More stitching

So the stitching bug is really starting to come back. Last week I found a Sashiko kit that has been around for a while. The little straight stitches helped to soothe what was a very stressful week.



And in a very handy coincidence, it fits with the Monochrome May theme of Theme-a-licious 2013.


Most of this past weekend was spent stitching on the Paisley 1930s panel of the Great Scottish tapestry project. As the deadline for completion draws close, I brought the panel home with me to stitch on. I made a lot of progress and completed the central female figure.



The whole panel looks like this.



I'm really looking forward to seeing the finished panel hanging with all the others in the Scottish Parliament in August.

Last week was stressful for 2 very different reason. Firstly I was waiting to see if I had passed my most recent MSc module. Thankfully I have. The second reason was that the police made an arrest in the hunt for the man who killed my Uncle and finally at the end of the week, a man was charged with murder. The next few months are going to difficult but I'm much more hopeful we will get justice for my uncle.

March Madness progress

Really can't quite believe that March is over already.  What has made it particularly unbelievable is the very wintery weather.  Scotland doesn't have the best weather but snow at the end of March is fairly unusual and it snowed most days last week.

March has been a pretty good month for craft progress.

First, of course, was Autumn Queen.  I had hoped for more stitchy progress but my hands are causing me a few problems at the moment again.



Knitting wise I finished these very bright socks which are very much in keeping with the neon clothes in the shops just now.  I'm having flash backs to 1984 when I go into a clothes shop just now. I wore a lot of neon then including some very bright tights - my school had a very strict brown uniform but no one thought to specify colour of the tights we wore.




There has been a little bit of a jewellery product line going on.

Lots of bracelets



Some assorted other stuff



There are a couple of more jewellery bits but as they are for gifts, I can't share just yet.

April's theme is Amazon April - to work on your biggest projects.  I have a more than few things that fit into that.  I'm planning to work on my long term sock yarn left over blanket.  Also I think some of my long term Chatelaine projects might need some attention.

March Madness happy dance

Life continues on at a fast pace just now. Work and studying are keeping me pretty busy.  Thankfully I am still managing to get some time to other things.

The big news is that I've been stitching and I managed to finish Autumn Queen finally. Its stitched on Autumn sunset cashel linen by the Blended needle.





I started stitching her in 2001.  The fabric had to be resent initially as the first fabric order got lost in the transatlantic postal chaos immediately after 9/11 as it was first dispatched on 10th of September.  It got set aside for newer projects again and again and in favour of my knitting projects. At the start of this year, I decided it was time to finish her finally.

This month's theme-a-licious theme is March madness. I've decided to use this to see how many things I can finish this month and I'm including any sort of crafty project.  The Autumn Queen finish gets this off to a good start.

January crafty progress

January has been as it always is, a busy month.  Britain has been slammed with snow which has, in an unusual turn of events, almost completely missed my part of Scotland.  I am very pleased about that as whilst snow is fairly common here, the public transport doesn't cope well with it.

Knitting progress has continued this month with two finishes so far.

Baker Street mittens in Old maiden aunt BFL aran in Royal



Karise in Wollmeise sock yarn Fritzi frizzante



Both of these designs are by the very talented Karina aka Kariebookish and you can see more of her designs on her blog -  http://www.fourth-edition.co.uk/knitting-crochet-patterns/ and also on Ravelry.

I've also been stitching a little and made some progress on a couple of projects.  Today I even finished this little needlepoint kit.



I've also been making a little jewellery - these are for the bridesmaids of a colleague who is getting married in a few weeks.



The other positive thing is that I passed the 2nd module of the MSc I am working on which means I can move on to module 3 next week.

2013 plans and themes

This year, I'm hoping to stitch a lot more. I am going to join with Heather's theme-a-licious themes again. Again the graphic for this year really swung it for me - how could I resist the lovely David Tennant as the Doctor.



Stitching wise, I hope to finish Autumn Queen and Japanese Octagon box, which are both long term WIPs and I think this is pretty realistic. Anything else is a bonus.

Knitting wise, I think it might be a year of cardigans and socks. Some of my previously knit socks are a little worn and I have a lot of sock yarn so that seems like a perfect match. I've worn the Stevie cardigan I knitted last year a lot and my wardrobe really needs more cardigans for the somewhat variable temperatures at work. I also want to get more comfortable with colour work this year.

Life goals for the coming year are fairly simple - continue with the MSc and the job and have more fun. I'm hoping that my Internet dating journey results in finding someone special and I'm currently working on that.