Tigermum's last Wipocalypse 2012 and Hello 2013

Morning All.
It's finally bright and sunny this morning - the first one in a bright New Year for each and everyone of my followers (and their families). Let's hope that 2013 brings us no more of that horrid rain in the UK which has flooded areas, destroyed homes and even lives.

It was two years ago I started this blogging lark. I admit that initially I wrote down things to remind me what to include, but with increasing age I lose the notes! So most of my blogs are now random thoughts which occur to me at the moment I find a spare minute to sit and write. I haven't been around much lately, and I do promise to try and be a bit better about it all this year! But I'm finding it difficult to fit in all the things I WANT to do - sewing, cross stitching, quilting, knitting, papercrafts, cooking, reading, computer time etc. And as they are all things which require input (you can't set them up to do them without your intervention) then every now and then something falls off the end of the day! But I'm sure you all suffer from the same problem. The first person to invent a way to cram more into a 24 hour day will have the gratitude of crafters everywhere I'm sure!

Anyway - what have I been up to during December? Apart from rushing round and preparing for Christmas? Not a lot! We took a few days away at the beginning of the month on a Christmas Market trip on the Rhine. It was lovely; snow, cold, plenty of mulled wine, good food and a real Christmas atmosphere to get you in the mood for the start of the celebrations.

That was as far as the celebrations went really. My DH and I spent the actual day together but our daughter and family went to MIL for about 4 days, so although we delivered presents to them before Christmas we didn't see them over the holiday. Still we bought them a webcam so we hope that SIL will fix it up soon, and we can keep in touch that way. My decorations are mainly still in the loft - I couldn't even raise the enthusiasm to get them down!

My stitching over the year - my aim for the WIPocalypse was a little ambitious I now realise - as you will too when you look at the before and after pics below. I seem to have concentrated on large pieces this year, and not achieved much, next year I'm going to be a bit more organised (perhaps?) and slip a few smaller projects in!

To the yearly update -
1. Rose fairy and quilt -  This was at the start of the year. And this was the finished article inserted into the quilt for Jessica's birthday -  A pretty fair finish I think! FINISH 1.
2. Egypt -  a long way from finished at the beginning of the year!
And finished (although still not framed)  FINISH 2.
3. Lace fan - start of the year - . Not a single stitch has been put in this over the year. I'm seriously thinking that maybe I should give this one up; perhaps restarting it  on white fabric as I think the navy is putting me off!
4. Cheetah - January -  and December -  At least it's a start!!
5. Daisy -  Again not a stitch!!
6. Mandala cushion -  FINISH 3.
7. Jessica's Wordle -  FINISH 4.
8. All that Jazz -  FINISH 5.
9. Tree Frog Trio -  FINISH 6.

10. SIL's birthday Card - (his birthday is January 1st!) As you may remember from earlier posts he works designing computer graphics, so I thought that a Monsters Inc birthday card would suit this year! FINISH 7.

11. I also started something which I know won't be done for this year, but I saw these vintage Santa's in a magazine and decided that I'd pop them on a band - maybe a start for Christmas 2013! I think that as Jessica doesn't have a chimney for Santa I might make this into a wall-hanging with a pocket at the bottom for her letter to Santa. Then she can hang it on the handle of her bedroom door for Santa to collect! 

Add to that my other sewing projects (embroidered t-shirts, hungry caterpillar pack and various other sewn items), my knitted goods - scarves, fingerless gloves and my shrug (more of that next time), my papercraft - cards for everyone's birthdays this year and ALL of our Christmas cards - then MAYBE I didn't do too badly after all!

This month my daughter is heading to hospital again for her re-re-construction of her right knee. She's due to go in on Jan 22nd, and her consultant has told her it will be a long operation and a slow recovery with at least 6 months physio appointments. So please keep her in your thoughts and prayers for a speedy recovery.

Until the next few spare minutes I think I'd better stop now. In my next post I'll tell you about a few of the things I'm planning for 2013.

I hope you all have a happy and prosperous New Year.
love
Sandie

Tigermum's November WIPocalypse again!

This WIPocalypse seems to come round quicker than ever each month - or maybe it's just that I don't get as much done as I'd hoped each time?

My big finish has to be Egypt - no apologies for giving you the photo again!

Still haven't decided how to frame it though - I must take a trip to the local shops and see what looks right I think.

I also have ANOTHER finish - my frogs came and went quite rapidly without any visits from their froggy cousins either! I'm thinking of a nice vibrant colour frame for this one (once it's pressed!).

I took a few days to make a quick project for DH for Christmas. I can show it here because he never checks my blog! It's been a bit of a job to get it done without him seeing it! I've taken to stitching at the table in the dining room, with another project to hand so that I can swap if I hear him coming! He's always been a bit of a musician (with guitars, clarinets, mandolin, banjo, ukelele and piano keyboard around!) so I went for a music theme. It's called "All that jazz" and It's totally in black apart from a few gold stitches around the singer's dress.

My knitting also takes centre stage this month. I finished my wrist-warmers (and wore them on Monday when we went to London for the day).

I've now started another knitted project - a cabled shrug from a Lion Brand pattern. It's my first attempt using circular needles, and so far I have to say I feel very comfortable with them.

And my cross stitch concludes with the first picture of my cheetah. I showed the fabric on the frame in my last post - here are the first few stitches I've put in. It looks like it will be a slow progress on this one because there are so many pesky confetti type areas, but the finished project looks like it will be worth it. It also uses Madeira threads which is the first time I've sewn a project with them, and so far I'm impressed with their coverage and the fact that - unlike my experience recently with Anchor threads - they do not twist up so much either.

Well, if you're still here I hope you've enjoyed seeing my progress this month. I'm off to check out some of the other blogs and be inspired yet again.
'Til next time - take care and keep warm and dry (especially if you're in the cold or flooded parts of the UK)
Sandie

Tigermum's EARLY Wipocalypse update October

Evening everyone!

It's getting colder here, and with the news of price rises from our energy companies I've finally brought out the jumpers rather than turning the heating up a few degrees! Have to save the pennies now we're both officially pensioners you know!

What have I been up to? Well - read on -

Egypt - it's actually beginning to feel like I might get this one done by my self-imposed deadline of my birthday in November - TWO years after I started it. Here's the photo I took last night as I finished the mini hieroglyphs above the last two figures.

Now I just have the final hieroglyph band above them to do - so I'm looking to do that during the afternoons - before the light gets too bad each day.

I've started with some of the wool I bought at the show. I'm trying out a pattern for fingerless gloves - I followed blindly, and if I was to knit them again there are some changes I'd make to it. For a start I think the 4 garter stitches at either end of the row should be cut to 2 stitches. After the rib rows the pattern tells you to make 3 rows of garter stitch - why? It doesn't make sense to have that just below the cable pattern. But as long as I knit the second mitt the same as the first it won't really matter! But the wool is lovely and soft - it's called Sublime - a bamboo and pearls dk - something I haven't used before. It would be perfect for baby and toddler clothes too.

All the rest of the items I had on my original WIPocalypse list are still there - glaring at me as I type! But AFTER Egypt I'll pick one to get going on again. How are you doing with your UFO's?? Drop me a line and let me know?

Here's my contribution for Hallowe'en -

This is a Pocket Dragon figurine I collected a few years ago. They were produced by someone called Real Musgrave, but are no longer available. I think they are really cute!

Dinner calls - and I need to get settled in with those gloves for the evening!

Sandie

Back again - September Wipocalypse as well!

Hi everyone
I know I keep saying it - I've been missing in action recently - and I think I've finally worked out why! For the last few months I have had a series of doctor's appointments - nothing serious - but following a Health Check, they discovered I had High Blood Pressure. Over the last 3 months I have been on a series of tablets trying to find one which succeeds in bringing down the BP but which doesn't have other side effects! Over that time I have had swollen ankles and hands, a cough, a kind of skin rash - AND a feeling of lethargy!

Now I finally have it sorted - I'm on another different tablet and this time (touch wood) everything seems to be fine. I've had so much blood taken from me to test that it's okay, and last week I had to have an ECG - scary in a way as I've never had to have one done before! But all the tests came back positively fine, so I now have a 3 month trial of this prescription. All I can say is thank goodness over 60's get free prescription drugs here as it would be costing me a fortune by now! My doctor is off on her maternity leave next week, and she's happy to leave me in the care of their Practice Nurse, so - hopefully everything is back on track.

And now I don't feel so lethargic I'm picking up the stitching again on a regular basis.

So what have I been up to? Well I've decided to pull out the stops on Egypt. It will be 2 years in November since I started it, and I want it done by my birthday (which was when I started - on our Egyptian Nile cruise!)

Here is the original picture from the pack -

and here is where I am today -

I had done all the details of the centre panel and to the left of the mask before I lost my mojo - but since picking it up again I now have done the bottom border (you can just see it poking out from the frame), and I'm busy doing the 2 figures. So far I've managed to get in a couple of hours each day since I picked it up again, so toes crossed (I can't stitch with fingers crossed - silly!) I can get it done soon. 

We also had my DH's 65th birthday last week and had a friend over for a meal. She was widowed last December and it would have been her husband's birthday a few days before my husband's, so I was a bit dubious about asking her as I didn't want to bring up too many unhappy memories for her, but she was happy to come and a good evening was had by all I think. I even started baking again (something I hadn't done for quite a while). I made Sauerbraten and served it with homemade red cabbage, broccoli and potato scallops, followed by a cherry clafoutis and cream. Then I baked some scones, and a raspberry and white chocolate loaf cake. Needless to say there's nothing left so I can't show you pictures! 

I've also decided that I am going to try and sell my old Brother knitting machine. I just don't have time to get on with it these days. So I've gathered all the bits together - from the shed, the loft and the bedroom, cleaned it all up and sorted it out. I've advertised it on Gumtree, so if anyone in the UK knows someone who wants to start up - or is looking for a new machine, ask them to have a look. 

Now I had better get back to my "other duties"! I'm trying to organise my pdf cross stitch files via calibre - the programme I use for my Kindle books. It's been quite easy, but does take time away from sewing - so I limit myself to an hour a day on that! You know (I'm sure) how computers eat up the time you have available!

Til next time - love to everyone - and keep safe

Sandie

Long time - no show! And my WIPocalypse entry!

Hi again everyone! Do you have days go by (or weeks even) and then when you look back you can't remember where that time went? Well that's what life has been like recently!

My cross stitch took a back seat - and I still don't really know where my stitchy mojo is? I do a few bits now and then, but the idea of picking up and stitching for hours? No way!! Still I don't feel like doing any stitching - so what's the point of pushing myself? I know we all have times when we don't want to even look at a needle - mine usually involves repairs - but it feels good right now not be beating myself up about it.

My little grand-daughter's birthday was last week, (you may remember me mentioning how hard I was working for it). Her parents had the birthday party in a local children's play centre - with play equipment, ball park and food included. Two hours in total including the food. And of course all the presents were taken home to be opened AFTER the event - so I didn't get to see their faces when they opened my presents :((

Still - finally I can post about ALL the goodies I had made for her!

1. That quilt eventually got handed over. My daughter just sent a text with the word - AMAZING so I think they were delighted with it. As they're talking about putting Jess in a bed soon it couldn't have been better timewise!

2. My Wordle cross stitch picture.

3. I made 6 blank t-shirts into works of art!

Four of them had machine embroidered motifs on them and the other two had applique motifs sewn on. I cut the bits out using my Slice then sewed them onto the shirts. I didn't realise just how difficult it is to find blank t-shirts for kids these days - most of them appear to already have some form of decoration on the. If anyone knows of a good source of BLANK t-shirts - I'd love to know about it.

4. A Hungry caterpillar! Jess already has the book which she loves at bedtime - so I decided to make up her very own story sack to go with it. 

The body was made with circles of fabric, which I lightly stuffed and then joined with velcro - so she can made him as long or as short as she likes! A friend gave me some fabric which had some of the "food" which the caterpillar eats - so again I lightly stuffed those. Then with all the other things I cut out felt shapes, embroidered their name on the front, stuffed and finally made 2 bags - one for the "food" and another for her to put everything into! It was fabulous - even if I say so myself!

5. A Knitted zip-up jacket.

Right - off to play computers! DH has been digitizing old photos and it's down to me to sort it out into something resembling order, otherwise he won't be able to find them again! He's spent most of the afternoon running them through a scanner onto an SD card - now I've got that fun job!

Take care everyone - til next time

Sandie

Tigermum's WIPocalypse update for May - a bit late!

Hi everyone - it's been a while I know, but I finally got my stitchy mojo under control in the last couple of days. Previously I've had a few weeks where I could see these bright coloured floss skeins peeking out at me - but could I be bothered to pick them up? No way!
So my stitchy progress has been less than I would have hoped. :((

Egypt has had a few more stitches put into it. I am REALLY bored with this at the moment, so it hasn't had the loving care and attention put into it that I would have liked. Anyway - here is my progress - almost 2/3rds done I suppose...

My Mandala/motif is also 3/4 done - only this time I've run out of the required thread. As I haven't been to town in the last couple of weeks I haven't been able to get more, so here's the progress...

As you can see I also forgot to release the hoop when I put it away, so hopefully when I refresh it with a quick wash afterwards it should all look better! Still like the design, but think that when I make the next one I'll turn the motif 180 degrees so that the wider end is in the centre. It will just make the second one a bit different. I've got some of the pale blue fabric left that I used to make Jess's Christmas stocking, so I think that I'll use that to make this into a cushion when it's finished.

My BIG finish is my quilt. Not only is it all put together, but I've done all the quilting. I've even washed it all and made a matching pillowcase! I put the wadding on and the back (I used an old duvet cover to make sure it was soft), then decided that the quilt needed another colour to edge it before I turned the cream from the back over to make the binding. So I took DH on a trip to a local Craft Centre and bought another piece of brown fabric which I used. (DH wasn't too upset to accompany me as there is a guitar shop in the same centre!) So finally - HERE IS THE FINISHED QUILT!!

Full quilt

Top half

Bottom half

Last two panels with my cross stitched Rose Fairy

For the first time in years I have had a series of doctor's appointments to attend. I went for a "Health Check" when invited, only to discover that I'm not as healthy as I thought! I have both High Cholesterol and High Blood Pressure, and have been sent for blood tests for Glucose levels too. Unfortunately when I went on Friday, my GP hadn't told me that I should have fasted for 10 hours before having them done, so I had to go home, and will have to go again on Monday to get it done. As both cholesterol and blood pressure are only marginally high, with a bit of diet change I should be able to get it under control... we'll just have to wait and see.

Hope everyone had a good Mother's Day on the other side of the pond? I'm going to sit in front of the TV in  half an hour to watch Hawaii Five-O and dream of being back in Hawaii instead of cold Britain!

Take care
Sandie

Tigermum's April WIPocalypse postings

Afternoon everyone.
I have to admit that all in all things have been a bit quiet on the cross stitch front this month. Other things have taken priority!

Over Easter my DD and her family came to see us for the day. It was the first time we'd seen them since before our cruise, and I have to say I've really missed them (even though I enjoyed the holiday). We bought Jess a chocolate bunny - she's really got into chocolate this year! (This photo's taken in a local supermarket cafe on a different day).

When they'd left I started again on the quilt for her birthday - I'd put it away to make it a total surprise for my DD too. I've got most of the body of the quilt done (after a chat with my BF who's a quilter). I didn't have much fabric left, so I decided (we decided) to make a border of small blocks. If I can find some more fabric I want to make it a bit bigger so that it can be used on a "grown-up" bed when she's bigger, but as it stands it's almost toddler bed size. I've found an old quilt cover in cream which had a stain on the front, so I'm going to cut that up for the backing. Here's a picture of it hanging on the front of my wardrobe.

As to the rest of my work this month - I've done a tiny bit on the mandala and a bit more on Egypt. One of these days I'll get to the second side of Egypt and that might spur me on to finish it! (Do you think??)

(Apologies - not very good photos there!)

What else have I been up to? Well, I've decided to cut down the vine which covers the pergola in our back garden, so that's been chopped near the root so that it doesn't grow any more and I'm gradually cutting it back. Last year I made some grape juice from it, but it was so sour - not like the previous years'. And because I left quite a few bunches on the vine we were completely over-run with thrushes who cleared them in a couple of days. It was like a scene from Hitchcock's "The Birds"!! Then I have to clear the fallen leaves away from the patio, so this year I decided that I need an evergreen climber to replace it. Once it's all removed I shall take a trip to the local garden centre to see what's around. Anyone have any experience with climbing plants?? Today I have blisters on my fingers from cutting through the thick stems, so a couple of days rest is planned.

Just bought a program from Create and Craft called Serif Craft Artist. It seems a really good paper-crafting CD, but I need to do a bit of housekeeping (AKA clean-up) on the laptop before I install it. Yet another thing that I need another pair of hands for!

Must go - dinner calls!

love

Sandie

Late WIPocalypse post

Finally got round to taking some more photos of my WIPs. I worked on this piece while we were on the cruise. 

I don't normally use Anchor threads, but I liked this space-dyed thread colour - 1344. I've got a few other skeins of different colours, and I'm playing around with the idea of doing more of these panels, perhaps using the design in different ways for cushion panels. More on this idea soon perhaps?

Since we've been home I've been concentrating on my Flower Fairy.

I suddenly realised just how close August is! By the time I get this done, I've still got to complete the quilt (adding this as the last square); then I've got to add batting and a backing fabric which I've yet to decide on. Then bind it all and add any extra hand quilting. I'm going to ask my friend (who is a far more experienced quilter than I am) for her advice on that part of it.

The rest of my WIPs are no further forward than they were last month! That's what comes of having a holiday!

And as a finale - for a change - something that I didn't do!

While we were in Souzhou we visited their Embroidery Research Institute. Their work is absolutely amazing. All worked on silk with silk threads! Unfortunately we weren't allowed to take photos inside, but DH and I fell in love with one particular piece of "art" - there is no other word for their work. Some of the pieces we saw were done by students, some by teachers and some by masters of their art. Some pieces were single sided - several portraits were on display which were photographic in their realism. Several were double sided - the picture is reversed on the back - both sides are sewn at the SAME TIME! And the other style were pictures with a completely different picture on the reverse! The most amazing was a lion's head with a tiger's head on the reverse! Again - both sides are worked at the same time, but it was so real - you could see each and every hair on the animals' heads.

We bought a piece which shows the Rainbow Bridge in the Humble Administrator's Garden in Souzhou, a place we visited later in the day. Although we didn't have the benefit of bright sunshine or spring flowers - it was still a beautiful place. Enjoy my photos of our embroidery, something I could never hope to achieve.

 The "Front" view.

The "Reverse" view. 

 Close ups of the two sides.

 Absolutely AMAZING work isn't it?

Better go now - my Flower Fairy is calling my name!

'Til next time

Sandie