drive by dancing and update

Just a quickie update right now...

I have a couple of pictures to share including a happy dance.

First off my progress on Lanarte's black tulips...

Then part 5 for the iStitch mystery SAL arrived and I stitched that up as well... I'm enjoying these small parts as I can actually keep up with the SAL.

And last but not least my happy dance! I finished off Elizabeth on Sunday night. I was surprised as I was super tired and didn't think I would be able to stitch very much let alone finish her, but I guess being so close made me want to continue until she was done, so I wouldn't have to wait another week to finish her off.

I'm not sure how Barbi is doing but she has smoking needles that girl, so I'm sure she is close to finishing as well. Not sure who we will stitch next but I'm leaning towards Mary Margaret and then leave Suzannah for last.

stitching along...

Thought I would post my progress pictures of what I've been working on the last few days...

After I finished up the Madonna, I pulled out another wip... this time my blue kitties... I managed to stitch up another kitty before switching projects...

then since it was Sunday, it was time for our SAL on Elizabeth. I didn't have too much time to stitch but I did make a little progress. Not much to go now till the finish line on this one.

Also over the weekend, the next installment of the mystery SAL by iStitch came so I stitched that up very quickly Monday night.

And last but not least, I started a new project...this one will be a gift, but I won't say for who, as I know they occasionally read my blog! It is Black Tulips by Lanarte, and its been sitting in my stash for quite sometime. I did buy it with the intention of stitching it for the person who eventually get it, but for some weird reason its taken me this long to pull it out and actually work on it!

Here is what it will look like when done and my measly progress...

I'm also adding the Madonna pattern to my sale list so for anyone interested please let me know!

Now I'm off to stitch for the rest of th evening.

where has the time gone???

Well its been a good few days since I updated last... we've been busy including taking care of a sick kitty. Good thing though, she is on the mend, at least I hope she is, as she is making small progress, but progress none the less!

Anyways, even though I didn't post here, I did remember to take pictures of my stitchy progress at the right times! I'll start with our Sunday SAL with Barbi... the first weekend of September was a long weekend, and we weren't home on Sunday, so I made the holdiay Monday my stitching day for this project.

Here is last weeks progress:

I also had a pretty good stitching session this Sunday (yesterday) and here is where I stand as of last night:

I've been continuing to work on Madonna Dolorosa, as I can see the end of the tunnel on this one. I'm getting very close to finishing her...

Here she is as of the long weekend:

And again the progress on her as of last night:

Since I'm getting so close to finishing the Madonna, I'm going to keep working on her this week as well. I'm just going to have find my silver thread that I used on her robe, so I can finish off the silver accents on the top of her head in her veil.

This past weekend, is also when the newest part to the iStitch mystery SAL came out and here is my part three... I stitched it up quickly on Saturday...

I'm going to end this post with a quick picture of my favourite mountain.... some of you may have already seen this on facebook, but I can't help myself... no matter how many times I see this mountain, I just feel compelled to take a newer picture. Its so beautiful to me, and no matter how many times we go by it, I always admire it and stare at in awe as we drive by...

Till next time... happy stitching and I hope everyone has a great week!

tusal, wips and cherries (picture heavy)

Well its that time of the month already when its time to post our ort jars. I have to admit mine filled up pretty darn nicely this month! Even more so than usual. I think that finishing off the backstitching on my antique lace sampler really pushed things for me.

Here is my jar before and after squishing.

stitching along...

I have a little stitching progress to show you... I didn't get too much stitching time on Sunday with Elizabeth, but I did manage to work on her some...

I finally finished the dress! I am so thrilled to be done with it, it seemed to take forever! Now on to the other parts of the design!!!

I also worked some more on my canvas project - antique lace, with the backstitching. I made some pretty good progress on that one as well. I managed to finish up to the halfway point in the design, so the end is near! I can see it! I've included a picture of the whole design to date as well as a close up of what I've backstitched up to now...

I have continued on with the backstitching this week, so I'll see how far I can get.

I do really want to start a few new projects (again), but I'll try and be good and maybe wait till at least next week to start them or at least one of them. I'm wanting to start Just Nan's Bluebird Alphabet - I've not stitched a Just Nan before as I don't really like her designs with the exception of her snowflake. However, this one just called to me. More than likely becuase it has the alphabet in it, but the colours too. And the other one I wanted to stitch is the Birds of Feather's mystery sampler by With Thy Needle & Thread - which isn't so much of a mystery anymore as all three parts are out!

Anyways, I'll try and be good and not start anything new this week...

a finish and some progress...

In my last post I showed you some partial happy dances, one of which was super close to being finished - my maple leaf... well my beads arrived in the mail yesterday and after a fun evening out with friends, I just had to sit down and finish it up.

So here she is in all her glory...

Maple leaf by AAN
Stitched on 28ct white joblean with DMC 815

I really like the way it turned out, and it was a fairly quick stitch too. Very enjoyable!

I also made some progress on my canvas project, with the backstitching on it. So far so good... It is actually going quicker than I thought it would.

And last but not least, here is my progress on Elizabeth... since it was a long weekend here, I didn't get any stitching done on Sunday on her but Monday instead. Here is where I am...

That dress is a killer! It doesn't look like its very big, but it seems to be taking forever to finish it off... I know that I still have lots of big blocks of colour left to stitch on this project at the bottom, but I really hope they go faster than this darn dress! Other than taking what seems forever, I am really liking the way she is turning out. I know Barbi hasn't been stitching on her lately as she has been busy enjoying the summer, but at least this way I can catch up to her!

its awfully quiet here...

Wow, its been so long since my last post! I can't say that I haven't been busy though...

Since I last posted, we've managed to put a few thousand km's under our belts with all our road trips and adventures that we squeezed in what little time we had left before my family headed back off to Europe...

We managed to go see an international horse jumping event, here at Spruce Meadows; we also did several road trips to the mountains, where we went to Takakkaw falls, Emerald Lake, as well as a day trip to Fairmont hot springs to enjoy the pools. We saw numerous deer, elk, mountain sheep as well as mountain goats. The Stampede was in town as well, so we managed to go to the grounds twice, once only to see the chuckwagon races, and the grandstand show, and then one full day to enjoy the rides, exhibits and junk food. We even went on a whirlwind road trip to Vancouver, where we put our feet into the Pacific ocean and walked along the beach (plus the many other things and places we saw on our way there and back)

Then after all that, its was packing and more packing, and then one last full family farewell dinner and the next morning a trip to the airport, with many farewell tears (from me), and they were gone. The family left on Thursday of last week, and the house has been so quiet and so empty since then. It's back to just the 3 of us and the kitty. The family has been gone only 5 days, but it seems so much longer than that. Though it was a challenge at times to have them here for so long (roughly a year), especially with so many people in the house (not just 3 but now 6 and sometimes 7 for a while), I really enjoyed having them, and I really miss them. I liked having my brother around, and really liked having the girls around. It was fun to be able to go to what other people may think as boring, like school concerts, piano, swimming, and horseback riding lessons etc.

But with everything going on especially in the last few weeks, I haven't touched a needle, and did absolutely no stitching. I did miss it, but at the same time it was so worth not having the time to work on my projects.

Since they've been gone, things have been very quiet... I was on holidays all last week, so once they were gone, and we got home from the airport, we slowly started putting the house back in order, doing laundry - load after load, as well as changing my littlest niece's room back to the sewing room we had it as before they arrived. I also managed to make up for lost stitching time! I had a great stitching session every day since they've been gone. I've managed to make very good progess on my maple leaf as well as made pretty good progress on Elizabeth.

Here are my most recent progress pictures:

Maple leaf:

and Elizabeth:

I'm going to continue on with my maple leaf, as it does go fairly quickly - at least the stitching. I still have some back stitching on it to do, as well as a ton of french knots which I just may switch out to beads if I can find a good colour match.

Well that's it for now... I should hopefully be back to posting much more regularly again...

a girl, a leaf and some kitties... oh my!

Not much stitching going on, but I am making some progress albeit small...

I managed to put a few stitches in last week and a few this week already so here is my progress:

Last week I pulled out the kitties to work on, and finished up the second kitty...

then on Sunday we had family over, but after they left, I did manage to put a few stitches into Elizabeth. I'm behind Barbi but I'm plugging along with our SAL...

and yesterday I finally managed to start my maple leaf...

what i've been up to...

I haven't felt like blogging the last little while, but that doesn't mean I haven't been productive!

Here are some pictures of what I've been stitching on...

I've missed posting two weekend SAL progress pictures of Elizabeth, so here is last weekend's report, as well as yesterday's progress...

After my last post, I didn't know what to stitch so I pulled out a wip - my antique lace canvas project and filled in some more with the dark grey. I'm almost finished filling in this layer, I only have the four little diamonds and the bottom row left to fill in, and then I can move onto the last layer of the project, but probably also the most work intensive... I know that layer with all the white backstitching will take a while... but at least I'm that much closer to being finished!

I didn't get much stitching done this last week, but I did manage to start a new project that has been calling my name for the last few months... it is by Carole aka Novalee02 from her shop. I saw this on her blog a few months ago, and fell in love! Here is my start as well as a small picture of what the entire piece will look like. I just love those little kitties!!!

I've changed some of the recommended DMC colours and I'm stitching it on 32ct hand dyed fabric from Dinkydyes... there is no colour name on the fabric.

That's it for now, I'm off to work on the kitties some more!

Till next time.... happy stitching!

finally a stitching update...

I actually have some stitching to share!

Since yesterday was Sunday, it was time to pull out Elizabeth. I didn't get too much done, but there is some progress!

And after my last post, I did sit down to stitch and managed to get quite a bit done on the Madonna. It helps that I wasn't feeling well on Friday so I didn't go to work and when I was not napping I was stitching.

I'm not 100% sure on what I want to work on now, but I think I will put the Madonna away for a bit. I need to stitch something other than pinks right now...

catching up...

I didn't get a chance to post last week so I'm playing catch up with my stitching posts.

After my last post, I pulled another WIP - My Stitching Treasures by Jeanette Douglas, and did a little on that. I didn't get too much done as I was stitching over one on 32ct and even though I love the look of over one, I really don't like doing it that much...

I haven't touched this WIP in such a long time! You can see where I was before I pulled it out here: click I stitched on it last just over a year ago...

Last Sunday I didn't get too much done on Elizabeth, instead I had to frog most of the nest that I had done from before, as I had miscounted. I basically took out what was wrong and restitched that and added a little more and that was my progress...

You can see it here:

Last week, I pulled another WIP out, this time it was Madonna Dolorosa by Solaria/Kustom Krafts and got a nice chunk done on that. I just may keep this one out for this week, as it's coming along nicely, and even though I'm just doing big blocks of colour I'm not bored yet! Though I will admit I have a ton of other projects/new starts calling my name!

You can see where I was the last time I stitched on it here: click quite a long time ago ~ just over 2 years ago... where does the time fly???

And yesterday was SAL time with Barbi, and here is my newest progress on that one. I managed to get quite a bit done. It went quickly as I didn't have to count that much once the first colour of the nest was done.

That's it for now... I'm off to continue stitching on the Madonna...

Till next time happy stitching!

ort report and wips...

First off let's start with the TUSAL... here is my jar as of last night...

Next up, our SAL with Barbi on Elizabeth. I was actually somewhat productive Sunday and got a nice bit done. It helped that I was super tired all day and was nothing but a lump on the couch and stitched between naps! We had a very long night the night before coming home in the wee hours of the early morning Sunday... I'm getting too old for these late nights, and I just can't handle them the way I used to!

And finally what I stitched last week. Since I couldn't decide on what to work on, I pulled out a wip - my Antique Lace canvas project by SJ designs... I last worked on it in February and you can see the before picture here

No the greatest pictures, they all turned out a bit fuzzy no matter how I tried. But you can sort of see in the first one, a somewhat close up, that the dark grey filling has been done up to and including the row of 7 squares - basically the third row down. 5 rows of dark grey filling to go and then I can start the final layer of backstiching filling stitches... not sure I'm looking forward to that as there is quite a bit to do, but it will be pretty when it is finally finished!

Now I'm off to figure out what to work on this week! Till next time happy stitching!

stitching time...

I would love to come and show you all sorts of stitching that I did last week, especially since we had a long weekend, but can't do it... I didn't make a single stitch all week last week, until Sunday evening... and even then it wasn't much.

Here is my progress on Elizabeth. She is coming along slowly but surely...

Right now I seem to be going through some sort of stitcher's ADD in that all I want to do is start something new, but can't decide on what then I think no I'll just work on a wip, but which one... and in the end I don't stitch a single thing! How sad is that!!! So much stash so little time!

I did however finally (sort of) started getting some of my stash organized - at least what I'm going to be selling. I have put a few charts up for sale and you can see them under the de-stashing tab at the top. If you have any questions, just holler!

Now to figure out what to stitch...