I AM SO EXCITED!!

I was going to post some wip photos and house building photos, but now I can't find the camera. The camera bag is there, the usb cable is there, but not the camera. So apologies once again. (The camera is working, even though it is still doing the 'jittery thingy', DH replaced the batteries DOH!!)

I am so looking forward to tomorrow. I am finishing work early and then making way to a little place called Narbethong. What for you may ask? A Stitching Retreat!!! This is being organised by a fellow stitcher and ONS owner Bernadette. Check-in is any time after 2pm, I am hoping to arrive at around 5pm. I am thinking a which wips to take, perhaps a new start also. I suppose that I should also take some clean clothes and other stuff, toiletries etc.

I have met Bernadette on a couple of other occasions, so I am looking forward to catching up with her, but as I have only ever been to one stitching afternoon before, at Bernadette's house, I haven't met many other stitchers and bloggers. There will be 'goody bags' and stash shopping as Bernadette is bringing her shop with her.

Just so there is a photo for this post here is a picture of how our house will look when it is finished. The photo is from the National Builders website, and if you click on the link it will take you to a page where you can down load a pdf file to see the floor plan of the house. Ours is the Sandhurst 3ooE. We have changed a couple of things; taken out the hall-way behind the kitchen to the home theatre and just 'moved' the kitchen back. The door to the home theatre will then be past the kitchen. And we have added an additional 1.5 metres onto the width of the garage. The entry was huge, a room all of its own, so we made that a bit narrower and gave the extra space to the study and living rooms, but we still have the double doors at the front.

Well I must go and start packing for the weekend and try a do some house work just so that DH doesn't have so much to worry about.

Bye for now, happy stitching and stay safe.

Thank you!!!

I would sincerely like to thank everyone who read my last post and left a message. You are all truly wonderful and I consider all of you to be true friends.

Pokua, thanks for the tip about the fabric for MOTM, I will certainly make sure that I am happy with the coverage before I get too far along with the design.

I have been stitching, every night as my de-stress, but I can't get my camera to work to show you any progress pictures. Joel, our 7yo, thinks that the camera is a toy and I think that he has damaged it. We have trouble turning it on, and if by some chance it does turn on the screen does this jittery sort of thing before actually turning on.

I have mainly been stitching on Impatient Ballerina by HAED, and a little on CDC by Ink Circle of a lunch time (I only work 2 days per week so progress is quite slow, but it all helps.) I have also had a new start, Spanish Geometrical Sampler by The Needle's Content. Here is a link to the completed design. The colors and silks are amazing!!

It is a week of birthdays at the moment, mine was on the 30th of September, Caitlyn (my baby) had her sixth birthday on the 1st of October and DH has his on the 5th, I am caked out!! LOL

The building of our house is coming along great after some initial delays. There was a problem with the design of the concrete slab, so our builder had to consult with another company for the fault to be rectified. Once that was all sorted out and the slab laid, the frame and roof tiles went up, and the windows were put where they had to go. Last week the plumbers and electrician were there, and the heating and cooling units were installed. The bricklayers and plasterers are due to be there in the coming week. Sorry, there are no photos due to the camera problem.

Well I must go, I am about to do an order for the latest JCS ornament issue, plus some other things, I have to justify the postage HEHE. I am going to get some threads so that I can kit a few things up.

Happy stitching everyone, and stay safe.

The Last of Our Firsts

Yesterday, August 10th, marked the first year of my Mum's passing. We have had a year of firsts, first birthday, Christmas, Easter, Mother's Day etc, hence my title.

Dad lives five and a half hours away by car, with no stops, but we always stop half way for a break and a meal so the trip invariably stretches out to six or more hours. On Friday night we made the trek to stay at DH's Dad's house, half an hour from my Dad's, so that we could spend some time with my Dad. On Saturday afternoon DH and the kids took me to Dads and I had a sleepover at his place. He cooked tea, quite well I might mention, he is a very capable cook. He would often cook meals for us, I am one of five, when we were growing up as Mum worked alot of nights in the kitchen of a hotel.

Dad has got a little dog, a Jack Russell called Bessie. She is such a blessing. I am sure that she is the reason that Dad gets up in the morning. We, my siblings and I, are so, so pleased that Dad has her. Bessie sleeps with Dad during the night, however when I stayed she came to me during the night and snuggled with me. Dad called her a traitor, lovingly of course, and he was glad to share her with me.

Dad has begun to attend church. I was able to go with him on Sunday morning. My three sisters joined us, albeit a little late, while my brother (church is so not his thing) waited for all of us outside. After a cuppa with the parishioners we all went to the cemetery. One of my sisters bought a bunch of balloons, in rainbow colors, for us to release. DH and the kids had arrived by this stage, and the kids took great delight in being able to release a balloon for their Nanny.

We then went to a hotel for lunch. It was a good day, and a fitting way to remember Mum.

Dad had some misgivings, he made a comment to me that he would like nothing more than for the day to be like any other, for it just to slip by quietly. But with two of my sisters that is just not possible, the bigger the fuss the better as far as they are concerned. Even to the point of 'dancing and stomping' on Mum's grave so that Mum knew that we were there. I was disgusted. I had always been taught that to even walk on someones grave was very disrespectful. I haven't spoken to Dad to see what he thought, but I am sure that he would think the same as me.

Dad spoke of how badly he treated Mum at times, but it mustn't have been all bad as they were married for just shy of 57 years. We had a very stable upbringing. I lived in the same house until I was married, and I never had to change schools, except for going to secondary school when the time came. Dad thought that Mum did a great job of rearing us kids. You see, Dad wasn't always around. He was a shift worker on the railways. I assured him that he was and still is a great influence on all of us.

Mum, I miss you so much, you were always there for us. Whenever I was unwell, you would always come to help out. I still expect you to answer the phone when I ring, or to be on the other end when I answer our phone. I love you Mum and you will always be in my heart.

Stitchy Update.

So here are the update photos that I spoke about in my previous post, mind you, I have stitched more than what shows in these photos LOL. That is what I get for taking so long to post.

First off is Gypsy Rose. There is more stitched in this part, as well as some progress on the far left of the design, just me going off on a tangent.

Next up for show and tell is Faery Tales, this is the completion of this page and is of course The Ugly Duckling, sorry for the crappy photo.

Here is another photo of Faery Tales with an 'almost' complete Cinderella, and we can see the emergence of Prince Charming.

And last of all is Impatient Ballerina, there is quite a bit more done on this one.

That is it for the stitching updates.

As for the house, the builder should be given the go ahead next week, so we should start to see some progress. We have been and selected all of our colors, including a red front door and magenta glass splash backs for the kitchen. What have we done??? The color consultant suggested that we make a feature of our front door as it is a double entry door, so we did!! As for the splash backs, what were we thinking? We had a cinnamon color chosen and DH kept on referring to it as baby poo yellow, and I just would not be able to live with him saying that all the time. We had already chosen the bench tops and cupboard doors and didn't want to have to change them again as well, so we went with magenta. Everything else in the house is neutral. Neither myself or DH are 'out there' sort of people, these selections are so out of character for us, but have a couple of WOW factors really appealed to us.

Well best go and see if I can get some things around the house accomplished.

Stay safe and happy stitching.

Bad, Bad Blogger

It has been some time since my last post (hangs head in shame), no excuses really, just that life gets in the way of blogging at times. I am finding at the moment that I would much rather stitch that blog or read other blogs, but when I do read blogs I do enjoy it, seeing what everyone is up to and stitching on.

There hasn't been any further developments as far as the house is concerned, the trees are still living on our block of land, but their time there is limited, they should be down next week. We are waiting on the final plans, then they can be submitted to council for approval. Is still could be a month or more before any sort of construction work begins.

I saw that a fellow blogger, Ranae, was working on a CCN project called Princess Parade. I left her a comment that I had made several attempts at ordering it but had been able to resist, you all know how weak I am and that being able to resist ordering anything for me is a major miracle. Anyway, Ranae very kindly offered to send me the chart once she had finished with it, and here it is.

Along with the chart, Ranae also included some fabric to stitch it on. And see the Cross Stitch Crazy Certified, that is the top of her note pad, is that not the cutest thing that you have ever seen? Thank you so much Ranae for you generosity, I shall truly enjoy stitching this.

In the comments of my last post Alison Gunning from South Africa left a comment regarding the jungle animal sampler that I completed for my son Luke. She asked where I got the pattern from. Alison if you are reading this, I got the pattern from a craft book which contained various crafts to decorate nurseries/babies rooms. I can't remember the exact name, sorry, it was started some time ago, Luke is now 14. I have looked for my chart but am unable to locate it at the moment. If I do happen to find it I would be more that happy to send it to you.

I do have some stitchy updates to share with you, but I will leave them for another day, in the not too distant future, I hope.

Take care everyone.

We have a winner!!!

Congratulations Billie, you guessed correctly. My secret project is in fact Impatient Ballerina by Lisa Victoria, here is what she will look like when she is completed.

I noticed that Billie has already e-mailed me with her address, the package will be in the mail in the next few days.

Weekly Update

No one guessed the name and artist of my new start, there is not much to go by, is there! It is a HAED design and the name of the artist is Lisa Victoria, good luck everyone. The first person to leave a comment with the correct design name will win a stitchy package from me.

Here is an update photo of the mystery project, even though the picture is a bit blurry, the colors are pretty close.

Also, there has been some work on Faery Tales, not too much as I was trying to get more done on the mystery, but every little bit helps.

This week I was called into work to do some extra hours, is it so wrong that I do not mind at all!! It is never a problem as long as it doesn't interfere with collecting the kids from school, so they make it during school hours.

Luke has been sick for most of the week, with some sort of viral thingy, so we have been dosing him up on pain relief and basically just letting him rest, I am sure that he will be off to school tomorrow.

Joel's school thinks that there is something impeding his learning and they are leaning towards Aspergers. I have done some research and just can't see where he fits, I know that the spectrum is quite large and that just one or two characteristics can have an impact on a persons life. He has a specialist appointment on Friday just to see what is happening with him.

Caitlyn is simply loving school, her teacher and her friends.

Today after church a few young families got together at a wonderful park/playground for lunch. We had a lovely time, it was great just sitting in the sun catching up with some people that we would not normally get to see much of.

Thank you to everyone who stops by and checks on us, I appreciate you all so much. Take care everyone and stay safe.

I am so Weak!!!

I have succumbed to startisis. Just in the last week I was e-mailing Ranae and telling her that I was trying to avoid any new starts, well I caved. I was going through my charts and Caitlyn was sitting beside me. I came up to a particular chart and she said "Oooohhh, that one is pretty, I like it." That is all it took to convince me that I needed to stitch it. I have been fortunate since I have been blogging and have won several give aways on other blogs, so I have decided to have a competition. The first person to guess the name of the design will win a little package of stitching goodies from me.


Here is the first wip picture;





It is not the best of photos, it is stitched on white evenweave. As you can see, it is stitched over one, and it is a HAED. So all you have to do is name the artist and the design. If nobody has guessed it by next week-end I will give a further clue.


I while ago I joined the Our Friends HAED SAL, back then, rather than a new start ahem, I thought that I would pick up one of my other wips and get some stitches into it. So a search through my wip containers brought up Gypsy Rose. I don't have a before shot, but here is an after one:





and here is a picture of what she will look like when completed. So as a part of the SAL I will be stitching on Gypsy on Thursday nights.







This week I have also put some stitches on Faery Tales and here is an after shot.



I have decided do a 'sort-of' rotation. I will continue with these three wips, alternating between the new start and Faery Tales a row at a time, and Gypsy on Thursdays. If I need a break from over one stitching I will spend some time on either A Love Song or CdC. The last time I had a rotation I failed miserably, seeing that this is a 'sort-of' rotation, I just might do better!!

Louanne asked me in my comments the details of my CdC and A Love Song. CdC is stitched on 28ct navy lugana, 2x2 with Dinky Dyes silk in the color called Desert Sands, and A Love Song is stitched on 32ct Antique White linen using HDF (Vicky Clayton) silk in Garnet.
Thank you everyone for your wonderful comments on my last post, I hope that you are all well and doing lots of stitching, stay safe.

What have we been up to?

You may recall some time ago that we put our house on the market (not the one we are living in, we are currently renting, but one that we built ten years ago,) well it has sold. Now we have secured a block of land and chosen a house design to build WOOHOO!!! We will officially own the land on the 14th of May and building should begin soon after that. Before it can start though, we need to remove some trees, five all up, as they have been planted in a row almost diagonally across the block. I will post some pictures in a little while.

We went to our holiday house over Easter and had a very relaxing break. My DH has a very warped sense of humour, around Easter every year he organises for all of us to have dental check ups, he takes great delight in reminding us when this is coming up. We all came away without anything overly major happening, but the dentist has recommended that Joel sees an orthodontist as he has a quite severe over-bite.

Joel and Caitlyn started back at school yesterday, and Luke went back today. So today is the first child-free I have had for a couple of weeks and have just decided to chill today and get back into routine tomorrow.

On the 5th of April my three months probation was up at work, and even though there was no mention of it, I assumed that they would be keeping me on. Well yesterday I spoke to my manager and said that my probation was up and could I then assume that they would be 'keeping me'. He was surprised that the time had gone by so quickly, and then proceeded to congratulate me and said that it did look like they would be keeping me. Another WOOHOO!! I am really enjoying my job, it is such a great and positive environment.

As for stitching I have been concentrating (obsessing) on HAED Faery Tales, and have now managed to complete nine out of sixty pages.

When I am not working on Faery Tales, I am putting some stitches into Four Oaks Designs A Love Song. Not too much more to go on this one, I predict a finish, mmmm, by the end of the hhhhmmm, let me see, year, hehe. I am not one to stick to dead-lines, and not wanting to over extend myself LOL.

And I have also been putting some stitches into CdC, nearly done with this one also.

So that is a condensed version of what we have been up to, I hope to not leave it so long until I post again, I really love getting comments from all of you, it warms my heart when I read them, bye for now and stay safe everyone.

Times just flies!!!!

WOW two months have passed us by without a post on this blog.

The first thing that I would like to show you my readers is a wonderful gift that I received from

Anna. I won her monthly draw for March, Anna made her stitched piece into a pillow cover and I absolutely love it. The stitching and finishing are perfect, and I love the wooden star buttons that Anna embellished it with. Thank you Anna for your kindness, this is the first stitched piece that I have ever received, it will truly be cherished.

I will be posting again soon with some news and some pictures of my active wips. Hope you are all well, and getting lots of stitching done.