You Have Died of Dysentery

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It’s complete! I had so much fun stitching this, although the neon floss was a pain to work with and made it take so much longer. I could have had this done in a weekend, easily, with normal DMC floss. But the neon green floss matches my T shirt perfectly! The regular floss would not have had the same WOW factor.  Now I just need to find a smaller wooden hoop and I think I will paint it black. I am also going to need to back the entire thing with black fabric or felt to ensure that light does not show through, as it is in this photo.

XXX
Carrie


Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer

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I have had this Rudolph cover kit from an issue of The World of Cross Stitching for a couple of years at least. I don’t even recall which issue it came with. But recently I found it and decided to give it a go even though it would not be ready before Christmas. It just seemed like such a cute little project, and quick to stitch. I worked on it during two weekends, then finally finished the backstitch today and mounted it into the card blank that it came with. I think he is so adorable and I’ll hang on to him until a future Christmas when I will send him to someone special.

The finished cross stitch, without any backstitch:

XXX
Carrie


Khufu

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The October 2019 issue of Cross Stitch Crazy magazine featured in one of its columns a small pattern for the Egyptian pharaoh Khufu, the commissioner of the Great Pyramid. Loving all things Ancient Egypt, I knew I had to add this to my to-do list. It wasn’t until a year later that I needed a quick project to work on and decided to give this one a go.

The fabric was left over from Spaceship Earth and was just the right size for this chart. I debated about what fabric to use for almost as long as it took to stitch the design, because I wanted the finished piece to resemble the only statue that exists today of Khufu, which is in a museum and is approximately 3 inches tall.

What do you think? Does the cross stitched piece look like the original?

I didn’t take any progress photos because this one stitched up really quickly. The colors used were all very similar, so good lighting was needed to complete this one. And it really didn’t look like much of anything until the backstitch was added.

I am not sure how I am going to finish off this piece. My initial plan was to cut the figure out and stuff it, with a weighted base, so he would resemble the actual statue. But I am not sure how that would really work out, and it would probably get lost in all the clutter sitting on my desk. I may end up framing it instead, but for now I am not sure.

XXX
Carrie


America the Beautiful

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Done at last!

I’m so happy to have this project completed. I probably won’t get around to framing it for a while, but I think it would look good in a distressed white frame. This has been a nice, calming project to work on. The specialty stitches were a bit tricky to count due to my eyesight not being what it once was. However, the colors are just so beautiful (and nowhere near as vibrant in the photos as they are in real life) and the patriotic feel of this project during the troubling times we are in was just so relaxing. We all need more relaxing right now, I think!

XXX
Carrie


Spaceship Earth and… Figment!

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My quarantine project is finally finished, and I LOVE IT!!! I can’t wait to get it framed. I want to get a wooden hoop and paint it in a bright color (probably purple) but at the moment it’s hard to find supplies. I probably won’t worry about getting this displayed until fall when things have hopefully calmed down a bit.

I am a Disney fanatic, and Epcot is my favorite park. Spaceship Earth has always been one of my favorite attractions. I am also especially obsessed with Epcot’s mascot, Figment. I have been since I was a little girl. Here I am with Figment and Dreamfinder, circa 1985.

I probably have an unhealthy amount of Figment memorabilia, but oh well. Dreamfinder has been gone for years, and other than a topiary at the Flower & Garden Festival, you can’t really get your picture taken with Figment any more. But here I am in my Spaceship Earth gear a couple of years ago, next to my favorite Disney character.

I have looked online for cross stitch patterns of Figment, but there really aren’t any aside from a few that people have come up with on their own. Someday I would love to stitch a picture of my favorite little purple guy.

XXX
Carrie


Hummingbird

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When I saw this adorable, bright colored hummingbird in the February 2020 issue (353) of CrossStitcher magazine, I just knew I had to stitch it! It was exactly the kind of project I needed – quick and easy, with only a few colors and very little backstitch. This little guy only took a few hours and really brightened up my dreary winter days. The designer is one of my favorites, Maria Diaz. Instead of using the 28 count Cashel linen as suggested, I used up a scrap of white Aida I had laying around. I’m not sure how I will finish him off, but I’ll probably end up putting him in a hoop and displaying it near my recent embroidery mandala.

XXX
Carrie


Under The Sea

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After two years, working off and on, this mermaid is DONE! I am not sure yet how I want to frame her, and she needs one last trip to the ironing board. But I am so glad I stuck with this project and was able to complete it. And now I think I need a break from stitching for a while, and then a nice, simple project when I get back into it!

The beadwork was pretty intense, but sooooo worth it!

The camera can’t do justice to the gold and silver metallic threads.

XXX
Carrie


Neon Mandala

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This project finished up so much faster than I expected, and I love it. But I am a bit disappointed at how much of the white pattern shows underneath the stitching. I wish the lines had not been put onto the fabric so thickly. But I am a perfectionist, and I doubt anyone else would scrutinize my projects the way I do. I also think I may paint the wooden hoop a bright color, perhaps neon green.

I would definitely try another embroidery project in the future, but I think I would prefer to use my own fabric and threads and transfer the design to the fabric myself. I could definitely see myself doing a sugar skull pattern!

XXX
Carrie


Glad to be Done!

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In September 2018 I started on this card kit. I quickly grew frustrated with it and put it away to work on other things. When I finished the penguin card kit the other day, I decided to finish up all the small projects I have going before starting anything new. I found this barely started kit in a drawer and decided to tackle it again. It only took a few days of stitching here and there and was a lot easier than I thought it would be. It was really only the backstitch and french knots that were an issue.

Yes, this is another cover kit from an issue of The World of Cross Stitching. I think it turned out pretty adorable, although I have absolutely no idea what to do with it now that it is finished!

XXX
Carrie


A Caroling Penguin

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This cute little caroling penguin came as a free cover kit with issue 259 of Cross Stitch Crazy. It took me a lot longer than expected to finish it, because of several colors that all looked the same (white, cream, and light gray) and that awful fluffy backstitch. I love cute little critters like this, but stitching the details on their fur is the worst! Instead of completing this in a weekend, it was more like a month-long project, only working for 5 or 10 minutes here and there. But it turned out adorable 🙂

  

XXX
Carrie


Finished at Last!

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Hot off the scroll frame! I am so happy to be done with this project at last, and before October! That gives me a good two months to track down the correct kind of pom pom trim and to put the entire thing together.

This project was featured in Cross Stitch Gold magazine, issue 141 (British numbering system, or issue 63 in the US). It was designed by Durene Jones.

XXX
Carrie


A Needle Book

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The free cover kit with the October issue of Cross Stitch Crazy is this adorable sunflower needle book. It even comes with a silver butterfly charm! Although you can’t see in the photos, there is an additional piece of felt so when you fold the book over you have two pages inside the cover. The backstitch on this one is a bit tricky on the flowers, and so is the cross stitch in two yellow shades of floss. Lots of quarter stitches in this! Keep a sharp needle handy to pierce the Aida blocks.


Butterfly Garden

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I have had this kit designed by Susan Bates for years, ever since I saw it advertised in a British magazine. I fell in love with it and had to have it… Amazon to the rescue! But it sat in my stash for ages. I finally decided to get it out earlier this year and it plugged away at it little by little. I took progress pictures along the way but never got around to posting them. After months of work, here is the finished product!

It is washed and ironed, but it will be a while before I get around to framing it, as is usually the case! I have a box full of things I stitched 10-15 years ago (or more) and have not done anything with yet.


What a Cutie!

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My little Cinco de Mayo mouse is finished!

I’m now going to go back to working on the gingerbread houses because that is a project I can stitch on hands-free. In the future, I might use one large piece of fabric on a scroll frame and stitch several of these mice on it, then cut them apart. Then my hands won’t hurt so badly when I stitch.

XXX
Carrie


Be Mine?

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Finished already! I absolutely loved working on this fun little Furry Tales mouse from issue 238 of The World of Cross Stitching (February 2016). It only took a few days of stitching, working for a few minutes here and there. The photo doesn’t do it justice, but the fabric is a nice light pink. I’m going to finish this off as a pillow ornament with some fabrics left over from my quilting days.

XXX
Carrie


A 2.5 Year Work-In-Progress

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Yesterday I was going through my box of “completed” projects that have not been framed yet, when I came across my little hedgehog pincushion. Well, it was technically two stitched sides of a hedgehog waiting to be turned into a pincushion. I had completely forgotten about this project. I had stitched it up quickly, but then never got around to putting it together. I decided it had been long enough (since September 2015, yikes!) and I got out my sewing supplies. It was a bit trickier than I had thought it would be, because the pattern was from one of my digital magazines. So when I printed out the templates on my printer, they were not large enough. I had to play around with enlarging them before I figured out the correct size. Most of it went together on the machine, which was quick and easy. But the bottom piece of green felt had to be hand sewn on, which was really tedious and painful and today I’m having an issue with trigger finger because of it. Ouch! But finally he was done, and I got to put in the cute leaf shaped pins I had found. He is so adorable and I absolutely love him! I think instead of using him as a pincushion I am just going to keep him on my desk to look at, whenever I need to smile.

You can read my original post about this little guy here.

XXX

Carrie



Frogging

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Tonight I finished up Autumn Flowers, and then had to decide if I wanted to rip out the two small flowers and redo them, or just leave it as it was. Here is the finished project along with the picture of how it should have looked.

In the end, I had plenty of floss left and there was enough time to rip out and restitch the two flowers tonight. I felt that if I didn’t redo it, I would forever look at it and wonder why I had left it. I am so glad I decided to frog the orange flowers and make them yellow.

Frogging is a term cross stitchers use when they make a mistake and have to rip out stitches. “Rip it, rip it” sounds like a frog saying ribbit, ribbit. Get it? Generally, I don’t make mistakes when I cross stitch. I am a slow stitcher, and stop every few stitches to cross off what I have done on my chart. On large pieces, I grid. And I am always double checking to make sure I am doing the right thing. So I rarely ever have to frog my work. But on this project, I wasn’t even looking at the key. I knew I was to use two colors of variegated threads, yellow and orange. And since I had done the first flower with the orange on the outside, I just assumed I was supposed to do the small flowers the same way. Oops! But it wasn’t much work to rip out my mistakes and start over. And I am so pleased with the end result! So often I get caught up in large projects that take months to finish, and my stitching time is so limited. So I am glad I was able to get a quick finish done.

XXX
Carrie



Done!

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I’m so excited to finally have this sugar skull finished. Things had gotten so busy that I was unable to work on it for quite a while. And then one day the internet went out and I couldn’t work, so I decided to sit down and stitch for a while. The next morning the internet was still out, so I was able to finish this guy. And then I even got right into a free cover kit that had come with the latest issue of World of Cross Stitching. It was sitting on the coffee table and was so cute, I couldn’t resist jumping in. That little hedgehog card should be finished up in one more stitching session.

For the sugar skull, I think I will try to find a wooden frame that I can paint in a bright, bold color that matches one of the colors in the design. I think I would want to do it lime green, actually!

This was a fun and quick design (when I actually had time to sit down and stitch!) and can be found in the 2016 Halloween special issue of Just Cross Stitch magazine. It was actually charted to be solid black, but I used colors of DMC Color Variations that I hand picked. You can purchase the magazine here: crossstitchers.com

XXX
Carrie


First Finish of 2017

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I am so excited to be done with this project, and to have my first finish for 2017. The last year or so has been really rough, between all of the things on my schedule along with not physically being well enough to cross stitch. So here it is, at long last, my Pyramids by John Clayton.

pyramids12

Currently this project is sitting in some dish soap and lukewarm water. After I dry and iron it, I will probably need to have a custom frame made, as I don’t think I have anything on hand that will fit something this long and narrow.

XXX
Carrie


His Name Is Jesus

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Done at last! I thought this would be a quick stitch but with kids, work, volunteering at school, physical therapy and exercise, it just didn’t happen. I finally finished this today. It needs to be washed and ironed, and then I am going to check out Hobby Lobby for a frame and mats, and will do the actual framing myself.

hisname

I did change the word “saviour” to “savior”, to be more American.

This pattern can be found here, for free: http://www.joyfulexpressions.us/HTML/FreePatterns.html

Now for my next project… I think I need to get my little hedgehog pincushion put together. And that deer in the woods is not getting finished just sitting in a drawer. That might need to be a summer project, though, as the counting and similar colors are horrible. I desperately want to start on John Clayton’s pyramids. And it should be an easier project, with huge blocks of one color and extremely small amounts of backstitch. Time to look through my stash again and see what other treasures I have set aside that I forgot about!

XXX
Carrie



Stash Finish #12, Framed

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Willow Tree House Sampler, designed by Catherine Theron for Kreinik. Just Cross Stitch magazine, June 1999 issue. Stitched on 30 count linen with Kreinik Silk Mori for the cross stitch and Northern Lights silk for the grass. I did change the color of the lettering and house door and shutters because I did not have the right color on hand.

willow1

I am really pleased with how this piece was finished. I found the frame at Hobby Lobby, on clearance for $3. It doesn’t have any hanging hardware, so I will have to add some. For now, I will display it propped up on my dresser.

I used acid free foam board and silk pins to mount the stitching:

willow2

willow3

willow4

Then I used pearl cotton to lace the back.

willow5

willow5b

I then added two more layers of foam board to fill in the extra space, and finally glued kraft paper to the back.(I didn’t take a photo of the kraft paper)

willow6

I normally don’t take this much care with my framing. Actually, most projects I finish don’t even get framed – they end up in a box with all of the others. Now that my walls are pretty much filled up, I like the therapeutic value to stitching more than just making something to decorate the home!

XXX
Carrie