The Treehouse

Song of the Weather - March

I was in two minds whether to carry straight on with the March chart or have a change. I decided that as I had all of the stuff out that it made sense to carry on. March was a lot of fun. I already like Queen stitches and the Basque knots were fabulous to stitch - they are two rows of knots around the outside of the design. 

I sweated over the cutting - again! I'm not too sure that's going to wear off in a hurry in fact, as I get more bits stitched it might get worse...more to ruin if I mess it up! I really like the shape that the Klosters and the cutting make this month and the Square Filet stitch inside the middle holes is great - I used a sharp needle to do that, made it a lot easier. 

So here it is...

I put a piece of fabric behind the holes this time - it was a useful exercise. I now know that I will not be using any shade of pink fabric at the back!

Here are the first 3 altogether...

 

 Back to my  Nancy Drew stitching now - the hop starts tomorrow. You can find the full schedule here at Carol's blog.

Song of the Weather - February

In my enthusiasm to catch up on the Papillon SAL I forgot all about my February piece of the Song of the Weather SAL. I was so excited to get part two and get stitching away at it but I just kept on stitching the Papillon! Then half term came around and Catherine wanted to make a waistcoat so we got stuck into that and Matthew wanted to make a birdbox as well and my poor hardanger got totally forgotten about. I didn't remember until the email for part 3 arrived in my inbox on the 1st March.

It's stitched now though and I love it. I had a good session of sweating before I actually managed to do the cutting on this - I've had no experience of cutting before so I was very apprehensive. I invested in the special scissors which look at first sight like a pair of pliers and I'm glad that I did. They were extremely easy to use and also nice and sharp. The little bead stitch in pale pink gave me a few problems - I'm left handed and my thread was twisting the wrong way so that when I looped through the first start of the stitch it actually undid the stitch! Spent a rather frustrating hour or so trying to work out what the problem was but once I had, I was able to stitch along quite happily. 

I'm using the same threads throughout. I love the perle threads and I think there will be more of those in my future at some point. Here's the finished piece...

I need some more practice with the Dove stitches I think! I'm stitching these pieces on one piece of fabric as a kind of Hardanger sampler. Here's the story so far...

I'm going to get some fabric to put behind the pieces that have holes in them - probably an Oakshott to match the dark pink. I can order that up once I'm ready to order the fabric to applique my Hexy MF down. Part 3 has a few different stitches in it - including Queen Stitch which is a favourite of mine. I'm looking forward to stitching that - hopefully I won't forget again. For the moment I'm busy finishing off my items for the Nancy Drew blog hop which begins this week on Wednesday - my day is Friday.

Song of the Weather January and Lucky Stars Practice

I've just put the final stitches on the January piece for Song of the Weather. I can't possibly say how much I've enjoyed stitching this little piece. I had sworn off doing monthly stitches for this year other than the ones already underway and was seriously reluctant to take on another one. I'm glad now that Carole persevered with her temptations and that I finally caved in and decided to do this SAL. It really hasn't taken very long at all to do the stitching and the instructions are excellent. I only stumbled on the knots (in the middle of the daisies) and had to get out my left handed embroidery book to do those as the picture in the instructions was for a right handed person and my brain refused to translate! 

Here's the finished piece - I am using 25 count Lugana in ivory with DMC threads 600, 605 and 712.

Isn't it pretty? I can't wait for the February design to arrive in inbox!

Yesterday I did the practice piece for the Lucky Stars BOM (oh look, another monthly project - I thought I had sworn off those and here I am posting about another one :o ) All of these designs are foundation pieced - I thought it was time that I got this skill licked - I usually put the fabrics in the wrong place and end up with them not covering up what they're supposed to! Not so this time. I made the 6" version of the block and it went as smooth as silk, no hitches at all which bodes well for me making the January block - some time soon, before January is done and dusted!

I'm really thrilled that this turned out so well. It's destined to become a little pouch for Catherine in the near future :)

Around the World in 80 Stitches

I started this project last year after some encouragement from Carole and a peek at the first part of her project. I struggled to keep up with stitching last year as I wasn't enjoying very good health, there were a couple of months when I think I didn't actually stitch at all and this was one project that got left by the wayside. Well actually, it got put into the naughty corner. It wasn't the project's fault really - it was me, I just couldn't properly decide on thread colours. Anyway, it was on my list of things to sort out during this month and I got everything out a few days ago and had a good old sort out. I had already stitched the first heart and was onto the second. Having forced myself to make some final colour choices and undo the colours that I didn't like I set off toe finish heart number 2.

Heart number 1 - I can't remember what I enjoyed stitching on this one as it's so long now since I stitched it but I do recall having problems with the Berwick Stitch which should have been the stitch beneath the dark pink flowers. I think I resorted to backstitching instead - it looks no different to me.

Sorry for the quality of these photos. I've been waiting for the weather to behave so that I could take some decent pictures. I usually take photos in the conservatory where the light is excellent however, the weather decided to drop another 5 inches of snow on us yesterday so it's rather dark in the conservatory today! The husband and the son are currently trying to dig us a path up to the main road - yes, we live right at the bottom of a steep hill. Anyway, onto more exciting things, here is heart no. 2 - this picture is even worse but at least it gives a general idea...

On this heart, I loved stitching the big flowers - I think these are called Lindisfarne stitches. They were a lot of fun and I love the cute, cushions of the Scotch stitches. Notice that nowhere am I making mention of the Lazy Daisies. No. Keeping quiet about those. I must have stitched a gazillion of them on other projects but I can't seem to make them look pretty on this type of fabric. Humph!

Here's the whole progress so far - I have already stitched the outlines of the tulips for part two so last night I enjoyed doing the Hardanger in each tulip and then I started to do the Mordvinian Star pieces. Unfortunately, it was 10 o'clock and my eyes were saying enough, enough, enough - it's time for a rest. So I had to pack up and leave it to play with today. Those Mordvinian things are a bit fiddly to be honest and I was thinking what a heck of mess I was making of them but when I looked at them in daylight this morning they seem to look okay so I'll plod on with those this afternoon.

Now, Carole is an excellent friend and I am certain this in the past I have tempted her to many a book or sewing purchase. Currently, she is having a good run at tempting me to do stuff. I said last year that I wasn't going to do the Song of the Weather Hardanger SAL. I should have realised at the time that I was fibbing to myself when I know that I've wanted to do some proper Hardanger for a long time. Anyway, Carole persevered with the tempting and it wasn't long before I found myself clicking over to see what the first month's piece looked like. Not long after that I was clicking over the Sew and So to order up the necessary. Oops! Hopefully, this will be a healthier year and I will get more stitching done. I hope so - I've got plenty to do! Below are my supplies - I decided to use the cream fabric with a raspberry pink and a pale pink for the colours. I'm rather excited to get started but will wait until I've finished part 2 of Papillon.