Exchange Has Found a Home

Hurrah, Carol has received her SBEBB Spring Quaker Exchange! I always like trying something new if I can when I’m stitching exchanges – it’s the same for my dinner parties, and sometimes it works out and sometimes it doesn’t (*see below). And this time it looks like it has worked out! Carol says she likes it and especially all the goodies I sent along – it’s nice treating nice people to nice things! Here is a photo of what I stitched (as usual I didn't take photos of the treats, but Carol has posted some photos so swing on over if you're interested to see):

Design: The Workbasket: Quaker Tree Third (freebie here)
Linen: 32ct Silkweaver ‘Seafoam’
Floss: Carrie’s Creation ‘Irish Kiss’ and Atalie ‘Soleil’
Finished as: A…scissorcase? and scissorfob

Front, back, then inside

*One of the times my new finishing ideas DIDN’T work out was for the SBEBB Here’s to Ewe exchange – which I’ve now successfully re-stitched. I’ll now be a bit more careful with the finishing LOL. At least the first one isn’t completely ruined (it’s just a bit wonkier than I’d like to be sending out!) so I keep it for myself – which is actually quite funny because I was really of two minds about which coordinating colours to use when finishing it, would I use the one or the other. So now I can see how both would have turned out!

Now that the clocks have (finally) moved forward, I’ve realised yet again how much my moods (don’t believe H when he tells you that I’m moody *wink*) are affected by the weather – I’ve been cheerful and smiling coming home from work all week! I also have found the odd extra hour or two after work and before dinner, and have been industriously clearing weeds and snails (the little b*st*rds) and pruning the roses (yes, it is a bit late, but never mind, they’ll be fine). So I definitely plan to spend some time in the garden this weekend – time to start planting seeds, hurrah!

Happy stitching!

GIVEAWAY!

Brrrr – it was really cold this weekend – we had snow flurries and hail flurries, mixed in with sun (albeit cold wintry sun) and rain all weekend. So my plans to get out into the garden and tidy that up and our idea of going golfing – nope, all didn’t happen. So the weekend became mostly about indoor pursuits – stitching, quilting, sewing, baking, (and, yes, the ubiquitous laundry), and of course sampling the gorgeous Easter egg that the Easter bunny brought! How did he know my exact favourite?? :)

Now, I believe I may have mentioned recently that my blogaversary is upcoming…well, I didn’t manage to post on the actual day (which was Saturday just gone) – but don’t think I’ve forgotten! And because it’s all of YOU who make blogging so rewarding (let’s face it, I’d be doing the stitching anyway!), I think you should be the ones to get a big thank-you, so I think a giveaway is in order, don’t you? If you want to be entered in the draw for a stitched item (which I have yet to stitch, so I can’t tell you much about it at this point LOL) to help me celebrate one whole, full, satisfying and very exciting year of blogging, leave a comment on this post and I’ll enter you in the draw! H will help me draw names on Sunday morning (30th March) UK time, so you have until then to enter (he likes his sleep, so it’s likely to be quite late morning LOL). Good luck!

Now, Nicki and I agreed that we were going to use the Easter weekend to, in her case catch up with her quilting project(s), and in my case start my very first ever quilting project. And I have to say it was quite a learning curve! I managed to rack up about 5 hours on the phone over several days with my mum, my personal quilting guru. I thank the stars for digital cameras and instant messaging, because we spent a lot of time saying ‘What? I don’t understand what you’re trying to tell me …MSN me a photo of what you’re talking about.’ Here is what I managed to achieve – 6 blocks that are nearly complete. I have yet to attach the last two strips to the top and bottom of the block, and then it’s on to the sashing and corner blocks (yes, you can see I’ve been trying to pick up the lingo from my mum as well!). I am only praying at this point that the blocks are somewhat straight, or I’m going to have to claim that it was a crazy quilt pattern to start with!


In addition to quilting, I managed to put in a few stitches on both ADD and PL, but the emphasis is definitely on ‘few’ – even with side-by-side ‘before’ and ‘after’ photos you’d be hard pressed to identify any progress – so I’m just telling you about it, and not posting any photos. Hopefully next time with each of these I’ll make better progress and have something worth showing!

Much of the weekend was spent sewing and stitching for exchanges – my HOE biscornu and SBEBB Spring Quaker were posted, my personal exchange with Becky is finished ready to post, SBEBB Here’s to Ewe is stitched and sewed and ready to finish – so I haven’t much in the way of photos that I can yet share. I’m going to slow down on exchanges after April to focus on one bigger project. I haven’t decided whether I’ll be posting about it or not (as it’s meant to be a surprise), but I think perhaps I might – you’ll see soon enough :)

I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter break – happy stitching!

Phew, It's Gone!

Phew! This past week has seen frenzied activity with my needle in an effort not to miss the sending date for the SBEBB Winter House Exchange. This is my very first SBEBB exchange, and because Becky is closing the board for health reasons, it'll also be my last! No excuse for missing the date though, so after quite a few late nights on the trot, it's all done and H kindly took it to work to wrap it up in bubble wrap and find a suitable box, and then took it to the post office and sent it off. Now hopefully it will arrive both soon and safely! Photos, of course, when I can :)

Tonight is the Snowbird SAL, and as H was off at a late work meeting, I had an early dinner and then got down to it with my needle - I think I've made splendid progress if I say so myself! I thought this medallion on the right was going to take me weeks and weeks, but now I think it will merely be weeks.

Also, I don't think I have posted a photo of the Fair & Square (round 4) squares that I sent to Annemarie - in the hustle and bustle and holiday over Christmas and New Year, I plain forgot that she let me know that they arrived! I stitched a Quieter Moments design called Flower Sprinkles over 1 as I know that An is making a quilt out of her squares, and so I wanted to stitcher her something 'quilty'.

And, since An had mentioned on her blog that she wasn't going to have time to stitch any ornaments for herself this year, I snuck in a quick ornament for her tree:

Our second anniversary is fast approaching (2 weeks on Monday) and we are meant to be going away on a short holiday - which we still haven't booked! That will be this weekend's job, and a very important one!

Happy stitching!