The Girl that Stitches

Home is Where the Magic Is Colette (my Mum) has finished the HAED Diamond Painting Home is Where the Magic is. Previous progress: Finish!:   Happy Stitching & Diamond Painting! xxx

T-shirt Rug Finish Awhile back, I shared the start on the t-shirt rug gift for my Sister's baby.  Laura is due at Christmas, so there is not long to go now!  The size of the rug ended up being about 89cm wide.  It's not as big as the one I made a few years ago, but it's a nice size for the nursery :) Last blog progress was up to here:   Progress over the last few months:   Angelica's Garden Butterfly Here is the butterfly for November!  There is one more butterfly design to release and the Kaleidoscope Collection will be complete.  At this point, the Samplers for this collection will most likely be released at the start of next year. Small Angelica's Garden Butterfly: 49 stitches high by 81 stitches wide, 26 DMC thread colours Angelica's Garden Butterfly: 111 stitches high by 181 stitches wide, 25 DMC thread colours  Threads in this chart: Happy Stitching & Diamond Painting! xxx

Butterflies Over the past couple of weeks I’ve been stitching another butterfly cushion! This was the colour scheme of the first one I stitched some time ago. Original Butterfly: Monet’s Room I stitched another version of this butterfly as a gift for my Sister. The colour design of the cushion was inspired by Monet's painting "Water Lily Pond 2." My Sister has a room with a Monet inspired colour scheme, so I picked colours that would work in this room. Water Lily Pond 2 by Monet: New Butterfly; Ready to be stitched to cushion: Finished Cushion; 22 count Hardanger tented with 3 to 4 strands: Lilly Butterfly The Pattern is available on the downloads page .  The colours used in this Monet version are: Happy Stitching! xxx

Rug Progress  The t-shirt rug is now finished! Here are some work in progress photos from where the last blog left off: Previous progress; 20 rounds, about 80cm wide: After 31 rounds; about 127cm wide: After 32 rounds; about 130 cm wide The Finished Rug The completed rug ended up having 35 rounds and measuring 144 cm wide!  It’s also quite heavy!  Which is not surprising since there has got to be at least 50 or so whole t-shirts of varying sizes in there.  I did end up needing more green t-shirts for the last couple of bands as I decided to go back to green before ending on black.  There were some t-shirts left over but I did use most of the yarn I had.   The great thing about the rug is it is hand washable.  I've found it’s better to spot wash if possible because it’s really thick which means it takes ages to dry. Underlay I purchased a non-slip rug grip underlay for underneath.  Although the rug so heavy that it doesn’t tend to...

Framing Flowers & Birds I hope you all had wonderful Christmas and New Year celebrations.  Happy New Year! My Parents liked “Flowers & Birds.” I can finally share pictures of it framed.  Finish, Ready for framing: First it was washed and ironed!: Birds & Flowers Framed:   The frame was modified. Originally the pattern was much more solid looking, but I brushed some white acrylic over the top to soften the effect. A second matt was cut using really thick card which had a pearlescent sheen to it. The second matt ended up having to be wider than anticipated because I stitched out to a template but didn't factor shrinkage in… and the piece did shrink slightly when washed and ironed. An Enchanting Surprise I woke up Christmas morning to find a RAK (random act of kindness) from the lovely Sandra Popek! She is such a generous lady and it was an awesome Christmas surprise! She sent me Josephine Wall’s Enchanted Manor. I am...

Here is a reminder of where the Mystery Chart left off at!: And now...  Drumroll...  Well… Here we go… ta da!!! Mystery Chart Finish: Tented using 3 to 4 strands (colour dependent) on 20 count Mint Green Bellana/Lugana Started March 19th 2015, Completed December 18th 2015 Completion time: 9 months (whilst jugging other wips!) This is my second ever stitchy finish!  It's such a good feeling to put that last stitch in! It's also such a relief to finish the piece in time for Christmas so it can be gifted.  Since it’s not so mysterious anymore I can reveal the source.  The chart is appropriately called Flowers and Birds and is available as a freebie from the Free Cross Stitch online website .  It is a very complex pattern to stitch… If you check it out you will see the confetti battle within and understand!  Improvising You may notice the pattern has been made wider.  It has been stitched out an additional 1-2 centimeters...