it'd probably do my head in if I left it all to the end. I'm really liking the colours on this one, whichis very strange as I have never been a fan of pink... They look much better than on the pattern too. I'm really loving that I am back into my stitching, and projects like this one make me excited to keep going too.

Must take pictures!

That's a mental note for myself... lol! I have been putting off posting as I wanted to get photo's taken first. Now I have decided I can't wait that long, so I'll post pictures later. I want to have natural light to take the photo's but every time I have chance to think about it, it seems that the daylight has gone... I'll try tomorrow :)

I finished my Home Is piece on Monday evening - yay! - and am now working on one of the birth samplers I have to stitch. I am currently unsure as to whether I am posting pics of these as I go, as the friend whose children they are for reads my blog. I am leaving the decision up to her as to whether she wants to see them as I stitch them or if she wants a surprise at the end. So c'mon Jane - let me know! :D

I have had a pretty good stitchy week, to be honest. I had a stitchy meet on Sunday at Cassie's house which was smaller than usual but it meant that we all got plenty of stitching done (despite the snacks calling out to be eaten!). The company was fabulous and I realise now why we try and make the meetings as regular as possible. It's lovely to get together with a couple of friends and stitch the afternoon away.

On Monday afternoon, I headed over to Belinda's house for some more stitching. She couldn't make it on the Sunday so it was nice to catch up. Bek came along after work and we all had dinner together and then did some more stitching. It was a great couple of days - lots of stitching and lots of good company.

Besides those two days, I have managed to get a little bit of stitching done in the evenings, but not as much as I could have done. Unfortunately, my daughter is teething and has a pretty bad cough to boot, so she's having difficulty in getting off to sleep and staying asleep (understandably) so my time has been taken up with trying to settle her. I'll be so glad - for her sake - when the cough goes and the teeth coem through. How hard it must be to be a little one...

Hubby's progress

As you can see, hubby's stitching is coming along nicely. I thought I would take a picture with the kit cover so you can see what it will look like in the end. We're not sure where it will end up living yet, but it's definitely going to be put on display :D I think it looks great, and I am very proud of hubby for how far he has come with it. He seems to be enjoying stitching again, so that can only be a good thing. I think it is definitely beneficial for him to be able to do something to switch off from work and home, at least for a while! It's great for me to have someone to stitch with on some evenings too.

Home Is...

I've had a couple of evenings this week, when for one reason or another, I haven't managed to stitch. Since I have got back inot my stitching, I have enjoyed stitching every evening. Not doing so this week has seemed a little strange. Still, I have managed to make some progress on the design I started stitching this week. (I didn't have chance to iron before taking the picture and have just realised how bad the creases look...) I just love how quickly Lizzie*Kate designs stitch up - they give you that sense of accomplishment so quickly. This is actually the third time of stitching this design, which I never thought I would do. Three friends of mine got married within 2 months earlier this year, and I wanted to stitch them something for it. They are also all stitchers so I figured they'd be stitching their own weddign samplers anyway, and I needed something quick to stitch but effective. I think the message says it all. :) I'll be personalizing it with names at the end too. One day I'll stitch it for myself but I think I might need to have a break from it for a while! Needless to say, none of them have actually reached their owners on time, but that's just me. I guess it's the thought that counts, eh?



I'm already looking forward to my next project - birth samplers for my best friend's twins. I have chosen 2 designs that are similar and compliment each other - one has a blue colour scheme and the other a pink one. I already have the fabric and threads (I bought Anchor especially as all my threads are DMC and this one was stitched with Anchor. It was in a magazine waaaaaay back when I used to get the stitching magazines. I think my purse and the lack of space in the house were two of the reasons why I stopped. Nothing to do with the fact that I'll never get around to stitching all the designs I have kept out of them - honest! :P

Stitch and slim update - finally!

Things have slowed down of late, which is why I haven't posted about my weight loss, but also because I want this blog to be primarily about my stitching, so there may only be a once in a while post about the weight. I am so happy with this week's progress though - I lost 4lb!!!! I'm not entirely sure how I did it, but I think I might have focused on the job in hand - I took my eye off the ball the previous week and had a little gain, but this week corrected that and then some! It brings my total since mid-July to 12.5lb when my friend and I decided to go for it, but the total since the end of January to 1st 11lb! There's still a long way to go, but I feel like I am actually getting somewhere this time.

I think it's also helped that I am trying to stitch every night to keep the munchies at bay. I have started on a Lizzie*Kate design that reads "Home is where our story begins". It's going to be a pretty quick stitch, I think, and I am already thinking about what I will stitch next. Maybe Jack or Megan's birth sampler. They are the twins of my best mate, Jane, and I think it's going to be difficult to choose which one to do first! Hmmmm, decisions, decisions.....

Another finish!

As you should be able to see, I finished stitching "A Stitch in Time". I actually finshed stitching this on Saturday night/Sunday morning (I was up at 3.30am stitching!) but have only just got around to taking a photo of it. Why was I up at that unusually early hour I hear you ask? Well, I blame the Melbourne weather. It was incredibly windy and raining quite hard, when I was awoken at 3.20am by the dog barking. Thank goodness we have a monitor for our daughter's room, or else I probably wouldn't have heard him! He had let himself out of his doggy door and gone to the front part of the yard. Unfortunately, the brick that is usually holding the gate open between the front and the back of the yard had not been put back, so the wind blew it closed and it locked. Poor Buster was out in the wind and rain with no shelter and no way of getting back in. No wonder he was barking! I have never seen him so happy to come into the house as when I opened the door. He was running around like a lunatic, barking, growling playfully and generally VERY HAPPY to be in a dry, warm place! He was pretty panicky too, so I decided to stay up with him to calm him down and settled myself on the couch with a blanket (after putting my daylight lamp on and getting my stitching out of course! I knew it was going to be a long night...) As soon as I was settled, Buster was on my lap - he took up the whole length of me! He didn't move for a good couple of hours, poor thing... Still, at least I managed to make good out of it and get some night time stitching done! ;)

Hubby's stitching update

Daniel has been doing pretty well with his stitching lately, but he apparently "hasn't got the time" to do a blog to show off his progress. Well, too bad, coz I'm making sure I show off what he's done! :P I'm so pleased that he has finally got the enthusiasm for stitching again. It's been a long time coming. Well done hubby!

Some finishes

Hubby and I decided that some of our stitching need to be framed this week, so we took a look at what was there. We came across hubby's very first stitched design, and he decided that it was small enough to put into a coaster, so here it is:



It's good to see it being put to use, and it is so neatly stitched - he must have had an excellent teacher! ;)

The next one is mine, and we took it to the framers. The lady there looked at it and said that it looked like it would fit into a standard frame, and it did! I think the colour of the frame really brings out the chocolate in the design. The mat came with the kit, and I think it looks perfect for it. I'm very happy with how it has turned out.



We also took my recent Lizzie*Kate finish in. I chose a dark frame with no mat, and the frame itself has a bit of a carved design. I'll hopefully be getting that back next Friday. I can't wait! Hubby chose to take his Concorde design in. It was his first evenweave design and it looks great. He chose a dark grey mat and a greeny grey metallic frame that compliments the plane perfectly. He's already chosen where he wants to hang it, so all we have to do now is wait for the phone call to say that it's ready.

Stitch in time update

All seems to be going pretty well with this little stitch. I am really enjoying working on 32 count again - it was a little daunting at first but I'm very happy with how it is turning out. As always though, the picture on the cover doesn't do justitce to the colours. Normally I find that the stitched design is brighter than the picture on the cover, but with this one it is the opposite - the colours look a lot darker in reality. Still, I am pleased with how it is turning out, and with any luck it'll soon be finished!



I think it helps that I have been making time for my stitching too. I had a stitchy friend, Bek, come over one evening this week and usually we just sit and chat and maybe show off our stitching but we both actually DID some stitching this time - shock, horror! She also very kindly got me 2 threads I was missing for the pattern - my local shop didn't have them in and it really frustrates me. I think it's mainly because when you go in and pick up a handful of threads they just scan one and multiply it by how many you have rather than scanning each one so the stoitck can get replenished. Grrrrr! Ayway, rant over... It was a great night and I love to stitch in company. I have also been taking my stitching to work with me to do in my lunch break seeing as it is such a small one. Half and hour here and there really does make a difference!