Smalls Report for January

I'm a little late for the Smalls SAL report - it just crept up on me this month.  I started the year by stitching some tiny framed Christmas trees, to replenish my Christmas visitor 'take home gift' basket. I stitched 14, but already two have been claimed by two very late Christmas visitors, who came for their visit in mid January.

Here are my tiny Christmas trees:

When I say tiny trees, I do really mean tiny - the frames are just 4.1 cm x 3.8 cm (1.675" x 1.5").

HD - Christmas Dreams is now 25% stitched (again)

Page 36 is finished - in record time.  This page took less than a week to stitch.  Although there were blocks of confetti, there were more blocks of solid colour, so it stitched up quicker than most HAED pages I have stitched.  A weekend challenge on the Aussie HAED Stitches FB group spurred me on as well. A casual inspection of my next page, page 25, leads me to believe this will not hold - it appears to be full of confetti.  Never mind, it was good while it lasted!  I am now bsck to where I was in September last year, and one quarter of the way through the stitching. I am happy with my progress.  I will keep stitching on CD for the next 4 weeks, and hope to get 2 pages finished in that time.

Can't chat - I have an page to start ...

HAED Christmas Dreams - my first page finish for 2017.

I brought HAED Christmas Dreams downstairs to my stitching nook last Thursday, and I have been working obsessively all week to get my 14th page stitched (page 47 in fact).  A few minutes ago the final stitches went in.  I am a happy girl!  I really want to get the next page stitched by the end of this month.  That will bring me back to where I was in September 2016 when I discovered that very stupid error I made which resulted in that horrid two weeks of unpicking two full pages of stitches.

This page took me just one week to stitch, which is a record for me. Some of the 10x10 blocks had as few as 6 different floss colours, and there were some stretches of solid colour across the blocks, so it was a much easier task than most of the HAED pages I have stitched so far.

So, Christmas Dreams with 14 of 66 pages completed (except for that one stitch of 754 that I have to stitch after my next floss buying trip):

And now for the 15th page (page 36) ... I hope to be back with a pic before the end of January (this January!)

Gifted Gorgeousness Report for January

I haven't yet got used to being in 2017 - in fact I have not yet had the need to even write '2017' as part of the date - and yet here we are in the middle of January, and it's almost time for the first Gifted Gorgeousness Report of 2017.  Here's where you can sign up for Jo's Gifted Gorgeousness Blog Hop.


I have made some progress on the Growth Sampler I am stitching for my great-nephew.  The kit was a baby shower gift to my niece from a family friend, and my niece asked me to stitch it up.  The four characters are now stitched, and I added some blue fabric to the top and stitched baby's name.  The birth details will also go into the blue section. I am at a standstill now, now waiting for the details my niece wants stitched - birth details and the ages?/dates? on which Angus reached various heights (I am going to stitch these on the left hand side).  My niece wants to be able to add info to the growth chart until Angus is 5 years old, so I have had to come up with a finishing method that allows extra stitching over time, and laundering.  I hope I get it right!

Semco kit, Beatrix Potter's Peter Rabbit Growth Chart

I am getting ready to start working again on my HAED Christmas Dreams (chart, fabric and most of the floss purchased with birthday money &/or gift vouchers), so I decided to stitch some bright little things to get me in the right frame of mind.  I stitched these bead and button decorated trees to replenish my stock of take home gifts for Christmas visitors.  There is a cross stitched (or sometimes a Smyrna cross stitch) tree under all those beads and buttons. These little gold-coloured frames measure just 4.1 cm x 3.8 cm (1.675" x 1.5").  I love making these little trees, and I guess (because they disappear so quickly) that my Christmas visitors like them too.  I will be making more tiny framed cross stitches during the year - probably not more trees, though.

 And here is a pic of all 14, standing up.

All my stitching time for the next month(s?) will be spent on Christmas Dreams.  I have almost forgotten the horror of having to unpick almost two full pages because of that silly error I made with the repeated stitches, and I will be starting tomorrow on the 14th page (page 47 as it happens), in my third row of stitching, as I am stitching it sideways..  My aim for this year is 12 pages, so it will be good to make a start on it.  Here is where I am at the moment. Try and ignore the dirty area where I unpicked those offending pages.

I will enjoy popping in to read the GG reports.