IHSW June Check-in

Hello dear friends,

It's time to show what I stitched for International Hermit & Stitch weekend . If you don't know what  IHSW is, its a SAL which was started by Joysze at Random Ramblings .Here is how she describes it "International Hermit and Stitch Weekend takes place every 3rd full weekend of each month, from Friday till Sunday. In our very busy and hectic lives, IHSW is a chance for us to squirrel some time away for ourselves and "Hermit and Stitch." It is a time set aside to take care of us and our love for stitching."

Weekend in my part of the world is on Friday & Saturday, so I will be stitching from Thursday to Saturday and post on Sundays whenever I participate in IHSW.

We had a extra long weekend due to Eid holidays from Friday to Monday  . I was a true hermit this time , stepping out of the house only once in 4 days to visit family friends who live 500 m away from our house 😁.
If you think this would have given me a lot of stitching time , oh well this isn't the case. 
Thursday : I sat down on Thursday evening to finish  Eid gift  called "Eidee" to be given next day. After few hours I could clearly see that I wouldn't be able to finish it during the night. 
Friday: It is weekly cleaning day which meant very less stitching time in the day. I decided to visit our family members for Eid on Friday evening without the gift and told them I'm late and will finish it soon. Friday night I sat till midnight to finish the stitching . 
Saturday : Morning I FFOed it with help from Dana's tutorial .  The gift was delivered and appreciated by the recipient.The rest of the day was spent cooking for a pot luck dinner at my place. 
So what is this gift which took me so long... ha ha another small project  .

Dimensions kit : Flower Mason Jar

This is my first cross stitch finish in a hoop and I quite like the result.This Dimension kit was a recent gift from my penpal in USA . I really liked stitching it , the floss was nice and in excess of required quantity .  However, I made many mistakes while stitching it. I had to frog thrice and decided to continue with the two mistakes I made as I was short of time. I guess stitching when you are going thru emotional problems is not such a good idea.

Now about the pot luck dinner ..the dinner was a success , everyone liked the food and there were leftovers which were shared and eaten next day. We played UNO and Tambola with kids which was lot of fun.

You see my cat, Twitch is not used to having kids in the house and associated sounds . She was hiding under the bed the whole time while we had guests. After the guests left, we went to bed at midnight and Twitch came to our bed after a while. She was scared and disturbed and didn't wanted to sleep alone. We have trained her in a way that she never sleeps in our bed. But this time she didn't wanted to leave the bed and wanted to sleep with mommy. It took us two more hours to put her to sleep and sleep ourselves. 
Sunday was a hangover of sleep deprivation .. ha ha which meant no crafting. 
Yesterday we were busy packing for vacation , so I put 10 stitches in my WIP. 😄 

Well I have no regrets of lesser stitching time as I enjoyed spending time for my other hobbies :cooking and travelling.

That my friends is an account of my long IHSW . I fly tomorrow for our vacation in Georgia. There will be no Smalls SAL post this month, I'm shoe horning the finish as my Small SALs entry too.

If you have any tips on how to calm down an elderly cat for a new cat momma, pls leave a comment.

Gifted Gorgeousness SAL June Update

Hello Friends,

It's that time of the month when we show what gifts we have been working on or/and what crafty gifts we have received. If you don't know what I'm talking about , check Jo's blog for more info. This is a easy SAL where you have choice to stitch any designer, color or pattern, just that it should be a gift for someone or gift from someone.

I'm taking a break from finishing a gift to write this post. The gift was supposed to be given today but the amount of back stitching is just killing me . I visited the family today for whom I'm making the gift and told them their gift is late by one day 😩😀

Let me show a gift finished last week back, my first no sew cube finish.

Blackwork Elephant
Anchor Design Studio

Image Courtesy:Rene Bester, taken during WWKIP day

This is a birthday present for a lady in my craft group who loves elephants. I would like to claim extra GG points for this finish- the fabric was a gift from husband; pattern was gift from Jo, the GG SAL hostess herself ; the metallic thread was a gift from Shami. 

I didn't have the called for threads in the pattern except one. I bought a lot of Anchor variegated threads from a shop in my hometown to support the shop which was clearly not in good financial condition. I tried to use the nearest matching threads in my stash with the ones in the pattern . I am very happy with how these piece turned out, I have used metallic floss first time and didn't play chicken with the french knots 😉.

Jo, if you are reading this , may be you should start a point system for the GG SAL😀. It can take into account how a gift shown in the GG post uses gifts received.

When I started stitching the design, I thought of framing it. Failure to find a suitable frame , I turned to YouTube for no sew cube tutorial. I'm surprised how easy and quick this finishing method is . I will be surely making more cubes in future.

That's it for GG post. 

Last Saturday my craft group celebrated Fourth Edition of Kuwait WWKIP day. This time I took a back seat and requested other group members to organize the event. It was a fun event with lucky draws and door prizes. Everyone bought their projects to share and so much talent was on display.

Beautiful brooch like this was given to every attendee

If you wanna read more about it , click the link 

http://www.arabtimesonline.com/wp-content/uploads/pdf/2018/jun/12/20.pdf

You can also visit my fellow Kuwaiti crafter Tammy's blog for more pictures :

http://tsdailytreasures.blogspot.com/2018/06/kip-day-2018.html

Its a 4 day weekend here and I will try to put in stitches in my WIPs whenever I can amidst packing for vacation, hosting a dinner , shopping and sleeping .

How did I do for "Stitch every 'Day' in 'May'"

Hello Friends,
May month has come to an end , I hope 'Maynia' in the cross stitch world has settled down. I have enjoyed looking at the various versions of Maynia . I hope you enjoyed whatever version you followed, after all its about enjoyment right?

My personal goal was to Stitch every 'Day' in 'May'. Many of you commented that stitching daily is a routine and you don't have to make it a goal. I on the other hand sometimes have to push myself hard to get my ass up from the couch and the TV and sit to stitch. I'm pretty happy with the what I achieved during the month, there were initial hiccups but things smoothed after a while.

Let me show you how I did statistically using a pie chart.

And here is the progress on my WIP.

Progress on 28th April 2018

Progress as of 31st May 2018

I made a new start for an upcoming birthday and managed to stitch this much.

New start on 27 May 2018

Can you guess what this is going to be?
I love the color of the variegated thread and blackwork is one of my favourites form of cross stitch/embroidery.

I wish to continue this streak next month but looks difficult as we are travelling to Georgia for vacation . Its hard to carry needles ,scissors , patterns and floss during travel. That's where knitting comes handy ..no scissors, patterns required. It easier to knit when the light is dim or when the road is bumpy.

Let me know in comments how did you do stitching wise this month.

Smalls SAL May Check-in

Hello Friends,

Its last friday of the month , time to show what smalls we stitched during the month. I'm participating first time in Smalls SAL this year hosted by Heather. I decided to join this SAL as I usually stitch birthday cards or exchange pieces throughout the year and this gives me an additional chance to blog.

I didn't stitch any new Smalls this month however I have smalls that were made in past and not shown here on the blog. These tiny gifts were given to my new friend who is an avid traveller . 

Luggage Tag
Stitched in 2016

A luggage tag made from my own imagination.I tried getting fancy pictures with props and maps 😀

Tea Toter
Knitted -Dec 2017
Pattern by Julie Tarsha

This tiny purse can be used to keep tea bags or a coin purse and takes an hour or so to make.

I kitted up a new small yesterday but couldn't start it because of severe headache . Will try and show it for next Smalls post.

That's it for today ,have a good weekend friends.

IHSW May Check-in

Hello dear friends,

It's time to show what I stitched for International Hermit & Stitch weekend . If you don't know what  IHSW is, its a SAL which was started by Joysze at Random Ramblings .Here is how she describes it "International Hermit and Stitch Weekend takes place every 3rd full weekend of each month, from Friday till Sunday. In our very busy and hectic lives, IHSW is a chance for us to squirrel some time away for ourselves and "Hermit and Stitch." It is a time set aside to take care of us and our love for stitching."

Weekend in my part of the world is on Friday & Saturday, so I will be stitching from Thursday to Saturday and post on Sundays whenever I participate in IHSW.

Can you believe its third weekend of May already?This year is flying by so quickly, it needs to stop.
I had a very productive weekend. I stitched to my hearts desire and very happy with the progress I made .
Here is a before, after pic and picture of what the finished piece looks like.

Fabulous Florals 

Designed by : Claire Comerford

Pattern source : The World Of Cross Stitching Magazine, Issue 245

On Thursday I was chatting with a fellow cross stitcher and she asked what I was stitching these days . I replied to her "Flowers again" . I don't know why I have started to believe that there is no variety in my projects. I mostly stitch flowers and I think it is kind of boring. Well I have reasons why I stitch flowers which I have talked about before on my blog. I mainly stitch gifts and the recipients are not big fans of fantasy, Star wars, GOT and they don't have a clue what a sampler is ! So my safest bet is Flowers.

With these thoughts in mind, on Friday I was discussing with my husband can I start a new project which is not flowery ? He said, well you can but didn't you say in your last post that you want to  finish current WIP in a month? Reality check is what was needed 😏😥and I was back to stitching what you see above.

I know many of you have a eclectic taste and stitch wide variety of projects so I ask do you find it boring to see same themed projects in my posts. I wish there were more Indian themed designs other than the peacock, tiger and the elephants 😞.

Do you discuss cross stitch with your partners? What projects to start, how much money to spend on hobbies?

Let me know in comments, interested to read what you ladies think.

Gifted Gorgeousness SAL May Update

Hello Friends,

It's that time of the month when we show what gifts we have been working on or/and what crafty gifts we have received. If you don't know what I'm talking about , check Jo's blog for more info. This is a easy SAL where you have choice to stitch any designer, color or pattern, just that it should be a gift for someone or gift from someone.

My stitchy bug is back and I'm enjoying adding stitches to my main WIP which I'm making for my mother's 60th birthday. I'm trying to keep up with my personal challenge of "Stitch every Day in May". Life is getting busy with changes at work and some days I'm too tired to stitch.

Here is how my WIP "Fabulous Florals" looks like now:

 Fabulous Florals 

Designed by : Claire Comerford

Pattern source : The World Of Cross Stitching Magazine, Issue 245

I have managed to reach the top and left most point of the piece. I have stitched all the stitches of DMC 164 and Anchor 243 , so 2 out of 35 colors are done. I must confess the number of colors and fractionals in this piece scared me in the beginning. The designer seems to be fond of fractionals and the pattern has single stitches of one color spread throughout the design. Some pics to show you progress thru the days:

I will be working for shorter hours for a month starting tomorrow . I work 48 hrs in a week, for the next month it will be 36hrs a week. I have set a target to complete this piece in the month, lets see how it goes.

That's all I have to show for GG post.
I would like to thank you all for the sweet comments on my blog and specially to friends who liked the idea of "Stitch every Day in May" and agreed to participate with me in this challenge.

Happy stitching !

Stitch every 'Day' in 'May'

Dear Friends,

Join me for the challenge Stitch every 'Day' in 'May'. This is my personal challenge as I have been slacking from crafting last month. Well it was a choice to take things easy craft wise.But I miss crafting 😁

Image courtesy:Hands on Design

So I decided to take the challenge to stitch each day in May even if it is for 5 minutes . You see I did this in 2016 and I stitched for 29 days out of 31 that year. I would like to repeat it this year , if not better the record.

Also, I must confess that I'm a bit overwhelmed by the all the posts on Stitch Maynia group on FB about the 18/31/100 new starts people are doing for Maynia 2018. Don't get me wrong , I have nothing against people who like new starts or multiple WIPs. However, I like simplicity of one focus piece and enjoy finishes more than new starts.

Join me if you find it hard to stitch every day due to busy schedule or lack of motivation. The purpose of this challenge is to dedicate time to our hobby.

Use the hashtag #stitcheverydayinmay if you post pictures on IG.

Have a good month friends.