A Photo A Day: June 4

June 4 A Photo A Day: "Close-Up"

The "Close-up" theme for A Photo A Day run by Fat Mum Slim reminded me of faces. And what is unique to faces? Moustaches.

I was inspired by MaMagasin and stitched my own moustache button.

Want to see more quirky cross stitch moustaches?  Check out these sites:

1. Moustache cushion
2. Framed cross stitch moustache plus many more
3. Free moustache pattern Mr.Distinguished\

Thanks for helping with the weeding...

                                                           Jan x

A Photo A Day: June 3

June 3 A Photo A Day:  "ON YOUR PLATE"

Today's A Photo A Day theme reminded me of what I wished was on my plate - cherries. Wrong time of year darn it.

But I stitched a cherry for a lolly jar instead and filled it with raspberry and black berry lollies and had them on my plate. Quite yummy if I don't say so myself. They are fruit right?

The cherry cross stitch pattern is of course from Sweet Treats stitched in DMC threads.

Thanks for having a cuppa in my teahouse...

                                                                      Jan x

Theme-alicious...from May to June

I made the Theme-alicious May Memories theme fit so I could keep stitching the Marjolein Bastin sampler.  I want to remember May as the month I finished the squirrel! It was so relaxing to be able to wind down by working on the squirrel after a busy day at work or sorting dancing costumes for the big dancing eisteddfod which starts today!!! Here is progress on the bowl of pumpkins and the lower border of the MB sampler.

Theme-alicious has a new theme for June of course:

"Jumanji June "
Is it a jungle out there in your stash? Give some love to the projects with animals or birds.

I have the perfect project to fit this as I have stitched all of the animals and birds in the MB sampler. It is The "L" in the Prairie Schooler Alphabet featuring a gorgoeus deer. I am kitting in up and stitching it in a SAL. 

I also have a UFO that a friend gave me called Promises Kept by Designs with Scissors. 

It will be perfect on Toddler Tom's bedroom wall. It fits in perfectly with this theme so I will work on that too. Here is the progress so far:

                                                         

Thanks for visiting my flower beds...

                                    Jan x

A Photo A Day: June 2

June 2 A Photo A Day: EMPTY

You can tell when the local dancing Eisteddfod is on as my kitchen cupboards are EMPTY!!! Only a cross stitch cupcake to eat.

This cupcake is stitched from the delicious craft book Sweet Treats.

You can check out my "morning themed" June 1 A Photo A Day here.

Thanks for sitting under the umbrella in my garden...

                                                                                  Jan x

A Photo A Day - June

A unique way to remember June is to participate in A Photo A Day. A photo theme is suggested for each day. My cross stitchy blog will be inspired by these photo themes.

June 1: morning

To honour "morning", I designed and stitched a sunrise on 32 count evenweave using 2 strands of DMC thread.

Since moving to my new house 18 months ago I marvel at sunrises almost every day. I have never had this luxury of a house with a view and blindly ignored sunrises most days. Magical.

The sunrise from today is extra important. It's the first sunrise for Winter.

Thank you for crunching the frosty grass...

                                                                      Jan x

Help! How to wash my cross stitch...

Hello to all in Blogland and a royal wave to my new followers. Thank you for your "squirrelly " comments. It seems that my blog readers like squirrels! And no, sadly there are no squirrels in Australia; just wallabies and lots of rabbits!

As I near the end of the Marjolein Bastin sampler my mind wanders to how I will handwash it.  It is a large cross stitch (see previous post) and as such it has some light dirty marks from fingers and the hoop.  So to you my trusted cross stitch friends I have some questions:

What is your favourite method of handwashing cross stitch?

Do you leave your cross stitch in to soak and if so for how long?

What water temperature do you use?

What do you wash it with?

Any other tips?

 Photo sourced from Old Picture of the Day

Thank you in advance of your fabulous tips!

So I have left the red squirrel to stitch on  a bowl of scrummy pumpkins and the lower border...

Don't you just love finding new cross stitching blogs? Check out this adorable German blog called Kissy Cross with some freebie cross stitch designs.

Thank you for soaking up the sun in my garden...

                                                                             Jan x

All about squirrels....oh yeah and IHSW..and mustn't forget my TUSAL

IHSW provided some much needed stitching time to finally finish the squirrel.  Hooray I hear you say!!! Finally Jan will have new pictures on thread garden that don't feature a squirrel.

So close to finishing...watch this space over the next month (yes I will allow you to blogstalk)

Well I have learnt something whilst surfing for cross stitched squirrels.  There are squirrel haters. One blogger at Beware the Squirrel, even blogs about her love/hate relationship with them. Can you believe there is a whole blog dedicated to this?  I admit I don't live amongst squirrels (living in Asutralia would have something to do with that) but when I visited the UK I couldn't believe how utterly adorable they were with their little nose twitches and acorns between their tiny paws. 

So in the interests of the cross stitched squirrel let your mouse do some blog hopping:

1. Another Marjolein Bastin squirrel stitched by June King
2. The Victoria Sampler Winter Squirrel stitched by For The Love of Cross Stitch
3. A darling squirrel at pieKnits which is a freeie (link on the blog)
4. A cross stitch squirrel purse
5. A 3D embroidery squirrel at The Floss Box. I know it's not cross stitched but it is seriously impressive.

Finally...stitching means orts. So here's my TUSAL.  It was irresistable to little fingers.

Thanking for singing in the rain in my garden...

                                                                       Jan x

Theme-alicious update and GIANT cross stitch

My "May Memories" Theme-alicious involved working more on my Marjolein Bastin design. It doesn't fit perfectly into the theme but I figured why stop stitching when I am on a roll. That squirrel scene is almost done!

I plan to get back to the Christmas House (as Christmas evokes so many cute memories) so will hopefully post progress on that on the next update.
I've had busy fingers decorating these black tutus with feathers. I hope the costumes will evoke happy memories for the dancers wearing them at the Southern Tasmanian Dancing Eistedffod in June. My DD is so excited for the competition which runs over 9 days. She will be dancing in 11 items and that means 11 costumes (lucky me)! Did I tell you she was excited?  Dancing is about 90% of her conversation so I take it she adores it. As she put it "dancing is my life".
                                                        

Have you seen GIANT cross stitch used as wall decor?  Take a look at these links here , here and here. I think it looks pretty cool. Tell me what you think?

                                                                     "Make it Rain" by Jessica Decker

And by the way the IHSW (International Hermit and Stitching Weekend) is on this weekend and I'm trying to finish that jolly little squirrel picture. There will also be some dancing costume sewing thrown in (if that counts).

Enjoy beavering away on your stitching!
Thank you for dropping by...
                                             Jan x

An Australian Mother's Day...

Hi to all and especially a warm welcome to my new followers,

I had a day that made me feel loved and that is all any mum could ask for. It started with my daughter making me yummy pancakes using a Gary Mehigan recipe.  For those not in the know, he is one of the Australian Masterchef judges). Yummo! Then hubby and eldest son cooked eggs and bacon. Topped with two beautiful schoolmade cards, a bunch of flowers, chocolates and the 3am "mummy" call from toddler Tom it was a day that memories are made of.  SShhh... I also managed to do a sneaky coffee with a friend and listened to live jazz.

Being Mother's Day I had less after dinner duties so I started stitching much earlier than usual. I have so nearly finished the squirrel on the scrubbing brush.  Drats - I have run out of thread in one colour so will hopefully match it tomorrow. As there is no number or brand on the thread I will match it with DMC thread.

Thanks to those with advice about my HAED from my previous post. It's all food for thought...

Surfing can bring the most amazing discoveries.  Can you believe a little house like this exists? Isn't it dreamy? It would make the most perfect stitching place.  Where would you put it?  Somewhere in the hills near a river is where I would locate it.

Thank you for playing hopscotch on the stepping stones...

                                                                                      Jan x

It's "Super Moon" Wipocalypse Time...

Did you have the buzz talk about the "Super Moon" last weekend? Maybe this phenomena only happened in Australia. I had never heard this term before and suddenly I heard this term used the media 20 times in the one day! Well I wish this Super Moon had had some gravitational effect on my quickness with this squirrel picture, but alas it hasn't. It's just plodding along. The scrubbing brush is slowly appearing...I want to start on the pumpkins already! Yes I am being impatient.

Well I have come to a realisation.  I don't like stitching my HAED ("LOVE"by Marta Dahlig). Here are some reasons:
* it is really hard to get neat stitches 2 over 1 on 25 count (I am a perfectionist)
* my DMC thread gets very worn and breaks
* I cannot stitch it sitting on the sofa
* it is really hard to end the thread into the back of the tiny, tiny stitches

I think I will not continue it...convince me otherwise HAED lovers or offer any suggestions to get me back on track. I have done about 1/2 of the first page.

On a brighter note I have bought some patterns I have admired for a while -The Prairie Schooler Alphabet and have joined a blog site, The Prairie Schooler ABC Stitching Bee with fellow stitchers. I think I will stitch some of the letters individually especially the "L" featuring a deer - I am so into deers at the moment like the rest of the world. I also think I need to stitch a mermaid so "M" is on my list too. I don't have all of the letters but I am sure I will accumulate them over time.

Thank you for dropping on by and sitting in my garden...

                                                     Jan x