A Very Happy PS Dance indeed!

Hello Stitching Friends!

Today I finished The Night Before Christmas by The Prairie Schooler and I'm so so happy with it! 

The Prairie Schooler, Book No. 199
 THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS

Some finishes pleases you more than others, don't they?! Well, I just love this one and on the inside I'm very busy doing a very happy dance😁! I just love everything about this project. The pretty old-fashioned letters...

...and the gorgeous sleigh, and the sleeping cat and dog, and all the beautiful silvery snowflakes! It just amazes me that The Prairie Schooler ladies managed to get so much detail and Christmas feeling into a design with only SIX colours! Personally I also found it extremely relaxing to only have six colours to keep track of😊.

I did a couple of small changes to the design to make it my own. I changed the colour on the reindeers' harness/shackle (?) from green to red to make them stand out more. I also added an extra little snowflake above Santa's sleigh where there was an empty space.

I haven't decided yet what frame to use. Closer to Christmas I will go through my collection of frames and see if one of them will do my finished piece justice...

Now I'm trying to decide what PS Christmas project I'm going to start next. The two festive charts I'm deciding between are DECEMBER....

...and CHRISTMAS EVE.

Decisions, decisions... Maybe I'll live in the moment and start both of them...

Before I leave you I have to show you the gorgeous Easter flowers I have on my livingroom table.

I love surrounding myself with beautiful handmade things made by myself and by the people I love, and these colourful paper flowers are made by my clever and creative sister. I wanted something happy and cheerful for my tables and begged asked my sister to help me and these colourful blooms are what she came up with💝. Do I need to tell you I was well pleased😍😍😍?!

And if you want to fold your own spring flowers my sister has a Youtube channel, THE PINKLADY DIY , where you can find a 'Fold a Tulip' tutorial🌷🌷🌷!

Now I'm off to make some Fried rice for dinner😋! 

Hope you are all ok and finding time for some stitching💝.

Annie

Searching for new quick and easy go-to charts... and other crafty stuff

Hello Stitching Friends!

What a crazy start to this year it has been here in my little x-stitch nook. Plenty of visits to the vet and broken down technology; just one (financial crisis) after another. And the vaccination is going REALLY slowly here in Sweden; neither my dad (who's got alzeimers😢 and is 73 years old) nor my mum has had any vaccine yet. At this rate I will still be waiting in the new year.. Unfortunately I also live in one of the areas in Sweden that has the highest rates of covid-cases so I have to be really careful. But so far everyone in my family has stayed healthy so I just continue to keep my fingers crossed🤞.

So most part of February I spent knitting and selling some wooly mittens to earn some well-needed money...

When I was finished with those, I crocheted some Easter inspired gifts and things for my home.

 

For example this cheerful doily that I displayed in my hallway. 

 

Even though me and my furbabies spent Easter on our own it was nice to spruce up my humble little home a bit💛💜💚.

I also stitched Easter cards to send to some family and friends far away, and once again I used my favorite flower charts by Lesley Teare from The World of Cross Stitching issue 230.

They are just PERFECT for cards; quick to stitch with very little backstitch and one can combine colurs and patterns any which way depending on your stash and the occation.

 

Unfortunately I have a strong feeling that almost everyone near me have received at least one version of these flowers, so it is about time I find a found a new easy, very quick and adaptable go-to card pattern. 

I have realised though that it is easier said than done as I've been going through my cross stitch magazine stash...😳. Either it's too much backstitch to make it quick, or there are too many colours used, or the patterns aren't very adaptable... Still, the search must go on!

Due to all the knitting and crocheting and cross stitch cards, I haven't had much time to spend on larger projects. Just a few more added stitches on The Prairie Schooler chart The Night Before Christmas ...

However, I have spent a lot of time thinking of what I want to stitch during the summer ahead. Which projects do I want to (try to) finish? Do I want to make some new starts? Are there any stitching challenges I can join to speed up my stitching? I'm hoping and praying that some sporting events will take place in the coming months, such as Stanley Cup playoffs, the Ice-hockey world championships, the FIFA European championships and the Olympics🙏🤞🙏...and if they all do, there will be PLENTY of time for me to do some stitching! And frankly, I can't wait!!! And I look forward to having more stitching progress and projects to show you here on the blog this summer.

In fact, I'm about to start a new exciting project very soooon (who am I kidding?! I just cannot NOT start new projects😂🙈😂) and I'm iching to get off the computer and finish gridding my fabric! 

I hope that you are all well, and I look forward to chatting with you about lots of stitchy things soon again🌷🌸🌷!

Annie

Easter crafts

Hello Everyone!

 

I hope all is well and that you've all had a nice Easter:))

 

I've spent a lot of time with my family during Easter, which has meant that I've had to make some Easter Cards for my loved ones. For my dad and his wife I made this card:

 

Perhaps not as Eastery as it could be, but at least it has lovely spring colours:)
I also stitched this decorative heart for my dad...

...which says 'Loved Dad' in Swedish.

For my mum who loves bright colours I put together this card...

...and for my brother-in-law's parents I made this card:

I also received a couple of Easter cards from my sister - well, what can I say, I'm the kind of sister who deserves TWO Easter cards lol! This is the first one I received on Easter Friday...



Glad Påsk - Happy Easter in Swedish:)

...and it came in a cute envelope made out of notepaper. My sister told me that she realised when she made her cards that she didn't have any envelopes to put them in, so she started to play around with a paper and came up with this solution...

Trust my creative sister to make something so nice out of nothing lol. I put my Easter card on my Easter shelf, which for once also had beautiful tulips that I received from my grandma:)

On Easter Saturday I also received this very pretty Easter egg card, and I love...

...the pretty colours and the white feather. Soo cute! This card will definitely be saved in my Easter box and brought out in future Easters to come:)

I haven't stitched much lately and it is not that I haven't wanted to, but that I've struggled to find time. Sometimes I've just been too tired, and other times I've been busy baking for myself to save money, or seeing my friends. I don't know about you other stitchers, but when I get tired I just can't stitch. It is just too difficult for my tired brain to keep up with a chart and move the needle repetitively up and down through the fabric. It always ends with my eyes closing heavily and my head nodding off to the side...
I must say that I feel a bit frustrated about my limited stitching time right now, but I hope that I'll find some time soon to bury myself in a cross stitch project. And hopefully that time coincides with the much awaited arrival of my Prarie Schooler charts I have ordered lol!

Happy Stitching!

Annie

My Easter stitching

Hi!

Since Easter is coming I have brought out a few special cross stitched pieces at home.
First of all there is my little Easter table cloth that I stitched a few years ago.

 

It is not very big but I love the purple crocuses and the cute little chickens!

There is also this little Easter picture that I've stitched with some more cute chickens and some lovely tulips.

 

Both of these designs are from a Swedish cross stitch company. As you can see, in Sweden we have a lot of Easter chickens rather than Easter Bunnies, and we eat Easter sweets served in an Easter egg rather than actual Chocolate Eggs.  

 

My third piece on the other hand is from an old English cross stitch magazine, and it is actually a picture that I started to stitch while I still lived in London ten years ago. Nowadays I would not stitch a piece like this one. It is too simple for me and the design feels quite old-fasioned.

 

However, because of the history of it and the fact that it has come so far and I have come so far, this piece means a lot to me and it always comes out of hiding at Easter :)

Happy Stitching everyone!

Annie