Simply Stitchy

A huge thank you to Jane over at the World Embroideries Blog for sending me these two kits from her giveaway a few weeks ago.      Both kits involve learning new skills.  The Golden retriever is in Tent Stitch which is something that I haven't come across before and I've never knitted with beads so I'm looking forward to getting started with these two! Thanks Jane, they are absolutely adorable.  I'm in the process of knitting handwarmers at the moment.  I've just completed my first pair, which Eldest can be seen modelling below. Youngest thinks that they look really cool so now I'm knitting a pair for her to.   The thanks for these go to Stacy over at Golden Bird Knits.  The handwarmers are based on her Fingerless Glove pattern, without which I wouldn't have had a clue how to even start knitting these. Its a lovely pattern, very simple and knits up very quickly. The pattern is on her blog site and it's well worth popping across to take a look. 

Moving on from the slight disaster with the floppy brim hat, I decided to have a bit of a break from knitting and turn my attention back to cross stitch for a while.  The cover kit in this month's Cross Stitcher Magazine was for gift tags. Ideal - small, quick and even better, simple!   And here are some of the finished items. What a brilliant way to spend a day.  Better still though, "Ice Cold in Alex" was on the TV this morning and "Dirty Dancing" is on in about an hour's time.  Two of my all time favourite films - on the same day.  Bliss!!  Could the day get any better? Wishing you all a perfect day to, Bye for now Olly

You may remember from a few posts back, I treated myself to a copy of "Knitting in No Time by Melody Griffiths.  I bought it because I liked the look of the wrap on the cover and wanted to have a go at knitting it.  As I hadn't really knitted anything large before, I thought that I should practice on smaller projects first.  So, this is how I got on with the Floppy Brim Hat on page 34. The pattern uses 339 Metres of Rowan Yorkshire Tweed DK (double knitting) in Revel, which is a deep purple, pure new wool. Its knitted using 3.5mm (US size 3) needles. I have neither. The wool is discontinued and the local wool shop didn’t have the needles.    Not one to let a small matter of lack of material stand in my way, I deviated from the pattern a smidgen. I used some unbranded acrylic DK yarn in a lovely shade of lavender on 4mm (US size 6) needles. Did I do a gauge swatch? Now, don’t be silly, of course I didn’t. The brim of the hat is knitted first. It is worked in two full rows f

I always find that this time of year is tinged with more than a hint of sadness.  The long, warm days of summer have slowly given way to the longer, cooler nights of autumn.  Leaves have gone from greens to golden browns, russets and yellows.  Winter is on its way which means its going to get colder.   In a way this is good news because I have finished the hat I was knitting. Just in time to by the sound of it. According to the weather forecast for this week, we have arctic winds heading our way.  That means the possibility of snow.  Great.  My least favourite season is coming early this year.  I hope that means that summer will be early next year. Anyway, Youngest will be super toasty if it does snow.  She's really taken to this hat and scarf set.  Umm... if I want to be super toasty, I guess I'd better start knitting another hat! It seems to have been ages since I last did some cross stitch.  My main problem at the moment is lack of light.  We have energy saving ligh

“They shall grow not old as we that are left grow old:  Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.  At the going down of the sun and in the morning We will remember them.”  Bye for now  Olly

Having successfully completed my scarf, I thought I'd have a go at a hat.  It's a bit of a challenge using four needles to knit with.  There are three holding all the stitches and then one to do the actual knitting.  Sounds great in theory but its a bit like trying to knit with an octopus! The needles you aren't knitting with go everywhere. This is an easy hat pattern, well it said easy on the internet.  It's knit in the round so there isn't any purl to do, which is good as I'm not that good at purl yet.  Just doing knit stitch in the round forms stockinette stitch.  It has a natural roll which neatly forms the brim.  Cool eh?  I need to stitch in stockinette for about 7 inches.  I'm just under 5 inches here. The next step is decreasing.  Not sure how to do that yet.  I feel a Youtube moment coming on! Still, in the meantime I'll leave you with an update on my Lion - he now has a nose! Bye for Now Olly

I feel like we need a bit of a drum role here, for the first time ever in the history of me, I have completed a piece of knitting! Yea! The years my mum spent trying to get me to grasp the basics have finally paid off.  Casting Off!! So Exciting! I started working on this back in August, and finally completed knitting it today!  Yippee!  Now, I know it sounds like I've been knitting this for a month.  I haven't. The last three weeks have been, well hectic, but that really is an understatement.  T fell off a horse and fractured his back on 11 Sept. It was a bit worring to start with as no one seemed to know if he'd be OK.  The girls, bless them, were devastated.  Youngest was so upset she missed school.  Eldest went quiet - she seemed to think it was her fault in some way.  And there was me in the middle of it all trying to stay strong for all of them, saying its going to be fine. Of course, I failed miserably - I was just as devastated as the girls.  There's been a

You might remember these glow in the dark threads from a few posts back.  I didn't have a project in mind when I bought them.  I've been thinking about what to use them for - possibly halloween designs.  Maybe a skeleton, or a pumpkin.  I've even thought maybe a nice bright bookmark.  Eldest found a really cool use for them.  She has spent most of the bank holiday weekend making friendship bracelets for her two best friends.    She is going to give them to her friends when she goes back to school next Monday.  I think they'll be tickled pink.   I am also tickled pink but for a completely different reason.... I found a cross stitch kit with my name on it.   Bye for now Olly

I bought this book on a bit of an impulse. I love the colour and design of the wrap on the front cover.  I also like a couple of the bags that are in there as well. My mum would have knitted this wrap up in no time, but unfortunately, she is no longer with us.  So, if I want a wrap like this one I'm going to have to knit it myself. There is just one slight technical hitch though.  I don't really know how to knit. I know the knit stitch and sort of know the purl stitch - but that's it. Still, I'm not one to pass up a challenge.  How hard can it be? I've had a look through the instructions. It tells you what wool to use, what size needles and even what gauge to keep to.  This pattern is 5.5 sts & 7 rows to 4in over st.st  on size US 35 (20mm).  Umm... so far sort of OK.  Well, I know that 20mm is the needle size so that's a good place to start.   There are also a few SKPOs, PFBs, and YOs in there.   Isn't YO another way to say hello?  I had a r

It's not just Youngest who is getting into cross stitch, Eldest is also having a bit of a dabble.  This is the kit she is working on: She's working very methodically and doing a pretty good job. She has said that stitching with 4 different shades of blue thread on a blue background is a bit of a challenge but she seems to be rising to it.  Actually, for a starter's kit, it is a little tricky in places and dear old mum has had to come to the rescue a couple of times.  She has so far avoided the temptation to start looking for the next project. She says she wants to finish this one first.  Bless. Bye for now Olly

T said that my Born Free cross stitch was starting to look a bit like a lobster.... Umm.... I can't see it myself, but then I've seen the picture on the front of the packet so I know what the finished picture will look like. This is where I am at the moment....... I've got a fair way to go yet....... This next picture is the Winnie the Pooh kit that I was going to do after finishing the cute teddy in a previous post. My youngest had other ideas and decided to bag this one for herself.  Of course, she has to finish the hedgehog she started first... Ah, Bless, just like her mum.  Always on the look out for the next project before finishing the one you're on! It's a good job I had Eeyore on standby..... Bye for now Olly

This is Lickle Ted by DMC. Did I mention that I have a soft spot for teddy bears? Its a cover kit from The World of Cross Stitching Magazine from a couple of months back -April's issue I think, could have been March, I forget.  I like doing cover kits as they are usually small enough to finish in a short space of time. Anyway, I thought this little guy was so cute I started stitching it as soon as I got the Magazine, which was pretty much when it came out. I finished him today - 18 June 2010! He only takes up a 4" square!  So much for cover kits being quick to do! My main problem was not being able to see the difference in some of the colours.  It has two shades of cream and two shades of beige.  My other problem was running out of thread.   The back stitch for the outlining is in DMC 3371 which is the chocolate brown above.  The kit only had one length of around about 8" of the thread.  I ran out before I had done his legs, arms and face.  I got the skein above from

This is Chunky. It’s a counted cross stitch kit which I purchased way back in 1989/1990. From memory, I think it was a DMC kit called Fluffy Kitten and is possibly on 18hpi Aida. It took months and months to complete. Well, more like years really because I was a bit disappointed with it. It finally got framed in 1994. It was the first counted cross stitch project that I had ever attempted. And yes, I made mistakes right from the start, hence the disappointment. Unfortunately, I didn’t know I had got it wrong until half of the face had been pretty much completed. There was no way I was going to unpick any of it at that stage! My first mistake was not really understanding what was meant by two strands of the fabric. My second was not realising that the threads can be separated into 6 individual strands and when the chart said use one strand it didn’t mean a whole thread of all 6 strands. These two seemingly trivial errors led to two unavoidable facts. The finished article is about

I put this quilt together over Christmas 2009.  The top is made up of pillow panels and the backing fabric is cotton lawn with an all over parrot design.  All the fabric has been in my stash for years as I didn't really know what to make with any of it.  Inspiration is a bit weird isnt it?  You can rack your brains trying to think of something and nothing comes to mind.  Then, all of a sudden, it just hits you.  Literally in my case.  I was in our attic, sorting through the stuff in readiness for our forthcoming house move. I was going through my fabric stash.  Honestly, its amazing how much you can collect over a short space of time.  I'd got a pile of stuff to get rid of and a pile of stuff to keep.  Well anyway, one of the piles slid a little and knocked over some wadding I had still attached to its cardboard roll which was leaning against the wall.   It fell over and smacked me across the back of my hands.   So there I was surrounded by my favourite pillow panels and som

This quilt was designed and made on a soggy spring weekend a couple of years ago.  The top is made from fat quarters with a pillow panel as the centre square.  A fat quarter is a piece of fabric cut to a generous quarter of a yard.  Normally 22" x 18" or thereabouts. My girls picked out their favourite pieces and chose the order for them to appear in the quilt.  Then left me to stitch them together!  I trimmed the fabric down a bit to make sure all the squares were the right size before making the quilt sandwich.  The quilting is fairly light on this one.  I've only gone around the outside of the squares.  I get a bit teesy quilting something this size on a sewing machine.  Rolling it up to fit under the arm of the machine and then moving it about is just too much hassle.  I didn't want to hand quilt it as this would have taken longer than the weekend to finish!  The quilt is also self-bound.  I left the backing fabric slightly larger than the top so that it

A quillow is a lap-sized quilt which folds in on itself to become a cushion or a pillow.  This is the one I made for my eldest who is seen modelling it below. Well, her fingers and elbows can be seen.  She hates cameras. She loves horses though and as I had some horse related fabric, I thought I'd put it to good use. This is the front cover when it is folded up into a pillow. And this is what it looks like when it is opened out to a quilt.  My eldest is behind there somewhere. The beige looking squares don't show up too well on the photo but they are covered in little horse shoes. Quillows are easy-ish to make.  Its two quilts in one really. The front cover panel is made up into a mini-quilt, with its own wadding (batting) and backing fabic.  Its then stitched to the back of the completed main quilt on three of its sides.  It needs to be right at the very top of the main quilt and in the middle.  On mine above, its behind the top middle beige panel. Make sure that the pic