Spooky finishes!

This weekend I've managed TWO spooky finishes!
Here is Horrid Halloween.


Here is is before finishing.


As mentioned in my last post I changed some of the colours for Glow in the Dark ones. This was a really fun stitch. You can order the chart from Faby Reilly Designs here.

It is my sister's birthday today so yesterday I set about stitching this biscornu based on the Boo needle book from Just Nan.


I finished this one this morning. I also did some domestic stuff between the stitches and, yes the needle was glowing by the time I was done! Unfortunately, what with postal strikes and things over here, my sister will not get this in time for Halloween Sorry Sis, but your prezzie does look good in my Halloween display!

With all this biscornu stitching Open House has not had a look in since Thursday evening. Here is the progress to date.


This Halloween stitching sure is fun! Off to wave my magic wand around the house. OK, reality check, it's a duster!

Happy stitching!

The Big Finish Weekend 2!

This weekend I was able to finish a number of projects. Firstly the October Calendar got framed.


I also mounted Midnight Ride. She will be going to the framers tomorrow. I also finished The Boo tin lid form Just Nan.


And finally,


the Breast Cancer Awareness Biscornu. I'm really pleased with this one.

Today is Sunday so it should be Mary Wigham day but I have a half finished November Calendar. This is the eleventh one I have stitched and usually they take about a week each but there is a lot of work in this one.


I did also say that I was only going to stitch spooky stuff in October. It's now the fourth and not a single spooky stitch has been sewn!

October came early ~ well sort of

In the post before last I declared that I was going to stop the rotation and only stitch spooky stuff for the whole of October. Well folks October came early!

I really wanted to make a start on 'Open House' but did not feel that I could start a project before finishing something else. I stitched the Boo tin lid from Just Nan.


I finished this on Sunday morning and Sundays are Mary Wigham days, so, I stitched on her until my Aunt and Uncle arrived.

In the living room are my Mum, my Aunt and me having a good old stitchy time, both of them on their UFOs and me on Mary Wigham. I have to say that I ended up frogging most of what I stitched. My Dad and my Uncle were in the garden pruning what, in recent years, has turned into a 'Whomping Willow' of a corkscrew willow tree. It was almost the size of the house (I say, was, because on Monday, whilst I was at work, the trainee tree surgeons chopped the whole thing down!). Well the tree branches and leaves started to pile up. So, stitching was suspended for the rest of the day whilst a clean up operation was mounted.

On Sunday evening, when peace and tranquillity had been restored to the garden, and the willow had less branches than before, I was able to take up stitching once more. Well that was the plan, my Aunt had taken the Mary Wigham charts home with her! What a shame! I had a legitimate excuse for starting 'Open House', so I did!


You may ask where was The Other Half whilst all this deforestation was going on. The answer in Scotland saving this for the nation.


In a previous life this half of a carriage, the only one left, looked like this.

Built in 1907 of teak, which is why it has lasted so long, this Dining Saloon must have been a spectacular sight, all varnished and shiny.

Half of this carriage was sold to a young couple in the 1950s who had it put in their back garden. They lived in it whilst their house, the cobblers shop, was made fit to live in. The carriage has remained in the garden ever since. The lady of the house is now 97 and will shortly be moving in with her daughter. The carriage became 'under threat' and had to be moved before the winter. It is now in a safe place and we will wait and see what will happen to her.

Back to the stitching.

The early arrival of October was, however, short lived. This week I have stitched on White Nights. Tonight I am hoping to finish the grid in the top left corner.


Next week I think I might just have to go back to Open House!

Nine days away from home

Here in the UK we are coming to the end of the May half-term holiday. The Other Half and me spent all of the holiday away from home, a few days here, a few days there, that sort of thing and very enjoyable it was too. I did manage to get some stitching done. Firstly I finished the Dutch Delft biscornu. The 'charms' are hand painted enamel earrings bought at a craft fair many moons ago.

I also managed to complete the backstitch on one side of my Teepee Teddies UFO and all the cross stitch on the other side.


I also managed to complete all the stitching on the Boo needle book. This now needs finishing off properly along with a whole list of other stuff so my next weekend at home will be a 'finishing weekend' of a different sort.


I will leave you with two holiday photos. On Thursday evening we walked to the source of the River Thames. I have been there a number of times before and have actually seen water bubbling up from the ground, but not this time. The pile of stones in the foreground is where the water usually comes up.


This photo shows what we had to cross to get there and yes, it is a high speed train and yes, the official footpath does cross a double track mainline railway (between Swindon and Gloucester).

A few spare days

For the last two weeks I have faithfully stuck to the rotation. The June Calendar was finished with a day spare and the Just Nan biscornu was finished with two days to spare. So what did I do with those spare days? Well I would love to say that I spent the time on my Teepee Teddies UFO and finished it, but I didn't. Instead I started and finished something else.

The something else was the 'How many UFOs are in your closet?' by Raise the Roof Designs. This is what it looks like if you follow the chart.


This is my version


Stitched on 28 count Cashel linen (lilac) I made the following alterations.

• Kreinik blending filament was used on the UFOs to give them a metallic sparkle


• The purple parts were done in The Gentle Art 'Hyacinth' rather than the DMC floss suggested


• Threadworx' Mythical' and Weeks Dye Works 'Mother's Day' (left over from the last two biscornu from The Sweetheart Tree) were used to make the fabric on the second shelf more interesting


• Instead of having another brown box above the 'to do' box I designed a very simple straw hat, blending two shades of DMC to give a textured, 'straw' look and used more 'Mother's Day' for the hat band and the feather


• I also blended the floss to make the basket and changed the colours of two boxes. The bottom right box ended up being stripped as I was running out of 'Hyacinth'

Let's say I had great fun!

Next job is to frame it. I'm going to have a ago at doing this myself. I bought a wooden 8" x 10" photo frame for £4.50, some wadding £3.00 a metre, and some spongy mounting board, sorry I have no idea what that is called, all I know is that an A1 size sheet cost £4.99 and they had it on offer, 'buy one get one free'! So at a rough estimate I should be able to frame it myself for about £6! Can't be bad. When it is done I will post the results.

Anyway, back to the stitching. After adding in this extra project, I still had some time left, Sunday afternoon and evening. So why didn't she frame it then? I hear you say. Well, The Other Half cut the board to size for me, so a start was made. Unfortunately, whilst stitching the words I stabbed myself and bled on to the linen, not much, but enough to show. So it was a quick soak in warm water, with a squirt of Fairy Liquid, which did the trick and the stain came out.

So to fill the gap I started the Boo needle book from the Just Nan 'Over the top and in the tin' range. You can find out more about the crisis I had with this one in my post on the Spooky Stitcher's SAL. This is as far as I got.


So this week it's Back to White Nights In St Petersburg. My aim is to finish Part 2! Watch this space.