Celtic Christmas (Lavender & Lace)

August      1998             

I love stitching Christmas designs especially when they are by one of my favourite designers Marilyn Leavitt Imblum.

Apparently the inspiration for this particular piece, ‘Celtic Christmas’ from a company called Lavender & Lace came to her after seeing Loreena McKennitt a concert .  She’s a Canadian  singer who plays the harp, accordion and piano as well as writes music with Celtic and middle eastern themes.

This design is of a young lady wearing a flowing Red dress with beautiful Gold work around the bottom and she carries a wreath and candles. 

The Celtic theme is picked up in the beaded border and the word ‘Noel’ features across the top of the piece gives it its Christmas feel.

When I think that this picture cost me almost £80 to have framed,  it was a bit of an extravagance really, but then again this stitching lark isn’t a cheap hobby.  When you take into consideration the time it takes to complete, almost eight months in this case, it’s worth every penny to have it framed the way you really want it.

It’s stitched on 28 count Linen in a subtle Dusty Green colour which really complements the deep Reds and Gold’s of the threads and the stitched area measures  approx. 30 x 44 cms.

DMC Threads

321           356           433           434           435
469           498           498           754           758
780            781           783           801            814
815            898            934           936           948
3371         3820         3822         3823

                                                                                                      
Specialty Thread
DMC metallic floss  284Z

Mill Hill Beads
00557
02011
03003
62020

The Twelve Days of Christmas

December 1997

On the First day of Christmas my true love gave to me,

A partridge in a Pear Tree……..

And so the song goes, on through the twelve day with gift of Lords a leaping, swans swimming and maids a milking to name but a few.

This was a chart that I came across in a magazine but for the life of me I can’t remember if it was Cross Stitcher or another magazine that was just dedicated to Christmas projects.

  

Oh Christmas Tree

October      1996            

Towards the beginning of 1996, around about February I decided it was time to start work on a Christmas project. 

It was going to my biggest project to date, the stitched area measuring 42 x 35 cms  and it involved not only counted cross stitch on even weave fabric but also lots of beading,  so I knew I was going to have to start work on it early if I wanted to have it framed and on my wall in time for Christmas.

The design………..Oh Christmas Tree, another Marilyn Leavitt Imblum design for a company called Told in a Garden. 
As with her Catch the Wind, the design is full of detail and shading and I simply fell in love with the picture of two Victorian children dressing a Christmas tree when I saw a finished sample of it on a wall in my local needlework shop.

By mid-October  I had finished all the stitching  and spent the next couple of weeks adding all the beads before taking it back to the needlework shop for them to send it away  to be framed. 

Here's the finished project.  

It's really such a shame that it's only hung on the wall through the Christmas period but each December it has pride of place about my fire surround.

The finished piece measures 60 x 66 cms and looks quite imposing In its double mounted frame . 

Olympia - Stitch Show

April  1993

A visit to my first ever Stitching show at Olympia back in 1993 saw me return home with three new projects to work on.

The first was a Moira Blackburn sampler kit called Time and Season.

I’m ashamed to say that even though I had wanted to stitch a sampler for a long time, the one I brought that day was destined never to be finished, in fact all the threads and chart are still sitting at the bottom of my foot stall where I store a lot of my sewing paraphernalia. I think it was the fabric that came in the kit that put me off because I really loved the muted colours and the design. My fingers were getting quite sore as I stitched because the ‘Rustico’ aida fabric was so course.
Who knows, one day I may go back to it, we shall have to see.

One of the other bits I brought that day was a chart called ‘Voice of the Shepherd’ by a company called Told In A Garden.
On the stand at the show they had stitched it and mounted it an oval wooden frame, which looked amazing but by changing the wording they made it into a Home Sweet Home sampler.

Here’s my finished one.  It's counted Cross Stitch, stitched on evenweave fabric.

Finally the last thing I brought that day was a little kit for stitching a Hardanger square, a technique that I’d not tried before.
I eventually got around to stitching it and then the square sat in my footstool alongside the ‘great unfinished sampler’ because I had no idea what to do with it.

It wasn’t until many years later when my friend Nicki came to visit from Switzerland that she suggested making it into a cushion. I’m useless with a sewing machine, so when she went back home she took it with here and a few weeks later this is what arrived in the post.

My beautiful cushion.

Sue’s Kitchen

July   1989

I came across this 'Herbal Window kit by Janlynn way back in 1989, soon after having my kitchen redesigned. At the time I was looking for something to hang on wall in there and the colours in this were a perfect match with my terracotta walls.

I’m sorry that the photos are not that great, I’m managed to get a lovely reflection of my window in them all.

I did change the design slightly because on the original there was a rectangle in the top Right-hand corner with a star design in but I decided to leave that off and personalize mine instead by adding a rectangle on both sides and the words 'Sue’s Kitchen'.

Don’t you just love the little cat popping her head out from behind the Chervil?

The cat reminded me of my own little cat Emily that I had at the time, which was another reason I decided to stitch the kit.

At around the same time I also came across a chart in the magazine Cross Stitcher of some geese and again, the colours were perfect for my kitchen so I stitched that too.

DIMENSIONS - *TREE OF LIFE*

March  1986

I hadn’t realised until I started to write this that I stitched this picture back in 1986, that’s 25 years ago!

The kit was one of my Christmas presents the year before from a little girl, then aged just 6 months old that I used to babysit for and I have to say, she knew me so well when she picked this out for me.

It was a Crewel Embroidery kit, which means the design is printed onto the fabric and worked in wool using a combination of stitches including satin stitch, seed stitch, back stitch, chain stitch, couching and a sprinkling of French knots for good measure. The detail in it is amazing and every time I look at it I see something different.

The finished piece now hangs on the wall in my craft room, a constant reminder of lovely little Sophie and her mum and dad Jenny and Paul who I sadly lost touch with when the couple moved away, divorced and as if that wasn't enough, poor Paul had a breakdown and tried to take his own life.

I often wonder where they all are now and what they might be doing but at least my picture brings memories of happier times.

Caught by the bug

Summer 1981

My first ever recollection of stitching was when I was in infants school, around the age of five. We had a garden shed in the play area that was used as a Wendy House and I was chosen from the class to stitch the Red Gingham curtains that were to be hung in there.

I’ve stitched on and off since then but my real passion for cross- stitching started some 20 years later.

We were on a weekend trip to Yorkshire and had an afternoon visit to Theakston’s Brewery booked. On the way, we stopped off in Masham for some lunch and while we were there we did some exploring and came across the tiniest of shops that was packed to overflowing with all things sewing.

After spending a good thirty minutes experiencing all the delights that were on offer, I finally left the shop the proud owner of two DMC Flower Fairies kits but what I hadn’t realised was that the kits were both counted cross stitch. Up until that point all my embroidery had been worked on pre-printed material but these two kits had to be worked from a graph onto plain fabric.


Well, after what turned out to be months of stitching I finally finished the first of the kits.

The Cherry Fairy wasn’t the neatest piece of stitching I’d ever done if I’m honest, ut it was a new skill and I felt a real achievement when I added the final stitch.

More months of stitching, a little neater this time, and I managed to finishe the Clover Fairy, but with them both completed I now had idea what I was going to do with the two of them.
They didn’t really fit into any of my rooms so I’m ashamed to say that they just sat in my sewing box for the next fifteen or so years.

I just knew that something would come along and that they would eventually be used for a good cause and that’s exactly what did happen.

My good friend Nicki, who lives in Switzerland started making cushions for a charity called Kids Company and I asked her if she could find a use for the two stitched panels.  

She was delighted to take them off my hands and instead of making them into cushions she made these two beautiful quilts.