Knitters have balls...

...and so do I :) Remember that cross stitched card with a teddy and a pink blanket I stitched for a little baby daughter of my colleague? I blogged about it HERE. Well, I decided to knit some julekuler in a baby version to complete the hand-made gift :) Last year I spent long months knitting all those 55 Scandinavian balls by Arne & Carlos. Then I had a knitting break until now (except knitting the Easter eggs). I missed my knitted balls on double pointed needles. I thought knitting a girly pink-n-white version could be as much exciting as knitting in red-n-white. I chose motifs that could easily go as kiddy ones too - a butterfly, a heart and a rocking horse. 

I thoroughly enjoyed myself knitting these. The gift was well received and I was pleased to be able to make one :) Would love to knit some more, perhaps in blue, yellow and beige/coffee shades :)

Thank you for your visits and the lovely comments you leave behind x x x

New Baby Cross Stitched Card. A very "stitchy" weekend.

This weekend has been all about cross stitching. Woohoo! Finally, I have finished my cross stitched teddy  and mounted it on a card. I was backstitching it all afternoon yesterday and today I've washed it, ironed it and mounted on the card and embellished the whole thing :) Quite elaborate piece of work considering how many hours have gone into stitching the teddy itself plus how much time I spent today pondering on the card layout and choosing the right stamps! :) Pink gingham paper was a must! - I just love gingham patterns. Cross stitched cards are the most time-consuming types of cards but they are so unique and special in this way. Not bad ;) Pleased with the results.

The card will go to my colleague, who recently has had a baby - gorgeous ginger-haired Millie May. Hope she likes it. 

The cross stitch design comes from Cute Cross Stitch magazine, a newbie on the press market, issue no.1, Spring 2013. The stamps I used to make a tag: Nordic Baby from The Waltzing Mouse Stamps and the punched lacy heart border was made using Martha Stewart punch Heart Border. 

Still on the cross stitch frontline, yesterday a new issue of subscribed Cross Stitcher arrived through the post and since I just loved their added freebie, I started stitching it immediately :) These 3 supa cute retro / folksy flowers are sooooo my style! They will make a set of 3 cross stitched notelets. 

I'm really enjoying stitching them right now!

Speaking of the cute flowers, I have been sooo over the moon when I managed to get hold of these 2 gorgeous sets of stamps:

In a way they are very special for me. These are the stamps by Basic Grey from 2009 - series: Ambrosia Bitsy Bohemia stamps. Very difficult to buy now as they are the retired products. I spotted them being reserved and then bought by someone else in a 2nd hand craft market group on facebook (doh!) and since I'm always on the lookout for the craft products with a unique folky feel, I knew I had to find a set like this for myself too. I scoured the whole internet looking for them and finally some persistent search on ebay made my dream come true :)))) there was one seller in Germany who was still selling them and now I can enjoy card making with these beautiful designs. How lucky I was! My favourites among these sets are naturally the  gorgeous folky butterfly, 2 birds on the branches and a folky medallion with a butterfly inside (two separate stamps).

To finish off with this stampaholic confession, I'm linking up tonight at Hand-made Harbour to do some blog hopping. Hope all you have had a good weekend and enjoyed the last two sunny days. x x

Being thrifty

Just a few random cards I made last weekend using scraps of paper and remaining chipboards. I had a set of papers with diamond jubilee theme and I decided to use them up making cards and notelets.

A baby card for the future baby boy in my bf's family :) I love gingham!

 
and some mini-makes :) a great way to use your scraps and use your favourite mini-stamps

Festive Houses

Hi all and welcome back here again :) Last week was pretty busy for me. Work, gym, home, crafts, work, gym, home, crafts... and so on :) I've been trying to do as much crafting after hours as I could as Christmas is coming soon and I still haven't done my regular Christmas cards! As always I've got a few projects going on at the same time, typical! :) Last Friday I spent hours at my sewing machine making these little festive houses :)

Some pics taken in the garden :)

They came out quite well, what do you think? I tried my best to get my machine stitching as straight and neat as possible :) My mum loved these and she ordered some for herself and my nan so it seems like I'll be making some more in the near future!!! For those who want to know more, this project comes from Cross Stitcher magazine, issue 244, Christmas 2011. The houses were a freebie kit, which provided materials for the first 3 of them, there was also a choice of 6 cross stitch patterns. I made one extra using my imagination :)

Needles to say, I've been also working on my big cross stitch project for the cushion:

There's been some visible progress since I showed it last time, yet plenty remains to be finished. Getting there!!! 

Apart from my big project I've been trying to keep up with my festive linen bunting :) (Doesn't look like bunting at the moment but hopefully it will soon! :P ) So far I've stitched L O V E  C H R I S T M A S

You prolly think the polka dots letters are cute but they are quite fiddly to stitch due to numerous fractional stitches and frequent changing of the thread colour :) Can't wait to see it finished and hanging on the mantlepiece!!!

Today I've made this simple, quick card:

...for a colleague who has recently had her baby, Jay. I didn't want anything excessively fussy or fanciful, rather a simple card, something that is above all...blue and white :) Hope she likes it.... I'm desperate to sit down, lay out my card making toys around and make some proper decent cards but as we are going through a temporary house fix at the moment, some of the bedroom stuff is piled up in our lounge and blocking my card making space for days. Argh!!!

Tonight I'm joining Hand-made Monday at Wendy's. Get clicking chucks to see some lovely crafty creations. I'll be catching up with your blogs tomorrow evening as I am off to my bed in a moment :) (big yaaaaawn!) Back to work tomorrow!

Hello again :)

Hi. I haven't been here a while. Dunno why. Time flies so fast that I found it difficult to get round to posting on my blog. But I'm back. Oh no! I haven't been loafing around though :P I've been busy with my cross stitch projects and here is the outcome of my prolonged blog silence:

This is a hanging decoration with a wedding sampler motif - two folky birds - just as I like it :)  the design is by Joan Elliott and comes from the book "Cross stitched Greeting Cards. 70 Stunning Designs for Every Occasion". Originally, it meant to be a sizeable cross stitched card but I thought a cross stitched cushion like that would be even more eye catching :) It took a while to stitch this one due to large amount of details, which is characteristic of all samplers. but it was worth it, I think. This decoration is going to be sent over abroad to my cousin and her husband to commemorate their wedding day.

The cushion has got a backing fabric in coordinated colours and so is the ribbon :)

Well this is not the end as I've been also stitching these:

 and these:

This is what they looked like a week ago :) There's been some progress and now the stitches look like this:

Now all I need is to iron my stitches, stuff them, sew them up, attach some red beads and enjoy! :) They are going to be a part of Christmas decoration for the mantlepiece. 

In the meantime I also made this card, welcoming my colleague's son into this world:

And I've also started another project - I'm turning some little black metal framed garden lanterns into white christmassy tealight candleholders with some red and white glass painted motifs, Scandinavian ones, of course ;)

The black metalwork has been sprayed with some white gloss paint and now the glass panes are waiting to be painted :) I'm hoping to get round to it soon!

For my crafts I've recently bought some lovely books :D (Gosh, I can't ever resist them, can I?)

My latest "faves" - little booklets with absolutely gorgeous cross stitch designs from Rico Designs:

This book has a wonderful collection of Nordic designs :D Surely, I'm gonna stitch some of them this year!

I fell in love with these wintery blue gloves!

Aren't they gorgeous???

Well, the cherry on the cake among my crafty shopping are these two buys from Sewandso: 2 Christmas table cloths to be stitched. The moment I saw these red prancing reindeers, I knew this table cloth would be mine! Dunno how I'm gonna do this, but I'd love to stitch both for Christmas this year! .... or at least one of them!

Well, I think I'll stop here although there is more to show and brag about :P Let's not forget that it's Handmade Monday at Wendy's so get clicking guys to see some great crafty stuff others have made. I'm joining in tonight. 

Thanks for dropping by and leaving some warm comments behind. x x x