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Sunday 29 December 2013

Christmas Baking Adventures!

Our Christmas baking adventures! I almost forgot to tell you guys about this!

I've always admired gingerbread houses but I have never made them before because it looks so hard. But this year we were looking through cookbooks and found one and I didn't think it looked that hard!

Oh how wrong we were!! We started looking and then went shopping for lollies and stuff to make the dough.

We made the dough then realised it needed to sit in the fridge for 2 hours.

We rolled out the dough and cut out the pieces then had to move them to the trays without breaking them... it sometimes worked!

Then we baked them and let them cool.

Once they were cool we made the royal icing from scratch and started to ice it with make shift piping bags because mum couldn't find the real ones.

We then realised it had to set before we could actually build it into a house.

This whole process took a day and we still weren't finished. I actually collapsed the next day and vegetated I was SHOT!!!!

But come sunday we put it all together and drum roll please!




 The proud decorators... they helped all the way through and loved eating it on Christmas day!



It's very wonky and has been decorated by a 7 and 9 year old but it was extremely yummy and full of good sugars!

That was all the Christmas baking I could handle!

Happy Baking,
Caitlin

Friday 27 December 2013

Last WIPocalypse 2013

I've been really bad and forgotten all about the WIPocalypse. With my life going stupid this year is was much better forgetting about it. But I figured I did need to sum up my achievements or lack thereof! I haven't done a WIPOCALYPSE post since APRIL!!!! I'm well overdue then!

I'll start with the easy ones. I've already taken pictures of these.

'99 is no longer on my list. It was going to be a gift for my partner instead I handed the partial work to my friend who showed interest and the pattern and she is finishing it in time. It will be hers. 

Maskerade Pale Dawn
It was only just started in April. I'm still loving this piece especially since I got my millenium frame to hold it tightly!
Now it looks like this :D


Quite a bit of work considering how little I've actually worked on it! I have done more than I showed you last night I did another 100 stitches today :D and undid one colour too as the last one I put in last night was one two high.

I want to have a page finish by the end of next year maybe two. Any more is a bonus. It is easy to work on when I start fiddling.

Afternoon Tea

Last time I showed you this.

I've done a little bit more but nothing near what I expected to be at!


I did hope to be finished the top row by the end of the year but that plan bit the dust... Maybe by the end of next year!!

Winter Fairy
I really haven't done much on this one.


I haven't done much more. I bought what I thought would be the right size millennium frame and its too small because when they cut the fabric they didn't cut it evenly! There is a 2 inch difference between top and bottom and silly me didn't measure both sides. But I think Baroque will fit but I haven't started that one. An excuse to start another project! Now I have all three projects on millenium frames the afternoon tea

As you can see I have made some progress with all my pieces but I haven't done as much as I would have liked. My life kinda changed a lot this year.

But better plans next year. I'm going camping for a couple of days tomorrow so I probably won't respond for a while. Have fun and Happy New Year!

Caitlin

Friday 20 December 2013

Being Organised ...

I'm not what you could call the most organised of people. I seem to crave organisation to function well but can never manage to be organised to do it.

I am trying to avoid writing an assignment very diligently so am actually managing to organise other stuff. Kinda... I may just be making more of a mess... It is technically meant to be organising my patterns but ... I don't know how well it's working!

I took my collection of World of Cross Stitching and had a look inside and realised how many patterns I like and how many I really don't. So I pulled out the staples, cut the magazines down the centre (not as easy as it sounds.) and started organising the patterns. I pulled out all the filler pages and then organised the patterns into keep and don't keep. The keep pile was quite high but so was the don't keep. Some patterns I liked went in the don't keep because I can truly never see myself stitching them.

Then comes the fun part. I bought a pile of display folders and sorted the patterns. They aren't sorted by designer except my Joan Elliott Collection. I love her patterns though I haven't stitched many of them. So now I have to go through the rest of my magazines and then I'm going to have a big giveaway. I have a couple of piles of cut out patterns that I no longer want that I think someone must want somewhere. They are gorgeous patterns I just won't stitch them.

So when I get all my stuff sorted into folders I will be having a pass on giveaway and pass on a whole pile of patterns to other people. Just because I won't stitch them doesn't mean someone else won't! That will be in the new year though before I get them all sorted. I have to go through a few magazines... and other stuff.

 I've got eight folders like this. I had to add more pages to most of them. It's interesting what I like and what I don't
 The cross stitch gold magazines are a pain! They are wider than a normal magazine so they won't fit in the folders I have to cut down the patterns. Annoying! Also annoying because I had a lot of Joan Elliott patterns in them.
Here is my pile of giveaway patterns. I've got to sort them into rough categories so that will take time. I also need to ask a couple of my friends here to look through them so hopefully I'll have less to post around.

I've just handed in my assignment for the first unit so hopefully I'll have time this weekend for actual stitching :D
Happy Stitching
Caitlin




Monday 16 December 2013

Almost finished doily

I have almost finished the doily. I only have the butterflies to finish. I have done one but I have another five to go.

I'm loving how it has turned out, the colours are beautiful :D





The butterfly looks gorgeous laid on the edge. The problem is it takes ages to make just one butterfly as it's in 5 parts. I was debating giving it as a gift but I don't know whether I love it too much. 

Happy Stitching, 
Caitlin 


Giveaway Winner!

I numbered all the comments and then ran a random number generator and here is my result.
So the winner is BEAUTY BONNET!!!!!

Please send me an email and your pattern will be winging it's way to you :D

To everyone else that entered I have a special prize as well. I have a special Mrs Claus chart that I'm going to give to everyone that entered. Thank you for supporting my blog!

Happy Stitching Everyone!
Caitlin


Thursday 12 December 2013

Secret Santa

Well I had craft group on Wednesday and it was decided we had to bring something worth roughly $5 to exchange. Sadly there were only 3 people actually there so for the last week we didn't have much of a party! But I had a lot of fun though I didn't feel like stitching much.

I don't really have any progress on anything much to show but hopefully I will soon. I will show you what I made for a gift though. I kind of got the idea from the Just Cross Stitch Christmas Magazine this year with the gingerbread cupcake. But I didn't have a fancy stitchable cupcake mold so I had to glue it in.




A couple of different angles there! I made the top look like icing and sprinkles with some french knots thrown in. I followed my imagination there wasn't any pattern. It was fun to do but awful to glue in place. I had to hold it for 30 minutes to let the glue dry.

The cording was fun to do it's the pink and green I used spun together and then folded in half. I like the effect of this and for something I was experimenting on it's pretty amazing I think. Though I'm also not rushing out to make another one any time soon!! Too much effort though I might make one with one of my patterns... maybe??

I should have a crochet update if nothing else in the next couple of days as I'm getting closer to a partial finish.
Happy Stitching,
Caitlin


Tuesday 10 December 2013

Ooops I forgot!

Oh no! I was looking through my crazy January page trying to update it and couldn't find photos anywhere! Then I realised I probably forgot to post updates when I finished or worked on some of my projects while so stressed out through work! I wasn't in the best mind frame!

So I finished the RED gingerbread man!
 He's all ready for me to work out how to finish him entirely.

 I'm also well on the way with the Blue guy. I don't work on these much they tend to be my portable projects as they don't have many colours. So they live in my car!
I also never posted a photo of the green one up on the crazy January page so I have done that now! I'm so behind in dates and times it's not funny!


I also finished another of the Joan Elliott ornaments its the circle house. I will need to finish a pile of designs from this one though to be able to finish them entirely so I'm not sure what I'm doing with this yet!

Lets hope I can get some more finished before CHRISTMAS! It's coming up toooooo fast!

Happy Stitching,
Caitlin

Monday 9 December 2013

Small Finish and a giveaway extension!


I managed a small Christmas finish yesterday in the midst of an absolutely crazy weekend. You can get my Santa pattern here.

I had 2 performances last weekend plus all the rehearsals. It was kinda crazy. Just one more performance left and then I have a break until next year which I'm looking forward to. Everything will be taking a break including softball.

So I have been working on Santa and I managed to finish him despite the lack of motivation and having to do a couple of exams.

Oh I don't think I've mentioned this yet. I got accepted into a dual diploma course business and management. I'm taking a step away from teaching and we shall see where it leads. As I told my grandma yesterday I want to eventually run my own craft shop but what form that shop takes I'm not sure. I don't know whether I will just run workshops for kids or have a full shop with a cafe attached. There are lots of options and I'm throwing them all around at the moment. Nothing is happening quickly I need experience first and everything I'm doing is testing the waters and moving in that direction.

But back to Santa I finished stitching him yesterday morning I think but only now getting the time to post.

 Doesn't he look SOOOOO cute! To understand the size they are only about 2 inches high. I'm going to turn these into some sort of Christmas quilt hanger or something. I'm not sure exactly what!


 
 L and C were looking for something to do so they both picked up some sort of stitching. L is doing her cross stitch Sampler while C is doing a tapestry style star. He is getting better since I put him on Plastic canvas. I will update with their work soon.

I've also been working on things that aren't my designs. I'm loving the way this one is turning out but I'm so out of practice working on evenweave! I've been working a lot on aida recently.

GIVEAWAY NEWS!
Ohk for those that made it this far I'm giving a couple more days to get an entry into my giveaway. It's a couple of posts back. I understand the silly season means noone has time to keep up to date so I'm giving some more chances to get an entry in. You have until Friday your time to post your entry!!!

Happy Stitching!
Caitlin

Friday 6 December 2013

Please don't forget my giveaway!

Well I have one person who is going to receive something for my giveaway as that is all the people entered!
You have until sunday to enter on the previous post! Please do!


I have been stitching a little tiny bit. Not much though. I have been caught by the crochet bug. I'm technically stitching a doilie but since the pattern asks me to stitch with a 1mm hook and #20 crochet thread and I'm stitching with a 3mm hook and 4 ply I think it will be a little bit bigger than I thought!

It's looking gorgeous though with the rainbow colours.

I had to spread it out on the floor because it won't fit anywhere else for the photo. It's no longer a doily it is a table cover. There are still 5 rows to go then I will be adding butterflies to the edge!

Happy Stitching,
Caitlin

Sunday 1 December 2013

Carolers and a Giveaway!


So I now have some carolers in my shop and to celebrate having so many awesome designs up finally! I want to do a special giveaway on my blog.



You have the chance to win the pattern of your choice from my etsy store.

To enter:
1. Visit my store and pick your favourite design.
2. Post about this Giveaway on your blog
3. Reply on this post with your choice and a link to your blog post.


ETA:
I HAVE extended until FRIDAY the 13th your time. SO I will wait until ALL of Friday around the world has finished before drawing!


Happy Stitching and Enjoy!
Caitlin

Angel Wings

I was bored yesterday afternoon and decided to try out my Angel Wings pattern. I picked the wings I liked the best and started stitching. I found an issue with the pattern with the skin colour. I had an outline around the face but it made her look like she had a beard. So I changed that and I added a bit of sparkle to the wings and replaced the yellow with gold sparkle because sparkle is always better.

Then I spent yesterday afternoon after I finished the pattern fixing up my listing. So that the pattern is now correct!

But without further ado here is my finished angel.
 
 For the wings I blended one strand of silver in with the ecru to make the sparkle without overpowering.
I'm almost finished the carolers pattern then I will plan a giveaway :D
Happy Stitching!
Caitlin



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