Christmas Decorations

I've been stitching a little recently, though not as much as I would like, and have finally managed to complete some Christmas Decorations BEFORE the actual date. Normally they get finished some time in January.....or so.... :-)

I'm posting one today, as I have yet to scan the other. The designers are unknown, as I have had them on my computer hard-drive for a while and only found them when I was sorting files a little while ago, and they date to back when I didn't keep track of designers or websites. Anyway, the colours are my own choice, but based on the original charts and models. 

I will post the second one when I have had a chance to scan it!

Obviously, I'm still in the middle of turning it into a decoration though! Will post an updated picture when that's done.

Enjoy.

Things I have stitched this year and not blogged about yet.

I've been busy with Mum. She takes a LOT of caring for some days, so my stitching is limited to the rare moments when I have some time to do such things.

Anyway, I'm including some uploads of things I hinted at back in February, but that at the time could not post due to their imminent arrival on the other side of the world, and the fact that the person they were being sent to reads this blog!

So here goes.

For Valentines Day this year, my boyfriend received this lovely little freebie:

It comes from Gigi Online, and while I changed the colour of one of the sheep to suit a mating pair of sheep my Dad has, I have pretty much stuck to the pattern.

It will be here somewhere on the site. I cannot remember the date of the original, nor do I speak French well enough to be able to instantly go to where it is on the site, and I don't feel up to trawling through each and every single page just at the moment. I will include a better, more precise link when I am so inclined.

http://gigir.canalblog.com/

(EDIT - I've found the proper link finally - http://gigir.canalblog.com/archives/2009/01/10/12042407.html)

Secondly, I also sent my boyfriend another freebie for Easter. The last few years, due to the expense of postage, plus the rising cost of everything in general, we have agreed to make Valentines and Easter cards, rather than buy cards and presents. That way the card becomes the present!

So, I sent him a freebie I stitched from a an old filet crochet pattern I found on the About.com website:

I changed the colours, added silver thread to add a bow and painted the card with gold metallic paint. He apparently loved it!

The link is here:

http://crochet.about.com/library/blrabbits1.htm

Also, I wanted to add a scan of the finished (non-freebie) bookmark I gave to Mum last year (Mama's Song), by Told In A Garden:

As to what 2012 holds - as usual, my New Years Resolutions include more stitching, but whether that happens is another story. I am still very keen on the primitive stitchery, but recently found the joy of old filet crochet patterns, as they are often simplistic, and can be stitched in whatever colours you might have to hand (as can be seen by the Easter card above). So I guess you will just have to wait and see what gets posted next!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Dimension Enchanted Cottage (#06710)

I've started my first big project. Prior to this I've only ever done small designs, as I don't have a great deal of patience, or time (but then who does these days?).

It will eventually look like this:

But currently looks like this:

It's to be for my Mum's birthday, which is coming up. Mum knows about it, as it is a bit hard to keep secrets when you have your Mum living with you 24 hours a day, and you are her carer :-)

I'm not sure yet whether I will stitch the black border, as Mum isn't that keen on it, preferring just the cottage, but we've agreed to wait until the cottage & its garden is done before making the final decision. She's asked me to make it up into a cushion for her, so I need to find some pretty backing fabric as well. Any ideas on pattern or colours?

I have also been having a bit of a clear out of my craft room, and kept finding WIPs, so I will upload them when I have finished scanning them.

I'm *still* working on the both the Orchid, and my quilt - pics to follow!

More valentine finishes

Title - Darling Valentine

Designer - Gigi Online

Fabric - 14 ct white aida

Threads - DMC 3607 & DMC 3608

Sorry about the bad quality photo (I promise a better one soon!), but I'm not actually able to get to my scanner just now, and I'm stuck on dial up, so I had to upload a low-resolution photo of my finished project. 'Tis another freebie! This time from a french website that I've only just discovered. Again, I had a play with the colours - I let Mum choose which ones she wanted me to stitch it in. I also had a bit of a play with the design. The V of Valentine was supposed to be all the same colour as the boy and girl, but I felt picking out the rose buds in that colour, and making the V the same colour as the rest of the word actually worked better. My feelings, anyway, and Mum agreed with me. It's much prettier in person, and hopefully the full scan will show that. I have a frame for it, and when assembled I will add a photo of that too!

Here's where you can find the chart:

http://gigir.canalblog.com/archives/free_graphics_from_gigi/index.html

(it's about half way down, on the 29th January 2009)

Other things:

I have finished stitching an Easter card that just needs to be made up and then posted to the same place the Valentines card got posted to. Scans to appear after Easter! 

Mum reminded me of a cushion I stitched for her many years ago (and which STILL needs to be finished - I hadn't worked out how to stitch shut a cushion neatly at that stage, so I gave it to her neatly pinned down one side!). I'm including a photo of it here. I have no idea who the designer is, or whether it's a freebie or not, but I seem to remember the chart being called "April Showers" or "April Rain" or something similar. Anyway, it's a daisy, and the grey splodgy bits are rain (again, it's much prettier in person). Any help on the designer would be much appreciated!

Another finish

This lovely chart is a freebie from Primitive Betty!
http://primitivebettys.blogspot.com/2009/12/valentine-freebie-for-you.html

I completely changed the colours - chose pastels for my sick Mum to try and bring a smile to her face. She seemed to love it when I gave it to her.

I miss-counted when I first started though, so the design was miss-centred! Given I was using up some aida cloth I had to start with (that would have been plenty, had I not miss-counted), when stitching it up into its final cushion, I had to stitch very close to the border, but it still came out quite okay:

While I've been a bit slack in updating my blog of late, I have actually stitched stuff. Some of it I cannot yet show you, because it is on the other side of the world right now, waiting to be unwrapped on Valentine's Day, others I just cannot currently find the scans of. When I do, I will put them up! 

Recently I've become quite enamoured of the whole primitive stitchery thing, which is how I came about finding the Primitive Bettys site. From there, I have found others, one of which you will see after Valentines, when I can safely post a picture of what went overseas. More will be uploaded in days to come, as I have promised my Mum, who is staying with me, that I will put up more "pretty things" just for her (because she means the world to me).

I'm tossing up whether to start another valentine freebie from the Primitive Bettys site, or one of the others I have found along the way. 

Makes a nice change from teddy bears and cude & cuddly stitchery, anyway!