SPOILER!! Lizzie*Kate Frightful parts 1 & 2 completed

Part 2 of the Frightful Mystery Sampler arrived last Tuesday, so I couldn't resist stitching it right away! The fabric is PTP Cauldron Belfast, and while the floss colors are similar to what is called for for the most part, I am taking a few liberties so this isn't exactly what the design will look like if stitched as charted:

Now it's back to "work" until the third and final part is released mid-September; I might even be able to have this framed in time for Halloween...

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Miss Honey Bee

Back when I received the models for Miss Honey Bee and Miss Queen Bee my first thought was how cute they would look on Berkshire Hive fabric by Fabric Flair. I ordered a fat quarter (which is enough for both designs) and put it aside, and I was able to start Miss Honey Bee for myself as soon as I received the chart, so here she is completed:

I love how she turned out, and look forward to stitching Miss Queen Bee when I get some more time.

Last night I finished a Tempting Tangles "Quakers In..." model, so now I'm going to work on one for Rosewood Manor that I hope to finish within six to eight weeks; then I have a Mirabilia that's due in December, so I guess I have the rest of my stitching year pretty much mapped out--yikes! I think part 2 of Lizzie*Kate's Frightful will arrive today, so I'll probably work on that a bit every few days.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

SPOILER!! Lizzie*Kate Frightful Mystery Sampler part 1 finished

Don't scroll down if you want it to remain a mystery! I'm putting the picture from 123Stitch here so the picture of the finished piece doesn't show up on any thumbnails of this post:

I was really excited that L*K would have a new Halloween mystery design this year, so I ordered it as soon as it hit 123Stitch, and started it right away when it arrived last Monday. I chose Cauldron Belfast from Picture This Plus for the fabric, and I'm using threads from stash that are fairly close to the recommended floss. I did add a purple floss and a couple of DMC variegated threads to the mix, changed some color placement around and added some extra beads, so this isn't exactly what the design will look like if stitched as charted:

Really looking forward to part 2 now!

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

I can finally share

Two new Nora Corbett designs were released today, and are part of the Intriguing Insects series. This is Miss Queen Bee:

And Miss Honey Bee:

I'm looking forward to stitching them for myself at some point, to join Miss Moth and Miss Dragonfly, and the other two insects that I haven't stitched yet, Miss Ladybug and Miss Beetle. But for now it's back to "work"...

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Made a new start

I took a break from model stitching this past Friday through Sunday to make a new start that was calling to me. I got a great piece of fabric from Ship's Manor that reminded me of a sea with underwater plants, so I went through Nora Corbett's mermaids until I found one that had colors that I thought went well with the fabric and decided on Luce Mia. I even had her kitted up already, so that meant it was even harder to resist starting her! So far just her face and hair are done, but the other colors still to come are a light green and aquas:

I also wanted to share a funny scene from the movie The Moon Spinners that I watched last week. As a stitcher it's always fun to see needlework or references to it in movies that I watch while I stitch (and it happens quite often since I like to watch adaptations of Jane Austen's novels!), but this one was particularly fun because it was two of the "bad guys" discussing it:

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Miss Dragonfly is finished

I went back to Miss Dragonfly last Friday, and was able to finish her up yesterday morning. The black thread is Rainbow Gallery Wisper, which takes quite a bit longer to work with than regular floss (it's fuzzy, which means you have to use short lengths and pull through the fabric slowly as it tends to knot easily), but it does give a nice effect, especially for an insect-inspired design:

I am happy that I was able to finish her, as last week a Mirabilia model landed on my doorstep, so now I can use the Q snap that Miss Dragonfly was on to start that. I think I'm going to try alternating between the Rosewood Manor piece and the Mirabilia on a weekly basis for a while, then slip in one of the Tempting Tangles designs and see how much progress I can make that way. Regardless, I won't have much stitching I can share here for a while, though I think the Nora Corbett releases for July might be ones I've stitched, so hopefully I'll have a post then.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

One down, three to go

Last week I finished the first of three models for Tempting Tangles, Quakers in England. It is currently a SAL on Facebook, where the first five parts have been released. Here are those parts:

This is the third in Deb's "Quakers in..." series. The Holland SAL has finished (but the chart is still available) and France is ongoing on FB right now; all three can be found in Deb's Etsy shop. There are two more countries in the works, Japan and Scotland, and I wouldn't be surprised to see more!

Once England was finished I started on a Rosewood Manor model right away, but this past weekend I was just really missing stitching for myself as I hadn't done so for over a month, so I spent some time on Nora Corbett's Miss Dragonfly. Here is where I left her as of last February:

And as of this morning (I wanted to finish those wings!):

Now that the wings and skin are done (with all those partial stitches to give them clean lines) the rest should go pretty quickly; I'm hoping that I might be able to complete her next weekend. For now it's back to "work"...

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Enchanted Alphabet is framed and almost home!

Last Tuesday I received an email from Amber at Rensel Studio that my Enchanted Alphabet was finished, and I am so pleased with their framing:

It is due to be delivered sometime today, and I can't wait to see it in person! I don't yet know where I'm going to hang it, but I have two more of Marilyn's designs that I stitched over 20 years ago (Morning Song and The Bride), and I think I might try to hang them as a grouping. The two older ones were stitched when I was still fairly new to cross stitch, so they are on Aida (as I hadn't made the move to linen/Lugana), and the fabric colors are pretty close to what the patterns called for, as I hadn't even discovered hand-dyed fabrics back then. My stitches also look a lot better than they did in those earlier pieces, so it'll almost be like a record of my journey as a stitcher to have them all together.

The Nora Corbett designs that were released on the 15th weren't ones that I had stitched, but one of them (Lily Pad Sprite) is one that I did do some frogging and re-stitching on. Nora had decided to make some changes after the piece had already been returned; here is what it looked like when I received it:

And after the changes had been made (mostly to one shoulder and the back stitching on the face):

The other one in this new series of Pond Pixies is Pond Lily:

I really like both of these, especially Pond Lily, and I'm looking forward to stitching them (and seeing more in the series!).

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

A bit bogged down

Just realized that it's been a month since I last posted, but I just haven't been doing any stitching for myself so I haven't had anything to share. About a week ago I sent back a couple of Nora Corbett models and made a small start on one for Rosewood Manor, then three came in from Tempting Tangles; having four in the house is making me a bit tense, so I need to make some good progress on them before I go back to working on my own pieces.

On the plus side, I was reminded of the joys of model stitching when I recently got back The Garden Flowers from Karen at Rosewood Manor, in a gorgeous frame that really highlights the stitched border:

I'm going to take this to my framer to have glass added before I hang it, as well as some others I've received previously that still need glass; the problem will be finding wall space!

A few days later I received the chart for the last piece I stitched for her, Hello Moon!:

I think this would be so cute stitched up as a birth sampler, but I don't have anyone to stitch it for! Maybe someday...

There will be two new Nora Corbett designs released in a couple of days, and they might be ones I've stitched, so hopefully I'll be able to share those next week; otherwise it will probably be a while before I post again.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

It's finished!

Last week I finally finished the Vervaco mini SAL, and it turned out really cute:

I'm thinking about sending it to SewMuch2Luv to have a project bag made, but for now it'll go into the finishes bin while I think about it.

I was going to start Miss Ladybug as my new weekend project, but the chart won't arrive until today so I had to pick something else (at least for one weekend) and I chose Disney's Cinderella Castle:

I've had this kit for almost 20 years now and have almost started it a few times but have always backed away; it uses quite a bit of GlissenGloss blending filament and holographic thread and I was afraid they would be difficult to work with. While I've only used a small amount of each so far, I was pleasantly surprised to find that they are actually nice to work with.

I switched out the navy Aida that came with the kit for PTP Mystic Belfast. I would have done this anyway, as I like the look of linen more than Aida and prefer 16ct to 14ct for coverage (especially on dark fabrics) but there are also a ton of partial stitches in this that would be difficult to do neatly on Aida. I was able to complete Tinkerbell last night, so here she is before and after back stitching:

I probably won't get much stitching done this week (or weekend), as Lima Beads is having their annual Easter egg hunt on their site, and that will keep me busy as long as I want it to up until Easter.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!