Is your home the Home of a Needleworker?

And how would I know?

That's the question I'd like you to answer to win my copy of the LHN chart of the same name.

I received the chart last year in a giveaway from Nic the Obsessive Cross Stitcher.  I was so determined to stitch it that I included it in my "12 in '12" and lo and behold, here it is - completed:

Spot the tiny change?  Not 100% sure of them but the Large Boy recognised them for what they are so that's good enough for me.  I was going to use the cute charm Sarah-Beth sent me but it was too big.

The other change was to use the rose pink for some of the letters as I liked the colour.  With hindsight I think I should have used it for my initials letters as it does stand out amongst the muted shades.  Oh yes, and I satin stitched the triangle border, not cross stitched because it was sooooooo much quicker!  And added little red stitches to the wreath instead of the pale green charted which wouldn't have shown up over 1.  But's that's it really!

The design is stitched over 1 thread on the 28count flax linen Kaye sent me with the JBW Noah's Ark chart, that will also be framed in the same brown wood frame (£3.80 from Wilkinsons for my UK followers, available in a variety of sizes!).

I know alot of you already have this chart, either already stitched or in your stash but for those of you that don't, here's a chance to join us!  All you have to do is:

1. Be a follower

2. Leave a comment on this post

3. Telling me HOW I would know I was in the "Home of a Needleworker" if I came to your house/flat/castle.  What is the first thing I would see when I walk up your path/through your door/across your drawbridge?

You have until Wednesday 3rd October to answer.  Make sure that if you are a "no-replier" you include some way for me to contact you.  Even if you've got the chart already please feel free to answer the question just for fun.  You never know, I might have something else you'd like!

Here's my new start, the first of my Hallowe'en stitching (yes, I put an apostrophe in the word because it used to be there when I was young).  This is a freebie from Puntini Puntini but I don't think it's available anymore.  There are some nice freebies still on the blog anyway and some adorable buttons!  When I get to the bottom you'll see the reason I fell in love with this chart!

I'm stitching on 28 count evenweave over 1 using the free Sullivans thread which came with JCS this month.  This is one day's stitching done while the Small Boy was at preschool.  I have to sit at the back of the hall so I might as well do something productive.  I did join in at singing time though because the playleader was struggling to explain The Farmer's in his Den to 2 year olds!

Finally, my blog has just hit the 50,000 views mark!  How incredible is that?

September TUSAL

Here's my TUSAL for September along with my "page-every-other-day" calendar and the latest progress on LHN Home of a Needleworker.

I finally finished the house!  It took ages but does look nice now it's done.  I love the little wreath on the door, there will be little red berries on it but I'm waiting until I use red again so I don't have to keep swapping the colours.

Thanks to Erin for the link to the missing chart from JCS Hallowe'en Special.  It was a Plum Street design called "Rotten but not Forgotten" and here's the link if you missed it - http://www.just-crossstitch.com/Corrections.aspx 

Finally, I was going to post some pics of my latest RR finish but there's a pigeon sitting on the telegraph wires so the internet connection keeps dropping out half way through loading the photo.  We do have a dongle but that is even slower than the half a meg we get from the landline connection!  So it's a short post today.

This week I have mainly been stitching...

So what have I been stitching this week?  Karen's Sweetheart Tree Round Robin and LHN's Home of a Needleworker.  There was some confusion over the mailing dates for the RR and luckily for me Karen gave us all another week if we needed it.  I could have barged on and mailed on the date but I decided to take my time and do it nicely.  And stitch both floral rows that I liked rather than choose just one!

Photo to follow when bands complete

I'm stitching the Home on Home of a Needleworker which is no where near as much fun as the lettering!  Rows and rows of "typewriter" stitching, just back and forth.   Anyway it's looking good and I have the lovely alphabet saved for the end.  Here it is so far:

The prize I awarded to Anne my 2000th commenter arrived in Canada this week!  Yay!  The design was chosen by Christine as the August Challenge piece on the Needlecraft Haven and I thought it would be perfect for Anne.  I stitched it on 18count rose evenweave over 1 using a Stef Francis mercerised cotton in variegated purple.  Lovely isn't it?  I finished it into a pillow using some of the fabric samples as backing.  Anne asked if I'd stitched all the french knots on it myself - is she craaaazzzzzzyyyyyy!  No, at £75 a metre I expect someone else to programme a machine to do them LOL.  No, I didn't pay £75 a metre either, I was given a bunch of old sample books last year.  Each piece is 12 x 12 and makes great ornie backing.

The design came from the Samplers and Santas blog, I just removed the crown and fitted Anne's name in the space.  Good thing she's not called Anastasia or I'd have had troubles!  The link includes nice instructions on how to make a needle keep if you'd like one.

Has anyone else used Stef Francis' threads?  I think I bought them from my old LNS or maybe the Olympia craft show.  They come in a variety of weights, this one is NE 20/3 (I have no idea what that means!!) and some gorgeous colours.  The website is well worth looking at as they do a wide range of items for embroidery as well as cross stitch and other crafts.

I have been treating myself a little bit just lately (it is my Birthday month!) and today I bought two magazines.  The first was Cross Stitch Crazy for the Joan Elliott Christmas booklet.  The second was Cross Stitch Gold for the lovely Blackwork Angel by Lesley Teare and the I Saw Three Ships designs.

As usual I have added the contents pages of these magazines to the special page on my blog.  You'll find it at the top of the blog under one of the tabs labelled "Magazine Contents Page".  The idea is that I post a picture of the contents of any UK magazines I buy.  This will enable you to decide if you want to try find the magazine in your own country.  It's very hard if the mags are sold sealed up to decide if you want to spend the money.  Hopefully this will help you.  Please note the Big Red Disclaimer at the top of the page - I will not scan and email charts.

Finally, I'm trying to comment as much as possible on your blogs but Blogger still won't accept what I type into the word verifier no matter how many attempts I make.  If you have a word verifier because you're afraid of getting Spam then try removing it and the option to post "Anonymous" or have an email address available so I can comment that way.  At the very least warn me there's a word verifier before I type out a long comment and then it pops up after I hit "publish"!

Theme-a-licious Looking Backward & Forward VIII Plus WIPocalypse August Number 2

Here's the round-up for the progress since the last Full Moon.

Part 1 - My 12 in '12

1. Dark Alphabet SAL - all completed this year
2. Joan Elliott's Green Goddess - not stitched for some time
3. Gift of Stitching My Lovely Sewing Tools SAL - not stitched for some time
4. Home of a Needleworker (PIF from Nicola) - started this month, great progress
5. Blackbird Designs (came with Madame Muriel from Margaret) - completed last month
6. Ed Hardy - Skull & Roses (for a friend) - not started
7. Wedding Sampler (for a friend) - completed this month
8. Baby Sampler (for a friend) - completed
9. Baby Sampler (for my cousin) - completed
10. Yiotas Coffee Fairy -  not stitched for some time
11. Papillon Around the World in 80 Stitches - Parts 1 to 3 completed.  Part 4 well on its way to completion.
12. Nora Corbett Trick or Treat Fairy - not started.

So here are the photos of this month's successes:

A roof appears!

Part 3 completed, Part 4 all done except the metallic

These were delivered to the Bride today, she loved them!

Now I have an empty nail in my conservatory.

 .

Part 2 - Just Nan-a-thon

Not so good, in fact nothing again!  Although I have bought some more charts...


Part 3 - Theme-a-licious
 
The theme for this month was Altius August - Embrace the Olympic motto--Citius, Altius, Fortius (Faster, Higher, Stronger)--by elevating your mind. It's the perfect time to learn something new! Or maybe achieve some goals...
I thought I'd follow Heather's example and set myself some targets and award myself Bronze, Silver and Gold medals for how many I complete.  Here are the August targets, in five categories, one for each ring:

Blue Ring
Band Sampler Round Robin - Finish the current piece and also the one due to arrive next week - Finished the first, started the second -  Bronze Medal
Blue Ribbon Designs - stitch the snowman ornie and scrapbook the two together - not at all.

Yellow Ring
Joan Elliott Round Robin - Finish the current piece -  Finished -  Bronze Medal
Birthday cards - stitch two cards for lucky August ladies - 
Finished one - Silver Medal
Finished two - Gold Medal


Black Ring
Giveaways - stitch at least one of the two outstanding prizes - Finished one - Bronze Medal
Needlecraft Haven - stitch the August freebie  Finished - Silver Medal

Green Ring
Papillon Around the World - stitch at least the outlines for Parts 3 and 4, complete Parts 1 and 2 including the metallics. -
Part 1 complete - Bronze Medal
Part 2 complete - Silver Medal
Part 3 complete - Gold Medal

Red Ring
Just-Nan-a-thon - stitch at least one design - not yet
12 in '12 - keep up the good progress and either start or finish another one of my 12.  NB this does not include the BBD as it is nearly done even as I type - 
Started LHN - Home of a Needleworker - Bronze Medal
Finished Every Time Hearts - Silver Medal

So that's a total of five Bronze medals, four Silver Medals and two Gold Medals.  According to the table of medals, that means I am Kenya.  Please feel free to sing the Kenyan National Anthem and salute "our" flag.

I won't attach photos of all the "athletes" this time, they are all featured somewhere in the previous eight posts so have a look back.

Looking forward to September - September Smalls

We all love gadgets, and none better than the teensy tools and holders we make ourselves. Let's stitch some smalls--needlebooks, fobs, biscornus, scissors keeps, pincushions--or knit some teensy things--amigurumi, jewelry, sachets....

Hmmm, not so sure about all the finishing skills needed for that lot.  I think I'll stitch to stitching smalls for my scrapbook.

Finally, I will be emailing the last postcards in the Summer Postcard Blog Hop out later.  A Big Thank You to everyone who took part.  Watch out for the Hallowe'en Hop in October!

The Mystery Stitch revealed

Well done to everyone who guessed the name of the Mystery Stitch and especially well done to Chiara, Needlework Geek of the Week, who guessed it from only the two letters "ed".

Here is my progress so far, anyone who cannot guess which design it is now needs to go back to Needlework Class 1 for Beginners LOL.  It is, of course, Home of a Needleworker by LHN.  Nic the Obsessive Cross Stitcher passed the chart to me last year along with the threads.  She had a giveaway on my Birthday and I think I scared everyone else away by saying I HAD to win because it was my Birthday!!

It looks a little "saggy" because it's stitched on linen and scanned on the printer!  It is straight in real life.

Amazingly, someone else is having a Giveaway on my Birthday this year too.  It's Sarah the Crafty Moo, check it out there.  But you can't win because it's MY Birthday!

I've made some good progress on Papillon Around the World this week, I emailed pictures of Parts 1 and 2 to Yvonne for her Gallery and have now completed Part 3 plus a good bit of Part 4.  I need to stop soon to stitch on the two Round Robins in my possession then I'll either continue with ATW or be starting Thine is the Trick or Treat.  Evalina has suggested we SAL as she's started already.  It will be fun to SAL with someone else, it's a great way to keep up with a project.

Finally I've just sent another postcard out for the Summer Postcard Blog Hop. Gracie's card went to Lesley.  Check out her blog soon to see the picture and message.  There's still time to get a photo in if you want to join in, click on the sunset picture to the right for more details.

For newer followers - I like to organise Blog Hop events where we post photos of our stitching to a theme.  So far we've had:

Advent Calendar (each person was assigned a day and they posted a Christmas picture on their day)
Secret Stitching Sweetheart (each person sent me a photo and I randomly sent them to the others)
Easter Treasure Hunt (each person posted a picture plus a letter which spelled out a secret message)
Summer Postcard Blog Hop (each person sends me a picture and a message which is sent to another blogger)

The next event will be the Hallowe'en Trick or Treat, (similar to the Easter event) so watch out for sign up details in October.