Hello Japan

I've had quite a few books joining my craft bookcase recently so this is going to be another post about a book :P Hope you're not bored to death:P Last Thursday this landed in my mailbox:

 - a parcel from Japan! Inside a quite unusual book in Japanese:

And a lovely piece of origami was attached with a few words of explanation. How cute!

The book is a collection of simple cross stitch motifs - just as I like them!

Here are few exemplary projects to stitch.
A nature-themed and home-themed stitches, lovely in natural greens and browns:

Something for the kitchen:

American style, sort of West Country look: (I love these!)

Rustic stitches for nursery:

There are plenty of botanical motifs in the book:

... in various styles...

Some projects for celebrations, cards and tags:

I spotted a couple of spelling mistakes. It's been pointed to me that the Japanese people are famous for misspelling English words and not paying much attention to it. Well, this book is a perfect proof of it.

Kitchen and food theme again:

Monochromatic samplers. I love simple stitches like these!

Floral borders:

Hearts and wreaths:

Sweet borders for various projects:

All the instructions are in Japanese, which is of course illegible to me. But I'm already familiar with the cross stitch techniques so I'll give these instructions a miss.

Basically this book is divided into 3 parts. 1st part shows the ready stitches, middle part is all about the explanations and how to stitch and the 3rd part is black and white charts for these projects.

I really like this funny Japanese collection of cross stitch patterns. I'm hoping to use some of these designs in my stitching projects in the future. 

3 Cross stitched cards

Hello world :)

Looks like my cross stitching mojo is back, at least for a while. Bored a bit with long months of knitting, I decided not to waste any time and grabbed a couple of little cross stitch projects. They were the stitched motifs for the cards. Supa cute and fun to stitch.

The Japanese kokeshi doll - I'm sentimental about them. My very first cross stitch I took in my hands was just one of these (click here to see it, it was one of those pre-blog times :)). It got me hooked on cross stitching which previously I used to think was boring and patience testing. This one is so sweet - I really enjoyed stitching this little Japanese lady. The extra sewn-on ribbon is an extra cuteness factor, I think :) The project was an add-on to one of the recent issues of Cross Stitcher. 

My other choice was a set of two cross stitched cards with the well-known characters designed by Margaret Sherry :) The cat is so sweet but the back stitching the outlines was a bit of a nightmare LOL Eventually I at some point I gave up following the chart and ended up stitching it my way :)))

The mice in a jacuzzi cup were a bit easier to stitch :) Phew!

And all 3 card altogether. Very pleased with them.

Currently working on my UFOs - a series of Easter cross stitched cards. Not even half way through yet but getting there... :)))

Well, no more news for today. Thanks for any comments you leave on my blog. Much appreciated and pleasure to read.

Buttons, welcome my new follower :)

Oldies from the past: The Cross Stitch Kit That Got me Hooked

Well, this was my first cross stitch kit (a freebie in a CrossStitcher issue) which got me hooked. A Japanese Kokeshi Doll I noticed in a shop window as I was passing by one boring and rainy afternoon. It was perfect and I knew Mom-mom (my bf's Nan) would love it. Cute and full of vibrant colours.  It immediately caught my attention. Then I thought: Hey! Why not? Let's give it a go and see how I'll be doing with my stitching... So I tried and... got addicted. I made it into a card for Mother's Day. With this little cute cross stitch kit my new hobby had arisen - cross stitching. Funnily enough, I had never been interested in cross stitch as such. I even thought it must be very boring and painstaking to sit and stitch on and on for hours while your threads are getting all tangled up and a knot follows a knot. I thought I would not have enough patience to do this and guess what! Now, I find it relaxing, to snuggle up in a blanket on the sofa with a needle in one hand and a project in the other. Sometimes I dream of nothing more than that! See? This is all about the change in attitude :) And this is how it all began :)

Japanese-themed cards

Recently I’ve made 8 oriental-themed cards. They are birthday cards, thank-you cards as well as Mothers’ Day cards. The latter two have already been gone as they were given away on The Mother’s Day :)

I used Japanese-themed papers and chipboards and stamps to achieve this oriental air.

And this is what the whole batch of cards looks like: