summer cottage, unicorn, sunflowers and more Rome

You wouldn`t believe the last 2-3 weeks I`ve had! 🙈 It all started so well: I dug out Rome and enthusiastically threw myself into stitching, but I also wanted to make the most of being temporarily commission-free, so I equally enthusiastically started working on projects around the house that I never have time for, from going through drawers and cupboards to painting the bathroom and the bedroom... and then, just when I had the bedroom half emptied, the front door blocked by big bags and boxes of stuff ready to take to the charity shops, my few hundred magazines neatly organised and two of the three bookcases taken out... I first had a sciatica flare-up (piriformis syndrome, to be precise) and I couldn`t move for days, then out of the blue, first I got the dreaded lurgy (not covid, the other one that`s like flu) and now my two boys are sick too. 😞 Luckily, though, I`m well enough now to look after them and just as well because the `holiday` is over, and I thought before I get too absorbed with work again, I`d better post here re. the most recent publications, the first of which is WOXS 322, with Susan Bates`s summer cottage on the cover:

This lovely colourful project took 75 hours, and after finishing the XS on Pattern Keeper...

... I added the backstitch detail - and just in case the difference doesn`t jump out at you from the first two pics, I add a photo of my paper chart that I marked with felt pens, I think the amount of backstitch shows up better on that.

Also out this week is issue 20 of XStitch Magazine, with this magnificent unicorn by Climbing Goat Designs that was a joy to stitch - I love the clever colour choices, the confetti sts blend so well that there`s more glimmer to this design than to many projects I`ve stitched where I had to add metallics for some extra sparkle.

Apart from not being able to sit in my craft chair for many days, then having a fever, and now having this weird side effect of the lurgy that makes my eyeballs ache (#WTF?!?), a lot less private stitching got done than I`d have liked - but to ease myself back into `stitchy mode` gently, I finished this little cover kit because I needed a needle case...

... and pre-lurgy, I also added more to Rome. I`m actually quite pleased with how it`s coming along, the Spanish Steps are almost completely finished now, and once page 10 in the bottom right is done, page 5 in the top right corner should be a doddle, just a few vertical lines, basically. Hopefully, I won`t have to wait too long before I can work on this again - here are a couple of pics of where I picked it up at the end of May and where I am just now, happy stitching, peeps! 😊

Rome update (mostly)

I`m tidying up my magazines and only just realised that last month I forgot to post about these wedding cards! 😳 Luckily, I have the time now to rectify the problem (hence the tidying of magazine shelves, etc. because I plan to repaint the bedroom). So:

These easy-to-personalise cards by Megan Caines of Meloca Designs were featured in issue 320 of The World of Cross Stitching, and I had great fun stitching them as they were just the right blend of get-on-with-it-quick-symmetrical (handy when time is of the essence!) and something-unique-to-this-particular-card-before-symmetry-gets-monotonous. 😊

So as I have mentioned, I`m trying to make the most of being between commissions at the moment, running around the house cleaning, painting, reorganising - but I also dug out some of my own projects that I hadn`t seen for months and months, e.g. this Autumn cottage by Carol Thornton from Gold 140:

My progress on this is frustratingly slow, not only because of work commitments but also because in my wisdom, I picked this pale yellow aida from my stash, and if you`d ever heard me moan about cardboard thick fabric that I have no choice but work on, you`d wonder why I put myself through this misery voluntarily, but waste not want not, amirite, and this freebie that came with a kit or a magazine was the perfect size for this project, so on I plod, I suppose... 🤷

However, just to give my poor hands a wee break, yesterday I also dug out my Rome stitching from under the bed - er, not that holding this rigid tube of linen is much easier after a while, but I desperately want to see some progress on this one too. I had to go back to a post in 2020 😲 to see where I last wrote about this Thea Gouverneur design - looks like the last time I took a photo, I`d just finished the first A3 page of 10:

This was in December 2020, and I must have picked it up at some point since then because I have some of the Spanish Steps done, so I`m just plodding on with those horizontal lines at the moment, hoping to reach the right edge of the design before I have to put this away again - I`m about to start Page 10 in the bottom right corner, I`m so excited! 😀

As I was reading this older post, I also realised that I`m mentioning there how I spent four days going through all the threads, matching them up to my DMC stash (in case I run out of a colour - I don`t like that kind of pressure when I`m stitching), but I never showed y`all the storage system I upgraded from 3 cushions to just one folder, and since I`m supposed to be giving some tips here 😉, I thought I`d share it with you, in case any of you finds it a handy idea.

So this was my original setup, something I just quickly came up with when I opened the kit because I wanted to start stitching straight away (er, and some think I have the patience of a saint?!? 😂). But I soon realised that not only did these 3 cushions take up a lot of space, there was also the danger of my needles with leftover threads disappearing into the cushion, so I needed another solution. Eventually, I ended up buying some of these numismatic sheets: there are various sizes of pockets, depending on what the coin collector wants to store/display in them; I chose the 12-pocket pages because these are small enough to store just a few lengths of threads but not too small so that my fingers would struggle to get the threads out (plus, the design uses 119 colours, so 10 pages worked out perfectly).

I decided that the easiest (for me) way to find a thread is to group the symbols by shape - I admit, this pic is not the best example, there are easier ones like squares or triangles... I guess this page is the `they have a dot somewhere in them` group 😂. Anyway, hope some of you will find this idea useful, thanks for visiting and happy stitching! 

sunflowers, returned stitches and Monarch update

Just a quick post because I`m in a stag-stitching frenzy, but issue 283 of The World of Cross Stitching is out now, so I can share my one and only pic of these cute little sunflowers in vases that are this month`s free gift:

Created by Fiona Baker, this cheerful little motif has been turned into a lovely wee needle case:

On Monday, I had another Super-Postie: two of my old stitches have been returned, both by Carol Thornton, the ladybird and the Spring cottage - yay, can`t wait to have these framed too!

Framed `too` because a couple of weeks ago I had some returned pieces framed - I`m not sure if I`ve added pics of that great event here or not but rather than scroll back, I`ll just add them here:

And finally, a quick update on The Monarch of the Glen: I finished Page 6 of 12 last night and am about to start on Page 7, woohoo! Happy stitching, peeps! 😊

Spring cottage and zombie love

Issue 155 of Cross Stitch Gold is out now and in it is my next Carol Thornton - I love her paintings and I think they translate really well into cross stitch. You might remember the ladybird I did recently, or her Christmassy cat lying on a cushion from last year, and there`s a castle also by her that`s already featured in the preview of the next issue of Gold (but more on that when the time comes).

For now though, the Spring cottage. Even though I had to rush like mad to finish it (I stitched it at the beginning of December and there was a lot going on at the time, so I had to do a few 16-hour stitchy days before the deadline) but my overall memory is that I loved working on it. Landscapes are my favourite subject matter anyway and I particularly like quaint wee cottages+horses+Spring flowers, so this was an ideal project for me. Because of the rush, I only stopped a few times to take a photo of my progress - here they are:

40 hours

100 hours - finished 😊

Those crooked chimneys cracked me up: I couldn`t help thinking of Spongebob every time I looked at my little "excited" cottage:

And here it is, beautifully framed in Cross Stitch Gold:

In other news, I finally got organised (even though I still don`t know where March has gone???) and now that I`ve obtained Issue 7 (the "Love" issue) of XStitch Mag, I thought I`d add a picture of the little zombie I stitched for them.

WARNING!!! The following is not of the cute teddies and sweet kittens variety so if you`re not into brain-eating zombies, please stop scrolling here! 😉

🧟‍♂️🧟‍♂️🧟‍♂️🧟‍♂️🧟‍♂️🧟‍♂️

This has been my first ever The Witchy Stitcher design and even though I wouldn`t have chosen the subject matter for myself, I thoroughly enjoyed the technical aspect; it`s a well-constructed pattern that flowed easily, which is always a plus for me among all the confetti-heavy pieces I often work on. And my son`s in the process of binge-watching The Walking Dead, so he appreciated my being so trendy. 🤣

That caption makes me giggle every time. 😆 This wee zombie only took 18,5 hours to stitch and I like how photographer Stacy Grant chose to frame it with torn black paper. Hope you like both of these - very dissimilar in style - cross stitch projects, have a lovely Easter and Spring break, and happy stitching!

cottage kitten - The World of Cross Stitching 253

Since I`m almost back to normal flu-wise and, happily, I`m at least several days away from that panicky stage where the idea suddenly hits me that I was hugely mistaken when I thought I was getting on surprisingly well with my current project, I have decided to post about the latest publication before I end up like with the last one, losing track of time.

I`m not sure when Issue 253 of WOCS is coming out, probably next Mon or Tue, but I`ve already received my subscriber copy and I was pleased to see that my little kitten is on the cover of the magazine.

I tried to look up who the designer is but could not find it - there is an image in the mag of the original artwork that has been translated into a cross stitch chart but to find out more about the artist, it seems I would have to register with Image by Design, which I don`t want to do (not that it`d be too much of a hassle, but because I`ve registered on so many sites lately that I`m running out of password ideas).

I know I always say this but I loved working on this project. Which is probably a good thing, come to think of it: it might even be a prerequisite of being a model stitcher, the ability to find something lovable in every project, otherwise cross stitch would become a chore and that`d be pretty dismal. And there was plenty to like in this one:

First and foremost, I love stitching in blocks, both in shapes and colours. This project had `daily blocks` on the one hand - the kitten, the curtain, the leaves, etc. - and on the other, nice big chunks of blue, yellow and greens, when I could just thread a dozen needles and off I went. I admit, I`m not the biggest fan of tons of backstitch, although I don`t hate it as much as some, because as I have said it before, I like the way it brings the pieces alive and besides, it usually means I`m towards the end of the project, near the finish line. There was plenty backstitch to be done here - if I remember correctly, those leaves almost reduced me to tears 😉 - but I quite enjoyed adding the details to the fur and especially the beams (how clever is that play with shadows under the window ledge and the thatched roof? Love it!). Anyway, the whole project took 85 hours and since I only had about two weeks for this one, I didn`t stop to take photos as often as I usually do; however, I still have a few pics that I managed to string together in a mini video to save scrolling time. Hope you enjoy it, happy stitching!

Lesley Teare`s cottage teapot and some Twilleys

Well hello, peeps - the weary traveller has returned. ;) The holiday was great and a lot has happened since then too: firstly, the shoe sampler I`d teased you with in my last post got bumped up into a later issue of Collection; at the same time, I stitched a cute ties (as in `neckties`) alphabet by Rhona Norrie for Cross Stitch Crazy that, it seems now, will be in next month`s WOCS; however, there is the cottage teapot that was supposed to be in that issue and is now brought forward to 242 - and if you think you`re confused, imagine how I manage to follow all this, I who actually have to think for long minutes every morning about what day of the week this is.

So the cottage teapot. What can I say? Dream project. So much detail to keep it interesting, not an overwhelming amount of colours or backstitch and it`s cute to boot, what more does the stitcher need? Hehe, maybe that`s why it`s this month`s Stitcher`s Challenge...? ;) It took 48 hours to complete and I loved working on the evenweave, plus I distinctly remember that the BS on the roof felt positively therapeutic. So all in all, good memories - and a wonky photo:

Luckily, there`s a much better one in the mag (love the pink mat, I`d never have thought of choosing this colour but it complements the flowers on the handle beautifully):

And apropos my wonky pics vs. professional photos: yesterday I had a look at the Thomas B. Ramsden site here to see if any of the projects were available yet that I`d stitched for Twilleys of Stamford - and there is an abundance of them! So here`s a wee photo album and for comparison`s sake, I chose the worst of my lot, sometimes the back of a project or a pic that was taken in pitch dark, just to accentuate how much better the other ones are. ;) Hope you`ve all had a great Spring break, happy stitching! :)

Clearly (?), here I was experimenting with taking photos of phone cases out of focus...

Ah, that`s much better!

The back of my perfume bottles...

... and the finished article

My two pub signs in the twilight...

... beautiful in their frames

Two little sweet pea designs...

... turned into two sweet (pea) hangers

A pair of designs entitled Weekend and Weekday...

... and this is what they look like with the backstitch detail added

A wee tapestry for a change ;)

`Lush Meadow`

And, finally, a larger tapestry (the wee man`s there for scale, lol)

And the beautiful end product, a rose cushion :)

The World of Cross Stitching 229

Although you wouldn`t know at first glance but the latest issue of WOCS is so `me` that it`s surprised even yours truly! ;) I`m not only talking about my own pieces in it, but the magazine as a whole - from the Dachshund on p. 13, featuring the Riolis kit I`d stitched a year or so ago for my Gran, to the model on p. 37 that I stitched for the Hen Fun kit for Bothy Threads. I also recognise model pieces or kits that friends of mine are/have been/will be stitching, oh and of course there are my Fathers` Day cars previewed from next month`s issue... However, I`d better stay with issue 229 for the noo, as it has not only one but TWO of my stitched pieces in it (cf. buses analogy).

So, the first one is a gorgeous cushion from Amanda Gregory. Now, you might remember that the only colour I don`t like is purple, so it says a lot about the design that despite its hues, I still like this cushion. It`s an interesting thing about model stitching, that it very often yanks you out of your comfort zone and you end up stitching - moreover, surprisingly, enjoying working on - designs that otherwise you wouldn`t have chosen for yourself. When picking my own, I`d go `too big, too small, too purple, too much backstitch, fractionals, French knots, yada yada`, but if it`s a commission, you just get on with it - and you`ll find the sense of accomplishment at the end is the same, maybe even greater.

Before my string of progress pics on this hydrangea, let me show you a close-up - if there`s ever been a project where BS made all the difference, eh? Love it! :)

And now the `short film`: pics taken every 5 hours, as usual, until all the cross stitch was done after 68, then another few hours backstitching (the picture was completed in 78 hours).

Hehe, did you notice how I delayed starting on the purples as long as I could? Tried to stick to the lovely shades of blue (my favourite colour) as long as possible, lol. ;) And if this wasn`t colourful enough, here`s the other end of the rainbow: a most cheerful, sunny cottage, á la Clarice Cliff, by Susan Bates - yet another project that I thoroughly enjoyed in-between two larger ones, so I`m afraid I don`t even have progress pics for this piece, only The Final One:

This project took 42 hours and was so much fun - if you`re feeling even just a teeny bit down, I`d recommend it as therapy: by the time you finish that great big sun alone, you`ll be smiling. ;)

And I love the orange frame they picked for it, as do I the finish on the hydrangea cushion - so all in all, a very good little issue from The World of Cross Stitching, I hope you`ll agree! :)