Tag Archives: cross-stitch

Watch Out For Your Wishlist!

Loved this quiz – found it on Jo’s blog, but it originally came from Anna. The questions must be answered with cross-stitch charts. This is a dangerous exercise though – I think my wishlist grew by half as I looked for all my answers :giggle:

1. Are you male or female? New Graduate Girl (Pinn Stitch Kits)
well… almost :giggle:
2. Describe yourself: Child of Spring (Victoria Sampler)
3. How do some people feel about you? Gotta Love a Stitcher (Bask Designs)
4. How do you feel about yourself? I Know All About Stressed (Twisted Threads)
5. Describe your love interest: Tech Support (Calico Crossroads)
6. Where would you rather be? Fly Me to the Moon (4 My Boys)
7. Describe what you want to be: The Fortunate Traveler (TW Designworks)
8. Describe how you live: Plain and Fancy (Barrick Samplers)
9. Describe how you love: Straight From the Heart (Annalee Waite Designs)
10. Share a few words of wisdom: Clean Your Ears (Calico Crossroads)

Winter’s Lament

I keep on mentioning this, but it’s finally time. I finally have a moment to introduce you to my unfinished darling. Winter Queen, by Mirabilia.

This is one of the designs that started it all for me, really. In early 1998 I purchased Garden Verses and Winter Queen. I believe Garden Verses came first. This was back in the days when Lincraft stocked a better range of cross stitch supplies. Had they never stocked Mirabilia, I may never have caught the bug, because Home-Sweet-Home stuff just doesn’t appeal to me (though my taste has since evolved to include an eclectic range).

I started Garden Verses first, but if you remember, that start was doomed. Not long after that, I discovered to my delight… an LNS! I seem to have outgrown that same store now; most of my stash arrives by mail. But back then, it was a magical haven of all things new and glorious. I discovered linen came by the metre, not just in pre-cut pieces wrapped in plastic. After the Garden Verses debacle, that was a huge relief. I purchased some fabric, floss, and beads, took my bounty home, attached the fabric to Mum’s old tapestry frame, and started with enthusiasm.

Everything went swimmingly from the crown down to the waist. When I hit the endless blues and whites of the gown, I stalled. A lot. Over the years between then and now, WQ has re-emerged a number of times, been worked on some more, and then banished to the cupboard once again.

When I really became assimilated into the world of stitching – late 2001, early 2002, I decided that I really should finish WQ before getting crazy with too many other projects (ha!). I pulled her out again and did a lot more on that gown. Then I realised she had bigger issues, and that I didn’t really know what I would do with her if I did finish her. Let me explain:

Fabric colour
Why, oh why did I choose cream linen for this beautiful design that needs white. Or antique white, at the very most. Cream! This is far and away the worst problem, I just don’t like her on this fabric.
Dye lot differences
Hmmm. I have since learned my lesson – buy all the floss needed for a design at the same time. The dyelot differences in the a few of the floss colours are seriously noticeable. For me to be happy, I’d have to unpick a lot of stitching and restitch with one dyelot. Just quietly… that’s not going to happen!
Dirt
Yep, and lots of it. Poor stitching practices (holding onto the scroll bar where the fabric was attached) plus poor storage over a long time, have caused the cream fabric to become really dirty, not to mention a lot of the white stitches now look cream as well. Yes, I know about Orvus. Trust me, I’ve tried everything on this baby. Orvus, Napisan, Woolwash (yes, I know I shouldn’t). Even… {shock, horror}… the washing machine. Yep, I threw her in our front loader, beads and all. ‘Twas for nought though, she’s still just as dirty. The white areas could be frogged and restitched… but see above for how I feel about that. And as far as the fabric goes, well I don’t think it could be fixed at all. Possibly it could be hidden by a close mat if it were ever framed.

So. That’s what’s wrong with WQ. If you’ve made it this far, you deserve a prize. That’s her. I know, she looks not so bad in that pic. Trust me, all those problems look worse in real life.

She weighs on my mind a lot. For a good long time, I felt that if I didn’t finish her, I wasn’t a real stitcher. I finished a lot of small stuff, but nothing big, until Celtic Christmas, and more recently, Waiting For Ships. Finishing those two, and particularly WFS, has eased my mind a little. The other reason I think about her a lot is that I do still really like the design. But restitching the whole thing does not thrill me one bit, given how far I got. So if I turf her, it is very likely she won’t ever hang in my home. But if I don’t turf her, she’ll still never hang in my home. So you see my dilemma!

SBQ Catchup Part 2

Here’s the remaining two SBQs to bring me up to date:

Have you ever stitched something as a gift and later realized that receiver doesn’t respect your stitched gift a bit (for example it’s never on show, or you have other reason to suspect that it may even be nonexistent or at least placed in some dark storage room corner)? If so, what have you done? If you’ve been lucky enough to avoid such people what would you do if it’d happen to you?

I have been very selective in my choice of giftee. Other than immediate family (and then only those who I know would appreciate the value of a stitched gift), only a few friends who are also stitchers have received a stitched gift from me. None of the gifts have ended up in dusty corners or been otherwise ill-respected. I have a few more people to stitch for, but mostly I’m happy to stitch for myself. I wouldn’t want something I spend so much time on to be thrust away disdainfully, that’s for sure. I think if that happened, I’d secretly kidnap the piece back!

And finally:

If you have stitched for a while, can you usually pick out the DMC colors you need from memory when you go to your LNS? (For example, you know that 610 is a brown.)

Well, white, ecru, 310 and B2500 are not a problem, of course. And I would know 3041 and 3042 if I chanced upon them in a dark alley! I could probably identify a handful of other colours commonly used by Teresa Wentzler as well. But if I had a shopping list and left it home, I would be bound to forget what was on it. I have a spunky new PDA now though, so I’ll never be leaving my shopping lists behind again!

SBQ Catchup Part 1

Hoo boy… I am a little bit behind on these questions. Here goes:

How do you ‘non-hoopists’ who use a rotation system handle it (as it seems to be lot easier if you are in good terms with hoop)? Do you have several scroll frames? Do you use Q-snaps or maybe something completely different? Or do you just have one or two big projects and others are small enough to be kept in hand while stitching?

I am a very happy Q-snapper. I have all the sizes (and two sets of 11-inch, which I like the best), and they do the trick very nicely, when rapid changeover is required. I will never ever use hoops again, as I am not dedicated enough to remove stitching from the hoop regularly, and I have a few small pieces with irremovable hoop-marks on them.

I only stitch in-hand for very small pieces like ornaments, can’t seem to handle anything more than that.

Oh, and a confession – I also have multiple scroll frames! Before I discovered Q-snaps I tried to find a scroll frame system I was happy with. I love the look of scroll frames, Q-snaps are a little, well… plumber’s pipe in appearance, aren’t they?! So I have two cheapy scroll frames and also a very nice set of Lokscrolls from Artisan designs, which are great, but I can’t manage to get the tension I like, using these. So I Q-snap. Someday I will sell off the hardware I don’t want!

Here’s another:

Do you mark or hi-lite your patterns or can you follow them without any markings? Do you make copies to mark up, or do you mark originals?

Um… follow without markings? Ahahahahahahaha! Um… no. I can’t do that. I am a highlighter. I don’t like to mark the originals (I suppose I could trade them afterwards, but really, I’m just a collector, and I like my collection to be in good condition). So working copies are my thing, and whatever highlighter colour I have to hand. Once upon a time I marked up the copies with pencil, but on more than one occasion, stupidly stored the pencil-marked copy with the WIP and ended up with stubborn pencil marks on floss and fabric. So far, touch wood, I haven’t had any disastrous highlighter incidents. I think Finn knows what Mummy would do if he drew on my stitching :giggle:

Meep

The sound you hear is me emerging from under my mountain of notes and textbooks, to discover myself still stuck beneath mountains of boxes in the new house.

Yes, we’ve been here for 2 weeks and it looks frankly worse than it did on the day after we moved in. A lot of stuff has been unpacked, but a lot of boxes are only half unpacked, in the frantic search for this-that-or-the-other, which leaves us with M-E-S-S 🙁 I’d like to say I’ll get on top of it soon, but health-wise, things are kind of difficult at the moment. I’m feeling really good for only a few hours in each day, and I’m trying to spend those playing with Finn, lest he nominate me for world’s worst mother:giggle: (And after I accidentally opened a door in his face the other day, believe me, I’m in the running. Poor kid :ouch: ).

I did finally get my redwork exchange piece finished and off in the mail, only a day late. I’m feeling somewhat anxious about the finishing of the piece. Not what it is, but what colour it is (hint: not red). The rules didn’t say the finishing should be red, but the other finishes I’ve seen already are all red. I just didn’t find a red fabric that worked for me, and what I chose does make the redwork stitching stand out. I just hope it is well received, because I like it 🙂

Now on to doing my Christmas ornament exchange. Huge hugs to Cathy for the 2005 Just Cross Stitch Ornaments issue – I love a lot of the ornaments this year, so I’m going to try and settle on one from there to stitch.

Not much else in the works at the moment, due to the feeling-like-crap thing. Sleeping is high on my list of priorities, that’s for sure. Will try and be around a bit more often though… I’m missing blogging, and feel like I’ve dropped out of the community a little bit in the past weeks.

My Blog Should Be Purple

According to Blogthings. Just in case you were wondering 🙂

And…

“You’re an expressive, offbeat blogger who tends to write about anything and everything. You tend to set blogging trends, and you’re the most likely to write your own meme or survey. You are a bit distant though. Your blog is all about you – not what anyone else has to say.”

Well damn straight. Who else is it going to be about?!

Don’t know about that setting blogging trends bit though. It took me until 2005 to even start this thing, so I’d say I’m pretty far behind in trendset-iness.

I’m not really interested in making my blog purple, so nyah, Blogthings. I have many ideas running through my head for my perpetually delayed template re-jig, not one of them is purple.

Dum de dum…

This post is rather full of good nothing-ness, isn’t it? I need more nothing-ness in my life. I would rather be stitching, but in the 10 minutes I’m taking a study break for, I would get next to nothing done, and would want to stitch for the next 2 hours, instead of slaving away on a Web Databases assignment.

Speaking of stitching, I received goodies yesterday! So happy – Laura sent me a wonderful chart, (which Finn promptly decided I should start stitching for him, but since he deleted a vital chunk of my Usability Engineering assignment on Tuesday, he’s not in line to be demanding anything of the sort :grr: ). Sorry, I digress. It’s Unicorn, by Peter Underhill. Finn does have a point, it would be pretty funky for a boy’s bedroom 😆 Then Mum arrived, and forced new fabric on me! A beautiful bluey-purpley solo from Silkweaver – and a huge piece, too. I’m envisioning a Mirabilia Fairy on it. Can’t wait to stitch again.

Before I disappear, here’s the 5 second update on the Grrr things in my life (in case you care):

    ~ Auto-pinging: I think not working. Let’s see how it goes this time. Will manually ping if necessary. Update: nope, it IS working. Yippee!
    ~ Car: fully repaired as of today – ask me again on Sunday! 😛
    ~ Washing Machine: not working, but problem finally diagnosed.
    ~ Washing Machine Company: won’t replace, will repair.
    ~ Stupid motorist who hit my car and denied it: Hmmm, I actually don’t know. Must find out what’s going on with that. I’m kind of curious to know what story she’s going to come up with :giggle:

On The Upswing

Didn’t I tell you I’d post an all GoodThings post someday soon? Well, things are not quite all good, but are definitely back on the upswing.

The washing machine finally stayed dead long enough for TheGuy to see what was wrong, and hoo-boy was it nasty. The control board had burned out badly enough to have charcoal on it! I don’t want to know what one of those things costs, I’m just super glad the machine was still under warranty.

The car is fully repaired and happy to be home again. The liability issue is ongoing. Let’s not talk about that :giggle:

Then, good things arrived in my mailbox on Tuesday and Wednesday. First, official notice of unconditional approval on our home loan application. There had been some delay in that, for reasons beyond our control. Second, a lovely stitched piece by Annette arrived. This was the final mailing in the seasonal exchange we took part in last year, and I just love it, it’s a great design. And thirdly…stash! For me! New Stash! I’m sure you can tell how happy I was about that – I bounced around the room for a good half an hour :giggle: Kati from The Wagon sent me these great Paw Printings charts which have been on my wishlist for a good long while:

rak

I think I have enough black perle cotton in my stash to stitch the ornament on the Onyx chart, and suitable substitute beads, so after I finish my red piece, I might treat myself to a new start. I can do that right? It’s only small, after all…!

Thanks Annette and Kati. It’s so nice to share a hobby with such a great bunch of people. Kati’s gift was a RAK (Random Act of Kindness), which have just been introduced on The Wagon. I RAK’d someone this week too, but shhh, it’s a secret!

Oh, and the final GoodThing I have to report? I’m not going to turn this into a weight loss journal. But. I’ve lost 5.5kg in the last 6 weeks. Happy Dance!

A Spring Shower

Well, the stitching drought may not have completely broken, but there has been the equivalent of a light shower’s worth of stitching in this house over the last three days. There was linen, and there was silk (red), and for a little while, all the NotGood things in my life receded into the background. Stitching is Good, and I should never not do it again!

The NotGood things in my life at the moment are mostly some variation on crap customer service. I’m beginning to wonder if it’s me. In the last week, or thereabouts, I’ve had NotGood interactions with our bank, our insurance company, one of my tutors, and the girl at the copy centre. Oh, and our washing machine decided to die a horrible (and stinky) death. What’s going on? It must be me. I must be giving off “piss-me-off-today-coz-I’ve-got-nothing-better-to-do” vibes! Or perhaps it’s a full moon*. Whatever it is, I wish it would just go away :grr:

So I will continue putting a few stitches into my new (top secret) project each day, keeping the NotGood things at bay. And hopefully sometime soon I’ll be able to make an entirely GoodThings post 🙂 Meanwhile, think good washing machine thoughts, coz TheGuy comes tomorrow, and I’m really hoping this death thing is just temporary!

*Nope, nuh-uh, not a full moon. Therefore it’s the vibes. QED.

Sulking

One hundred and thirty one days until I can buy stash again, announces my sidebar cheerfully. And I pout, and grumble some more 😥 Everyone who is anyone on the stitching BBs has just returned from Nashville CATS (= big stitching show in the US) bearing mountains of new stash. And I want some.

This always happens when I’m not stitching. Pre-Wagon, I would indulge my slump-induced desire for new stash and shop all my favourite ONSs until my credit card begged for mercy. Well, perhaps I exaggerate just a wee bit, but that’s the general idea. Nowadays, however, my blog tells me I cannot, and the serious size of the mortgage we are about to become intimate with tells me I cannot. So my clicky-finger is itching, and I just can’t take reading about the Nashville stash-orgy any more, dagnammit!

I really need to be stitching again, and I’ll get over the yearning to shop. But I’m not stitching, because if I do, I’ll get the guilts because I should be studying. But I’m not studying either, because… well, there is no because. Simply that I am the World’s Best Procrastinator. Aaargh!

I’m also very antsy and impatient to settle on our house, so that it all starts feeling a little more tangible and a lot less like a dream. I want to paint walls… and tear down a different wall… and plant vegetables… and hang out in my own backyard watching Finn ride his trike…

Off to put our settlement date into my sidebar countdown, to distract myself from the not-allowed-to-shop situation. I so deserve to win the Queen of the Wagon challenge, with all the pain this is causing me!

Good Things, Bad Things

Good Thing: Lending Manager has approved our request to borrow more $$$ 🙂
Bad Thing: Bit scary, that! :blank:

Good Thing: There are 4 or 5 houses on the market in our desired area which may be in our price range 🙂
Bad Thing: One of which sold at auction today for more than we expected 🙁

Good Thing: Played in my stash the other day, found a design to stitch for the Red Exchange 🙂
Bad Thing: Still no actual desire to stitch, no time either 🙁

Good Thing: Have formed a group with 3 other apparently competent people for major assignment in Web Database Applications 🙂
Bad Thing: We all got stuck in an elevator at uni together 😮

Good Thing: Got to see the wee babe again today, and a cuddle too 🙂
Bad Thing: Fatherinlaw is in hospital awaiting eye surgery after a construction incident 😥

It’s been quite the few days. Not feeling particularly chatty right now.