Sonntag, 25. März 2018

WIPocalypse - March

It's the last Sunday of March and therefore, it is time for WIPocalypse and I am on time! I also learned that I was not late for February, because the date was moved due to the Olympics, so I am actually on time for a second time this year, I can't believe it ;-)
Anyway, a few people already signed up for this month, so visiting the link-up page here is a great idea ;-)

As every month, there is a question for us to answer: What newer designers and product creators (fabric or floss dyeing, etc) out there have you discovered and recommend?
Well, you know, I am very traditional, I mostly do Haeds and Dimensions kits and I don't really try a lot of new things. When I went to the crafts fair this month, I picked up two kits for a company I didn't know before. It's now exactly "new", they seem to be in business since 2014, but to me they were new. I haven't started them (yet), but I surged the edges and took a chance to look at the small kits.
The designer is called "Liebevolle Kreuzstitchentwürfe" and they had lot of stuff on display and everything looked so pretty. These are kits, including linen and threads (plenty of it), along with the pattern. All seems to be of good quality. A friend of mine also bought a smaller design and already stitched it and is super happy with the result. So, far, I have only seen a photo of it so far, but that already looked very pretty. Maybe I will start one of the kits for next WIPocalypse =)
  You know, I already spent 110€ for two other kits when I went there, otherwise I would have bought more ;-) They also have an online shop (but I don't know if they ship international), where you can take a look at their pretty designs. The site is in German, but that should be fine if you just want to look ;-)

But this brings us to this months progress. I am super happy, this month has been a blast! Finally, I had more time to stitch (especially during the last week - I was ill and had to stay out of work. I have another week in bed ahead of me, so another week of sleeping, stitching and reading...)

The first thing I want to show is my progress by Jule Angel by Anne Stockes. I made a start on the second row of pages and stitched a whole page. This sounds like a huge amount of stitching, but since it was only background, it stitched up rather fast. I went from here:


To here - a total of 5005 stitches done!
The second project I worked on is QS Paddys Luck. I took Paddy out for IHSW and already showed an update, but since then I managed to finish page 2. I went from here:
To here - 2160 stitches added:
So, we have a few new colors in the rainbow and his head has grown a bit. I messed up my counting in the pink/rose colored ray, was not able to find my mistake and tried to fix it and I don't think it will be visible in the end (lucky me, the colors were rather similar). You can also see one of the new needle minders I got =)

The third project I want to show is - as every month - my Kreimhilds Revenge. I am doing my best to get the fourth row of pages done. I went from here:
To here - 2695 stitches added to her.
Now there are only 4 columns left to stitch on her and I want to get those done by next month. Maybe I will even stay with her and tray to stitch those 4 columns next week.

Last but not least, I have an update on my Hydrangeas by Mill Hill. I went from here:
To here:
I stitched one shade of green and started on a second one, which I will hopefully be done with by next month ;-)

Well, that's all I have for this month. I got 9860 stitches done (plus the ones on Hydrangeas), I wish every month would be a successful as March ;-)

Happy stitching =)

Dienstag, 20. März 2018

IHSW and tons of stash!

Yes, you did not misread the headline! I managed to take part in the International Hermit and Stitch Weekend, yay! I was a pretty good hermit in Saturday, where I spent all day stitching, and I was a fairly good hermit on Sunday, where besides stitching I went for lunch with a friend and had my first book club meeting (which was awesome), but before and after that, I stitched ;-)
The link-up, along with an awesome update on Joyszes "Yexian" can be found here.

I originally wanted to pick out my focus piece Kreimhilds Revenge, but since it was St Patricks day on Saturday, I decided to pick up my QS Paddys Luck by Joana Bromley and that was exactly the right choice, so much fun! Why didn't I work on this for so long? The last update is from the end of July last year!

Anyway, here is where I started:
And here is where I got by Sunday evening:
I added some 1 100 stitches, I hoped for more, but the confetti in Paddys head slowed me down. By now, I finished this column and there are 560 stitches left for a page finish, which I will surely get done for the WIPocalypse update at the end of the month.

And this brings us to the second part of this post! I went to crafts fair last week and bought some pretty goodies there and then also my Gecko Rouge Gold Club kits arrived. I chose the voucher as my half year reward, so I am able to choose various items instead of one kit. I got the following two kits:
This is "Paddy the Rat drinking Guinness in a Quiet Pub" by Tanya Bond - I choose 18ct for this one. I already have the matching needle minder. There is a companion piece called "Ronald the guard drinking Carlsberg", which I also find very cute. I was close to buying it ;-)

This is the second kit I chose "Lil' Hamster Playing Bagpipes" by Amy Lyn Bihrle. I'll do this on 25ct magic guide fabric. It's soooo cute =)

And here are the things I bought at the crafts fair:
This is a Maia kit called "Geishas". I am usually not into Geisha motifs, but this one was so beautiful and colorful, I could not resist. This is my first Maia kit, I think it uses Anchor floss (which is common in Germany, but I never used it before) and is worked on 18ct Aida. I feel a great itch to start this!

This is the second kit I got, another design by Eva Rosenstand. I have seen this design online and I absolutely loved it, but it was really expensive (I think about 190 Euro). And then I found this one on sale for 60 Euro, so I bought it right away :D It's very big and very pretty ;-)

These are two smaller kits I bought from a German designer called "Liebevolle Kreuzstitchentwürfe", they have a lot of seaside designs, they had a lot of stitched designs on display and so I decided to get two of them for a try. After all, some smaller finishes can be very motivating =)

I also got two magnets to make into needle minders:
And I also bought a pair of earrings:
This is from a German shop called "Schokoklunker" . They have a lot of amazing jewelry designs, most of them are chocolate themed items and they look so real! I was pretty torn between getting this one (Spekulatius is very famous for Christmas here - it's a sort of spiced cookie and I am not sure if it has an English name) and a pair of Oreo cookies ;-)

I also bought a couple of other things like wedding cards (I am invited to several weddings this year), a birthday present for my nighbor and a couple flowers for the garden (I have two weeks off around Easter and hope to get started on gardening - right now it's to cold for flowers). I am also expecting another pair of earrings, I saw it last year and was so much looking forward to getting it, but it was already sold. But it's already on it's way to me and should arrive here soon.

Well, this is a long post, longer than I thought. And I think I will try and not buy any more stitchy stuff for a while, I have sooooo many lovely non started projects ;-)

Happy stitching =)

Samstag, 17. März 2018

Gifted Gorgeousness SAL - March

Here we go for another GG SAL update. I could have sworn, February just turned into March, but it looks like March is already half way over! And I am two days late for the SAl, so if you take a look at the link-up there is already plenty to see ;-)
I was super busy during the last weeks, my students had their exams and we spent ages correcting them. Luckily only 540 students turned up for the exams (the students are signed up for the exam automatically and most of them don't turn up - our list had 1096 students on it), but it still took a lot of nerves to go through it all. Now there are just some oral exams to do, but we think we can finish them in one day. And after that, I have two weeks off from work, yay! I'll stitch and start working in the garden then =)

But back to topic - my progress for the GG SAL. I managed to work on two project and have some stash to show (I got some kits for my birthday and since I was to busy to drive to a "local" shop (80km one way), I order a few things online)..
Let's start with my actual stitching.
The first thing is - just as last month - my Map  of Middle Earth. I managed to get a page finish on this and went from here:
To here:
So I added 2 000 stitches since you last saw this one. 6 pages done, 54 to go.... I hope to be able to finish another page this year. If I stitck to my plan of doing roughly 1 000 stitches per month, this should not be a problem ;)

The second project I worked on is my Candy Cane Santa Stocking - yes, he's finally back! Not to much progress on him, but every stitch done is a stitch closer to gifting this to my fiance. I went from here:
To here:
You can see that I am now working on background now and since it's only half crosses, it stitches up rather fast. I just need to pick this up more often.

And since I don't already have enough on the go, here is some stash I got for my birthday =)

First up is a small kit by Dimensions Gold - it's from the petite collection. I think it's very pretty =
The second kit I got is also from Dimensions Gold. I loved this when it was released, but it was quite expensive here and then sew and so had it on sale, so I got it =)
The third kit I got is a Mill Hill beaded kit called "Geranium". I am currently stitching "Hydrangeas" from this line, I am close to finishing all the stitching and looking forward to get to the beading =)
And once I am done with my Hydrangeas, I will stitch this one =) It looks like so much fun =)

That's all I have for this month.
Happy stitching =)