Plodding along

Hello to all.

Well, I am plodding along, as my title suggests. I am still working on my thesis. I am still looking forward to finish it (obviously), but I feel like I've stopped fighting with it so much. Either way, it's got to be done, so there's no point in hating all the time spent on it.

In the time that I have to spare I have been working on some round robin pieces (again, I won't post pictures until the whole round is complete. There's a total of 13 of us participating...that's 169 pieces! Massive!

I have also made some progress on Kitten Reflections. The backstitch looks so nice in this piece. And now the first smitten has a face. The colours are so good; I'm looking forward to getting back to it between round robins. Picture below.


In other news, a friend of mine has been working on a project of siamese kittens and has palmed it off to me as she's not really interested in cross stitch any more. Her progress is in the picture below:

I'm not sure if I'll actually work on this one, as I've actually already done the pattern up before (about 10 years ago). It is lovely, but I have so many other projects that I'm really keen to get into. I'll see how I feel once I've finished kitten reflections.


Hope everyone is well. Happy easter. I'm off to stick my face into some easter eggs :)

Kitten Reflections

Well, I've been working a lot on Kitten Reflections, and I've got to say, I am loving it. Look at how much progress I've made!!! It's going very quickly :) I love that you can begin to see the shape of the first kitten coming out. I think the colours are really nice and the shading/blending is beautiful. Go Dimensions!
I was even a bit worried that I was going a bit fast...I do like to be able to spend time on projects, but then I realised that if I do finish it quickly, my enjoyment won't be hindered, and I'll be able to begin one of my other projects sooner! Double positive!

In other news, I'm addicted to reality television. Biggest Loser & SYTYCD Aus, are great!! I want Charlie to win Dance and I think he just might. If you are elsewhere in the world and/or haven't seen any of the show, I recommend you youtube some of Charlie & Penny's dances...lots of fun.

Anyway, back to the dreaded thesis :(

Something different

Hello

this is a long overdue blog update.

When I have the time to stitch I've been working on a few round robin pieces, which I'm really enjoying. Although, not sure I love the time pressure of round robins. I like being able to take the time and enjoy my stitching...although I do also love seeing the picture take form.

When I've been between round robin pieces I've been working on Kitten Reflections. Before I put it down in January, this is what it looked like:

This is where it's at now-ish.

I'm really enjoying this piece...I like the textures and different stitches Dimensions use.

I will hopefully be able to post again soon :)

What have I been doing?!?

Well, I'm back in blog-land.

Not sure what I've been doing that means I haven't been able to post anything. I suppose I'm back at all my jobs now (I work at 6 different places!...no wonder I'm confused all the time). Other things of interest: I have been working on improving my diet...go me! And in doing so I've lost a little bit of size (not weight, but it's the size I'm interested in losing). I'm hoping that with a healthy diet will come nice skin, but I suspect that that will sort itself out when I'm not so stressed (someone tell me to cut it down to only 3 work-places).

I have also been working on my thesis...I have to hand it in before the end of March and it still needs a fair bit of work...I can't wait to have it done.

In happy stitching news:

I have finished Stroke of Midnight!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Oh my god. It's about time. I have been working on it for about 4 years

Obviously she needs washing and ironing. I think I'll work on all that, and getting her framed once I've handed in my thesis...and gotten on top of some other projects.

Here are some photos of the detail in the piece:

beading and over-1 detail...I like the way her face turned out.dress detail (including over-1 parts)

I have since done a little bit of work on Kitten Reflections (no picture as yet), and been working on some round robin pieces...also no pictures on the off chance co-robiners stumble across my blog. I am loving working on round robins, it's such a great opportunity to stitch pieces that I enjoy working on, but wouldn't necessarily do for myself. Brilliant. I will post photos of these once they have been received by their owners

Thanks for reading. I will try to be more diligent in my posting, reading and commenting :)

Happy New Year

Well, it's a new year. How exciting! I had a very uneventful evening at a friends place playing board games, but it was a good time. Hope everyone else's nights were good.


Anyway, onto stitching. Below is a picture of the secret santa piece I made up.

Sadly it's not the best picture in the world, but it is now on the other side of the world (in Canada!) so nothing I can do about it. I am very proud of the finishing (I've only ever framed things before. I made the cording myself! I must admit there were a few nasty words and tears in the making. The lady I sent it to said she received it on the 23rd so I'm glad it made it before Christmas.


The picture below is the completed stitching for my Christmas round robin. I am absolutely loving this piece to bits! The colours are great, there's sparkle in the border. It's just so lovely. It will be sent off in the next few weeks (now to 13 other places). I will look forward to getting it back, hopefully with some nice additional pieces :)



Below is the finished picture of my Paris project. All framed up. Again, I did the framing myself. What bitch of a job! It took ages. But my parents loved it and said they had no idea I had been working on it. Go me!! Now to pick where to hang it...


And lastly:
Now that I've finished all my extra projects etc, I am back onto the Stroke of Midnight. I did a little bit of work on her before Christmas, which is the photo below.

But then, compare with the work done in the past week. I am on absolute fire with this bad boy! I can't wait to finished it. It is so complicated and intricate. Give me solid blocks of colour any day. I think I'll finish it within about a month. Then I'll dance around, put it in my finished projects bag and not think about it for about a year.

Anyhow,
that's it for the moment. Thanks for having a read. Sorry I haven't commented recently, it's been that crazy time of year. Hope everyone is feeling suitably righteous about the New Year's resolutions, I know I am :)

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

No seriously, it is! :)

I am looking forward to Christmas. Although I'll still be teaching my classes at the gym over the break, they only take up one hour at a time, and I won't have to do any 9-5 style work! Hooray!

I have a couple of bits and pieces to report.

I finished my naughty/crafty cat. He's so cute!!

Hehe, he puts me in a good mood. Now I'll hopefully be sending him off sometime in January so that he can have some cat friends join him :)

Once I finished the cat I began work on my part of the Christmas Round robin I joined. The pattern is from Cross Stitch Collection issue 162. I really like it so far, although the sparkly threads are a massive pain in the ass. Should have this finished within the week.

Lastly, I received my Secret Santa from 'Jay' hidden identity in Canada. It looks great! and is sitting above my computer where I can see it. Bit of a bird-Christmas theme this year so far...

I will keep you posted on other goings on up until Christmas. As soon as I've finished my wren I'll be picking Stroke of Midnight up again...hooray!! :)

Paris is Finished!!!

Hooray! I finished up Remembrance of Paris. See picture :)

I'm very pleased with it! And go me for persisting with all the drab colours. The only disappointment is that the pattern I got for this (which was bought off ebay), did not include background details:

I suspect that it was originally a stamped kit, but as I bought it from somebody potentially dodgy, I missed out. Oh well, I think my parents will like it anyway (and they need not know that there's parts missing ;) I just need to wash & iron it, find a frame, cut up the mount board, frame it, wrap it, and put it under the christmas tree :)

This means I can now finish off my cat round robin, stitch up a christmas pattern, and then I can finally get back to the Stroke of Midnight. Woohoo!

Thanks for stopping by, it's absolutely lovely receiving comments! :)