TUSAL - April 2014

Try not. Do or do not. There is no try

~Yoda ~ The Empire Strikes Back

Goodness, here we are again.... another TUSAL post and ORT report.  And did you notice - I am on time this month!!!  Amazing what a week off work has done for my time management!!!  But I will have to warn you that normal service will be resumed shortly... back at work today... and from now on I will be working 5 days a week for the foreseeable future so my spare time will be severely curtailed!!  Oh well... as they say "the only constant is change"!!

April 2014 TUSAL

So as you saw from my last post yesterday, I have been doing a little bit of stitching during April.  All those lovely long weekends make for more stitching time!!

This month we have threads from my Halloween April Ornie, Jingles April stitching and also the start of the MS SAL #5 sitting on top of the jar.  I decided to stick with the Owl theme of April and take the photo with my little Owl that sits on the bookcase in the Craft Room.

That's it for this short ORT report.  If you would like to sign up and join in the fun this year, then pop on over to Daffycat's blog and leave a comment saying that you're in and start collecting your ORT's!  And if you don't want to join in with the ORT collecting, you will still find links to some great blogs that you can read to while away the hours!!

The next 2014 ORT report will be ready for publication on or around 28th May 2014.

New Moons - 2014
28th May
27th June
26th July
25th August
23rd September
23rd October
22nd November
21st December

Til next time happy stitching!

"Bee" happy and keep stitching!

Hugs, Stitching Noni xx

Stitching Update....

A morning-glory at my window satisfies me more than the metaphysics of books

~Walt Whitman ~

Hi there!  How about a bit of a stitching update?  It surely must be past time that I showed you what I have been stitching over the last couple of weeks.

Now when I last posted I had just started my Lizzie Kate "Jingles" SAL - but more on that in my next post....

This month I have also been stitching on my April design for the Halloween Ornie SAL 2014 blog.  The April theme was Owls and I chose to stitch a rather cute Diane Arthurs design.  Surprisingly this month I have actually managed to get my Owl stitched and posted before the end of the month!!

Say hello to "Owliver and Punky"!

"Owliver & Punky" - designed by Diane Arthurs
Stitched April 2014

This design was published in the Just Cross Stitch Halloween 2013 Special Edition magazine.  I stitched this lovely design on plastic canvas which I will back with some felt at some stage before turning it into a hanging ornament.

Next month's theme is "Monsters" - but I am yet to find a design that I like.... so let the hunt begin!

Hallowe'en Ornie SAL
2014 Themes
May -Monsters
June -any freebie chart
July -Pumpkins
August -Ghosts
September -Black cats
October - Trick or Treaters
November -Bugs, insects or spiders
December -Free choice

**********************

So that was Halloween.... now onto the MS Lovers Blog SAL's.

Remember I said at the beginning of the year that I had signed up for three MS SAL's this year.... well finally four months into the year I have managed to start stitching my first one!

SAL #5 - Spring Bouquet
started 26/4/14

The fabric that I am using to stitch "Spring Bouquet" is a 14ct white Aida with pink spots that Heather sent me for the MS Christmas Exchange.  Now that I have started stitching on this lovely design I think it is going to be hard to stop... except that I will very soon be hitting the white on kitty.... not looking forward to that!!

Before I leave you, let me show you the secret stitching that I mentioned last month in my TUSAL report. For those of you that follow Nia's blog you will know that little Lourenço was born on 7 March 2014.  I decided to stitch a little piece of Australia to send to Nia and her little man.  But as always happens with me, time went by and I didn't get it sent off before he was born. But maybe I should say I planned it that way so that I could add his birth date to the final stitching.

I stitched part of a birth sampler design from Carrol Nielsen.  I love Carrol's designs especially her Koala's.

This was my first flat fold finish....  The fabric that I used was another one from Stitches and Spice.

I also sent some little Aussie friends for Lourenço - just a little piece of Australia for a little Portuguese baby!

My next couple of posts will be my TUSAL post and an update on "Jingles".  See you then!

Til then, happy stitching
Stitching Noni xx

I'm a Jingle-ing!!

In ancient times cats were worshipped as gods; they have not forgotten this

~ Terry Pratchett ~

Sometime ago Rita from Il Mio Mondo a Colori asked if anyone wanted to join in on a SAL that she was organising to do with Annette and Nia.  The design that the girls had chosen to stitch together was Lizzie Kate's "Jingles Flip-It" series.

Lizzie Kate "Jingles Flip-It"

Rita thought that it would be a great idea to see if anyone else might be interested to join in and stitch this cute design as well... and so far there are 11 stitcher's who have joined in the fun.

Now originally I said that I wouldn't take part as I didn't think I would get the time to stitch it especially with the other SAL's that I have already signed up to stitch this year.... but this design just kept on kicking at me and eventually I gave in and bought it!!!

Rita and Annette have been very good and have posted regular updates over the last couple of months and they are well into their stitching.  Hopefully I will catch up.. but probably not!!  If I can get close to a finish by the end of the year I will be very happy!

Back to my Jingles... on Friday the last of my back ordered Weeks Overdyed threads arrived from Stitches and Spice and the time was finally right to start stitching!  Yesterday saw me spending an hour or so preparing to start on the first design.  Needle and thread and fabric finally met while I was watching a couple of episodes of "House of Cards" last night - yes, I can now say that I have started to "Jingle"!

And this is how far I had managed to get last night by the time I had stopped stitching for the evening:

LK "Jingles" - "Deck the Halls"
as at 12 April 2014

Not a lot achieved so far.... but a start is a start!!

I have taken a long shot of the fabric so that hopefully you can see how nice it looks.  Unfortunately the photo doesn't quite show the shine that it has and the colour is not quite the same as in real life.  The name of the fabric is "Sugar Cane Crunch" and it is a very pretty opalescent 32ct hand-dyed Belfast fabric that I got from Stitches and Spice.

Hopefully by the time of the official update at the end of the month I will have a lot more stitching to show you!

Til next time, happy stitching and Jingle-ing!!!

Where's Witchiepoo??

When witches go riding, and black cats are seen,

the moon laughs and whispers, ‘tis near Halloween.

~Author Unknown

Wilhelmina W. Witchiepoo was one of my favourite characters from H.R Pufnstuf!  I just loved her!  However when it came to choosing my design for the March Hallowe'en Ornie SAL Blog I couldn't find a Witchiepoo to stitch....  so we will have to make do with the image that I found on the web!

Web image

So what did I stitch for my March ornie?  Well, it could only be one of the lovely seasonal witches from Maja's Snowflower Diaries blog!

Jo mentioned in one of her posts on the SAL blog that three (3) to thirteen (13) witches make a coven... and then when I was deciding what to stitch Jo also commented on my post that three witches can make a coven and how two of Maja's Spring Witches had already been stitched... so if I stitched Spring we would have a coven!

So I stitched the Spring Witch, and we now have a coven of the Snowflower Diaries Spring Witches for March!

Spring Witch (The Snowflower Diaries)
Started 23 March 2014, Finished 4 April 2014

This little witch is such a cute design, and very easy to stitch.  I stitched my little witch in DMC threads and it was stitched on some gorgeous sparkly fabric which unfortunately doesn't show up on the photo very well.

The fabric that I used to stitch my witch on is 32 ct Belfast (yes I know, 32 ct!!) and is called Wintered Marble (grey)"" but it is actually cream not grey.   This fabric is new to me and comes in a pack of fabric that I recently ordered from an Australian hand dyed fabric on line store - Stitches and Spice.  Their hand-dyed fabrics are lovely and this is the second piece of their fabric I have stitched on.   (Can't show you the first piece yet as it is travelling to a location far, far away!)

So now onto the April stitch which is "Owls".  I have already picked my owl design out and started stitching. I am stitching another design from the Just Cross Stitch Halloween 2013 special edition magazine.  Will post an update soon.....

So til next time when I will either be updating you on my owl friend... or showing you my secret stitch.... have a great week, happy stitching!

Big hugs,
Stitching Noni xx


Hallowe'en Ornie SAL 2014 Themes
April -Owls
May -Monsters
June -any freebie chart
July -Pumpkins
August -Ghosts
September -Black cats
October - Trick or Treaters
November -Bugs, insects or spiders
December -Free choice

TUSAL - March 2014 Take 2

But ne'er the rose without the thorn

~ Robert Herrick ~

And so it has happened again... two new moons in the same month for the second time this year.  All though that was actually a week ago and I am only just reporting in!  But then again I think you are all very used to me being late with my ORT report each month!!

The ORT's this month have a real mixture of colours.... some have come from my Halloween February stitching of the Count and others are from a secret stitch, and then the ones on top are from my Halloween March stitching.

Unfortunately I had some frogging happening on my secret stitch while I was trying to work something out... which is why the ORT's jar looks extra full at the moment.  Nothing that a little squish down won't fix!

March 2014 Take 2 TUSAL

This month's photo has been taken with some of the lovely roses that are currently flowering in our front garden.  The smell from the red roses is wafting around the house at the moment as we have the doors and windows open letting the gorgeous Autumn sea breeze flow through.  Such a wonderful breeze and a beautiful smell... just delightful!

That's it for this ORT report.  If you would like to sign up and join in the fun this year, then pop on over to Daffycat's blog and leave a comment saying that you're in and start collecting your ORT's!  And if you don't want to join in with the ORT collectiong, you will still find some links to some great blogs that you can read to while away the hours!!

The next 2014 ORT report will be ready for publication on or around 28th April 2014.

New Moons - 2014
28th April
28th May
27th June
26th July
25th August
23rd September
23rd October
22nd November
21st December

Til next time happy stitching!

"Bee" happy and take the time to smell the roses!

Hugs, Stitching Noni xx