Itching to stitch!

The last two posts have been brought to you by the magic that is Blogger's scheduling feature. I have been back in Scotland dealing with my late father's house - so not really a holiday, but nice to be back in Scotland all the same. 

I had taken some stitching with me but didn't have time to do any of it....yes two weeks without stitching - unheard of! I did manage to buy some cross stitch magazines (of course!) and was keeping them as a way to pass the time on the flight back to the US. As soon as we were on board the plane coming home, the stitching magazines had their plastic covers ripped from them and the contents devoured. Then it was time to start one of the free gifts that came with the magazines....ah, the heavenly feeling of threading the needle and starting a new project!

Of course, being on a plane meant no scissors allowed and so the freebie kit became a bit of a mess on the back since I couldn't cut any of the threads...

Oh my goodness....this drives me insane....the threads tangle up and get caught in the stitches....I'm sure you can feel my pain :)

Anyhoo, lots of turbulence meant that stitching was a bit difficult to do (that needle refused to go in the correct hole) so this project is in my current to-do pile and being worked on just now...

Being the queen of slow stitching, it's still not finished!

Coming back to all that laundry and the usual pile of bills and junk mail that always awaits you after a holiday, was made easier by finding this months issue of World of Cross Stitching sitting waiting for me. Issue 284 has my matching game designs in it...

A cross stitch version of the traditional game...

My kids adored playing this game when they were little and I love being able to use cross stitching for more than just pictures for on the wall!

Also in this issue is an interview with yours truly......

...with a very rare photo of me!

So now it's time to go visiting all your lovely blogs and get caught up with the backlog of blog reading. Thanks for visiting!

Until next time....happy stitching!

Rhona

Testing, testing!

I have a collection of various glues and tapes that I have collected over the years, some good and some not so good. I decided to test them all out and see which ones were best for  different types of projects.

Here's a collection of some of the glues etc that I have been testing....these were the ones that were in reasonable condition to photograph....I'm not the neatest person, so some of my glues are quite disgusting and I'm too ashamed to let you see the condition the bottles and tubes are in!

So, here's my question to you - what glues and tapes do you like working with? Which ones do you think work best? 

Please comment below and hopefully, with your answers, I can  come up with a list of best products that would help us all!

Until next time....happy stitching!

Rhona

How to make a tassel

Head over to www.TangledThreadsAndThings.com for this tutorial.

P.S. There's lots of other stuff there too....including some free charts :)

Stitching up a storm!

When the background in the design is done in half stitches, it feels like I'm stitching up a storm....it seems to be growing so quickly! And being the queen of slow stitching you have no idea how wonderful that sounds to me! Just compare last weeks picture....

....to this week's progress picture...

Not too shabby...uh?

I heard back from Dimensions about the shortage of thread for Ice Cardinal. You may remember that I had used up all the threads for two of the colours in the kit, and you can see from the picture just how close I am to finishing it....

...yeah, just that little spot at the bottom to complete! I was emailed a conversion chart with the DMC and Anchor equivalents. I can't decide how I feel about this. On the one hand it's great that you can get the missing threads quite quickly, but on the other hand, it's costing  even more money to complete the kit which was expensive to buy. I'm also keeping my fingers firmly crossed that there won't be a noticeable difference in the colours with the DMC threads.  So, what do you think about having to buy threads to complete a kit? Should I be upset or not? Do you think the company should send some extra threads? Either way, it's time for me to stitch on black fabric again and get this cardinal finished....finally!

Until next time....happy stitching!

Rhona

I broke the cardinal rule!

I learned the hard way to always put your stitching away when you're not working on it. Years ago my daughter accidentally dropped a plate of spaghetti with tomato sauce and the spaghetti sauce splashed over my stitching. Luckily for me that, although the stains did not come out even after several washes, the design was quit heavily stitched and the stains were covered by the stitching. Since then, I have been quite meticulous about always putting my stitching away.....except this week. I blame the brain fog on the fact that I had been feeling like I had been hit by a truck, thanks to the shingles vaccine. I put my stitching at the side of my chair and, yes, you've guessed it.....disaster! Yet another tomato sauce incident! Thank heavens that I had laid the chart over the main body of the fabric so only a small corner of fabric was splashed. The chart is now in colour....well, colour in some places! 

Image taken from Pinterest

The cardinal rule of stitching....always put your stitching away when you're not working on it!

Anyway, here's this weeks progress....minus the stains...

Last week my camera died before I could take a picture of the kit, so I left you wondering what the design was like - sorry! Here's what what it will eventually look like...

Luckily for me that the camera battery was all charged up when I spotted this little fella  hiding in the bushes right outside my front door...

Isn't he cute? Mama robin has been coming in regularly to feed him and they move hiding places so he's not obvious to predators.....or humans!

Until next time....happy stitching!

Rhona