Todays post....

....arrived and brought me a lovely surprise, this beautiful biscornu which has been stitched by my mum Veronica (its her first biscornu she's made), its really lovely, the design is by Chatelaine and I love the colours and the wee buttons. I never received my biscornu from the FGBB biscornu exchange in April and Mum volunteered to Becky that she would stitch me one, so really special thanks to Becky and mum for doing this as I really hadn't expected anything and its doubly special cos it was from my mum.

The weather seems to be picking up again - just in time for us to go on holiday LOL!!

Thanks to everyone who has left me comments I do so appreciate them very much.

Carols NRR

Here is Carols NRR, it is the last one for me to stitch on, My choices for Carol were easy - I had about 3 different houses I thought of stitching and I had already planned the garden in my head ages ago.
The house is by LHN - Cherry Tree Inn, the garden gate and cat is a freebie by Chessie and Me, I stitched the cat - which of course is Tasha in Kaalund silk thread - colour Animal to match Tashas colours (she is a calico tortoiseshell) as Carol wanted us to stitch a cat on our squares.



The wee rabbit is by LHN - Cherry Tree Inn too, I just changed the colour of him.



The bee hive and bees came from a Victoria Sampler chart which I love.
I have tried to capture elements of what Carol was looking for in her neighbourhood and I really enjoyed stitching this piece very much.




Here is a picture of it in its entirity, Carol has asked me to send it to Becky as she has offered to stitch one of Carols spare squares, it'll be going there either tomorrow or Monday at the latest.

Apologies too for not appearing to be visiting many blogs and commenting, I have been round some but I have been so incredibly busy I haven't had a lot of time which I feel bad about, also there wan't be a lot of time on the agenda for the next 3 or 4 weeks as we are away for some of that time on holiday - so sorry about that - hope you'll forgive me!

Thankyou to everyone whos has visited and left me comments and to all the 'newbies' who are visiting and also leaving me comments - its so lovely that you want to I really appreicate it.

Hill Top Farm

Here are the couple of pics we took whilst at Beatrix Potters house, the first one (above) is of Hill Top Farm in the rain, I took it from Mr McGregors garden.

The second one (below), is of Amy sat with Mr McGregor outside one of the cottages leading up to Hill Top Farm. - By the way Helen said I made my last posting sound like Ames was just Iains daughter - I'm rectifying that now she is my sisters daughter too LOL!!

Home - well almost

I thought I would post some pics of where I live. This beautiful and dramatic lake area is just 4 miles down the road from us.


My BIL (Helens hubby) came walking over here on Sunday before he picked up his daughter, my neice Amy from our home on Sunday evening. As Amy had been staying with Mark and I for the weekend and boy didn't we have fun!


BIL had taken his camera with him and had a wonderful warm dry day to walk and came back with some wonderful photos he had taken of Wasdale and the Screes, This picture above is a good one of the Screes, they are very dramatic all times of the year. Often you can still find snow tucked away in August in the top of the screes, though I don't think there is any this year as we didn't have as much snow up there this past winter.



Wasdale Lake is the deepest Lake in England and has many gory tales to tell. Its a stunning area to see and visit, though we do tend to get missed by tourists, we mostly get walkers (or crag rats as they are locally known) wandering around up here.


What else to tell - well Amy stayed with us from Friday - On Saturday Mark and I took her over to Little Sawrey which is near Hawkshead to see Beatrix Potters home - Hill Top Farm we had a great time even though it was drizzly rain, I will have a couple of photos downloaded from my camera in the next couple of days of our visit. When we got back Amy and I snuggled in our dressing gowns and watched Miss Potter on Sky movies.
On Sunday Helen came over with my nephew and we all went out for lunch in the local pub - what a great time we all had, Helen rifled through my patterns and stash and looked at all the wonderful exchanges I have received and ratched through my finishing drawer of the things I've yet to finish. We chattered all afternoon - good job Mark was at the pub watching the golf open as he would have been bored witless LOL!!! BIL collected everyone later in the evening.

Stitchy news - well I have finished Carols NRR and I am pleased with how it looks and I have now started on my seasonal exchange piece.
Picures of Carols NRR coming tomorrow with a bit of luck - time depending as I have a physio appointment tomorrow night.

Only 9 more days to go and we are off on our holidays - yippeeeeeed!

Proudly presenting My Neighbourhood

Let me proudly present to you My Neighbourhood of Make Believe

Remember picture is clickable to make bigger

Left to Right
Top Row:
Snippet from Racahels, Carols, My own, Snippet from Barbaras
2nd Row:
Rachaels, Barbaras
3rd Row:
My own, Diannes
Bottom Row:
Veronicas (mum), Annemarie, Snippet of Carols, Mums

I couldn't wait to show it off as its lovely, and I know I'm the first to get mine back and its early but I really didn't want to wait til September/October to show it. I haven't pulled my tacking stitches out yet that divided the blocks and the outer edges as I want to stitch a little bit more in my outer border and as I want to make mine into a very large quilted cushion I thought I would leave the tacking in for the time being, so thats why its still there if you are wondering.
I have really enjoyed the NRR - Its been an awful lot of fun and I have made some lovely friends and I have so enjoyed stitching on everyone elses its been a great exercise in creativity.

I have almost as we speak finished stitching on Carols it should be done by the weekend I am hoping.

This IS my favourite season

You Belong in Fall

Intelligent, introspective, and quite expressive at times... You appreciate the changes in color, climate, and mood that fall brings Whether you're carving wacky pumpkins or taking long drives, autumn is a favorite time of year for you

What Season Are You?

Thankyou, An, Barb, Carol, Dianne, Mum and Rachael

... for all the wonderful stitching that you have done on my NRR. These are just a token of my Love and Appreciation of your talent and creativity.
I LOVE my NRR I think its a beautiful piece and it will be made into a very large cushion (not to be sat on and used - but to be looked at and I know admired)

So watch out for the post man arriving in the next week or so as I wanted to stitch you each a little something to commemorate our NRR. They are wee fobs and I used the Sampler GAameboard by The Drawn Thread as my idea for the fobs.

Thankyou so much again I really do LOVE it all. - Pictures will follow in the next posting I make of my wonderful NRR so that everyone can see it.

Edited to add: I also meant to say - these are the secrets I was on about in an earlier posting that I have been busy with over the past week or so.
Hugs

Quaker exchange FROM AmySC

The most wonderful package from Amy arrived for me - the summer quaker exchange isn't it lovely! Amy also sent me some lovely goodies too and she sent me the wee needleminder I have coveted for ages by Kelmscott designs, some of my favourite silk threads and a wee PS chart, there is also a lovely button and some little tiny gift cards which will be put to great use soon.



Its a really beautifully stitched and finished bourse, its really pretty and its done in a really stunning shade of red. My pictures are not doing this shade justice at all - might have something to do with the miserable weather we are having.



I really love this red work piece and have added it to my redwork collection which is coming along quite nicely. - Thankyou so much again Amy - I hope you got my message as I didn't have your email address to thankyou more personally I am really really delighted with my quaker bourse.

I have finished my secrets and will be able to show them off to you all soon. I have started on Carols NRR after much deliberating on houses and flowers etc I think I have hit the right note - I'm not showing any pics yet though til I've finished a bit more.
I'm starting a countdown now in my head for when we go on holiday 21 more sleeps - yippeeee!!LOL!!

1 - 2 - 3 - 4.............

Look what I got it in the post yesterday from Barbara Isn't it brilliant, I had forgotten all about that I had signed up with Barbara for a PIF from her (I couldn't remember who I started up the agreement with - typical me).
I love this t-towel its so cute and Barbara knows that one of my favourite things is sheep, I think its such a happy design and far to nice to use, so I have it hanging in my sewing/spare room, I just want to get a proper hanger for it now. Thankyou so much Barbara I really really love it. p.s. Barb - Mark loves it too he said it was a happy design.

Valerie has stitched a and finished a wonderful pyramid, it too like mine was her first one - its really really lovely, well worth a visit to see, Valerie does some beautiful finishes and looking at her wonderful tape measure cases she is inspiring me to do one now, but I must get my secrets finished first, all will be revealed at a later date I promise.

Summer Quaker exchange

Elisabeth was the recipient of my stitching for the Summer Quaker exchange and I knew immediately what I was going to stitched for her, its Quaker Swan by The Workbasket.
I've stitched it 1/1 on pilstitches hand dyed fabric in a soft perwinkle blue and I used the cream in Kaaluund hand-dyed silk threads to do it there is subtle shading on this cream which 1/1 doesn't really show well. I then couldn't decide how to finish it. So after some thought and fiddling about with pencil and paper drawing finishing ideas I opted out for a pinkeep as it was simple and I felt that I wanted a more simple finish, then I thought it looked really plain when I had done the pinkeep so I took the ribbon off I had put on and did the twiddly ribbon finish using 2 shades of voile ribbon, in amongst that ribbon are some cream headed pins.

A Country Garden for Nicki

This is an exchange piece I have just stitched for Nicki
Now I knew that Nicki loved Blackbird designs and that she liked Autumnal colours so as it was a House with a Landscape and the landscape that Nicki had asked for was very large flowers, I thought that this design was perfect for her, so I just changed the colours to more autumnal ones - I think it works and Nicki has told me she loves it so I'm pleased about that. The fabric I used is 32ct hand-dyed linen called Douglas fir. I finished it very simply as a small cushion.

A couple of you have asked if I am going somewhere or stopping blogging - The answer is NO!! I'm still here and am planning to still be here for ages to come.

Pretty cool!!!!!

I pinched this idea from Danielle cos I really thought it was pretty cool You can do it too - you'll find it here