Merry Christmas!

Good morning all, and...

Merry Christmas 2020 everyone!

Hopefully Santa has been good to you and brought you lots of stitchy goodies?

I treated myself to a couple of new things for Christmas and will be starting one of them tonight. It's seasonal but a bit different to my usual choice of patterns. I'm definitely looking forward to putting in the first few stitches later, especially as I'm going to add sparkle! ;)

So, Merry Christmas everyone or, for those who do not celebrate Christmas, I hope you enjoy the small end-of-year break.

Love
Rachel x

Smalls SAL - December 2020

Hello all!

I'm posting this a day early as I always have a special post on Christmas Day and like to post things separately.

It's the last Friday of the month so time for the Smalls SAL. Thank you, Mary, for continuing to host this fun little SAL. Pop over to Mary's Blog to see what other participants have been stitching in the way of Smalls this month.

Each month I stitch a small project specifically for this SAL which doesn't appear elsewhere on my blog.

For December I stitched the fourth of six Christmas Words Cards by Durene Jones:

Let It Snow by Durene Jones (etsy)

Stitch Count 45 wide by 45 high

Stitched on 16ct white lurex aida

Started - 6th December 2020

Finished - 11th December 2020

Total stitching time - 8 hours 50 minutes

Like last month's, I changed the blues and added beads instead of french knots. Another piece ready just in time for Christmas!

In this Smalls SAL I'm also re-showing other qualifying small projects I've stitched during the month. This month's it's just my monarch, Elizabeth I:

For the start of 2021 I have a set of five cuties planned. They tell a little story - if I get them in the right order. I can't wait to start the first one!

Take care,
Rachel x

A Monarch A Month - Elizabeth I

Hi all!

Time for another monarch, number 24, Elizabeth I.

Here she is, with her trademark red hair:

Elizabeth I from Kings and Queens by Bothy Threads

Started - 1st December 2020

Finished - 14th December 2020

Total stitching time - 6 hours 15 minutes

ELIZABETH I
Preceded by Mary I (half sister)

Succeeded by James I (first cousin twice removed)
Lived - 1533-1603

Reigned - 1558-1603
No marriage, no children

Elizabeth became Queen following the death of her half-sister, Mary. She was the third and final of Henry VIII's children to reign, and the last of the Tudor dynasty.

She was extremely well-educated, fluent in many languages, and a Protestant, meaning that once Queen England returned to Protestantism.

Elizabeth chose not to marry, recognising that a husband might undermine her power and status. Her good friend Robert Dudley might have won her hand had his first wife not died in 'suspicious circumstances'.

There were numerous plots against Elizabeth's life, the most famous being the Babington Plot which implicated her cousin Mary Queen of Scots, and resulted in Mary's execution.

Elizabeth was not really interested in foreign campaigns, so various ventures in Ireland, France and Russia more or less failed.

However, a rousing speech to her troops at Tilbury, plus good fortune with the weather, led to the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588 (although what's rarely mentioned is the humiliating defeat suffered by the English fleet in Spain the following year!)

During the 1590s, Elizabeth's popularity began to fade; her new Privy Council failed to make decisions which benefitted the country, the economy was in decline, and, with the loss of a lot of her long-term allies, including her most trusted senior advisor William Cecil, Elizabeth's own authority was decreasing.

Elizabeth's health declined in 1602 and she died the following year. She is buried in Westminster Abbey alongside her half sister Mary I.

With no direct heir, and Elizabeth refusing to name one, secret negotiations had begun prior to her death to prepare James VI of Scotland to become James I of England.

So next month, the first of the Stuart monarchs, James I of England.

Take care,

Rachel x

Daisy Hugs - finished!

Hi all!

Yes, it's another finish, and the second this month from WIPs started way back in 2015. Go me!

After finishing Daisy Umbrella a couple of weeks ago my heart was set on finishing this one too. It's finish number 37/59 for Debbie's Super Duper Ultimate Crazy January February Challenge, and probably my last finish of 2020.

Here's how you last saw the hugging mice (well, the daisy at least!) back in March 2015:

And now finished:

Daisy Umbrella (my title) by Margaret Sherry

Stitch count - 45 wide by 62 high

Stitched on 16ct antique white aida

Started - 6th January 2015

Finished - 15th December 2020

Total stitching time - 23 hours 45 minutes

Due to the number of fractionals, and thread splitting for the backstitching, I think this will probably be the last time I stitch a Margaret Sherry on aida; I say 'probably' because I know I've started two others on aida and will have to decide (when I eventually get to them) whether to carry on or restart hem on evenweave. Luckily they're both small, and I haven't stitched that much, so abandoning/restarting them won't be too wasteful.

Take care,

Rachel x

Link-up For Fully Finished Gallery SAL - December 2020

Hello all!

It's the 10th of the month so time for another Fully Finished Gallery SAL, the place to show your FFOing achievements since your last link-up.

The link-up for this SAL opens on the 10th of each month and stays open for 10 days so, even if you have nothing FFOd today, or tomorrow, or the day after that, you still have plenty of time to join in.

So this is the last FFG SAL of the year. A couple of months ago I asked if it would be possible to reach 366 finishes this year. All we need this month is 18 and we will have done it. I think it's a definitely-achievable target!

Let's start off with four from me:

First up is the final part of the Advent Calendar. The actual Advent Calendar had only 24 parts, but there were 25 buttons in the pack so I couldn't not use the final one. I designed this myself, but it didn't exactly take a lot of brain-power to stitch a few letters! And seeing as it was the special one it was stitched and FFO'd a bit fancier than the rest:

Here they all are together:

And, yes, I did remember to put them up for the 1st of December! The days are random, although the colours are not (terrible photo as taken by night light):

Next up is my Pink Patchwork Hootie from September's Smalls SAL. He's been FFOd in my usual way with coordinating fabric and barley twist cord:

Third is my most recent finish, Daisy Umbrella. I always knew this was going to be a simple (sickly cute) finish, and had the perfect pink and blue card to hand. I added a few gems for a bit of bling and a ribbon bow to finish:

And finally, la piece de resistance... it's Hogwarts In A Bottle! I spent many days on the framing website trying different combinations of thick frames, thin frames, wooden frames, coloured frames, one mount and two mounts, but this is the frame which immediately caught my eye and stayed at the top of my list. It's quite chunky, in both width and depth, but just seemed right, especially with the gold highlights which pick out the castle colours. Getting the fabric completely straight and taut was a bit of a fiddle, but it's done now and the last big thing I'll have to frame for a while. And no, I can assure you the bottle is not wonky, it's just an optical illusion which makes the bottle seem to tilt to the right. Weird!

And now, it's over to you to show what you have finished.

Please link-up using the URL of your FFG SAL post and not the home page of your blog, adding a thumbnail of a finish and either your name or your blog name as the caption. The link-up will remain open for 10 days, closing at 6am UK time on 20th December.

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And please don't forget to follow other links and see what fellow fully-finishers have been up to; you never know, other projects may give you an idea for your next finish!

Next month's post will go live on 10th January at 6am UK time. It will also contain a round up of 2020 with a some data and graphs, for those lovers of statistics. Hope to see you there!

Take care,
Rachel x

Daisy Umbrella - finished!

Hi all!

Back in 2015 I started 59 projects during the first 59 days of the year in what was named Debbie's Super Duper Ultimate Crazy January February Challenge.

Up to now I've finished 35 of those projects - 17 in 2015, 9 in 2017 and 9 in 2018.

This year's to-finish list contained a further six but, mainly due to a lot of new-startitus, my good intentions haven't quite gone to plan - at almost the end of the year I've only just finished the first one!

Here's how I last left it:

And now, as finish number 36 of 59:

Daisy Umbrella (my title) by Margaret Sherry

Stitch count - 45 wide by 62 high

Stitched on 16ct white aida

Started - 21st January 2015

Finished - 4th December 2020

Total stitching time - 22 hours 40 minutes

I remember that this was one of my first Margaret Sherry designs, and I regretted using aida because of the fractionals. But it wasn't too bad in the end. The backstitching - all three hours of it - was probably more frustrating as it involved lots of thread splitting. But, again, it wasn't impossible, and well worth it for the effect.

The centre of the daisy was charted for french knots but I used beads because I don't like doing french knots!

I know exactly how this will be FFOd, so it will hopefully be ready for the 10th.

Wonder how long it will be before I finish another from this ages-ago Challenge?!

Take care,

Rachel x

People's Choice SAL - Stitching Disasters

Hello all!

It's the first Saturday of the month so time for the People's Choice SAL run by Jo from Serendipitous Stitching. Continued thanks to Jo for hosting this unique SAL which has a different theme each month.

This month's theme is Stitching Disasters.

I'm hoping, in the nicest sense, that this topic is relatively, if not completely, empty for everyone.

For me, I don't know if it's down to luck or care, but I can honestly say I've never had any stitching disasters.

I've never spilt anything, cut anything, damaged anything or had colours run when washing anything. All of my stitching has, thankfully, been very straight forward and non-dramatic.

Yes, I've had to restart a handful of projects after a few hours because I've chosen the wrong fabric or thread, but I wouldn't call them disasters.

I do admit to recently making a mistake cutting a project I'm FFOing, but it's retrievable, so even though it won't be FFOd quite how I wanted it, it's still not a disaster.

All in all, fortune has definitely been on my side for over 25 years.

But so as not to have a completely empty post, here's a disaster I would like to stitch, although it's currently about 1,759th on my to-stitch list! Along with many people I have a morbid fascination with Titanic, and this is my favourite chart, a now out-of-print kit by Dimensions called The Night To Remember:

And that's it!

Next month's theme is Designer Of The Year. This could be approached from quite a few angles, so I'll have to decide which one.

Take care,
Rachel x