Risky Business!

I know this is risky, and I hope this doesn't blow up in my face, but I've been making Cross Stitched Pinkeeps for the last several weeks and I've finally got a collection of designs and shapes I like. But I need to sell them for some Christmas money. So before I go further I just want to say...I did not make any of these designs. I am only using them to pretty up the face of the pinkeeps. If anyone has a problem with that, by all means, email me. I'll be mortified and embarrassed, but I will do my best!

So far I have only got the pics of the designs I've made myself, so hopefully I'll be able to build on these and anyone who wants a design that I don't have on hand, I will be able to sew another one. Simples!

Where possible, I will give credit to the actual designer, but since all of these came from Pinterest, obviously that is not always possible. Okay, disclaimer over...

Thread and Needle Square Pinkeep-

About 7.5cms across on 26 aida.

$10 for completed item.

$6 postage in Australia

Purple Flowers and Dark Leaves Wreath

About 7cms across on 28 count evenweave.

$10 for completed item.

$6 for postage in Australia.

Monochromatic Sew Pinkeep

About 8cms across on 28 count evenweave

$10 for completed item

$6 postage in Australia

Thimble, Needle, Thread and Scissors Pinkeep

About 9cms across on 28 count evenweave

$15 for completed item

$6 postage in Australia

Scandinavian Birds and Tree Pinkeep

About 6 cms across on 26 count aida

$10 for completed item

$6 postage in Australia

This will do for the time being and it's only the tip of the iceberg! All of these have endless variations available. If you want it on heavier or finer count cloth, colours and material for the back side of the pinkeeps. At the moment I'm relying on what I have on hand. If I can make enough to replenish my stores, I will be stoked beyond words. Anyway, the easiest thing is to comment if you have any questions and then I can contact you and we'll see where we go from there.

Cheers!
Dx

Late! So late!!

But I couldn't think of anything really earth shattering to share since last time so instead I've decided to be quick and brief.
I have been knitting like a machine with my combo beanies. I'm really starting to use up all that combined cone yarn I turned into more knittable 8 ply weight yarn. I made some headway on the lace socks but unfortunately knit holes in my fingers so I've had to put it aside for a bit. And I finished the first character on the third line of my Monty Python Cross Stitch.
All on all, pretty productive week I thought!
See you all later
Dx

Okay, I may have knit a bit too much this time...

I know, shocker, huh?

I've finished all these beanies over the last 2 or 3 weeks. I've used up all the Moda Vera Bouvardia ball I bought on a whim and loved watching the colour change as I paired it with the dark grey of the combo yarn. I thought it worked really well. And it feels gorgeous!!

And as well as all that I've also finally packaged up the beanies I need to send to my niece and youngest son. All nicely labelled and wrapped up ready to trundle down to the post...on Monday.

So, after I'd finished the last Bouvardia beanie I thought I'd do some more of the sock I've been slowly working my way through. I'm knitting up the extra gusset stitches after doing the heel and that's really not that interesting. And they're on 2mm needles. And there's a certain amount of tension because the gauge is firm.

Alas! I have knit HOLES in my fingertips! I'd like to pretend that this is a new thing but my family will loudly refute that claim. I OFTEN knit holes in my fingers. Indeed, I even fashioned a couple of finger thimbles to wear to counter this very thing! But I forgot and by the time I remembered, the damage was done! My skin splits where there's been constant friction and pressure and there is NO PAIN quite like the pain of poking yourself in your open, abused flesh with a pointy metal needle!

So I thought I'd better give the knitting a day or two off to give my skin a bit of time to think about what it's done and get back with the program! I mean, damn it! I have stuff to knit!!

In the meantime I've finally gotten out the paracord I bought when last in Albany and looked up all these instructions for paracord bracelets I'd been saving on Pinterest. I had even bought the right clips for it too! The hardest part though was figuring out what to do with the left over strands when you got to the bracelet end. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to tie a knot (Tried that. Looked clunky. Didn't like it.) or somehow slip the cords behind the back. In the end, that's what I did. It took the broadest wool needle I had and a pair of pliers but I managed it!

They look pretty good, don't they? Well worth the experience and now I can thing of heaps of other applications and really wish I'd bought more colours. Bother!

And last of all, I finally finished 3rd character 2nd line on my Monty Python cross stitch. After not really picking it up at all for over a fortnight, I thought resting my fingertips would be a good time to pick up a sewing needle instead.

There he is! Slightly underwhelming but you can't have everything. Next is the Green knight. But we see how I go with that tomorrow maybe.

So there you are. Manic knitting resulting in physical harm brings on a Paracord experiment and leads on to Dogged Cross stitching!

Yes, that pretty well describes my week.

See you all Later

Dx

Okay,...I think this time I've got it!

The right day, I mean!

I'd have done this yesterday but we went to Perth so Hubbie could do some swimming in a proper sized pool undercover instead of in a 2/3 sized pool subject to the nightly temperature plummet that only the wheatbelt can deliver! Not quite cold enough for ice but, By Gee! it feel like it!!

A productive day was had by all. We got to hang out with the sons, eldest cheerfully and carefree as usual and youngest burdened with the stupidity and foolishness of the world in general...but specifically his older brother. These two board together if you can believe it! I was forced to note as we sat down to eat lunch, youngest glowering at sniggering eldest that there were times I could not believe that they came from the same womb! More sniggering from oldest, faint smirk from deep and thoughtful.

I have a tooth in the front giving me hell at the moment making biting anything before chewing it nearly impossible and consequently didn't eat enough lunch to match up with my insulin (I've been an insulin dependant diabetic since I was 14...so it's been a while!) and energy expenditure. Meaning I became uncomfortably low in blood sugars while at a shopping complex and had to be herded to a table at a cafe while hubbie bought a hot chocolate for me, and the boys made sure I didn't fall over before I sat down. I hate feeling helpless! And stupid!

SO! anyway, since I'm a disaster on legs stumbling from crisis to crisis, on to the things I'm actually good at. CRAFT

So far these are the beanie's I've knit with the combined yarn I made up with my various op-shop finds. The first one I knit with 3mm needles. For the white yarn you see in the second beanie this was way too small. The fabric I knitted up was like a slat of wood! So I unravelled it and the next beanie I knit after the first one is the blue and black one and I used 3.75mm needles. This particular yarn combination feels lovely, cosy and warm! But I wanted to use up the white/grey stuff and since it could only be classed as chunky, I went up another needle size. Even knitting with 4mm needles the beanie is quite firm, but not so much that it's uncomfortable. It's also bigger than the proceeding two and youngest son has already put his hand up to give this a home...once the weather obliges of course.

Now I'm knitting another beanie using the same chunky white/grey yarn but on 4.5mm needles. Using another chunky yarn I have in my stash so we'll see how big this one turns out. These are all using the same beanie pattern I got for free on Ravelry. Garter Stripe Beanie by Terhi Montonen. It's absolutely fabulous and makes such a neat folded beanie when you're not wearing it.

And of course, the ubiquitous Monty Python cross stitch. Still plugging along with the three headed giant (I think that's what it is anyway.) I am enjoying putting the stitching together but I'm not sure what I'm going to do when it's done. I guess I'll worry about that when I get there. After this guy there are two other characters on this line and then I can start the next line! Onward and upwards! 

(Or downwards, really, in regard to the cross stitch anyway!)

The weather is finally beginning to turn around here. The nights are definitely cooler. We can even sleep under a doona at the moment without feeling smothered! And the farmers around our district are starting to get the paddocks ready for the next crop. They first sign of this is usually burn-offs of last years chaff and trash out in the paddocks. As we were driving back from Perth last night it looked like the place had been invaded by small dragons. Ribbons of fire running down the lines of chaff up and down the paddocks. Really impressive looking but I couldn't capture how awesome it looked on my phone. But this was the best I could get. 

I love fire, it's colour,and warmth. Mind you, only tame fire. Wild fire is entirely different beastie and not at all nice. Every summer we're reminded of that here in Australia.  But at pre-seeding time, fire is just another one of the tools of the farmers. Useful but only under certain circumstances.

Today is another day

And more hours to put craft into to keep fidgety hands busy!

It does puzzle me why I can sit hunched over a cross stitch or drawing up a picture or nutting out a new technique I've  never tried knitting before for hours! But when I have to tidy a bathroom or hang out laundry...blimey! It suddenly takes on the proportions of some enormous, insurmountable chore, sucking all the fun out of my creativity and rudely breaking in to my own little world. It's so inconvenient!

So what have I achieved so far this week?

The Marvellous Vest is all done and put away. I dusted off the Monty Python and the Holy Grail cross stitch and have actually managed to progress to the next line of characters! The light issue still remains so I can only do it during the day, so at night I knit.

I'm knitting a pair of socks with a lace insert with some yarn I dyed about 2 years ago but I still don't have a pic of those so I'm keeping them as a surprise for later when they look more like socks.

Also I realized I had accumulated a large number of left over cone yarns with ridiculously thin yarns on them that I really couldn't use in their present state. So I dragged them all out and combined a lot of them to make useable yarn for beanies. I must say, so far I am very pleased with the results! Much better than I'd expected and since they're almost all acrylics, they should be easy to wash. I'm going to see how many I can make and then I'll donate them to my local charity.

So there you have it. Does anyone else suffer from excessive creativity and nil enthusiasm for useful accomplishments?

Maybe it's just me :)

See you later!
Dx

Today is another Day...

...And onto other projects!

But before I do, I have to cover the wonderful Alcott Vest. Wonder of the Shetland Islands and their glorious wool and bright colours! Ahh, I could wax lyrical for...well, longer than I should but I'll get it out of the way since I'm sure you are all sick to death with the thing!

 Here is the vest pre-blocking with the amazing steek stitches behaving like arm and neck interfacing's, as they are supposed to!

And here, TA-DA! is the completed blocked AND worn Alcott vest.

To say I am pretty pleased with it and myself is a gross understatement, but there you go. It is shorter than I would really like but that just means I have to be good and stop tugging at the bottom because it isn't actually too short at all! I just like wearing things too long! But now, I swear, I will no longer bore everyone with my creation. It is beautiful and wonderful and,...and everything, but I will desist...

I swear!

But I have been good! I immediately got back onto the cross stitch poster I've been making for Eldest Son, the mad Monty Python fan!

Look! I finally finished the first line of characters! Don't ask me who they all are supposed to be because I've never watched The Holy Grail that I can remember. And besides the first character on the left who I assume is a character played by John Cleese, I've got no idea of the rest!

But I have realized again why I put it away. I can't do it at night! I just can't see properly and so at night I knit. Another pair of socks using up some of the yarn I dyed a couple of years ago so it's nicely variegated (unintentionally but it's still nice) in a rich crimson that fades in and out of blood red and then petal pink. Very nice. I'll get photos of it soon but I keep forgetting to during the day and by the time I'm doing it, it's night and the light is terrible! Oh well. First World problems.

So there we are. I'm still toiling away on the second line of characters and again questioning my sanity in choosing such fine cloth gauge (muttering to myself, about strands of thread, bad light, constant blinking to try and focus...mumble, mutter, whinge...) and knitting a hole in my finger with my pointy 2mm circular needles so I can knit two socks at once...

Because I can!

Is any one else keeping their hands out of mischief with crafts? What sorts? 

See you all later!

Dx

Today is My Birthday!!

And I've had a lovely day! My presents all came by post so I've been extra good and saved opening them for today...and that was hard since I knew what two of them were! I've been mooning over this box for over a week!

So, after trying to sleep in and failing thanks to sore shoulders and leg I gave up and started opening my pressies!

The first one - from my Mum!

She loves me and understands my addictions so she got me an Australian Galah cross stitch kit, two balls of novelty yarn from Spotlight that feel and look wonderful, a memory and charms necklace and a memo book with a pen. Really looking forward to making something nice with the yarn!

The second one is from Me, really. I have this pattern in one of my magazines, The Knitter with a wonderful pattern for a fair isle vest in lovely colours. So I ordered the yarn kit from Jamieson and Smith - Shetland Wool Brokers Ltd.

I'm kind of nervous now. The pattern has all the traditional attributes of fair isle, the stranded colour-work, corrugated rib and steeks and everything! But I'm going to put it aside until I've finished everything else I've got going. Even the cross stitching might have to take a back seat! But I'm really excited to actually do a honest-to-goodness Shetland Island item with the proper wool!

And lastly, another present to myself.

I've always loved the Anne of Green Gables collection but I've never had a chance to read all through the series in the proper order. I only had the first book and I've read the others at different times I think through library loans but I really wanted the whole set so I could go through the journey properly...and now I can! They look so cute and their in their own box and everything!

Everyone I loved rang and wished me happy birthday, and Hubbie bought me chips for lunch (in a little town like this, you're grateful for any take away food you can get and I love chips!) and all in all it was a lovely pleasant day. I am so blessed and days like today remind me that I have so much to thank God and those he's placed around me for. Sigh...

Oh well, another year passes by and time marches on. See you all later :)

Big Finale! Last Pin Cushion!

I have completed the last (for the time being anyway) pin cushion of my small set! So I decided to go all out with it's decorative bits!

This is the front piece design I copied from the blurred photocopy I had. I used the organic cotton for all the colours except for the white on the wings...and now I look at it I realize I forgot the one black spot for the birds eyes. Bother!! Oh well, too late now :)

So here is the finished product! I even found some ribbon to do the tie at the top instead of the ring. And I added beads around the edges when I was closing it up. I am ridiculously impressed with myself! It's so pretty! And a suitable finale for my collection of pin cushions.

See? Lovely red beads all hand stitched on, even around the ribbon join. And now...I think I'll give it a rest for a while. No more pin cushions...
...but I do have some adorable black-work motif patterns that would make absolutely gorgeous scissor fobs...mmm...maybe keep the threads out a little longer!
See you next time :)

Cross Stitch - the Other Obsession!

I've been on a mission to complete as many cute pin cushions as I can while giving my hands a bit of a rest from frenetic knitting...not that I'm not still knitting, just not so much like a machine!
I've been tooling around on Pinterest and there are so many beautiful patterns and projects! I love small motifs, both in cross stitch and black-work because they are so simple, are relatively quick to complete and have huge impact visually because they are so small and cute!
Also I wanted to use an organic cotton thread called Scanfil which has a large selection of lovely colours. Since it's a bit heavier than regular cotton I find it quite suitable to do fine cross stitch and black-work with.
Anyway...I have finished all but one of the designs I downloaded. Here they are in order of completion!

Roses and Bees

This one taught me a few things. That sewing together the two sides SOUNDS easy...but not necessarily in practice! Fortunately I'd followed the pattern and it had this backstitch square sewn around the design and you thread through that so you get a neat edge on the completed item. Very clever :) The brass ring is so you can attach it to your sewing basket or something. A ribbon might have been better but I didn't have any and the rings were just sitting there, so...

Birds and Flowers

These are on even weave fabric and it never occurred to me how tiny the gauge would be until I was pretty much past the point of no return and my eyes were hanging out of my head!  When I downloaded the picture of the design it was hopelessly fuzzy so I drew it all out myself and as close to the original design colours as I could. When I didn't have a colour I needed in the Cotton thread I just used DMC instead. All at 1 strand thickness.

 

Ladybirds and Flowers

...And straight after tiny gauge, back onto usual gauge! Don't ask me what gauge that is, all I know is the previous pin cushion is 6cms square and this one is 8cms square. So, a bit of a difference. I think both designs cover a 50 x 50 graph square. 

Ladybirds and Bees

Back to sort-of tiny gauge. Not quite as bad as the Birds and Flowers one but still pretty small. All Scanfil cotton. I was pretty pleased with this one too. But because of the large piece of base fabric I used that I didn't trim down, folding the edges in was a bit of an irritation!

Ladybirds and Lily Bells
 And my nemesis! The design had lovely white flowers on a pale khaki background. I didn't have any base fabric darker than the cream stuff I'd used on the 8cm pin cushion so I though, "I know, I'll just sew the background the colour I need so the white flowers don't disappear into the cloth. Brilliant!"
Most. Frustratingly. Slow. Design. EVER!!
You don't realize you've  become used to finishing a piece in a specific period of time until you hit something that defies every attempt to hurry it up! It does look very attractive, as a finished project...But I would NEVER do it again!!

Florals and Swirls
And this is my latest finished one. Pretty, cute, little (About 6-7cms square) and finished! I have one more design that I had to redraw out because I couldn't see all the squares to do and it is under way as we speak. But I'm pretty proud of my collection. I'm not really sure what I'm going to do with them all but I have a similar problem with the vast amount of finished knitting projects I have so why should this obsession be any different? Hope you enjoyed my little brag show. See you next time :)
Dx

Too hot!

It's too hot around here to knit at the moment. It was 43 today and probably the same tomorrow! So I've been cross-stitching instead. 
I bought some plastic coaster kits from the newsagents/convenience store. I hated the motif they wanted me to sew so I found my own. I only had three so I decided to do a monogram for my parents-in-laws and our daughter. So a B, a J and a M.
The design I found was lovely but the finished product doesn't adequately illustrate just how fiddly it was! But it was worth it for the end result.
I orientated the B a little different just for variety.  But I'm very pleased.
Cross stitch is nearly as fun as knitting :-)

Cross Stitch Design

I spent all yesterday making up a cross stitch design for a poem I love from The Lord of the Rings". By now I know it off by heart! It's the peom written by Bilbo Baggins about Aragorn and how he is the King of Gondor.

All that is gold does not glitter,
Not all those who wander are lost;
The old that is strong does not wither,
Deep roots are not reached by the frost.

From the ashes a fire shall be woken,
A light from the shadows shall spring:
Renewed shall be blade that was broken,
The crownless again shall be king.

It took all day and it's only now I realize it will be quite a large cross stitch to execute. Because I'm so mathmatically challenged the actual effort involved to plot this out without graph paper at home (had to make up some from the internet) was pretty funny. Each line and the decorative border and break have been worked out on paint with a graph I got my son to rig up for me which I then printed and cut out and stuck down on the HUGE graph sheet I joined together from 6 sheets of graph paper. Now all I need is the courage to actually do it!

I might have to wait a while before I have the strength....
Ah well, enjoy :)