Much needed update

Time has gone quickly. It seem more than 2 years ago since my last post. What can I say, life had been hectic. And blogging had been the last thing for me to update. Anyhow, some excitement news. Last month, we went to Europe. I had the opportunity to meet up with a cyberfriend for the first time. Francois was the co-owner/moderator of my IntricateXS yahoo group. He is no longer active in the group, but we've been keeping in touch. He was free when we would be in Paris and volunteer to be our guide. That was excellent and amazing. Having a local guide in any foreign country with a language barrier is the best things any tourists can hope for. We had the best time there. He showed us among other touristy area, some many things which a typical tourist would have missed. Naturally visiting a few of the LNS is a very important agenda. I bought lots of stash as you can see here

Many of the books and charts are hard or expensive to get back at home, and with the strong Australian dollars at present, they are bargains. I end up posting some of this home as my luggage went over the limit. LOL My wife and him also had a blast in some of the lovely yarn stores. And best of all, I got to see 'The Detail of Pearl Merchant" in real life. One of Francois many masterpieces which many of you might be familiar with.

On the way home, we had a very brief stopover in London. We got to attend the Knitting and Stitching show at Alexandra Palace, which was a great way to end our holiday. And of course I got more stash - mostly stitching accesories this time. On the stitching front, I am nearly finish with one of my project, A Tribute To Ackworth. This is an SAL from Sticklounge. I'm planning to move the last 3 letters which are my surname and putting the date onto it.

I do have some other projects to update but that would have to come in a different post in the future. Ciao.

New Zealand

I went to Auckland for work in March last year, and I baught this small kit at an LNS there. I pulled it out and started it recently as I have found some time while waiting to pick up Vivienne from school + tutorials etc. It's a perfect little thing to work on in the car. I did dropped my needle once and could not find it still. LOL Anyway, it's finished 2 days after the big happy dance. Now I've laced it, cut the mat and here it is. I'm using just a standard photo frame with standard glass hence you can see my reflection taking the picture. Thanks for looking.

Happy Dance Time

Yes, it's finally finished. My 40th birthday sampler. I put in the last stitch the night before last. I did run into trouble with the frog on the last big tree. Initially I thought I could cheat around it after some thinking, I'm probably too anal and ripped most of the big tree out. And I'm now happy.

Started on my birthday 9 May and finished on 27 September 2010. Using 40 count hand dyed linen and HDF - Dragon blood for the main colour + beguilted, bewitched, bebopped, beredded, and begrimed. There are 40 animals in the various colours.



Thanks for looking

Page 5

was done last week, but I'm a bit slow in blogging. Progress had been slow this last weeks. But here it is



I've added my birthdate + initials using Beredded and Beleaved. I removed 2 small trees from the design to put the birthdates in. I've borrowed the letters + numbers from my Jan Houtman's Tulip Sampler. Not entirely happy with their colours, Beleaved or the green initials needs to be changed and I don't like the alphabets given as well. Might use the ones from Jan's sampler as well.

Page 4

As promise this is Do Bears as of Friday. As you can see the 5th page is on the way.



This was taken with a normal camera instead of the iPhone one. As it is a bit big now for the iPhone camera to handle.

So far for 2010

I'm splitting the update into 2 as, it's getting a bit pictures intensive.

Being a new decade, I'm trying something new, blackwork. This is butterfly from one of the New Stitches magazines and it's quite fun. I dislike backstitch in general but this is not bad. That's the body so far



2010 started with an SAL in memory of Marc Davies. Marc is the designer for Needlemania who passed away unexpected in June 2009, Marc and I had been communicating in the XS cyberspace for some time being in various groups together. We went on and were both the co-owners of Long Dog's yahoo group. . This SAL were organised and charted by Sabine. I finished this in Feb and changed the middle to put in my Chinese surname. This is again with HDF.



Mystery X or Secret Victorian Garden then received some well deserved attention, It's at least over 1 year since I worked on it. I'm hoping to finish it this year. I worked on it for over 2 months. This is how it is now



In May, I reached a major point in my life by turning 40. Yes, I am now in my fifth decade of life !! Do I feel old ? Of course NOT. LOL I baught Jan Houtman cross stitch book some time ago, and I really like how he designed and stitched a special project when his partner Theo turned 40. So I want to do the same, well I'm not a designer so I searched through my stash and found Do Bears. I counted the animals in it, and would you quess there were 40 of them excluding the small butterflies + snails. I think this is perfect. I pulled out my hand-dyed 40 count linen and started it on my brithday. The animals motifs are done with some of the Be's from HDF, the main colour is Dragon Heart, also from HDF. I'm nearly done with the 4th page now and will take a new picture soon, this is how it was 2 weeks ago. New photo will come out this week



I've been very good in being OOAT this year, though I did steal 1 or 2 nights to work on St Sophia



Others were worked on as well but not much picture yet. I have also acquire so many stash in the last year but I'm not going to list them now.

Update in 2009

Wow, it's been nearly a year since I was blogging. I decided I was going to do more stitching rather than talking about it. But blog is like a stitching diary for me. I do have a small calender on my stand which I keep track of what I was stitching on those day that I was stitching. Let's recap what I've been doing for nearly a year.

After Twinkle Twilight, I started another Maria Van Scharrenburgh project. My friend Joyce told me now I need a piece for our self rather than the children. So here is the Kiss



In the mean time, I also finished up my dovetail box, which was fun with the different colour woods. There were some chip on the edges from the router, but not bad for the first box



Then it was Autumn festival, so I finally started Charng Er, the moon goddess which celebrate the festival, I'm really happy with the face of Pinn's chart. I should pick this up again soon.



In December, Julie was leaving our workplace. She is having a career change. So I decided to stitch this for her. I used the Bright Rainbow from HDF and she was really pleased. I think it is now sitting in her new desk.

First in 2009

Yes, my first finish for this year, considering how close 2010 is coming. It's about time. LOL I finally finished Twinkle Twilight for Natalie at about 2 am today. Just couldn't go to sleep while putting in the last of the metallics. My friend Joyce suggested I changed the colour of the border to purple rather than blue, and I'm really glad I did. It turn out fantastic and more fitting for a girl. Maria Van Scharrenburg designed this for a boy, but I think it could go either and the purple border made it a girly piece.



I told Amanda hopefully now Natalie will be able to sleep better now. You I finished Vivienne's piece when she was just a few months old and she has been a perfect sleeper. This one however had been a long journey. Natalie is now 14 months old and is still not sleeping very well at night.

It had been a long while since I last blogged. Life is just not like before anymore, very limited time with works + Natalie. There had been some major changes, I have now moved office and have a better view of some forrest and more sunlight which is great. Natalie is now walking more and more. Apart from TT, I have also done some other stitching including Cosima



and a new project Cirque des Carreaux by Ink Circle



What am I going to do next ? I'm not sure yet, I could start more projects or maybe finished some old WIPs or UFOs which most had become now.