Saturday, December 29, 2012

Crawling out from under the covers....

....to say a belated Merry Christmas.  Unfortunately I had the return of the dreaded lurgy on Christmas eve and the season of cooking and cleaning goodwill to all men became the season of sniffling and sneezing! So I have spent the last few days tucked up under the duvet doing absolutely nothing...except sniffling!

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and here's to wonderful things in the new year!

Until next time...happy stitching.

Rhona

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Who stole Monday?!!

...and most of Tuesday? 

Anyone else having trouble finding enough time to get everything done? Silly question, I know!!!

This week I have managed to get a bit more (albeit a really small bit!) of stitching done on Simple Treasures...


I'm trying to decide whether or not to do the back stitching as I go. Back stitching isn't my favourite thing to do but it would certainly pull this design to life and if I do it as I go along, it would save me a lot of heartache at the end! Mmmm, decisions, decisions.

After all the lovely comments about the afghan that I had crocheted, I decided add some more rows of crocheting to make the edging border a bit bigger....and it made such a difference!



As you can see, I got a bit carried away and did not just do one extra row....but three! Glutton for punishment or therapeutic stress relief? Heehee! All I can say is that it was lovely and cosy with that draped over me as I did the border. I wasn't really sure how to turn the corners on the border so I just made it up as I went along....it looks ok to me, and I'm sure that anyone who uses it will not be too bothered if the border hasn't been done correctly.  Maybe Santa will be reading my blog and bring me a  copy of  'Crocheting for dummies'.

Until next time...happy stitching.

Rhona



Thursday, December 13, 2012

TUSAL

TUSAL time again....and can you believe it, the last one for the year! Goodness, where did this year go? I sound so old when I say that, but it truly feels like the year has flown by. Anyway, enough of this old lady talk and onto the orts for this month...



I kind of cheated with my small jar and added the yarn ends from my crocheting! There are a few cross stitch threads there but not many...never mind, it can only get better. The large container is all the orts for the year - quite a collection, don't you think?

And I have to show you the lovely card/ornament that I received from a friend in Nottingham...


I believe the design is from Cross Stitcher magazine, but I have no idea of the issue number. Isn't it cute? 


And that little button nose finishes him off perfectly! Thanks Janet, I love him.

Until next time...happy stitching!

Rhona

Tuesday, December 11, 2012

Message in a bottle...

....well, it's actually a cross stitch in a bottle!


This adorable necklace came from Michelle  (you can find her blog here) and it came in a gorgeous little drawstring bag....too cute.  Can you believe it, she can do smaller bottles!!!  I do love the necklace - thanks Michelle!


Sticking with the cross stitch theme, I did manage to get back my mojo and have actually put needle to fabric! I've done a bit more on my Geisha....not much, but anything is better than nothing. 



Not great progress but time seems so limited at this time of year, don't you think?

I also managed to finish crocheting all the granny squares together and although it looked good, it didn't look great :(  (Also very hard to photograph!)



It look kind of unfinished and although I was desperate to say I had finished it, I decided that it probably needed a border all round the edge to pull it all together. So off I tootled, back to YouTube, to find out how to do an edging. The result was well worth the effort. Now I just have to decide if I want to repeat the edging (I do have an extra ball of yarn) and have a double border all round....what do you think?



I think a "Crochet for Dummies" book should be on my list to Santa this year!

Until next time...happy stitching!

Rhona

Thursday, December 6, 2012

Granny Squares

Remember all those granny squares I was crocheting? Well I'm now at the stage of joining them all together to make a throw... or afghan.... or blanket....I'm not sure what the correct term is, but it's a thing to warp yourself up in and snuggle under when the weather is cold and miserable! All those lovely cheerful colours are sure to brighten up any dull, miserable winter's day.

Since I've just learned to crochet, and making granny squares is the sum total of my crocheting knowledge, I decided to whip stitch the squares together. This seemed to be the quickest and easiest method to use. Unfortunately, the since the yarn that I used to make the granny squares is variegated, it really showed up when I stitched the squares together and just looked, well....wrong!


The only way to make it look less obvious was to find a stretch of yarn with the same colours as the squares that were to be joined and use that. it meant lots of cutting and snipping and took such a long time. Even using this time consuming method, it still didn't look right, so in the end I decided to make the joins quite obvious and crochet the squares together. So after Googling the different methods on how to join the squares together, this is the method I chose...


Crocheting then together turned out to be more enjoyable than stitching them together!

I've managed to do all the horizontal stitching and  just have to work on the vertical joins now. This is what it looks like at the moment...


One thing that surprised me is just how heavy it is! I'm going to enjoy snuggling up with this blanket/afghan/ throw (whatever the correct term is) ....roll on winter weather!

Until next time..happy stitching.

Rhona



Sunday, December 2, 2012

Christmas Reinbeer....

....and nope, I haven't spelled it wrong, it's not a typo....it is actually Christmas reinbeer....



Heehee! How cute is that? 

Thankfully my stitching mojo has returned and I can complete this Christmas gift. I have four more reindeer to finish for my six-pack herd of reinbeer. I'm hoping to make each reindeer slightly different (so that I don't get bored!) They are also being finished as tree decorations so they can be used again and again.

This is deer number two...


I haven't planned what three, four, five and six will look like yet. I'm thinking maybe one will  have pipe cleaner antlers, another one to have a bell round it's neck, one to have some googly eyes glued on and then I'm hoping inspiration will strike for number six! Any suggestions?

Until next time...happy stitching!

Rhona

P.S. Bottles of Root beer could also be used for a non alcoholic version!