The first Christmas finish of 2009!

The stitching Saturday at my Mum's paid off. I made good progress on Simply Christmas, and was able to finish it yesterday.


This was stitched on 28ct lambswool Belfast Linen with the suggested threads. The variegated thread for the lettering is Noel from Weeks Dye Works.

Also stitched on lambswool, but this time 32ct, is Mary Wigham. She had been put to one side during October to make way for Spooky Stitching. So yesterday, after completing Simply Christmas, and it being Sunday, she was back in the rotation. I managed about half a day on her.


Simply Christmas was a birthday gift from my Mum and Dad, along with a number of other stitchy items. I could not resist showing you the birthday gift from my sister.



You can understand why she did not trust such a fantastic gift to the post! Thanks Sis it's beautiful! If you are interested in scrap booking and paper craft then check out her blog here.

For my birthday my Mum and Dad also gave my the final month in the Mill Hill 2003 Calendar Series, December, which I am off to start now. As you would expect it is a Christmas theme. Should I stop the rotation, not that it has restarted, and stitch only festive stuff between now and December 25? Tempting indeed. Maybe I'll wait 'till December itself.

Happy stitching, festive or otherwise.

Not much to show

As far as stitching goes this has not been a good week. Well it's not really been a week, in reality only Tuesday evening, as last night was spent making the Christmas cake and Monday evening was spent doing this blog! So, for what it's worth here is my stitching so far this week.


This is Simply Christmas from Waxing Moon Designs and was a birthday gift from my Mum. Before we went away I stitched a little more on Open House which is now entering in to the rotation.


This weekend is a Railway Weekend so I am going for a stitchy Saturday at my Mum's. Fingers crossed I have more to show next week!

Off to put a few more stitches into Santa!

Purple is the new black?

If not the new black, purple is most definitely the 'on trend' colour this autumn, at least in Naples which is where The Other Half and me have been for the last week. Almost every clothes shop in Naples had windows full of purple stuff. The shade doesn't seem to matter anything from pale lilac to aubergine will do.

So what did we do? Well, our first impressions of Naples were NOT good. Bill Bryson in one of his books described Liverpool, a place where I lived for many years, as the city where a festival of litter had occurred. In Naples, never mind festival, it was a full on Mardi Gras. Litter was everywhere, piles of it, and the graffiti, well don't get me started, needless to say unsprayed walls were a rarity!

This was before we got to the hotel, which made 'Fawlty Towers' look like 'The Dorchester', Easyjet will be getting some feedback on their website about this one I can tell you! On the positive side the staff were friendly and it was clean.

So to restore our belief that Italy truly is a beautiful country, on our first full day, we got out of Naples and took a train ride to Sorrento.


Belief restored!

We also visited Pompei. We spent all day there, you cannot do it justice in two hours.


Next Vesuvius, which was steaming away nicely.


Sticking to the theme of volcanoes we also visited Il Vulcano Solfatara. This is found just north of Naples in a town called Pozzuoli, in an volcanic region known as the Phlegrean Fields. I cannot describe the smell, hydrogen sulphide, the strongest I have ever smelt, and remember I teach science!



Here are some other pictures. As you can see the weather was fantastic, we were walking round in summer stuff and the Italians had coats and scarves on!



In the end we quite liked Naples. It is chaotic, some areas are not good to be in, but you can say that about most cities, and crossing the road is an experience. We found some really nice places to eat and on our first night, by chance, we found the bar in Naples, The Caffe Gambrinus.

We used the DK Eyewitness Travel guide to Naples and the Amalfi Coast. Without it seven nights in Naples would have been a big mistake. My advice; buy a good guide book, do not stay a hotel near the Piazza Garibaldi(Station), choose one that is more than three stars and watch out for scooters, honestly, they drive straight at you but after a bit you face them out and they swerve to avoid you rather than the other way round!

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!

Spooky Update

Before the spooky stuff here is the November Calendar, and it's still not finished. Why? because I ran out of one of the Kreinik ribbon colours with about twenty stitches to go. I hunted high and low and could not find any stray big pieces that had got transported around the house on my clothes. So a quick email to Mill Hill and some more ribbon is being sent in the post.


So now for the spooky stuff. Here is the Horrid Halloween Biscornu by Faby Reilly. I made a few floss alterations. Firstly I used a blend of DMC 321 and E321 for the wording, to give it a bit of sparkle. I also used Kreinik Glow in the Dark #4 braids for the brew in the cauldron, the white parts and the border.


This next photo is not too good. Open House looks more like the house that Jack built!


I picked up Midnight Ride from the framers today. It took ages to choose the frame. In the end I chose black. I do not know how good Glow in the Dark threads are behind glass so I went without it. I think she looks really good.


This picture isn't the best either, maybe I need a new camera? Off to write a letter to Father Christmas, or does he do email? Better still I wonder if he has a blog? Now that would be COOL!

Totally Useless SAL

This weekend I put up my Halloween stitchy display. The ort flask decided that as he now had even more glow in the dark threads inside, from the Horrid Halloween Biscornu, he should be part of the display too. So I bought some Halloween tinsel from Tesco for some extra decoration.

Here is this month's photo

She has a roof ...

... well half one!

Not much stitching got done this weekend. The progress on 'Open House' was achieved on a long car journey on Friday afternoon.


We were off to Pickering in North Yorkshire, one end of the North Yorkshire Moors Railway. This weekend no train travel was involved. We were attending a carriage restorers convention. Although I own a carriage myself I'm not really in to fixing them, until it gets to near the end when they require curtains and stuff. This was not always the case, but having fallen through the floor in one of The Other Half's derelict vehicles, he has many, I'm not quite so keen!

All these carriage restorers needed feeding and I had volunteered to help out with the catering. So on Saturday three of us laid on all day coffee, tea and cake. A buffet meal for 82 people and in the evening we put on a four course dinner for 26. On Sunday we did another buffet but for half as many.

The kitchen was in railway carriage and was about 5 to 6 foot wide and about three times as long. Not only did we cook on gas, a six ring gas hob, with gas cooker we also had a gas plate warmer and the two fridges were gas cooled. It was hot! The washing up facilities consisted of a domestic double sink unit with single draining board. OK for normal pots and pans but too small for the commercial variety. All I can say is that I am glad the whole thing was not on a train that was moving. Here is a picture of the facilities!


It was the first tome the kitchen had been used to cook in and there were some teething problems which will need to be fixed. Not least how to stop things like dirty dishes and the clean ones on the drainer falling onto the floor whilst the train is in motion.

Anyway despite the heat and the lack of space good fun was had by all. We were complemented on our efforts on a number of occasions. One I found particularly amusing. I was complemented on my egg sandwiches. Now I do not eat eggs and have, to my knowledge, have never made an egg sandwich in my life until this weekend.

Back to the stitching. On the way home I stitched on the Horrid Halloween Biscornu until, despite using 'glow in the dark' threads, I was forced to stop.

Spooky Stitching

At last I have started my spooky stitching! Here is a quick update on progress so far.

Open House.


This really is fun to stitch.

My handbag stitching is the Horrid Halloween Biscornu from Faby Reilly. I am doing this on 32ct Crystal Peach linen as I have a lot left over from the Over the Top and in the Tin project. I am going to change some of the colours for Kreinik 'Glow in the Dark' ones as I have them in my stash.



I also managed to spend an evening on the November Calendar.


I hope everyone has a happy stitching weekend!

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!

Janlynn's Dolly Mamas Contest

A few years ago, whilst flicking through some cross stitch magazines my Mum and me came across these.






They are from the Dolly Mamas range from Janlynn. We thought they were quite amusing. There are now over fifty cross stitch kits in the series. The sayings like 'Go braless...it pulls the wrinkles out of your face!' are called Dollyisms. Now Janlynn have launched a contest where you can submit your own Dollyism. There is over $1400 in prize money with the grand prize being $1000. The winner also has their Dollyism made into a kit by the Dolly Mama's designer, Joey. In this Youtube video she explains what the contest is about.



To find more information about the contest and how to enter go to www.janlynn.com/dolly

My best attempt so far 'When did the bags under my eyes become suitcases?' Mmm, might need to do a little more work on this one!