Happy Thursday!

2 posts in two days! Must be a record :) But I really couldn't wait any longer to show you!

A couple of weeks ago I made my way to Michael's to finally get Nantucket framed. This is the first piece of needle work I have ever had framed :)

I was going for an old world kinda feel when thinking about framing. Actually, 'old trunk' is what I had in mind. I wanted the frame to look like it could have come off a ship somewhere. I think it turned out pretty good!

How did Nantucket get framed if you have many finishes and none framed, you ask? Well because Michaels had a sale on their framing services. If you can call it that... I still ended up paying a minor fortune to get Nantucket framed. So what was the deal? Well 60% off plus an extra 20% off. Now that in my mind means 80% off... Nope it's an extra 20% off the total after 60%... makes no sense. Anyway, I didn't get quite the deal I was hoping for but I really wanted to get her framed!!! SO I ponied up the $150. 

I was so excited by this 'sale' that I actually brought a couple of other pieces along with me... but alas they will remain in my finished pile for a while longer. 

I can't quite believe that $150 is considered a sale... I mean I've gotten a couple things  (non-stitchy) framed before for around that price normally. I think Michaels prices must just simply be astronomical and I would NEVER shop there without a coupon... EVER. E.V.E.R!

Anyway, I digress. 

The REAL question I would like to ask you all is... Is there anyway to frame a piece of needlework yourself??? I've heard of Frames By Mail but I'm a huge scardy cat because I have no idea how it works exactly. I have so many lovely pieces that I want framed but I simply will NOT be dishing out $150+ to get them framed.... 

HELP

Yours truly,

One desperate stitcher.

Happy Friday!

Welcome to the long weekend everyone!!!! I am just so excited to take a break from building and spend it with lots of family and friends. Unfortunately that likely means very little stitching will be done… if any. BUT I certainly have made up for it!

I have tons of stitchy stuff to share with you!

First up, I finally finished Old Nantucket by LHN a couple of weeks ago.

I also finished part 3 of Santa's Village just last night - with the help of Annette over at California Stitcher! Here is North Pole Post Office by CCN in all it's glory :)

I also finished Part 1 of LHNs Seasons mystery sampler:

I know… not a finish picture but I'm too lazy to go take ANOTHER picture and then have to upload it and fiddle around with it haha. The couch is too comfy. 

And finally the postman made a visit today:

That my friends is the delicious floss I received after finding out that I was one of MANY winners during Nancy's Birthday Giveaway at The Victorian Motto Sampler Shoppe. I couldn't wait to take a picture and the light was just right to capture how vibrant and beautiful these skeins are :) Thanks Nancy!!!

Have a great looooong weekend everyone!!!

Melissa

Happy Wednesday everyone!

Well after months of sparse stitching, I think I am finally FULLY back on the stitching train! All I can say it's about time. Between house building and constantly fighting the tendinitis in my wrist (which made stitching fairly painful after an extended stint in the stitching chair...) stitching has not really been a priority. Luckily, after a couple of months rest it seems that my wrist is finally getting back to normal... and the guys are currently roofing in the house - you will not see ME on that roof - so that means more time in the evenings than I've had in months!!!

I guess you could consider this as a mini-finish:

I've gone as far as I can until I get some more dark brown floss from 123stitch. I think I may have ran out of the required floss partly because I stitched on a higher count fabric than the model. Either way it was still agonizing to run out as I'm seriously one motif (a bird), the rest of the boarder around the word Nantucket, and a couple of finishing stitches away from putting this one in the 'Done' pile. 

OHHHHH WELLL!

So I moved onto my next (mini) project.

This is the 'North Pole Post Office' which is number three in the Santa's Village series by Country Cottage Needleworks. I'm stitching them all separately as I have vision of what I'm going to do with them in my new house... since there's 12 in the series that means I'm going to have to find 12 identical frames (GOOD LUCK WITH THAT haha). The best thing about this stitch is that it's fairly quick and you can see it come together in a flash. Very rewarding :)

I've also been thinking ahead to my next stitch... Santa's Magic. Not sure if I'll stitch this as a gift yet or keep it for myself. I guess it'll all depend on how easy the stitch is... however, since it's a Mirabilia I'm guessing it'll be fairly complicated. But I'm up for the challenge :)

There is one thing that is bothering me however with this chart - I've now sized it up several times... - and that is Santa's sleeve is empty of stitches for the most part, allowing you to tie in the colour of the linen with the overall design of the cross stitch. PROBLEM: the recommended fabric is called Desert Sand (which remarkable I have managed to find online) but it's yellow... very yellow. There are a few stitches you can see that complement the yellow fabric to shade in the said sleeve I was talking about earlier in the model picture. I don't like the fabric simply put. I can't imagine stitching on something so yellow and having it stand the test of time and still look good years from now. But how do I change the fabric colour so that I can alter the sleeve colours and still match Santa's hat????? What a conundrum! Please feel free to leave some suggestions because I don't think I can possibly decide what I can do without some input!

Model pic

Until next time!!!

Melissa

Happy Friday everyone!!!

Well I'm happy and very proud to announce that after months and months of waiting and planning, our house building has begun!!! 

You hear about those horror stories where people have to fight with the town council... well yup that happened to me. After a month and a half of 'reasoning' with the town council we finally were able to get them on our side. That's a month and a half of building lost and agonizing over whether or not we'd have to change the plans of our house. BUT as the saying goes, if it ain't worth waiting for...

So the boyfriend and I and of course half the family (gotta love them right!) started in on the house a couple of weeks ago and I finally have some update pictures I can share with you. This past weekend was probably the hardest work yet. We were putting up walls on the first floor of house, this in fact is not the hard part... it was the mid 30 degree temps we were fighting with that made it so difficult. I had learned my lesson about wearing sun screen a couple of weeks ago after getting burnt to a crisp my first day on the job... but the brothers, the cousin, and the uncle didn't fair so well this time round with scorching sun. 

Footings down and ready for some walls!

First floor ready for some walls!!! What you see here is the product of
our Canada Day long weekend :)

The fam-jam doing their thing!!! PS: That wall was HEAVY!!! Felt like my
back was going to crack in half!

The bones of my dining room.

Father and Son and Son-in-Law bonding time???

First floor is up yeyeyeyeyeyey. Now for the second :)

Strangest thing about this all is that I'm actually having fun building my house. I remember building my brother's house a couple years ago was certainly not as entertaining to say the least. But then again, I'm not the one responsible for planning everything and making sure everything goes up right - that's my Dad's job and he's VERY good at it haha, no doubt that part of house building can be very stressful.  He's definitely the boss on site that's for sure. I would say I'm the catch all on site with people yelling commands at me like "Melissa, come hold this for me", "Melissa, go cut that piece of wood", "Melissa, I need more nails"... on and on and on it goes like this. But I'm happy with that because I think I'd be like a chicken with my head cut off if it weren't for the direction given to me from da boss. 

All in all so far so good - I'll be sure to update you as we make more progress :)

While I'm here I should mention that I actually have been stitching... albeit whilst half asleep at the end of construction days. I'm NEARLY done Nantucket but for one problem... I ran out of some of the hand dyed thread I was using... which means Nan is just going to have to stay unfinished for just a while longer while Mr.Mailman brings me more :)

Have a great weekend!!!!

Melissa