Sampler Lovers Blog

The Tablet Sampler and Bathurst

2012-02-01T12:30:00.015+11:00

My goodness, it is ages since I posted. My Sister kept asking me when was I going to post again lol. But as always there have been a lot of things going on in my life. Christmas, School Holidays for 6 weeks etc. etc. Internet problems thrown into the mix.

First off, please excuse the following photos of the Tablet Sampler. My computer seems to have gone crazy when I uploaded these ones. I had to disconnect the camera from the computer and hope that the one above didn't go sideways as well. But thankfully it is ok.

It doesn't look like I have made that much progress on The Tablet Sampler, but actually I have done quite alot. The 4th Commandment was very long winded and went on and on like the 3rd one.

I decided when I finally finished it that I would take a journey down the bottom to see how that came out. The bottom is really stunning. I don't know if you can see, but the white flower in the corner is filled in with just all stem stitch going around and around like a finger print. It is quite stunning. Also the blue flower besides it is also filled in in stem stitch.

If you are thinking of doing The Tablet, be aware that this is a very big sampler. You need more than a fat quarter and don't do as I did and under estimate the size of it length wide. See where the tacking thread is down the bottom. That is where the sampler comes to when it is finished. I will have about half an inch left over the play around with when I frame it. But, it could have been worse. I could have ended up with nothing at all and I think that you would have heard me crying all over the place.

These flowers along the sides that remind me of Edelweiss are all satin stitch as are some of the little pom pom type buds.

While doing the verse one day, I got quite bored with it and I thought that I would start my next sampler to give myself a little break from it all. This is my start on Rebecca Cullin by The Scarlet Letter. Another sampler that I have been in love with for ages. Sorry this one is on its side as well.

I also started doing Susan Rambo. I thought that I would start this one in the middle as I really loved the duck. This one is on 40ct Meadow Rue. My dear friend Tanya from The Scarlet House very kindly sent me this piece of material last year when I first saw Susan as I have a lot of trouble getting the lovely hand dyed fabrics that a lot of people are able to get.

I thought that I would show you some photos of Bathurst that I took over the Christmas/New Year period. My Father and my Sister came up to stay for a few days and on one of the days they were here, we went for a lovely drive to Bathurst which is about an hour and 15 minutes away from Katoomba. Bathurst is a really lovely country town.

Bathurst is actually the oldest inland town in Australia. It was the gateway to the gold fields and there are a lot of Victorian buildings there. I loved these ones on the corner near the Station.

By the way if you are into Hatch and Patch products by Anni Downs. This is where her shop is.

Unfortunately we didn't go there as they were shut over the Christmas period.

Here are a few of the lovely buildings. The old Court House.

This used to be the old Post Office, but is now Bathurst's Music Centre and also Historical Centre.
This is the beautiful park in the centre of the City.

While we were there we went for a drive over to the train station to see this old steam train. We thought that my Father would enjoy seeing it and in the last few years it has been restored and is now on display outside the railway station

This train was the steam locomotive that one of Australia's former Prime Ministers, Ben Chifley 1942-45 before he got into Politics.

My Father's Grandfather was also a steam train driver and Ben Chifley used to be his fireman when he was a young man. It is quite possible we think that my Gr Grandfather also drove this locomotive as he taught Ben to drive an engine. That is my youngest son btw.

Well, that is about it. I'm sorry if I haven't left any comments on blogs lately. I have been having a lot of trouble leaving them for some reason. As I said earlier, I have been having a lot of problems with our internet and we had to get a new piece that was our internet/telephone set up. Hopefully things will go back to normal soon.

Thank you for stopping by. Hopefully I won't take so long next time to post again.

Michelangelo When Will You Be Done

2011-11-03T09:30:00.017+11:00

This is what I kept telling myself while doing the Second Commandment lol. The quote is from an old movie called The Agony and The Ecstasy about my favourite Sculptor Michelangelo. I have also read the book.

The line is when Michelangelo (Charlton Heston you'll get the connection in a minute) was working on one of his incredible creations The Sistine Chapel. Pope Julius II (Rex Harrison) kept coming in and asking him this question.

The Charlton Heston connection is that he played Moses of course in the movie The Bible. In this sampler there are 2 really long Commandments that go on and on - The Second and the Fourth Commandments. Thankfully these are the only two. All the rest are short in comparison. I am about to do the Third one which is 3 rows long.

I have really been enjoying working on the floral border. It is really lovely and such a change from continually working over one. But I suppose when you think of it The Agony and The Ecstasy also applies to this sampler as well.

Over the past couple of weeks we have been plagued with Bushfires. The first lot were a few weeks ago in Leura and Katoomba when I was staying with my Father. My poor DH who is in the Rural Fire Service was called out quite a few times to help put these fires out.

What is really upsetting is that all of these fires and there were a lot of them at the time scattered all over these 2 towns were deliberately lit. Two of the fires were very close to where I live. One was down the end of the Street and the other a Street away. The Police think that there were a few morons lighting these fires. The caught a 19 and a 14 year old and they are now before the Courts. The 19 year old will most probably go to jail.

Last Monday they struck again in Katoomba. Down at Echo Point. If you scroll down to a previous post on 7 May you will see photos of Echo Point in all it's glory. In the photo above you can see one really lucky house. The fire came right up to it. This house was selling earlier in the year for around 3 million dollars I think and then further in the distance you can see Katoomba Skyway. There is a Cable Car that comes from one side of the Valley to the other.

The fire came right up to the road

This is a 5 Star Hotel called Lilianfels. Thankfully the RFS and the NSW Fire Brigade were able to stop the fire jumping across the road and destroying this Hotel and the one next to it called Echoes. Another beautiful hotel.

This is the back of Lilianfels. You can literally go out the gate, cross the road and then go and get lost in the wilderness lol.

This would have to be one of the most luckiest people in Katoomba. I don't know if you can see it, but at the top of the hill, there is a house and the fire surrounded it.
Through the wonderful efforts of all involved, they only lost one shed. Which is totally amazing. There was supposed to be a very strong Southerly blow in and thankfully the winds that were supposed to be with it, didn't arrive. The next day the weather was wet and misty which helped to put the fire out. We had a couple of helicopters dropping loads of water onto the fire which also helped. But a lot of the times when there are fires up here and they burn down the face of cliffs they are really hard to put out as there are caves and overhanging rocks which protect the fires making them hard to put out.

In other exciting news my second DS and his lovely girlfriend got engaged on Friday night. So we have had a exciting week lol. They are planning on getting married probably in January 2013.

It is raining here again today. But I believe that the really hot weather is coming on the weekend. I like the warm weather, but not when it gets sticky. One good thing about living in the Mountains is that we don't get the Humidity and thankfully we are able to sleep at night.

Before I go, thank you for stopping by. I hope that you have a lovely weekend.

Not On Your Nelly

2011-10-14T10:43:00.008+11:00

My goodness, it is a long time since I posted isn't it? Well, lot of things have happened and for a couple of weeks I didn't do any sewing as for one I left my glasses down at my Son's house and had to wait to get them back and also I have been quite ill with a Lower Respiratory Tract Infection and for a while I really didn't feel like sewing. But more on that later.

You maybe wondering why there is a dog on the blog. Well, this is the lady of the house (or she thinks she is) Sally. Today in the Mountains, it is very overcast and misty at times. We also have light rain. Sally is the only sensible one in the whole house today. She got up had a look outside and then looked at me as if to say "Not on your Nelly, I'm not going out there", and went back to bed and is curled up there happily snoring away lol.

Anyway, on to more important things. This is my current piece. It is called The Tablet Sampler by The Scarlet Letter. For some reason I have always like Tablet Samplers and have a few photos of them. I think that this one is really lovely and I know that I have a lot of work ahead of me with the 10 Commandments over one. But I have decided to break them up and do pieces of the floral border and a Commandment or two depending on the size and then it shouldn't be to bad.

The Tablet Samplers always remind me of my visits to one of my favourite places England. On a couple of my visits we went into some of the Churches all over the place and I remember seeing the wonderful Tablets on the wall. Some of them were really lovely. In the Church of England Churches in Australia, most of them have the Tablets on the wall, but they put the Hymn No's, etc, that are going to be sung during the Service.

The angels face is all over one and I quite enjoyed sewing it. I am about to attempt another large flower and probably when I finish that I will go and do the first Commandment. I am planning on doing the left side first and then going over and doing the right side.

This is the next in the special Stacy Nash series that my LNS has. Because it is a bit overcast the colours look a bit different from what they should be. It is a really lovely piece though and only took me a day or two (probably two lol) to do.

I have been putting all my pinkeeps in this bowl. Now all I need is the sewing room to put them in. Yeah right. Fat chance.

One of the reasons that I haven't posted is that I have been staying with my Dad for 3 weeks while my Sister and my youngest Son went to England. They had a wonderful time and my Son now has the travel bug and is saving up to go again. Maybe, the pair of them will go again. I know that my Sister will lol. She is the Jet setter in the family.

My Sister loves going to Portobello road and while there she bought me this really beautiful Victorian Locket. I collect Lockets and Cameo's. It is really beautiful.

While staying with my Father, I had a wonderful day with one of my Aunts. The pair of us headed off to a wonderful Bead shop in Sydney called Bead Them Up and it was like walking into a wonderful lolly shop. It's a shop where a girl can do serious damage to ones credit card lol.

I bought a beautiful string of aquamarines and also one of tiny pearls and my Victorian Locket is now hanging off it.

I also love coral and I bought myself a lovely string of red coral and have had many lovely comments about it every time I wear this. For some reason though the photo is a bit strange, sorry.

While away, my Sister took my Son to some of our favourite places to visit. He has bought everybody presents, but they are Christmas presents. He did bring me back the tour guide to
Buckingham Palace and I have enjoyed looking through it. I have also enjoyed looking at the book on The British Museum. I know that he really enjoyed going there and he also loves History and has got a lot out of it. He loved his visit to Buck Palace and has been telling me about the wonderful things that he saw there. He even saw The Dress and told me that I would have really loved to see it.

Well, I guess that I have waffled on long enough so I had better get on and do what I was doing. I hope that you have a wonderful weekend and thank you for dropping by.

Anne Grant Is Finished

2011-08-16T09:13:00.006+10:00

I am sorry that I have been MIA again. There has been a lot of illness again in my house. We have been all battling the Flu and some of us have had serious bouts of it. My DH ended up with Pneumonia and one of my Sons ended up in Hospital as well with it. He was smart though. He went to the Hospital where they put him on a drip straight away with the anti-biotics in it. My DH went the other way and went to the Doctors. After nearly 3 weeks off from work, 5 trips to the Doctors and Chest Xrays. He is starting to feel better. My Son spent a few hours in Hospital and had a week off work. I think he took the best option. But you know men!!!!!!!!!!

The best thing though lol, is that my DH has told my youngest Son and myself not to go giving him the Flu as he has been told to keep right away from it all. Excuse me. Who gave it to us in the first place.

Remember in my previous post I told you about a very special Stacy Nash Club that my LNS was having. This is the second piece in the series. Isn't it beautiful. I really love it. I notice though that Stacy has bought other pieces out in design. It would be lovely to have them all. I think the flowers are different though in the Pin piece that she has brought out for general release. I think she must have loved this design.
This is the 2 Pin Keeps that are out so far.

Last month was my Mother's 81st birthday and it just seem appropriate to do this special Pin Keep. This is a "freebie" that is on the Pattern Mart website and the Design is by Pineberry Lane.

I also did this one as well. I thought that the verse was lovely. This is also a "freebie" and is by one of my favourite Designers - Needlework Press. The verse is:-

The only everlasting flower is virtue;

The only lasting Treasure Truth.

Also I was fortunate to win this wonderful velvet carrot and book on the Middle Tennessee Samplers on Carmen's blog called Cardan Antiques and Needlework There was also a packet of one of my favourite little flowers called Love In The Mist, but because I live in Australia and I knew that they wouldn't get through our Customs, I asked Carmen to give them to somebody else. Carmen very graciously sent me this wonderful collection of her designs. I have been a follower of Carmen's ever since she started blogging and I had long admired her designs especially 2 of them - Jane Thomas and Philadelphia Botting. I love Philadelphia Botting's name. Probably because I have discovered that I have a GGG Grandmother called Philadelphia Stevenson which is a bit of a mouthful lol. Wonderful name though.

The bush around where I live is looking really lovely. All the Wattle is out and it is glorious. I am waiting for the winds to come to blow all the pollen everywhere. My grey car usually ends up looking yellow. I am so looking forward to the arrival of Spring. We have had some lovely weather over the last few days. But unfortunately the rain is on it's way. I'm wondering if we will get any of the cold snowy weather that New Zealand is experiencing at the moment. That is unbelievable.

Before I go, I would like to thank you for stopping by and saying Hi. I love reading all of your comments.

I'm Still Here

2011-06-15T11:43:00.005+10:00

First up I want to apologize for the photos. It is as my DH calls a "Baby Weather" sort of day - wet and windy lol. It is one of those very dark grey, misty, wet and very windy sort of days. You get the picture lol. One of those days where it is good to be inside. I suppose you could call it bleak, but it isn't good for taking photos.

I haven't been blogging, but I still have been stitching. I have been plodding along on Ann Grant plus another sampler. Here is my progress on Ann and the end is very near. I just have to do a little bit more around the house along with finishing off the lawn plus the rest of the border and she will be finished. Ann and I have had a few moments along the way where she has nearly been in the fire, but I have pressed on with her and I will be glad when she is finished. She is really a beautiful sampler and I think I would have regretted her going in with the wood to keep me warm lol. But there were a few times when I was very tempted.

I thought that I would show you one of my Mother's Day presents from my children. It is a very special Stacy Nash piece that my LNS has. It is one of those special Stacy Nash Clubs and my LNS is the only shop to have this piece along with a few more that are coming. One is in the mail as we speak. Isn't it lovely. I did this a few days after they gave it to me which set on off on a Stacy Nash kick.

This is the Schoolgirl Pinkeep Drum. I already have it, but decided to make it a bit different by not doing the Peacock that goes on top.

I love this little piece. It is the Robin Pinkeep. I also have the Bluebird. I just have to sit down and do it.

I was also fortunate to win this lovely little booklet on Julie and Becky's lovely blog A Note Of Friendship I just noticed that there is more on the lovely story of Pandora. I have been enjoying reading this story so I should go off and read it.

Nothing much else to report. You know the old saying. No news is good news lol. My DH's leg is a lot better thank goodness, but it still lets him know that it is there.

Thank you for stopping my. I really enjoy meeting everybody who leaves a comment.

A Beautiful Day In The Mountains

2011-05-07T22:38:00.013+10:00

I must warn you that this is a picture heavy post. I don't have any stitching to show today as I haven't been doing much lately, so I thought that I would show you where I live. All photos are clickable and will enlarge to see better.

Today was such a beautiful sunny day in The Blue Mountains. The sun was shining (instead of raining), the birds were singing and I went for a walk down to Echo Point in Katoomba. Echo Point is always busy with tourists who come up either for a few days holiday or just for the day. Katoomba is about 2 hours drive from Sydney. It is a place that always has a lot of tourist buses. People from all over the world are always coming here. It is a very interesting place to just sit sometimes and do some "people watching".

Above is the famous Three Sisters. The Three Sisters have a very interesting story:-

The Aboriginal dream-time legend has it that three sisters, 'Meehni', 'Wimlah' and Gunnedoo' lived in the Jamison Valley as members of the Katoomba tribe.

These beautiful young ladies had fallen in love with three brothers from the Nepean tribe, yet tribal law forbade them to marry.

The brothers were not happy to accept this law and so decided to use force to capture the three sisters causing a major tribal battle.

As the lives of the three sisters were seriously in danger, a witchdoctor from the Katoomba tribe took it upon himself to turn the three sisters into stone to protect them from any harm. While he had intended to reverse the spell when the battle was over, the witchdoctor himself was killed. As only he could reverse the spell to return the ladies to their former beauty, the sisters remain in their magnificent rock formation as a reminder of this battle for generations to come.

They are 922, 918 and 906 metres tall, respectively. That's over 3000 feet above sea level! The Nepean isthe area below the Mountains.

In case you were wondering why The Blue Mountains are blue, it is because it is densely populated by oil bearing Eucalyptus trees. The atmosphere is filled with finely dispersed droplets of oil, which, in combination with dust particles and water vapour, scatter short-wave length rays of light which are predominantly blue in colour.

This is the new platform that was built a few years ago for easy access to viewing this truly beautiful place.

I don't know if you can see in this photo a rocky formation that is called The Ruin Castle.

The Valley where the Three Sisters and the above photos is called The Jamieson Valley on the other side of the this photo is Megalong Valley.

If you are lucky enough when you go to Echo Point sometimes there is this lovely young Aboriginal man playing the Didgeridoo. It is a magical experience to hear this beautiful instrument being played down here. By the way he is in full Aboriginal garb. Bit chilly though on a cool day.

This is a very special monument that was erected to remember the Convict Labour who built the road through the Mountains. If they worked the way the 2 men in the front worked it would have been very hard as they are wearing chains. There are 2 Convicts, 1 Soldier and 2 Aboriginal onlookers. They built the road from Sydney to Bathurst.
All the trees in the Mountains are showing their Autumn colours. It is really pretty here at the moment.
The building ahead is part of Lilianfels Hotel, a 5 star hotel. This is the actual Lilianfels which was the home of Sir Frederick Darley who was Chief Justice and Lieutenant-Governor. The house was built in 1889. It is now a Restaurant.
I hope you enjoyed seeing photos of this truly beautiful place. This is just one small piece of it. All the towns that form The Blue Mountains are surrounded by views such as this. Each one is beautiful in its own way.

Thank you for dropping by. I hope that you have a wonderful weekend and Happy Mother's Day. I hope this day will be special for you.

Update on Queen Mary's Rug

2011-04-20T11:18:00.007+10:00

I don't know if you remember, a few years ago I posted a few photos from a book that I have that had belonged to one of my Great Grandmothers and it was about Queen Mary

Among the photos there was a really interesting story about how Queen Mary started working on this beautiful Needlepoint Rug. She worked on it from 1941 until 1950. When she finished it she decided to give it to the Nation so that funds could be raised to help the war effort. I thought that you might be as interested as I was to see this stunning rug. I would really love to see it in person, but that isn't possible. Canada is a long way from Australia.

The above photo is of Queen Elizabeth (I think she was still Queen at this time and hadn't become the Queen Mother) and Princess Margaret looking at this amazing rug.

Here she is stitching in the Garden. Only a very regal Queen would sit in the garden dressed this way I am sure.

Today, some very kind person has sent me a link to see this wonderful rug in colour. I would like to say Thank You. I really appreciate it as I have always wondered what it looked like in all its glory. Isn't it beautiful.

The rug is in the National Gallery of Canada and because of its fragile nature apparently isn't on show.

Click onto this link to read all about this beautiful rug and how it ended up being in Canada. http://cybermuse.gallery.ca/cybermuse/search/artwork_e.jsp?mkey=3562

Queen Mary started this rug in 1941 when she was 69 and finished it in 1950.

I haven't done very much on my Ann Grant as my DH had a fall a couple of weeks ago and sprained his Lateral Ligament in his Right Knee. He has been home since than on crutches. The treatment for this injury is similar to having a broken bone which is just rest and keep off it. He fell while taking the little dog next door home in the dark. The dog had gotten out and was wandering around on the road and had nearly been run over. My DH fell in our neighbours drive way. My Son is also on School Holidays at the moment, so between the two of them, not a lot of stitching is being done lol.

Miss Ann Grant

2011-03-28T11:47:00.003+11:00

Here is my current progress on the beautiful Ann. She is such a joy to work on but my progress is slow. I have had a lot going on in my life at the moment. I am slowly getting there on Ann that is lol.

For some reason I really love the flowers in these particular vases. I'm sorry if it has come out a little bit fuzzy. It is very overcast here today. I did try waiting until the light got better, but no such luck.

You can feel Winter's long cold fingers reaching here into Autumn. I really think with all of the rain that we have been having that Winter will be here long before it should be. I always enjoy Autumn. I love the trees changing colour.

I'm sorry that this post is short but I really have a lot to do today, so I had better carry on and do what I was doing.

Thank you for dropping by.

Miss Hannah Has Been Framed

2011-03-07T12:03:00.005+11:00

Over the weekend I had the opportunity of framing Hannah Lancaster and here she is in all her glory. I think she looks lovely and she is hanging alongside my Sarah Moon.

I know I said last week that I was going to start working on Susan Rambo but somebody else stuck their hand up and started jumping up and down trying to get my attention. Anyway, she won, so I'm now working on Ann Grant from Shakespeare's Peddler. Ann is such a stunning creature (so is Susan btw) so I thought that I would do her before Susan. This is my progress. I just love the border. Now this is quite strange for me as I hate doing borders but this one is really lovely. I love all the reds and pinks in her.

I don't think I have ever shown these two samplers from my collection. I had to do a bit of rearranging so that I could hang Hannah where I wanted her and these have come off the wall.

The first one is a Shepherd's Bush sampler and is really lovely. I love all the little flowers in it along with the Arch. I'm sorry I can't remember it's name. I have the chart, but I am to lazy to go and find it. It is a very old Shepherd Bush Design.

This one is called Earth Laughs Sampler and is by Hillside Samplings.

The lovely weather from Friday has disappeared unfortunately. It is a bit miserable outside with light rain and overcast conditions. You can feel it getting cooler every day.

Well, this is it for me today. 2 post is a few days which is unusual lol. Anyway, I hope that you have a wonderful week and thank you for dropping by.

Happy Dance Time

2011-03-04T10:50:00.010+11:00

At long last, Hannah Lancaster is finished. Major happy dance lol. Hannah has been in my work basket for awhile. I started this last year at the beginning of the year and was doing a SAL with my friend Tawny. It was called Sunday Stitch Along with Hannah. Anyway, she is finally finished and she is a stunning sampler. Although Hannah still reminds me of something out of the Goofy cartoons. I think it is the hair and the mouth lol. Hopefully I shall frame her over the weekend or next week.

Also another beautiful sampler and I love her the more I look at her now that she is framed and it is Harriet Burry. Harriet has the same frame that Sophia's sampler has and they look lovely hanging together.

I have been seeing these lovely little cases here and there on blogs and I said to myself - "self that is just what you need to keep your scissors and things in". Imagine my surprise while researching them that I found that I could buy them in Australia at a Wool Shop in Margaret River in Western Australia. It arrived this morning and I am looking forward to putting all my "what-nots" in it. I am sure that my DH will no longer rolls his eyes when I am trying to find what happened to my scissors. I am forever losing them around my chair.

In case you were wondering about the quilt underneath these photos. It is a selection of very old Laura Ashley material. I have had this quilt for a long time, even before my eldest Son was born. I used to have a "thing" for Laura Ashley things. I even have a lot of her books in my book collection. This quilt is usually on the end of my youngest Son's bed.

A few weekends ago, I had such a lovely surprise. I discovered that I had won this beautiful layer cake from BBD's new fabric range. Thank you Alma you really made my day.

I got such a surprise as I never win anything and I said to my DH "I have won something". He immediately gave me a Willis like answer (you know - "What You Talking Bout Willis") of "Don't you dare open it". I said, "huh" lol. He then replied, " Don't open it, we will get a virus". I immediately set him to rest by letting him know that I hadn't won something on one of those -Congratulations, You are our Millionth Viewer, that I had actually won something wonderful. He was quite happy when he realised what I had won, but then I saw the eyes rolling around in his head when I told him that I would have to buy more material, to make the basket quilt that went with the material. You would think after all this time, he would have worked me out lol.

On a serious note, I would just like to say that I am really sorry to hear of the passing of Lisa Roswell of The Primitive Needle. I would like to offer her family and all her many friends my sympathies her unexpected passing. Unfortunately I don't have any of her designs, but I knew of them through my friend Tawny. I know that she used to do the most wonderful Halloween designs. I also noticed before I heard this sad news one of her new designs called Mary Doidge and thought what a stunning sampler it was.

It is a beautiful Autumn day here in the Mountains. Unfortunately they don't last that long up here and you can feel the cold fingers of winter starting to creep in, in the early mornings. Hopefully we will have a lot more beautiful days before winter does strike. Summer wasn't the best. It was either too to hot, or plain miserable with rain and mist.

I hope that you have a wonderful weekend and thank you for stopping by.

Dutch Spot Sampler

2011-02-14T13:51:00.002+11:00

I have been asked many times about the sampler above. It is a Dutch Spot Sampler. The pattern was in an Australian Better Homes and Gardens Magazine a long time ago. Probably about 15 years ago. I'm sorry I really don't know where you could a copy of this sampler.

It is a beautiful sampler and always reminds me of my Dutch Beauty Sampler as they have similar motifs on them. This one also has an A&E on it.

They are both worked on 32ct cream linen over one. They hang in next to each other in my hallway.

She's Armless

2011-02-11T12:45:00.004+11:00

This is where I am currently with the lovely Hannah Lancaster. Her dress is nearly complete. I only have a couple of rows to go before she is done and then I just have to finish off the side pieces, put the cross parts onto the border and she is all done. Yay she says lol.

I love Hannah, she reminds me while I have been doing her of one of Goofy's friends - Pete. She looks like one of his family. Oh I'm terrible lol. But you have to laugh sometimes.

Nothing much to report here. I'm looking forward to finishing Hannah and I think my next start will be Susan Rambo from the new edition of SANQ. What a stunner that one is. It is really jumping up and down getting my attention. I have all the DMC threads and just need to get the 40ct linen.

I hope that you have a wonderful weekend. I am going spend some time on the weekend with some of my family which will be lovely. I have 3 birthdays at the moment. On Sunday it will be my Father's 81st birthday, so it will be lovely to spend some time with him.

Hannah Update and a Forgotten Sampler

2011-01-28T14:00:00.009+11:00

My goodness, it is ages since I have updated my blog. But for a couple of weeks I couldn't do any sewing as I sort of had an accident with a slicing machine.

One of my Sons bought me one of those Mandolin Slicing Machines for Christmas and I thought that I would try and use it on a carrot. Not a good idea as I ended up at the local hospital for 2 hours as I couldn't get it to stop bleeding. I took a huge chunk of skin out and had to get around with the Mummy's Revenge as I called it for over a week. I did try to sew, but the needle kept getting stuck in the bandage. So I gave up. It also impeded on the heavy bandaid that I had on for another couple of weeks. I have only just stopped wearing the bandaid.

So this is where I am up to on Hannah. I was looking forward to actually getting Hannah on to the Sampler, but decided to go and do the one thing that I hate doing and that is the border. I have completely finished the right hand side, half of the left hand side and I am now working along the bottom. I also started writing her name on the bottom as one night I wouldn't find the skein of green that I am using to work the border. Would you believe it was in my thread container all along. It was hiding behind the needles lol.

This morning I have been going around like a crazy lady looking for a quilt that I started making many years ago. I thought that I should get it out and finish sewing all the applique pieces onto it so that I can finish it. But I don't know where I have put it, but I did find this sampler that I was working on in 1999. I always thought that it was quite pretty and it has my favourite Psalm on it - The Lord is My Shepherd. All I have to do is finish the border. I told you I'm not a border lover lol. I really should finish it. I think it is done on 28ct cream linen. This is many years before I could get 40ct linen.

Thank goodness today is a lot cooler than it has been for the last few days. Yesterday I felt like a melting ice cube. Unfortunately the cooler weather is only here for a couple of days. The heat is coming back next week. But I suppose it is better than all the rain that we had previously. I really thought that it was time to go and build an Ark.

I hope that you have a lovely weekend and thank you for visiting me and reading my wafflings.

I Have Been Busy

2010-12-20T12:09:00.006+11:00

Since my last post I have been very busy. I have framed Sophia.

I have finished Isabella Johnstone and also framed her

I have nearly finished Harriet Burry and there is about another days stitching on her.

I have got this far on Hannah Lancaster and I am currently filling in the bricks on her house.

I have also made a few of these lovely patchwork cushions for the family. I saw these being made one Sunday afternoon when the boys all went to the Football (Soccer). I was able to watch a TV show that I don't normally watch as it isn't my DH's cup of tea and I saw these lovely cushions being made by hand. What intrigued me was that they were filled with unprocessed bran and scented oils. I have also added lavender to mine and I had added lavender oil to the mix. My spare room smells quite delightful at the moment lol.

For an Australian Summer today, it is quite cold. At 6 a.m. it was 5 degrees C in the Mountains and by the sky it looks as if it could snow. If it did it would only be a light dusting and probably wouldn't settle.

I hope you all have your Christmas preparations in hand. I currently have a boiled pudding bubbling away on the stove. It is always a major feat when I make one of these and you wouldn't believe the washing up. Oh boy lol.

If I don't post again, before Christmas, I hope that you all have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. I hope that Santa is good to you.

Merry Christmas.

Harriet Is Slowly Moving Along

2010-11-05T10:37:00.009+11:00

It doesn't look as if I have done that much work on Harriet since my last post but she is slowly coming together. I am still working on her border which seems to take forever.

I have completed the left hand side and I am now about a quarter of the way along on the top section. I will be so happy to see the end of her. She is a beautiful sampler, but she has her ways about her:). I suppose if I was this old that I would play up as well.

I have also been working on Isabella Johnstone. I have been working on her off and on. I thought that she would look lovely with the sheep and I am looking forward to working on the cow. I thought that this sampler would be quite appropriate as my DH grew up on a dairy farm on the North Coast of NSW.

I thought that I would show you the lovely jewellery that my DIL Alison is making. She has opened an Etsy Shop called Coloured Squares. She is making some lovely earrings and brooches made out of lovely pieces of material and laces etc. Aren't they beautiful. She is a very clever young lady and we are all very proud of her. I have put a link to her Etsy shop if you would like to stop by.

Love these earrings. They are really lovely.

This brooch would look lovely on a nice jacket. Love the Autumn shades.

Another lovely pair of earrings. They are in my favourite colours red, white and blue. I love red, it always gives a lift to things.

This one is my favourite. I love the old piece of lace that she has added. Another brooch that would look lovely on a nice jacket.

It is a bit chilly here in the mountains today. It was quite nice earlier in the week. We had some lovely Spring days, but yesterday and today, there is a bit of a chill in the air. I think I need to light my fire as I have cold feet. If my feet are cold. I am cold.

I love Spring, I picked a beautiful jug of old fashion roses the other day and they have given me so much pleasure. They are all in the very pale pink shades along with some ivory ones. Their perfume is really lovely and they are near my stitching chair. I love smelling them as I stitch away slowly with Harriet:).

Thank you for stopping by. I always enjoy your comments. I hope that you have a wonderful weekend.

Harriet Is Almost Finished

2010-10-20T11:53:00.006+11:00

I'm sorry that I haven't been blogging lately. I seem to have lost the blogging bug. Every day lately, I think that I should update my blog, but something comes along to distract me and before I know it the day is nearly over.

I have been slowly plodding along with Harriet Burry and she is really a beautiful sampler, but she can be a bit of pain in the you know where. She has her tricky moments. She is quite a large sampler so it is a bit hard to take a decent full size photo of her.

I am slowly working on the border which is beautiful. I had so much trouble with her over the weekend that she nearly ended up in the garbage bin. Well, not quite, but I thought about it for a second or two. Luckily I think I have nailed her and I will continue on until she is finished. I am really looking forward to doing something else. I think Hannah Lancaster might be the one as I am trying to finish her before the New Year. I can only hope.

We have had an amazing lot of weather here over the last few days. It is Spring. One day it is really beautiful. The next day it is freezing and we have to light our fire again. On Saturday we even had a heavy down pour of snow, but unfortunately not enough to settle. No wonder people end up with colds etc at this time of the year.

Thank you for all your lovely comments regarding my work. I enjoy reading them. I'm sorry that I have become such a bad blogger.

Where Does Time Fly

2010-09-20T10:16:00.005+10:00

Yes, where does it fly to when we are having fun. Sorry I haven't posted for a while. Family members have been ill again. I was also nearing completing my beautiful Sophia and I wanted to wait until I finished her before doing that.

As you can see here she is in all of her glory. She is such a beautiful sampler and I do love the 2 sheep down the bottom. They seem to be saying "Who me!" lol.

I am planning on hanging Sophia next to my Grazing Sheep Sampler. I think they will look lovely hanging together.

I have also decided to work on Harriet Burry for a time. Unfortunately, I am going to run out of the gold silk that is in the house. I am going to try and get as much done before I run out. I haven't done any of the verse yet, bu will soon start tackling it. I always find this bit "a bit boring" and I am enjoying seeing Harriet all come together in all of her glory.

I am looking forward though to starting my next sampler. It is another one of those samplers that I fell in love with when I first saw it (funny though, I seem to fall in love with a lot of samplers when I first see them lol). I struck "pay dirt" when I discovered that I could get this one out here and it is now sitting waiting all kitted up for me to start it. It is another sampler with a challenge. I seem to like a challenge in samplers.

Another reason why it has taken me so long to finish Sophia and also to post is that I picked up the old knitting needles and made myself this lovely scarf.

I saw one of those curly scarves that everybody seems to be making and I decided that I would like to make one in something lovely and soft. We have an Alpaca Shop in the Mountains who sell beautiful clothing and wool made out of Alpaca fibres and this is the colour that I chose. It is a lovely dusty mauve/pink colour.

I started knitting the curly scarf and had about 6 inches done when I decided that it wasn't really me. So I unpicked it all and started again. Luckily I bought 3 skeins but I had to get another skein to finish it. The scarf ended up costing a whole lot more that I originally thought it would. But it is lovely and it is very soft. The only problem is that I most probably won't get to wear it as it is now Spring here. But I will have a lovely scarf next Winter.

I hope that you have a wonderful week, where ever you are in the World and thankful for paying me a visit. I love to receive your comments. They make my day.

I Am Still Here

2010-08-09T11:07:00.010+10:00

My goodness, I can't believe how long ago it was since I last posted photos of Sophia. Since that last post I haven't done that much on her really.

I finished the middle section and I have been working on the border that separates the bottom section from the middle section. This is all over one and it has been slow going. I am now filling in the rose buds, but I am currently sick of working over one at the moment, so I have decided to go down to the bottom section and work up from here. This where the sheep are along with a lot of green fill ins.

I have also since I last posted done a little bit more on Harriet Burry and she is looking lovely. I thought that I would leave the verse for a while and go and complete the right hand side of her. I have always liked this sampler and I find that I enjoy working on her.

It has been a long time since Hannah Lancaster made an appearance, so I thought that I had better post an update on her. At the moment I only work on her on occasions and she is looking lovely. For some reason I am all versed out at the moment so I thought that I would come back to that later. I was eager to find fresh fields with her.

I have also made this Stacy Nash Pocket which I quite like. I thought that it would be good to store odds and sods such as scissors and pinkeeps. I enjoyed stitching this as it was a change from working on a huge sampler. I changed it a little bit. It is supposed to have a string tie but I changed mine to 2 MOP buttons and I think that it looks ok.

I keep forgetting to post this chart, but while I was in hospital for my recent operation I was talking to Margaret of Days of a Sampler Lover about how I liked the sampler Jane Atkinson and the problems that I was having getting the chart as my Needlework Store in Sydney had run out of it. Margaret, very kindly ordered a copy for me when she was ordering a copy for herself and sent it to me as a get well present. Have you seen Margaret's Jane. I always knew that it would be a stunning sampler and I was right. Margaret's Jane is truly beautiful and I am looking forward to seeing it framed.

As I couldn't get Jane I ordered Sarah Bignell which has similarities to Jane and is another samper that I want to do. I love the floral borders on both of these samplers and when you really study them, you can spot the similarities plus the differences in the border. Both are all kitted up and ready to go. I just have to make up my mind which one to do when I finish my current samplers. I would just like to say a big thank you again to Margaret for allowing me to do this beautiful sampler. I don't think the Needlework Store has reordered it as yet.

I don't know if you can see these properly, but since my last post my Sister has come back with a bulging suitcase full of goodies for herself and my family. These are some of the wonderful things that she bought back for me.

While she was in England, she went to Windsor Castle again with her friend who has never been to England before. She spotted the sewing case and also the tape measure and knew that it would be the perfect gift for me. This sewing kit is very special as it is made out of a special piece of material, but more on that in the next picture. She also went to the Royal School of Needlework at Hampton Court and brought me back this stunning book on English Embroideries along the beautiful black pair of scissors in the red case. I love them all.

This is the other side of the sewing case and as I said the material is very special. I originally saw this beautiful material many many moons ago when I last paid a trip to England. I had always wanted to go to Broadlands which was the home of Lord Louie Mountbatten as we used to see him riding behind the Queen when we went to the Trooping of the Colour. One of the bedrooms in Broadlands is done with this material. The walls, along with the curtains are done in this particular bedroom.

The original design was created for the Royal Yacht "Victoria and Albert" in the 1850's and it is also in Queen Victoria's bedroom at Osborne House.

What makes this piece of chintz so unique and hopefully you will be able to see it is that amongst the twigs that form part of each bouquet you can see the profiles of both Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. Their profiles are in pink and Queen Victoria is on one side of the bunch of flowers and Prince Albert is on the other. If you concentrate on the middle bunch you will hopefully see them. I think that you can also buy these sewing kits from Buckingham Place as there is a label sewn on from there. Mine came from Windsor Castle.

And finally I have added a few more books to my sampler book collection. My eldest DS and DIL very kindly sent to England to buy the book on Samplers by Rebecca Scott for me for Mother's Day. I had to wait for it to come in the post. What a wonderful book this one is and I have enjoyed both reading and looking through it. I also obtained the Perpetual Engaging Diary by Needleprint which I thought was lovely. There are some lovely graphs in this collection which would help to make a wonderful sampler. The last book is one that I have been after for a long time.

Where I live there are a lot of 2nd hand book stores in a lot of the villages that make up the Mountains. I was going through the list of books at my favourite 2nd hand book shop, I discovered that they had the Samplers and Tapestry Embroideries by Marcus Huish. Believe me I hot footed it down to get it lol. Wonderful book.

Well, that is about it. I'll try to do a bit better in the future, but I haven't really been on the computer for ages. I hope that you have a wonderful week and that the weather is kind to you. I know that my friends in the Northern Hemisphere are going through extreme hot weather at the moment. My DH told me yesterday, that we only have 3 more weeks of Winter left. Where has the year gone. It seems to be flying by.

Another Sophia Update

2010-07-15T11:02:00.006+10:00

I'm sorry that I have been such a bad blogger, but I have been away staying with my Dad while my Sister has been away on holidays. I have been keeping Dad company.

It was lovely staying with him for a little while, although I found that for me it was a lot colder in Sydney than it is in the Mountains. Dad and I had a lovely time together. We caught up with my Aunts and Uncles. It was lovely seeing them, as I don't see them that often.

Here is my current update on both Sophia and Harriet. Both are looking lovely and I really enjoy working on both of them. Hannah is still in the mix, but I haven't touched her for awhile. Hopefully she will be making an appearance very soon.

I love the colours that are in Sophia and I am sure that she will look lovely hanging near my Grazing Sheep sampler. I have nearly finished the middle section, then look out sheep here we come lol.

Harriet now has all of her windows and her garden. I thought that instead of going down the bottom that I would head up towards the top and then do the bottom last. I really enjoy stitching Harriet and I am sure that when I have finished her she will look lovely hanging with my sheep sampler collection. I have a lot of patterns with sheep in them. I just need to sit down and do them. I'm finding though that a lot of the patterns that I want to do would be better done on 40ct linen and I am rapidly running out of it. My LNS doesn't have any and my other store in Sydney seems to have run out as well. I think that I will have to investigate further.

Thank goodness the sun is out today. We have had a lot of cold wet weather lately and it is nice to occasionally see the sun. I don't mind the cold weather as long as I am warm.

My youngest is on school holidays again and he has been enjoying spending time with one of his

Brothers and my DIL as well as my Dad who came up for a few days. We went for a few drives out into the country and it was lovely to see things that we don't normally see.

Thank you for your lovely comments regarding my work. I always enjoy reading them and it is always lovely to make new friends. I hope that you have a lovely week.

Not Another Sampler With Sheep

2010-06-17T11:01:00.006+10:00

I haven't really done a great deal of work on Sophia's Sampler this week, but each stitch is a stitch closer to the finish I say.

Sophia to me is still a really beautiful girl and I am enjoying working on her. I have nearly finished this section and it is sort of similar on the other side except for an extra piece. I have some stem stitch work to do on this bit round about when the bottom flower is, so hopefully I will get to it today or tomorrow. I love how Sophia has scattered all these little bits that look like stars. The verse is coming up next and in case you are wondering where the sheep are. They are in the bottom section.

The reason why I haven't done much on Sophia is that I decided to have a break from her over the long weekend. I decided to see if I could finish the house that is on Harriet Burry's Sampler. This is a sampler that I fell in love with when I first saw it on the cover of the Sampler and Antique Needlework Magazine.

When my friend Tawny and I were considering which samplers to stitch on our Sunday SAL. Hannah and Harriet were both in the mix. We wanted to stitch both of these samplers, but we decided to work on Hannah Lancaster first. Don't worry Hannah is still in my basket. I am waiting for Tawny and Deb to catch up with me. I think Suzanne who also joined us has caught up, but Suzanne has started in the middle.

I decided to start Harriet and do her for a little bit while I waited, but because I was so wrapped up in Grazing Sheep I hadn't done much on Harriet. So I thought, this weekend I was going to just concentrate on her and this is the result. I think that Harriet could be a little bit of a problem child as I have already had a few problems with her, but like all problem children she is worth all the trouble. I have the house all finished except with the windows. I have worked out the problems with the windows and hopefully all will go well with them. Maybe Harriet will appear again this weekend.

Harriet is a very special sampler to me as my dear friend Tawny kindly sent me the fabric and the silk threads to do Harriet. This is really the first sampler that I have done in silks and I am enjoying the experience of working on them. I can see why a lot of you really enjoy working with this wonderful medium. I have worked on occasions with silk but only on small amounts. I would just like to say to my dear friend "Thank you for allowing me to have this experience. I am really enjoying it".

Today isn't that good in the Mountains. It is very windy and quite cold. My fire is having a good work out today. I hope I have a better day with it today, that yesterday. It kept going out on me. I always have problems with this fire. I think sometimes, I have problems getting it going as I must be mean with the kindling as I hate using a lot of it.

Well, again thank you for paying me a visit and I love reading comments that people leave. I have been having problems with blogger leaving comments on some blogs. For some reason it has changed a little bit and requires my password which it doesn't seem to like. Hopefully, it will stop asking me these questions soon and allow me to make comments.

I hope that you all have a wonderful weekend wherever you are and that the weather is kind to you.

Grazing Sheep Is Framed

2010-06-09T11:52:00.009+10:00

Last week I discovered that I had the perfect frame for my Grazing Sheep Sampler. It had another piece in it, but I decided to remove it and reuse the frame for Grazing Sheep. The frame was too big for what was in it and I will look for another frame for the other piece.

I'm really happy with the outcome of this sampler and it is now hanging in my Sons bedroom. I decided that this was the perfect place for my planned "Wall of Sheep Samplers". I think he is ok with the idea lol.

I haven't done that much work on Sophia this week. I ended up sewing something for my friend who has a needlework shop. Sophia is looking lovely though and I am enjoying my work on her. I am currently doing the multi-coloured pine tree on the right hand side. This sampler will join Grazing Sheep when it is finished. Not sure how my Son will cope with this one.

I have always quite liked the Stacy Nash Pinkeep Drums and after a lot of consideration I paid my friend Karen a visit at her store to buy one of them. She had the Schoolgirl Pinkeep and Netty's one. Unfortunately she must have had a few customers in over the weekend who also like Netty's one as she sold out of it. So to cut a long story short I ended up buying the pattern for the Schoolgirl one.

I really don't know how this came about, but I ended up putting aside Sophia for a few days and I worked the Schoolgirl Pinkeep Drum instead for my friend.

She now has it and is using it as a shop model. It took me awhile to figure out how to put it all together, but I worked it out. So that was my weekend project. I haven't made up my mind yet if I will do another one for myself yet. It is lovely and I enjoyed working on it, but I keep saying to myself "where am I going to put it". Unfortunately my house isn't big enough to have a sewing room (ahhhh a sewing room, what bliss). I have enough problems working out where I am going to hang my samplers. They keep replacing other pieces. I know you are all saying -"send them my way", but no I'll keep looking for the right spot lol

It is very windy in the mountains today. Although it is sunny which is good. It doesn't make me so depressed like the rain does. Days upon days of rain is so depressing. I know that we need rain, but there is a limit on how much a girl can take. Oh well, it is always a good excuse for staying inside and stitch lol.

Thank you so much for the lovely comments regarding my work. It is always nice to receive compliments.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend and that your weekend is wonderful.

A Miss Sophia Update

2010-06-02T10:12:00.004+10:00

This will probably be a short post as really nothing much has happened lately.

As you can see I have been working on The Scarlet Letter's Sophia's Sampler on 40ct Newcastle Linen using the recommended DMC threads, although I did find a mistake with one of them. Instead of the pale pink that you can see in the portion of the flower near the butterfly, it was charted on my chart as 720 I think it was which is a terracotta shade.

It sort of stuck out like a sore thumb, but lucky I checked the AVAS thread conversion that Scarlet Letter has on their website and found the right shade of pale pink. I was also lucky that a had a full bobbin of it in my floss collection.

Miss Sophia is really a pretty sampler and I am love working on her. In case you are wondering she is in 3 sections of which this is the top. The butterfly and the flower are repeated in the other corner. Then at the bottom of the blue vase there will be a collection of trees and things either side of the central vase of flowers.

As I have said nothing much has been happening. Weather here has been wet and cold for over a week, although today the sun is shining so it is washing day. Hopefully, it will be a good drying day as I usually hang my washing outside.

Thank you for all the lovely comments regarding my previous sampler, Grazing Sheep. I hope to frame her some time this week. Just have to sit down and do it.

I'm Back And A Finish

2010-05-24T11:12:00.008+10:00

I'm sorry I have been away for so long, but I have been having computer problems. We have 2 desk top computers and would you believe both of them had problems within a week of each other. Both had to be sent away to be repaired and they came back the same day. So I haven't been able to show you my progress on Grazing Sheep.

As you can see, she is now completely finished. She is a beautiful sampler and I loved working on her. In case you were wondering, all the sheep are filled with Bullion Stitch. I always like doing Bullion Stitch and French Knots so they aren't a problem for me. All I have to do now is get a frame for her and frame her.

This is my next piece. It is another Scarlet Letter sampler (I love Scarlet Letter samplers lol). This one is called Sophia's Sampler and it is really beautiful. Guess what it has down the bottom. Yes, more sheep. I told you I like samplers with sheep in them. I am collecting quite a few of them. If I had the space, I could start a sampler sheep wall.

This is my current progress on Sophia. I am currently working on the large vase of flowers that is in the middle of the top section. This sampler is in 3 sections. The top section is a bit flowery, with butterflies and trees etc. The middle section has the verse. It is a verse that I seem to be getting a few samplers with, - Jesus Permit they gracious name to stand etc. although this one has a slight twist to it, Sophia added her name into the second line. The bottom section has the sheep.

I also wanted to show you the beautiful pinkeep that Suzanne from Squazi and the Chickens sent me. Isn't it beautiful. It is something that I don't have and I have never made my self one as I seem to work on big samplers. It has pride of place in my work basket.

On the health front, I am going along fine and venturing further and further.

Where's The Sheep?

2010-04-06T10:40:00.007+10:00

I'm sorry if these photo's are a little bit dark today. It is very overcast here at the moment and I can't get any better photos. Winter is on the way. Extra blankets are being put onto beds. In fact 2 days last week we had our fire alight. It was all nice and cosy when that was going.

This is my current progress on Grazing Sheep by Scarlet Letter. It is such a glorious sampler. I keep raving about the colours that are in it, but they are worth raving about.

As you can see I figured out the border. It is very pretty and looks quite lacy.

Judy from Crazy 4 Books asked the other day where were the sheep. Well, here is one slowly appearing. I am now back into over ones and I am half way up a tree at the moment, but I thought this morning that I would quickly do the outline of one of the sheep to prove that they are there. There are 7 sheep altogether. I noticed that 2 of them have dark faces.

While I was stitching this sheep this morning I was remembering one of my trips to England where we drove around for a month and we travelled over a few of the Moors e.g. Dartmoor and Yorkshire in Bronte Country. The sheep with the dark faces reminded me of the Yorkshire Moors. I was also remembering going on the first day of this expedition to Salisbury Cathedral and seeing Jane Austen's resting place. Ah memories. I quite enjoyed visiting a lot of English Cathedral's and Churches. I always remember visiting one Cathedral where they were having a choir practice. Beautiful. I am very partial to listening to choir boys. They voices of angels.

We have had a lovely long weekend for Easter. It was lovely as I saw my other 2 Sons and lovely DIL. It was lovely to spend some time together. The Easter Bunny paid a visit and eggs were enjoyed by everyone. Hopefully the waist bands don't expand to much.

On the knee front everything is slowly getting back to normal. Although I had a bit of a fright a little while ago when I nearly tripped over. Knee is a bit sore now. I just have to be careful with what I do.

Thank you to Deb from Lavender Rose Ramblings for giving me a Sunshine Award for my blog. I have tried to cut and paste it onto this posting but for some reason it won't work for me.

I have to nominate 12 other people for this award, but the way I am going today, I don't think it will work so I would like to nominate everybody who kindly visits me. Your comments and thoughts really mean a lot to me. Thank you.

Well, my youngest is on School Holidays again for 2 weeks. There goes to the peace and quiet. Although it is good that he is able to help me.

In case you are wondering where Hannah Lancaster is, I am taking a small break from working on her on Sundays to allow my friend Tawny who leads a very busy life to catch up with me. I am more of a lady of leisure at the moment. Hannah will be back again in a couple of weeks. I have been working on Grazing Sheep instead.

A Little Bit of Verse

2010-03-26T11:29:00.004+11:00

Because of my need to be careful what I do and the need to do a lot of sitting I am flying through Grazing Sheep at the moment.

I am currently working on the verse and I still have 3 lines to go.

This is one of the most beautiful samplers that I have done. The colours in it just pop and it is the perfect piece of work for my current situation. The only problems I have at the moment is the lacy looking boarder around the verse. It is the corner bits that I am having trouble with. There is a separate chart for this boarder but I don't know if I am still slightly off with the pixies of if I am just plain thick but currently I haven't got it.

My plans are to do the boarder leaving out the corners and try figuring the out later. Hopefully the plan will all come together.

Thank you for all the well wishes for my recovery. It is going slowly. It isn't as painful as it was, although it does have it's moments. Instead of doing physio therapy, they decided that I would be better doing Hydrotherapy as I have 2 legs to worry about. One I have to bend and the other straighten. It is so much easier doing exercises in water and the strain and stresses on the legs isn't as noticeable as doing it out of the water.

I keep having problems though with one gentleman though when I am doing a certain exercise on my right leg, the one that I have to straighten. The exercise is that I have to stand with my back against the wall of the pool with a rubber ring around my ankle. This brings the leg up and supports it while I have it straight out in front of me. I have to stand there on one leg with a belt with all these lead weights in it and it is placed on my knee. I have to do this exercise for between one and two minutes. No twice this man has accidentally walked into my leg and he has nearly knocked me over. I know that he hasn't done it on purpose but he is so lucky that it is my right leg and not the left. If he had pushed the left leg the wrong way, I am sure that I would have seen stars and he would have had his lights lights punched out lol. Luckily he wasn't there last night. I had my eye out for him though.

I'm Back

2010-03-17T15:48:00.004+11:00

I don't know how long I will be able to sit in this chair to type this post as I have trouble at the moment of getting into the chair and out of it.

I would just like to say a big thank you for all the wishes of good luck to me during my recent operation on both of my knees. I had to have a total knee replacement on my left knee and I also had to have hardware that was in my right knee removed. All together I have been in hospital for 3 weeks. One week was in a hospital and the other 2 weeks were in a Rehabilitation Hospital where I was undertaking Physio twice a day to help me on my road to recovery. While in Rehab I spent 2 hours per day in either the Torture Chamber undertaking all sorts of exercises to strength my knees or for a hour a day in the Hydrotherapy pool. I much prefer the Hydrotherapy. Exercises are so much easier in water lol.

While in Rehab in my free hours and there were many of these I worked on Grazing Sheep. The basket with the strawberries in it was my project and they took 2 weeks to finish. The strawberries and the funny looking dog are all worked over one.

I think that they are just so stunning. I had an awful moment while in Rehab and I must have been still "off with the Pixies" when I reread the instructions and discovered that the bottom section was all over one. My immediate though was "Oh No". After many hours of thinking what I could do to on this section I decided to read the instructions again. I mustn't been with the Pixies this time as I read that the Folly and the outline of the sheep were worked over one, BUT all the green grass was worked over 2. It certainly was a "Thank You Lord" time. I don't think that I could have stood to do so much boring work over one. Anyway, today is a brighter day. Now I just have to work out the satin stitch boarder that surrounds the verse. Another thing on this sampler that isn't easy. It is ok once you get away from the corners, but the corners could be a problem. Oh well, these things are sent to try us.

This is my progress on my Stitching with Hannah on Sundays Sampler. I spent a couple of more days working on this sampler earlier in the week as technically I have missed 3 weeks work on it. Hannah is looking lovely, but she does have tricky moments.

Now comes the hard bit. Getting out of this chair. Not easy as it is on wheels lol. I tried to do this on my laptop but for some reason the photos wouldn't upload and at one stage I thought that the computer had crashed. Just what I needed. But thankfully it is working again. Looks like I have to stick to my DH's computer to update my blog.

It's All A Bit Fruity

2010-02-05T11:08:00.014+11:00

I know I haven't blogged for a few weeks, but I have had a lot going on.

My Son finished his School Holidays so we had to go and get everything that he needed for the new school year. He started back last Friday so it is all nice and quiet here.

I also had to go and have a few tests and Dr's Appointments as I have to go into hospital in 2 weeks time for an operation on both of my knees. (Oh the pain of it all).

Although I haven't been blogging or visiting other blogs I have still been stitching and this is my progress on Scarlet Letters - Grazing Sheep. I love SL Samplers. Don't worry there are sheep in the sampler, just not yet. They are down the bottom. There is a dog though that will appear quite soon. But we have gone very fruity with pineapples etc. There are more fruit in the other basket, but these are over one as is the dog. In the border which I hate doing. Yes, I am one of those border haters. I think it is the repetition, in each corner there are large gold stars which are done in satin stitch. I am waiting to get a bit further down before I do these as I found that sometimes it rubs a bit and leaves little balls.

On the Hannah front, this is this weeks progress. See not much border done, although I am doing one or two a week when I stitch this on Sundays. Hannah is worked on 40ct cream linen and Grazing Sheep is on 35ct cream linen.

While my son was on holidays. He and a few friends decided to go down the end of the Street where we have this amazing waterfall. Although it doesn't look like it was doing much when he took the photos. If he went today, it would be a different story as we have had so much rain that yesterday which caused 2 landslides on the railway line, a train to derail and also closed the Highway due to a landslide.

Anyway, back to the photos. He borrowed my camera and took these photos and I thought that you might like to see what is down the end of my Street. Remember that this is part of the Blue Mountains National Park and that I am surrounded by the National Park.

This is a photo of part of the water fall. I think there are a few more parts to this. This all goes down into the Grose Valley.

This is the top of the Valley. It is a long way down to the bottom and there are millions and millions of gum trees down there. This is usually where all the Bush Fires lately have been.

There was also a pretty picture of a sandstone wall down there. There are also caves in this wall.

Here is one of the caves. I hope he didn't go into it as there as snakes down here.

Silly me, I have uploaded the wrong photo of the water fall. Sorry.

Here is one of the natives. I think it is a lizard and not a snake sunning itself. It looks like it has legs.

Hopefully I will be able to post another photo of Grazing Sheep and Hannah before I go into Hospital. Next week is another busy week. If not, I will see you when I return.

The Girls Are Framed

2010-01-18T10:08:00.004+11:00

I didn't get much stitching done over the weekend as I finally sat down and framed both Betsy and Beatrix.

I tried a new method of doing it. Vonna has this really good tutorial on how to frame a sampler and I tried that. I bought some acid free board with foam in the middle a heap of pins and I was off. So much easier than the lacing method. It is not perfect, but I am quite happy with the out come that is the main thing.

I haven't hung them as yet as I have to get some stronger hooks before I put them on the wall. Especially Betsy. Don't want her crashing down on my head lol. Even worse if it happened to land on my DH's. The thought of that makes me shudder lol.

On the stitching front, here is my update on Hannah Lancaster. I really didn't get that much done but I am really enjoying stitching her along with my friend Tawny. I'm looking forward to seeing Tawny's progress, but really at the stage where we both are, there isn't much to show.

On the Grazing Sheep front is is definitely nothing to report. I haven't done anything on her since last week and she has even less than Hannah.

Well, until next time, I hope you all have a lovely long weekend to my friends in the States. If you aren't in the States I hope you all have a lovely week.

Beatrix is Now Finished

2010-01-15T11:59:00.004+11:00

I have finally finished Beatrix. She was my problem child who I had a love/hate relationship. I love her, but I for some reason hated working on her. Maybe it was because she was stitched on 32ct linen over 1 or it was the continual use of just one thread. I don't know, but I am so glad that she is finished and that she can leave my work basket and be framed.

I started working on Scarlet Letters Grazing Sheep last night, but I haven't done very much. No enough to show anyway.

I am also doing something that I don't normally do. I am doing something with my friend who doesn't have a blog called a SHS which means - Stitching Hannah on Sundays. Both my Friend and I have wanted to stitch Hannah Lancaster for a long while, so we decided to dedicate Sundays stitching this amazing sampler and we both started last Sunday. This is my progress. It isn't much to show at the moment, but that is ok. I hope this Sunday is better weather wise than last Sunday. Last Sunday was one of those really hot sticky days. Not good for sewing.

I feel quite sad today. I live in one of the most beautiful places in Australia and also one of the most dangerous. For the past couple of days the Police Rescue and emergency people have been looking for 6 people who failed to come back after a few days canyoning in the Blue Mountains. Late yesterday afternoon, the Police Helicopter found them, but unfortunately one of 2 teenagers that were in the party had been killed from a rock fall. He was 15 years old. I have a 15 year old son as well and I feel so sad for his parents.

For the past 2 days after all the heat we have had we have misty, raining conditions. Yesterday there was a break in the weather and the helicopter was able to get the other 5 people out and take them to hospital. They have all been released this morning. But they couldn't get the body out. Police, Paramedics and Emergency Crews stayed and guarded the boy's body.

Today is another really misty day and I am listening to my DH's RFS scanner about all the problems they are having getting the body out. They have to carry it out as it is to treacherous for the helicopter. It is going to take them a long time to do this.

I find this all so very sad. I think the other teenager in the party was his brother.

She is all Finished

2010-01-05T14:52:00.004+11:00

She is finished. Yipee. I think she is so beautiful and I am looking forward to hanging her with Betsy Davis.

I finished most of her on New Years Eve while waiting for the Sydney Fire Works and only had a little bit more to do on New Years Day.

I decided to make a New Years Resolution to try and finish Beatrix Potter before I start something else. She is coming along nicely and I only have a few more motifs to go. She has been in my workbasket for quite a while and it will be good to have her finished. So I will have 2 samplers to frame.

Well it looks as if Grazing Sheep will be my project and I am looking forward to starting her. Hopefully Bea will be finished by the weekend all going well.

I hope that you all have a wonderful New Year this year.

Would You Believe It Is Nearly Finished

2009-12-29T11:10:00.008+11:00

Take a look at her now he he he. Isn't she beautiful. Hopefully she will be finished by the end of the week. All that I have to do is finish the black background on the right hand side.

I have really been enjoying working on these two Rhode Island Samplers. You never it is quite possible that they might be joined by a few more samplers from Rhode Island, but these 2 of the jewels amongst my small collection. I have a few more graphs in my collection, but they are more the Newport RI ones. I would love to get my hands on some more of the Mary Balch School e.g. the other Betsy Davis and/or Mary's Mother, Sarah Rogers. What a collection that would be. Oh well, it doesn't look possible, so I can only dream aaahhhh.

Have you ever had 2 samplers kitted up in your work basket that are both jumping up and down telling me to "pick me" no "pick me".

I have that problem at the moment. I don't know which one to do. One minute is Hestera and the next it is Grazing Sheep. I really don't know which one will be my next piece. What do you think?

I had a lovely Christmas. We all went down to my Father's house and we had such a lovely time down there. It was lovely to spend time with my eldest sons as I don't see them that often now. Santa was also good and brought me some lovely presents which I really love.

I will probably be murder for publishing their photos but you can see that my 2 eldest sons must have had a lovely lunch. I think this was before the pudding though lol. This is what you would call Brotherly love. Quite different from when they were younger as they were always fighting. Boys.

This is my youngest son. He played Santa and gave out every bodies presents. He is still down at my Father's house. The chocolates ended up coming home with us though lol. I don't think we would be popular if we ate them though.

My goodness this year has really flown by. Sampler wise, I think I have completed 3 which is lovely. I always seem to pick big, complicated samplers that occupy my time, but I really enjoy working on them and I love it when they are finished.

I just want to wish everybody a Happy New Year. I hope that you all have a lovely time and remember that there is always another beautiful sampler awaiting around the corner. Happy New Year.

Another Betsy Update

2009-12-16T11:03:00.004+11:00

Do you think I will have finished with Betsy by the early next year? Quite possibly. As you can see this is my progress with Betsy. I have to finish working the squiggly line all around it in 739, do a leaf, give the strawberries stems and then I have a lot of alternating half cross stitch to do.

She is looking good, if I say so myself. My progress on her might be quite speeded up though through a series of misfortunes.

During last week I had to have a lot of Xrays, bone scans, MRI's etc. etc. For quite a while I have been complaining about a pain in my leg which they thought at first was clots. After a Doppler - No Clots. Still more pain so another trip to the Doctors and it is off to have an Xray on my spine. Doctor is horrified at the condition of my spine. He doesn't know what to do, so it is off to a trip to my Spine Specialist. He sends me off to have all these tests and also books me into to see an Orthopedic Specialist re the knees. He thinks the time has finally come for me to have knee replacements. Mind you I was originally told 22 years ago that I needed knee replacements, but I was to young. So I have had 2 operations on the right knee. It is the left knee that is causing me so much bother.

So I go and have a bone scan which reveals among a few things that I have 2 stress fractures in my lower left leg around the knee area. No wonder I have been in so much agony. So it is a trip to the local hospital to see what I can do to help me with the pain. The answer is - go and see your local doctor. Ok. Still more pain and agony. I go to see my local doctor who tells me know wonder you are in so much pain. But because I am in the middle of having all these tests etc. he can't send me to the hospital to have them put plaster on it.

He gets in touch with my specialist (I have nearly finished all my tests by this time. One to go) who gets me to come to see him earlier and tells me. Yes I definitely need 2 knee replacements and can see no point in putting me in plaster as I have to see the Orthopedic Doctor next week which is tomorrow. So I am still in pain and agony. So it is keep talking the Nurafen Plus and Panadol and come back later. Oh and by the way, keep off the legs. Yeah, right. Bit hard sometimes.

I also forgot to mention that last week I kicked my toes on a metal piece that divides the slate floor from the carpet. Guess what I did lol. I broke my toe on the right foot. It is the toe next to the little toe. I tell you. Sometimes.

So I think my stitching time will be speeded up, especially from tomorrow as School Holidays start. So guess who will be doing the housework. Yeah, right. I say no more.

Anyway, I'm really sorry if I haven't paid you a visit for quite awhile. I'm not really into blogging at the moment, although it is a good reason to keep my mind on other things.

If I don't post next week, can I wish you all a really Happy Christmas and have a lovely New Year. Take care. If you don't hear from me for awhile you'll know that they have grabbed me and they have sent me to hospital to have a knee replacement. Not looking forward to it. I remember the last operation I had lol.

Could The Headless Lady Be Eve

2009-12-03T09:46:00.005+11:00

Here is this weeks progress on Betsy M. As you can see the headless lady now has a head. She also has a suitor, plus trees, sheep (or are they dogs lol) plus something that looks like a cat.

What I find interesting while stitching her and also while I was stitching Betsy Davis is whether these ladies are actually a Rhode Island version of Adam and Eve as they are both standing under apple trees. In this tree though there is no snake, but there is a bird.

In Betsy Davis there are 2 groups of these figures both standing on different sides of the apple tree. Interesting thought.

You might look at the above photo and think that I am having one of the moments where I forget where I am. But in between these 2 areas there are a lot of queen stitch strawberries and vines.

I thought before attempting this piece that I would go down to the bottom and work on Betsy's name and the border above and below. I will then go back and work on the queen stitch strawberries. Also coming out of the urns is a vine that runs along the top border above Betsy's name.

So when I look at Betsy and work out what is to be done there really isn't that much. I have to do the strawberries and vines. Fill in the urns and do the vine coming out of them as well as finish off doing portions of the border that cross over into the centre piece. A couple of leaves.

Then comes the interesting part as most of it has to be filled in with half alternating cross stitch in either black (mostly black), green around the saying and the fill in behind Betsy's name with cream. So I am thinking that Betsy will be finished in "A Couple of Days", no, no, no better make that a couple of weeks. We used to have a Comedy Show in Australia where there was a Greek Greengrocer called Con. Everything would be beautiful in "A Couple of Days". The no, no, no reminds me of a character in The Vicar of Dibley. Every time you ask Jim a question you would also be answered with no, no, no, no, yes. My youngest son keeps telling me that I watch to much TV, but that isn't the case.

I mostly listen to music during the day when I am by myself. My favourite music as the moment is listening to The Gypsy Kings. Don't understand a word of it, but I seem to have a lot of their music on my Ipod at the moment and I sing along with it all day long. My favourite song is called Montana which I think means - I walk among the mountains etc. I don't know what they do in the Mountains, but I love the song.

We have strange weather here at the moment. By Thursdays and Fridays the temperatures seem to rise really high. Saturdays have been unbearable with the heat and are dangerous days in these Mountains with dry lightening starting fires which have been all under control. By Mondays the weather starts getting cooler with showers and the other day it was quite cold. You could nearly have a heater going to keep warm. Strange weather, strange times.

Well, I hope that you have all have a lovely week. My youngest turns 15 on the weekend. My he is getting tall. He now towers over me lol. Although that's not hard these days as I seem to be shrinking lol.

The Headless Woman

2009-11-26T09:09:00.005+11:00

No it's not that good old Aussie expression "Running around like a headless chicken". It is a headless woman lol.

Here is Betsy's progress. I spent days and days working behind the saying that starts - "May spotless ......" It is all worked in 739 in alternate half cross stitch. I always have aaahhh moments when I do this if I am not concentrating as I find I can easily slip into having each row going the same row. It is really easy to do when working among the words. This will stand out more later when I have to work 3052 (I think) around it. It is either needle weaving or further adventures in alternating cross stitch.

Pity she doesn't have a head yet. Oh well, it will come in the progress of time as they say. I love her dress though. Very pretty, sort of green/gold tones. It reminds me of a piece of Thai silk.

On Friday, I celebrated another Birthday. My they are flying past now. I had a lovely day. My eldest son who is married came up by train and spent the day with me. It was lovely as I don't get to spend "one-on-one" time very often. My DIL drove up when she finished work and then they joined my DH and I in going out to dinner. My youngest couldn't come as of all nights to pick he had to perform in a concert at his school. He is in a Brazilian Drum Band. My middle son lives in Sydney and had to work on Saturday morning. He was going to come up to see me on Sunday with his girlfriend, but because of a lot of bush fires that we had, he came up on Saturday as he had to go and fight one of the fires.

My DH started his fire fighting effort on Friday night when he received a phone call to say that they had to go out at 8.30p.m. He spent all night out in the bush and didn't get home till 4a.m. Didn't see much of him over the weekend. He was either fighting fires, patrolling fires or sleeping. All these fires were started by lightening. We had extremely high temperatures and dry storms. Bad combination for bush fires. Thankfully everybody is safe and no property was damaged.

I received some lovely things for my birthday. I should have taken some photos of them. I have this "thing" for Pandora Bracelets. My DH and younger Son bought me 2 silver and gold charms. A Christmas tree and a Tea Pot (I am always saying to my youngest son "Put the kettle on". My Dad and Sister bought me altogether 5 of the Murano glass beads in pinks and blues. My bracelet looks lovely. I have 2 of them. This one I am slowly converting to silver and gold charms. Would love a gold charm (wouldn't we all lol). But...... have you seen the price of those suckers.

My other Sons and DIL bought me a beautiful cushion for my bed. They bought me one last year for Christmas. I dropped a few hints that it looked lonely on the bed lol. Some lovely Body Shop goodies and I received a dvd from my middle son on a Classic English Comedy that I used to watch. His girlfriend was very naughty and bought me a lovely watch.

To all of my friends in the States. I hope that you and your family have a lovely Thanksgiving. It is always lovely to spend time with your family.

A Mad Woman's Sewing

2009-11-12T11:33:00.003+11:00

This is this weeks update on Betsy. By looking at the photos they look as if a mad woman is working on it. I am trying to get it all lined up properly and found that I had to go and finish the right hand side border. I have nearly finished the last queen stitch flower and just have to fill in all of the greenery etc.

I can't start the next portion till I get the portion with the saying all worked out. She is looking lovely though. I don't know if you can see them, but there are all different strands of white cotton worked through it to line it all up.

Thank you to everybody for your concerns regarding one of my sons. He is thankfully and is not back to his cheeky self. Sometimes, as our children grow up they become more of worry than when they were small.

I am trying at the moment to beat this computer. Everytime I turn the computer on that I update my blog on, it wants to upgrade something. It just sent me a message that it is going to do it in a couple of minutes. These computers have minds of there own sometimes.

Just quickly thank you for all your encouraging words regarding Betsy. I really appreciate it. I'm sorry if I haven't had a chance to pay a visit to you lately, but I have had a lot going on with sickness in the family. If it's not one it's the other. Ah it's going.

Hark The Heralds Angels Sing

2009-10-30T10:29:00.005+11:00

Well, here is my progress on Miss Betsy Manchester. I am slowly getting there. I went through a period where I couldn't be bothered doing any sewing and then I had a lot of worries with a couple of family members.

In case you are wondering the reference to Angels. Well, it is for 3 reasons really. The first one is obvious as there are 2 angels on the top of Miss Betsy. The second is that last Sunday was the 2nd Anniversary of my Mum's passing.

The 3rd is on this particular Saturday/Sunday evening one of my Sons was rushed to the Emergency Ward of the Hospital. Some charming person decided that it would be great fun to spike his drink. I am so thankful to his girlfriend and her family as they rushed him to the hospital. Her Brother drove through red lights very late on Saturday evening, threw him over his shoulder and ran into the hospital with him. He kept going into and out of consciousness, he had chest pains, pins and needles and was hyper-ventilating. He was in a bad way for a few hours.

By the time my DH, younger Son and I got to the hospital after our 2 hour drive he was feeling a lot better after they had flushed out his system. Thankfully he is now on the mend but is still suffering pains in his body. We don't know what was in his drink, but honestly I think some people sit on their brains some times. I think my Mum and the Angels were looking after him.

See I have scary ladies again. I think the one on the rights eyes are too big hmmmm. I might have another bash at doing them.

This Betsy is a little bit shorter than the other Betsy.

After a week of rain and cold weather the sun has finally come out today. I have so many roses again which are lovely. I also have these beautiful flag iris's out, snap dragons and poppies, but the never ending forget-me-nots. I have hundreds of forget-me-nots. Everything is a sea of blue.

Well, to all my friends who celebrate Halloween, I hope you have a lovely weekend. We don't celebrate it here.

Miss Betsy Manchester

2009-10-08T11:08:00.007+11:00

As you can, Beatrix Potter has been replaced for a while by Betsy Manchester. But don't worry Bea hasn't gone far. She is still in my sewing basket. I decided to do a motif every now and then until I have finished her.

Over the last week I have been working on Miss Betsy Manchester. Oh she is such a beautiful sampler. I took photos all along he part that I am currently working on so that you could see how beautiful she is.

I have also noticed that she isn't as long as Betsy Davis which will be interesting when looking for a frame for her. She doesn't have the added bit that Betsy D has on the bottom.

There are still parts of this vine that I can't do at the moment until I have worked the border that goes all around the middle piece. I am planning on finishing the leaf and vine between the top 2 queen stitch flowers and then working down. I think it might be an angel, but I am not sure. Will have to check. It is just a rectangle with nothing in it on my chart.

I haven't filled in the vase yet, as I found that the first one that I did rubbed slightly on Betsy Davis, so I will fill this portion in towards the end of Betsy Manchester.

Well, we have been having strange weather again. We had a long weekend on the weekend and you guessed it, it rained. It has been cold over the last few days and I have had to light our fire. Today is cold outside, but the sun is shining. I think though that it is colder in Sydney then here in the Mountains. My Sister was complaining how cold it was and that she had to get her overcoat out again.

Nothing much has happened in my life at the moment. My youngest son is on school holidays (he always seems to be on holidays), so my peace and quiet has gone for a little while. One good thing though is that I can sleep in for 15 minutes more. Ahhh sleep.

Thank you for paying a visit to my blog. I love reading all the comments that I receive and it is lovely to know what I do is appreciated by my peers. Thank you.

Happy Dance Time

2009-09-29T15:12:00.007+10:00

Well, as you can see Betsy Davis and now finished and framed and hanging in my bedroom. She isn't in her final spot yet, as I need Betsy Manchester to hang besides her. They will eventually hang above my bed. I currently have 2 other needlework pictures, that did a long time ago hanging there and I plan on hanging them where Betsy D is now hanging. One on top of the other. These picture are of French Porcelain Dolls that I did when my eldest son who is nearly 25 was a little boy. So they are over 20 years old. There is a photo of them here and here.

I finished Betsy yesterday. All I had to do were the last 2 numbers in the date down the bottom, which didn't take my very long to do.

I decided last night to spend a little time on my Beatrix Potter. I have another motif and a bit of another one done. I don't know how long I will spend on Bea as I am itching to start Betsy Manchester. I also decided this morning that for me Bea works better as a day stitcher as it is all over one.

So I am thinking that I might start Betsy and every now and then stitch a motif on Bea. I joined the SAL for Bea, but I was totally hopeless at keeping to the commitment. I might make a deal with my self to stitch this every now a then when the urge overcomes me lol. I really don't know why I feel like this as it is such a beautiful thing. I think it might be after Elizabeth Cox and Betsy Davis I find it a bit boring. I seem to like samplers with a bit of a challenge lol. But my current plan sounds good, so I might see if I can stick to that.

I have so many other beautiful samplers all kitted up and ready to go. I am really looking forward to doing them.

It is another beautiful day in the Mountains today. I was able to wash my quilt that you can see in the background of these photos. I was able to get it totally dry and it has that nice clean smell. Hopefully I can wash another one tomorrow. Thank goodness the dust storms have gone. We had another one on Friday night/Saturday morning, but it was nothing like the earlier one. The earlier one was so amazing.

The End is Coming

2009-09-23T11:36:00.004+10:00

The end is so near with Betsy Davis. As you can see I am now working on the black background. I don't know if you can see it, but the urn is outlined, I just have to fill it in. I decided to wait till I finished the background to do this.

So what remains in the black background, fill in the urn and then of course there is around 10 rows on the bottom which includes Betsy Davis's name. I still think that she will be finished in around 2 weeks time. I still can't get over how fast I have finished this sampler.

Well, what an amazing day it is here in New South Wales. We are in the middle of a huge dust storm. Everything outside is covered in red dust, which turns to mud when it is wet. I am sure owners of car wash establishments are jumping up and down today with glee.

We awoke this morning earlier than normal as my youngest son had to be at school very early as his year were going on a school camp for 3 days camping in tents. Not a good idea at the moment I might add. There was this orange glow all around and you just couldn't see that far ahead. The Blue Mountains are the Red Mountains today.

Anybody flying into Sydney today would have been so disappointed as all the well known icons e.g. Harbour Bridge and Opera House were not visible.

I know that the planes were either delayed, diverted or cancelled. The Sydney Ferries weren't running at all. It is still extremely windy outside and I think this dust will be around all day. Guess who isn't doing their washing today.

I know while driving my Son to school this morning, people were ring the radio stations wondering if this was the end of the world. Well I am still here, so I guess it's not today.

I just realised that my subject for this post could be taken two ways lol. I am referring to the sampler of course.

Another Betsy Update

2009-09-16T10:59:00.004+10:00

Well, as you can see Betsy D now has black background in all the right places except on the right hand side. I am now working on the Queen Stitch flowers down this portion of her. I am wondering if she will be finished in 2-3 weeks. I can't believe how this one has flown along. I know that when I did the American Sampler, it took me 12 months to go, but I was working at the time, which would have stretch it out a bit.

I am really looking forward to finishing this one and starting her Sister, although I'm toying with the idea of finishing Beatrix which I really must do. I already have the frame for Bea and it is sitting besides my Son's desk. If I don't get it hung on the wall, I will end up having to buy another one because of broken glass lol.

Here is Betsy from the top. She is everything that I expected and more. I just love working on her.

I have been very busy in the garden over the last week and weekend. Although it wasn't such a good idea for me physically. By Monday I couldn't walk very well. But it is amazing what a heat bag will do. My garden is looking quite pretty at the moment. I have forget-me-nots all over the place and violets out. Now if I could get somebody to cut the lawn for me (ha ha) it would look lovely.

The fire season has started early out here and they are really worried about bush fires this year. We had some lovely warm weather over the weekend and by Sunday, it was a Total Fire Ban sort of day. My DH and one of my DS were "On Standby" up at the Fire Shed. So they were no use to me. The youngest DS had a lot of school projects to be done so it was just me, Sally the dog and my iPod in the garden.

I got my copy of Dan Brown's new book yesterday. I think I was the 4th person to get it. I gave it to my DH to read, but my youngest has pinched it from him. Oh well, he doesn't take very long to get through books. He usually costs me a small fortune trying to keep books up for him.

Usually when school holidays are coming up, I will buy him a couple of books and I think before the holiday has started them, he has finished them. That is how he has fallen under the spell of Dan Brown. I am trying to get him into the classics, but for some reason, I am not having a lot of luck. Ah well, he told me the other day that the holidays will be here again in 3 weeks. I don't know, he always seems to be on holidays.

A Little Bit of Background

2009-09-07T13:23:00.003+10:00

After finishing the top portion of Betsy, I decided to have a little break. I decided to start filling in the black background. Mainly to split this task up and a change is always good.

She is looking ever so lovely and I can't wait to finish her. She and her Sister Betsy Manchester have always been up there among my favourite samplers. I am eventually hoping to hang both of them in my bedroom.

I now have Betsy Manchester all kitted up and she is ready to go as well. I am looking forward to the experience of working on her. What a great pity that there are no more samplers that we can do from the Mary Balch school.

We have been having typical Spring weather here. We had a beautiful weekend. This morning was overcast and then it started to rain. Now the sun is shining. It is still a little bit chilly. I keep saying to myself "Will I light the fire or not?" So far I have resisted the temptation. BTW I have my slippers on so my feet are nice and warm lol.

We had a lovely weekend. It was Fathers Day here yesterday and also my DIL's birthday. My eldest son came up on Friday night, but unfortunately they had to go home before lunch on Saturday. Yesterday we went down to have lunch with my Dad and it was lovely. It is always lovely to see him and my Sister.

Well, I hope that you have a lovely week. I am still trying to catch up with my housework. For some reason I keep getting distracted. I am sorry if I haven't had a chance get to pay you a visit, but I will get there lol. Have a good week.

Strawberries are done

2009-08-31T09:20:00.007+10:00

Here is an update on Betsy. I finished working the strawberries (I think they are strawberries lol) along the bottom and the black background. I think she is such a stunning sampler.

I have decided for a change of pace to go back up the top and finish that section. When I have finished doing this I might start doing some more of the black background. Hopefully Betsy has only a few more weeks work in her. I also have to put her name down on the bottom. But she is looking good

Every time, I go to my friend Karen's needlework store I keep falling in love with Larry the Lamb. So of course I had to buy him and make him didn't I. Larry is made from wool felt and is filled with crushed walnuts. I have him in a tray that I use which contains my threads, scissors etc. He is very handy when I am using a few different needles at one time.

Before taking the photos for this blog, I picked my self a little bunch of Parma white violets. Aren't they beautiful. Violets are one of my favourite flowers. I love the perfume they have, although many years ago when I first started working I bought myself a bottle of Yardley April Violets. I found that stuff quite strong and every time I wore it which wasn't often, the smell would give me headaches. Funny I only ever bought one bottle of it lol.

Well, I have finally finished doing the boxes that I was doing. These ones took forever to do as they all had to been cut out. They actually look a lot better than they do in photos.

Now I will be able to get to my dreaded housework lol. It is always a case of a women's work is never done.

I hope you all have a lovely week. Guess what I will be doing this week. Housework.

A Beautiful Book

2009-08-18T08:52:00.009+10:00

Well as you can see Betsy D is moving right along. I haven't quite finished needleweaving behind the people on the right. The ones on the left hand side look ok though. When I have finished this bit, I have another lot of Queen Stitch to do. I suppose they will look like either buds or acorns. Who can tell lol. Then behind all this it will be black. I am still loving working on this sampler. As you know it is a sampler that I have wanted for many years.

It is really interesting with Betsy Davis as I have found another 2 samplers while researching the Mary Balch school. One of them is called Ruth Edd and the other is called Betsy Wardwell. If I get these links right check out how much Betsy Wardwell went for when she was auctioned a few years ago. All I can say is wow. It would be lovely if ours were worth that much. wouldn't it.

The other day I found this beautiful book and of course being a Jane Austen fan I had to buy it. What a beautiful book it is. It is called "Jane Austen's Sewing Box" - Craft Projects & Stories From Jane Austen's Novels by Jennifer Forest.

A lot of the craft projects are Regency Projects. But it is simply a beautiful book with small pieces from her books and small portions from her letters.

There are lots of photos like this one, which shows fashion in the Regency period.

There are also a few photos of miniatures that I love. This one also shows how to tie a cravat. Very useful lol. You never know when you have to tie one. Do you think he looks like Mr Darcy.

Among the projects that you can make there is this workbag. Very pretty.

Then there is this gentleman. Obviously an officer. I wonder who he could be lol.

I think it is actually an Australian book as it is published by Murdoch Books. But I know that Amazon in the UK have it as does Amazon in the US. I found it quite interesting with
Amazon US as they have this book listed new at $39.21, but they have I used book from $98.88. Interesting.

I must tell you, that I have found an absolutely brilliant cleaning cloth that really works. Most women will have them in their house and they work like magic. It is "panty hose". You use your old pairs of them. You can also use "knee high" stockings". It is a really good cloth that is very gentle at removing things e.g. soap scum, on stainless steel and also works brilliantly with bi-carb and vinegar.

We have a combustion fire and every few days I clean the glass of it to remove the soot that has built up. It works fine on the hot glass and removes all the soot so that we can see the wood happily burning away. When I have finished I just give it a wash and it is ready for the next time. They are also brilliant at cleaning around taps. You put the panty hose around the back of the tap and grab hold of each end and run it backwards and forwards.

Also I am sorry if I haven't paid you a visit lately. I have been very busy with my box project and hopefully I will finish it next week. The ones that I am doing at the moment have taken me a long time to do as they are decoupaged and I have had to cut all the motifs out. All I can say is that the end is near, thank goodness. I will be glad to see the end of them.

What amazing weather we are getting at the moment. I think Spring has come early, although my fire is still burning happily to keep the house warm. On Sunday, I went to visit my Dad in Sydney and it was definitely a "light and frilly" day.

I hope you all have a lovely week and thank you for stopping by. I really enjoy meeting all of you.

A Little Bit More

2009-08-06T08:57:00.005+10:00

I hope that you can see the lady and the man on Betsy D. They are looking a little bit pale at the moment, but when I finish this strip, they will all be surrounded by blue. The best way that I can describe how this blue part will be done is a running stitch over alternating threads. A bit like needleweaving.

The background around the Queenstitch flowers is done in black in an alternating half cross stitch.

I am so happy that I decided to do Betsy D and her Sister Betsy Manchester. They are such beautiful samplers. I am slowly collecting Rhode Island samplers and it is interesting the differences between them. The Mary Balch samplers have more work on them, which I think makes them look quite stunning.

I wanted to show you this beautiful parcel that I received the other day from my very special friend who doesn't have a blog. I met this lovely lady a while ago and we just "clicked". We have similar tastes and we know what each other likes. She has been helping me with my collection of Sampler and Antique Needlework Magazines and she sent me some the other day. She also included a few beautiful things that I didn't have, which really made my day. I love everything that she sent me and I am looking forward to doing a special sampler that I have in my collection with the beautiful collection of silks that she sent me.

I am sorry if this post is short, but I haven't been feeling to good for the last few days. I have a slight migraine that won't go away.

An Adventure

2009-07-23T09:22:00.005+10:00

Working on Betsy is like going on an exciting adventure trip. You know where you are going and what you will see a long the way, but when you actually get there and see all the beautiful sites, you go wow. That is how I feel about Betsy.

I am really enjoying this journey. The more I do the more I fall in love with her. She is so beautiful and not at all complicated

She now has a house and half a fence with one tree. I have another 2 trees with birds to go.

I am sorry if she looks a bit washed out in the photos. It was slightly overcast when I took the photos. But you have also remember that a lot of it will end up being stitched in black. Especially around the Queen stitch border. I think when that happens will really come alive.

I have also been enjoying researching Mary Balch and her school and some of her samplers. I find it so interesting learning about people who worked these amazing samplers. What an amazing collection they are. Wouldn't it be wonderful if they were all in a special collection for a short period of time in one of the Museums. Sort of how they bring together a famous artist and his collection of paintings, e.g. Monet.

Thank you to Pat to alerting me to a beautiful sampler that Betsy did when she was around 8. It is quite interesting to see how she has progressed. The Sampler is one of Joanne Harveys kits. I will have to go a searching to find the graphs lol.

What an interesting week last week was. They found the Back Packer safe and well. He can't go home to England for 6-8 weeks as he has fluid in his lungs and can't fly. His story is quite amazing as he survived some really cold weather. A lot of the experts are quite amazed that he survived his experience.

His father at the time when he was found was sitting at the Airport awaiting for his flight to be called to fly home. He got the call from the Police to say that his son was found and alive and well. They put Dad into a helicopter and flew him back to the mountains.

We also had a Tsunami alert last week, although I am totally safe where I live. There was an earthquake off the South Island of New Zealand with the 2 plates pushing against each other. I heard this morning that New Zealand is apparently 30 cm's closer to Australia. I just told my 14 year old. He was so excited that his comment was "Big whoop" and walked off lol.

Anyway, everybody was safe and sound. All we ended up having was a King Tide.

Anyway, I hope you all have a lovely weekend. I never know what I will end up doing lol.

English Backpacker Found Alive

2009-07-15T13:00:00.002+10:00

I just wanted to let you know that they have found Jamie Neale, the 19 yo English Backpacker who has been missing for 12 days. He is suffering from dehydration and exposure. Apparently he has walked out by himself after being found by a couple of bush walkers. He was 15km away from Katoomba in the bush.

This is really good news. Where he was was like looking for a needle in a haystack.

A Little Bit More

2009-07-13T09:32:00.007+10:00

I was going to update my blog last Thursday, but the cameras batteries were flat. We have 2 cameras that I could have used and you guessed it. Both were flat. So after a lot of recharging here are the latest photos of Betsy D.

She is coming along quite nicely. Although I think the people have really scary faces lol.

My next part to do is the house which is over one. As you know I don't mind doing the odd over one's lol.

Thank you to Barbara from Queenstown Samplers and to the 2 Pats who helped me find the link to seeing the original Betsy Davis Sampler in the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, each of you helped me in one way or the other and I really appreciate your help. My DH was able to print a copy of the photo from one of the Pats. He doesn't have full internet service, so Pat who sent me a photo on her email helped him print the picture for me. I find it quite useful and I continually look at it while I stitch. I was going to post a photo of the original Betsy, but this computer is being a jerk (as usual). I am trying this on another computer. I hope the link comes through. It is really fascinating to see the original. The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston link is here

It really helps when you are doing a antique reproduction if you can see occasionally the original. It sometimes helps answer the many questions one has while stitching these wonderful works of art

Don't you love these scissors. They are a pair of Scissoroos. I love the kangaroo on them. There are a lot of kangaroos around where I live, but you never see them. Sometimes when we go to Lithgow which is on the otherside of the mountains and it is early in the morning we often see a lot of them grazing in the grass. We are supposed to have a black panther who roams free around the mountains and has been spotted by a lot of people, but that is another story. Some people think it is fact or others fiction. He or she is supposed to have escaped from a circus a long time ago and has mated with a feral cat. So I am not sure how many there are. I have seem photos that are very grainy of it and hazy videos, but who knows.

Before I go, please say a little pray for a young English (19 yo) backpacker who has been missing for 10 days in the bush. He arrived here on the Thursday and stayed in the Youth Hostel. He decided to go for a bush walk 10 days ago and left his passport, papers, mobile phone in the Youth Hostel. He didn't come back and after a couple of days the Police, National Parks, Rural Fire Service Volunteers have been searching for him. Last week the weather was terrible as for a few days it was so misty and wet. The nights have been freezing and wet and there is another really cold snap coming again. His Father and Uncle have come out from England to help look for him, but the problem is that the Police don''t know where he was headed. It is like looking for a needle in a haystack. Anyway, I hope and pray that he is still with us. I feel so sorry for his poor parents and all those people who are out looking for him. Please pray that is is still ok.

We Now Have People

2009-07-03T12:59:00.003+10:00

Well, as you can see, we now have a couple of people in Betsy. They are all over 1 along with the funny looking dog (I think it is a dog), tree. The deer is in free hand embroidery. As you can also see I fixed the mistake in the saying. I was lucky that I only had to undo one letter and that it was on the end of the line. I am actually looking forward to doing the black part around the Queen stitch border.

I think I will also have to do the other pole on the other side of the sampler so that the path that everybody is standing on can be finished. Not sure about the ladies faces though. They look a bit weird. From what I can gather from the chart and the photo on the front of the chart, their faces are filled in with free hand embroidery. The eyes are French knots and the mouths are just red slashes.

I would like to thank Karen for alerting me to the fact that there is a photo of the original Betsy Davis in a book called - Samplers A to Z, Museum of Fine Art Boston by Pamela Parnal. I have been trying to find a bigger photo of this sampler on the Internet and unfortunately the only ones that I can find are so tiny that you can't see them properly.

I was wondering if any body out there has a copy of this book and would be able to scan this photo and send it to me via email I would be really grateful. If you can see the original or even larger photo's of samplers, it just helps placing things properly. My email address is - sandra.moffitt@gmail.com.

My youngest son has been home all week with a Lower Respiratory Tract Infection and is on antibiotics. Talk about cough. I ended up buying another Vapouriser to help him breath without the coughing.

My middle son had a week off work so he came home for a few days to see us. I think he likes living in Sydney as he kept saying that it is so cold up here and that he now prefers Sydney. Well, I suppose it is warmer down there, he lives not far from one of the surf beaches and he is not far away from the things he likes doing. One good thing for him was that he was able to catch up with a lot of his friends.

I would just like to wish my friends in the U.S. a Happy Independence Day and weekend. I hope you all have a lovely long weekend and that you get a lot of stitching done. I also hope that the weather is fine for you.

We have been getting a lot of strong winds over the last few days. Earlier in the week the weather was quite mild, but on Wednesday evening the winds hit. I thought we were going to loose the roof on Wednesday night. I could picture me lying in bed shivering gazing at the stars. That is one good thing about living in the Mountains in the stars. They are spectacular. We get to see a lot more than you can see in Sydney with the city lights.

A Sad Day

2009-06-26T10:52:00.003+10:00

What an amazing day this is. I have been having a lot of trouble posting this, plus with my emails. I have heard that this is because of all the internet traffic since Michael Jackson passed away.

I would just like to say what an amazing musical talent, in fact quite a genius Michael Jackson was. My favourite song of his besides the songs of Thriller is a song that I have that was on a special CD that I bought when Princess Diana died. There was a beautiful song on there by Michael Jackson and it was called "Gone To Soon".

Well, below is my progress on Betsy. She is slowly getting there. I've worked the angels and I have done all the needle weaving of the blue behind the angels.

I am now in the verse. I have discovered a mistake from the chart to the photo. In the last word of the 3rd line is the word unexperienced. The C is missing from the word. It is the photo though. I don't know whether to follow the chart or follow the word.

I am still battling the boxes. I think I will be doing that for the next few weeks.

I know this is a short post but I have a lot going on at the moment. I hope you all have a lovely week.

Elizabeth is Framed

2009-06-18T09:47:00.005+10:00

Well, as you can see I now have Elizabeth back and yesterday I framed her. I had to use just a plain frame as I couldn't find a style that I had used before when I framed Margaret Gibson.

Unfortunately after, I had finished framing it I discovered that the bottom wasn't quite straight. I had a lot to do yesterday, so I have decided that when I finish this job that I am doing at the moment I will undo Elizabeth and re do it. Besides this little problem I think she looks ok.

Betsy is coming along nicely. I finished the left side. I only have to do the black background in this bit, but that is left till last. I started working up the top and I thought I'd have a change from Queen stitch and free hand embroidery and do the arches with the angels etc.

It is funny doing freehand embroidery. You end up with funny looking birds etc. It is not as hard as I thought it would be. But if you can do all of the stitches, it is quite easy.

It is funny working on 25ct linen. I am so used to working either on 32ct over one or 40ct, but the Queen stitch and the over ones are a lot easier to do on the 25ct. I know parts of this sampler are hard to see at the moment, but when it is finished a lot of it will be surrounded by black.

A couple of my friends have asked what I am doing at the moment as I keep whinging about it. I have to cover 60 of these tissue boxes in 3 different types of wall paper. That is 20 boxes x 3 different wall papers equals 60. Plus the same in small boxes with lids.

Why I keep whinging is that I keep having trouble with the wall paper. This particular one is actually linen toile on wall paper. Because it is wet and misty up here I am having trouble getting it to stick properly. Also I don't particularly like having my fingers covered in glue all the time. It quite annoys me. Well I have done 10 of these so far so I just have 50 to go. 20 of the ones I have to do have to be done in decoupage. It usually takes me over an hour to cut out the motifs. As you can gather these wall paper types are very expensive. I am doing this work for a hotel that I used to work in many years ago. Every couple of years they get me to do some more to replace ones that are either stolen or need to be replaced. They are used in the bathroom when the hold tissues and cotton balls for the guests.

Anyway the boxes await me so I had better go and do some. Whinge, grumble, whinge lol.

Elizabeth is Finished

2009-06-12T10:23:00.005+10:00

I have been having a "Happy Dance" time as Elizabeth is finished. I finished her over the long weekend. I haven't been able to frame her as yet, as my DH wanted to show it to a lady who he works with. Unfortunately she hasn't been to work this week, so I have to wait till next week to do it. All I hope is that he doesn't decide to sell it on me lol. No he won't do that.

I am now working on The Scarlet Letter's Betsy Davis. I seem to have a "thing" for Rhode Island Samplers especially the ones from The Mary Balach School. I think what makes them special for me is the way the background is worked.

The way of working this sampler is a bit different for me. I usually work from the middle out, but this one I had to work from the top left hand corner. I am about to finish the Queen stitch flowers on the left hand side of the column. The stems and leaves are all worked in freehand embroidery e.g. stem stitch and satin stitch. I think when I have finished the bud below the last flower I will work the arch that connects the columns so that I can do the Queen stitch flowers above the arch.

As you can see I also have Betsy Manchester. Depending on how I go with the other Betsy, she might be my next work. I think they would look spectacular hanging together.

I have been very cold over the last few days. We have had temperatures of minus 2 degrees C. On Wednesday, snow was forecasted, but unfortunately it only snowed higher up. Can you see the difference here. Snow here is a bit of a treat as we don't get much of it. I think though if I lived in the US or Canada the thought of snow would be a great pain in the you know where. But still I'm finding it very cold this year. My feet are like ice. Must be getting old lol. I used to have a Great Aunt and Uncle who lived 2 villages up. They had the right idea. As soon winter hit they moved up to the Gold Coast in Queensland for 3 months. Sounds like the perfect idea to me, but I don't think it will happen.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend and thank you for paying me a visit. I love hearing from you all.

The End is Very Near

2009-06-04T11:12:00.003+10:00

Well, as you can see the end is nearly there for Elizabeth. Hopefully I will have her completely finished by the weekend. It is not until you really get up close to her to see how absolutely beautiful she is.

I noticed on the Scarlett Letter website the other day, that you can by the model of this sampler for $2,000 framed. I can understand why as there is so much work in it. I told my DH. He didn't seem to be impressed by this news (he's not a sampler lover) and told me "Good, don't give it away to anyone, we'll sell it". I think he has 2 chances of that happening lol.

I am looking forward to starting something new, but I can't make up my mind as usual. I don't know whether to sit down and finish my Beatrix Potter. I am over half way with her. Or to start something that I'm itching to do and that is Betsy Davis. Ah decisions, decisions. I will have to see what mood I am in when I finish Elizabeth.

School Girl Aprons

2009-05-26T14:10:00.007+10:00

As you can see Elizabeth is drawing to the end. I am now in the saying. All I have to do is finish this and do the top border. Put my Grandmothers name on the bottom of the sampler and she is finished.

Last week I paid a visit to my Dad and he gave me a bag with a few things that my Mum had kept. In it there were a couple of things that I completely forgot about and I thought that I would show you.

I went to school in Sydney during the late 1950's and 60's. While I was in Primary School we had to make a few things. The idea was to teach us to sew and to make some practical things.

The first thing I remember making was on a piece of Huckaback and it had all this needle weaving on it. I have it, but I can't find it at the moment. I had forgotten that we had to make ourselves these aprons. We had to make them completely from scratch and then to decorate them. We learnt how to hem and also a few embroidery stitches.One of these is mine and the other is my Sisters. Unfortunately I can't remember who made which.

I also made a napkin. Could this be my first cross stitch. I also remember that we had to make ourselves a pair of shorty PJ's. We learnt how to do all different seams e.g. French Seams. Unfortunately I don't have these lol. These were made when I was around 9 to 11.

I also have a small tea cloth that I made when I was in High School. I think I was about 14 or 15 at the time. This is where I learnt how to do counted cross stitch. I will go searching for it and show you one day.

Thankfully the rain has gone for a little while. It is lovely to see the sun.

More Lollipops

2009-05-21T10:15:00.002+10:00

I'm sorry if these photos are a bit dark. It is not a very nice day to day. It is quite chilly and very wet. My dog Sally has decided to spend the day laying in front of the fire. Lucky her. It is a good day to sit near it with my stitching in hand, but unfortunately I have other things to do.

As you can see the border is progressing. I have only to do one more lollipop on the side border and then to fill it and the other 2 in. Next comes the saying:-

"Jesus permit thy gracious name to stand
As the first efforts of an infants hand,
And while her fingers o'er the canvas move
Engage her tender heart to seek thy Love;
With thy dear children let her share apart
And write thy name thy self upon her heart."

This is all over one on 40ct.

Besides this saying is there are 2 different types of urns with quite large plants that are the whole length of the saying and then of course there is the continuation of of the border.

Hopefully, this will only take me another couple of weeks and then it will be "happy dance" time.

I would just like to say thank you for all your lovely comments regarding this sampler. It looks quite challenging but once you start doing it, it is just a piece of cake.

I hope the weather is kind to you, wherever you are. The weather on the East Coast of Australia is terrible at the moment. All that is good about it is that the dams are filling up quite rapidly.

Lollipops

2009-05-14T10:12:00.004+10:00

I decided to have a change from the main body of Elizabeth and do the border. I think the flowers look a little bit like "Chuppa" lollipops. The inside of the flowers are done in cross stitch but the petals are done in satin stitch. I should really be a lot further along but the dreaded frogs paid me a visit on the left hand side. I have had to undo this side completely twice. A right pain the you know where. So on the 3rd attempt I decided just to stitch the outline of the vine and then come along and stitch the leaves and flowers. So far this idea is working.

I have already bought Elizabeths frame and I am really looking forward to finishing her. After my problems with the border I am definitely looking forward to seeing the end of her lol, but that could also be that I have everything ready to start my next sampler. It's funny, there is always another one that comes along that grabs you be the throat and says "Pick me, pick me".

In my case it is Betsy Davis. Every time I take the graph out I shudder and think "can I do it" and then I say to myself, "Well girl, you'll never know unless you try."

On the other front, I am getting over a bout of the flu that my DH kindly gave me. I am ok now but still have coughing fits all the time, especially when I talk to somebody.

Today is very windy in the mountains. All the beautiful trees are now slowly loosing their leaves. Every now and then the wind picks up a pile of leaves and the leaves dance amongst the wind. Very pretty.

If anyone comes up to the mountains go for a drive up to Blackheath and go for a drive in the back streets. The trees there are glorious. Another beautiful place to go is Mount Wilson. Mount Wilson is famous for its gardens and the drive around there will be quite rewarding. The only problem is on the weekend, when you can't move. It's the same with my other favourite place Leura. It is always murder to find a parking spot.

Anyway, I hope you are all well, and will have a lovely weekend. I'm sorry if I haven't paid you a visit recently as I have had a lot on mind lately.

2009-05-04T10:18:00.003+10:00

Just a quick update on Elizabeth. I have a lot to do today.

Well, as you can see, I have finished the sky above the scene. I am now working on the border. I started that last night while watching "The Bucket List". Just looking at the photo while I type this post the scene looks really lovely. It was row upon row of stem stitch. This part of the linen is quite heavy and there is a lot of thread stitched into this piece of the sampler.

The border looks like lollipops and I am planning on working the border on both sides of the sampler and then working the 2 vases, and the verse that goes above what I have already worked. The top of the border, will be the last thing I do.

I am already planning my next challenge in life and I sent away to the U.S. to Scarlet Letter and order 2 samplers that I have always loved. One is called Betsy Davis 1797 and the other is Betsy Manchester 1793. I have always loved the Rhode Island style of samplers and I thought I would have a go at these.

I have to laught though, as Betsy Davis is recommended for very advanced needleworkers and Betsy Manchester is recommended for more advanced needleworkers. When I opened them to check out the graphs I nearly had a fit when I saw it. If I thought that Elizabeth Cox was a challenge these are much more so. Anyway, I will give them a go and see how I go. Nothing venture, nothing gained.

It is so beautiful in the mountains at the moment. I wish I had a photo to show you. All of the Japanese maples, cherry blossoms etc. etc. are in colour. Everywhere I go it is beautiful. There is one Japanese maple near where I live and it is the most beautiful claret red. It looks absolutely glorious with the sun shining on it.

Well, I had better get back to my dreaded housework. I have quite a lot of washing to do today and the washing machine keeps singing out to me to come and empty it. I know, I know, "A Women's Work is Never Done", she says lol.

And Now for the Sky

2009-04-21T10:21:00.006+10:00

I have finished working on the ground and now I am painting the sky. It is such a beautiful colour. It is 2 colours dmc 504 and 3813 blended together and is stunning.

My purchases from ebay arrived the other day and this is the first time I have had to post them on my blog. They are all charts from the 1980's. This is my favourite. It is a sampler by Mary Beale and is called "Personal Sampler". It reminds me slightly of my favourite style of samplers which are the Mary Balch samplers. That will give you an idea of the charts that I order from The Scarlet Letter.

This is a Needle's Prayse chart called "The Garden of Eden Sampler". It has Adam and Eve in it and I bought it to add to my small collection of Adam and Eve charts.

This one is a sampler from Jean Farish and is called "The Roxanna Corson Sampler". It has one of my favourite morbid sayings -

When I am dead and in my grave
And all my bones are rotten
When this you see remember me
Or I shall be forgotten.

I told my son that I was going to do this one and put it above his bed. I got told not to bother lol.

When I first say this one I thought it was a book on Antique Samplers that were museums. Well derrr it turned out to be just a chart of a sampler called "Ann Horton Sampler - 1830". But I am happy with it, which is the main thing.

Well as you can see they are all lovely, but I will put them away as I have bigger fish to fry as they say.

After a lot of hair pulling on my part (luckily I have a head of thick hair) I was able to place my order with Scarlet Letter and hopefully they are in the mail. I ordered the Betsy Davis and Betsy Manchester samplers. There is only one shop that I know of in Australia (in Sydney) that sells Scarlet Letter charts. Maybe it is just as well that I don't live near it and that I have to order things on line. Hopefully, my charts will arrive next week. I am looking forward to them arriving as I fell in love with them the first time I saw them. I am going to do them when I finish Elizabeth. I thought I'd do them before the eyes finally pack it in. Thank goodness I have one of the Mageyes. I find I am using it more and more.

You can tell in my small part of the world that Winter is coming. It has been wet, misty and cold for a few days. I have to rug up now, but if you travel down the mountain you need cooler clothes. No wonder my family keep getting colds.

Well, I suppose I had better go and fix my washing up. My washing machines is always singing out that it is finished. I don't know, a woman's work is never done lol. I hope that you are all well and happy in your part of the world.

Painting the Garden Green

2009-04-16T09:48:00.003+10:00

On of my favourite movies is "Alice in Wonderland" and I quite like the song "Painting the Roses Red". For days after I have seen the movie I get around singing this song. While I have been working on the garden on Elizabeth I keep singing this song. Don't know why. Darn I'm starting to sing it again lol.

Well, as you can see I have nearly finished working in the garden. I am looking forward to finishing this bit. Then when I have finished working the garden I have the sky to do which is behind the buildings up to all the small buildings.

I am quite looking forward to moving onto another area. I haven't made up my mind yet whether to start doing the border or continue above the flower vines. Decisions, decisions.

Last week I placed an order to Wye Needlework in England for one of these lap needle frames. I chose one that had 3 sizes of hoops and they arrived the other day. I am really happy with it and it is quite easy to use. I have been having a lot of trouble with pains in my wrist from the dreaded arthristis after breaking my wrist about 7 years ago. Wye Needlework is in Bakewell in Derbyshire where Pemberley from Pride and Prejudice is set. Ah Mr Darcy or should I say Colin Firth. I still think he is the best Mr Darcy,

I am also waiting on a parcel of very old charts that I bought on ebay last week. I successfully bid on 4 charts and got them all. One f them is a Adam and Eve Sampler from Needles Prayse. Also I think it is a sampler called Roxana Corson, a sampler from McCalls Heritage Collection of Museum Samplers and the one that I really wanted called Personal Sampler by Mary Beale. Hopefully they will come today or tomorrow. I have a great deal of patience in most things but not in others.

Yesterday I (hopefully) ordered 2 charts that I have always wanted from The Scarlet Letter. I had a lot of trouble trying to order them. I kept being told that I had to enter the "Billstate" on the previous page, and as I have no idea what that means or where on the previous page it had to go I gave up trying to order them that way. I ended up printing the order form, scanning it and them sending it via email. Hopefully that way the order went through. I'm really looking forward to these samplers as they are a style of sampler that I really love. They are also samplers that I will have to do soon, before the old eyes pack it in. You know 40ct linen one week 18ct Aida the next lol. Oh God, I hope not, I don't like working on Aida.

Had a lovely long weekend. My middle son came up for a few days and my eldest son and DIL came up for a few days. It was great pity that the weather was quite lousy. My eldest and DIL were quite happy, the love going to a book fair that is on a couple of times a year in a church in Leura. They were able to buy a lovely book of all Lewis Carrols work, with drawings by Tennial. It is really lovely. He must like Alice in Wonderland too, do you think.

While they were here my DIL decided to give my blog an update. Do you like it. She loves fiddling around with her computer designing things. For some reason she couldn't get the colours right with the needlework in the heading. I told her that she can change it anytime she likes because after a while it starts to look a bit boring.

Beautiful weather in the mountains at the moment. It is quite cool during the early mornings and evenings, but over the last couple of days the days have been lovely. But as usual, with the weekend approaching, guess what is coming back. You guessed it. Rain.

If my parcel comes today or tomorrow and I can get on this computer (I have to kick somebody who is on school holidays off) I will post a photo of my purchases.

A Little Bit More

2009-03-30T10:15:00.007+11:00

Well, as you can see, Elizabeth is growing. I am getting such an expert on doing stem stitch and French knots. I must say though that I don't mind doing either. I just sit down and off I go. It is such a pain sometimes when I get into full gear and I have to stop. Elizabeth is one of those pieces that you can see straight away your progress. Those shapes down the bottom of the sampler are flowers that are all filled in with French knots.

I must admit though that for a sampler that I thought would be quite taxing it is really quite easy. A piece of cake in fact. After I finish the fore ground I have to go back and fill in the sky. I found that it was easier to do the background in the gardens in the stem stitch before I had to fill in the flowers.

I don't know if you can see these 2 beautiful parrots that often pay a visit to my garden. I have a vine that has grown up among the gum tree called a "Banana Passion fruit". That is what the pink flowers are. The birds like to get among the branches and have a feed on the fruit.

Thank you for all the well wishes regarding my DH's recent illness. He is a lot better now and has gone back to work. Last week though I felt really sorry for him. We had a bush fire that started from a hazard reduction that the National Parks had started to clear the undergrowth. Unfortunately during the afternoon there was a very strong wind that pushed the fire towards a lot of houses in Leura and they had to call the Rural Firefighters from nearly all the stations in the mountains and also the NSW Fire Brigade to protect these houses. My DH came home early when he heard about the fires and after a train trip of an hour and a half he ended up patrolling this fire till about 10p.m. During the night another fire had started on the opposite side so there was another call out. My DH couldn't go to that call out as he had a lot of work that had to be done. When he came home on Wednesday evening he went out again at 6p.m. and came home 6a.m. Thursday, had a shower and something to eat and off to work again. Boy did he sleep well on Thursday evening. Thankfully we had some rain and that fire is now out. Scary things these fires. Especially when they get out of hand.

Well, as you can see, I have been awarded the Kreativ Blogger award from Margaret at Days of a Sampler Lover

Because I am so slow posting these lovely awards most of the lovely ladies who I would love to give this award to have already received this award. So I would like to dedicate this lovely award to all the lovely people who drop by by blog and leave lovely comments.

Since Autumn has come, I can really feel the difference. Most days though have been lovely, but the early mornings are getting cool along with the evenings.

By the way, I have been doing some research on my Grandmothers birth certificate as as you know I want to put her name which is similiar to Elizabeth Cox on my sampler. My Grandmother was born in Norwood, Kent, England. Could anybody point me in the right direction to where Norwood is in Kent. My Great Grandmother (her mother) was born in Hortsted Keynes in Sussex, so I am thinking maybe Norwood could be near the Sussex border.

Well, I hope you all have a lovely week.

An Elizabeth Update

2009-03-19T09:11:00.004+11:00

As you can see I have been flying along with Elizabeth. I have nearly finished the farm house and then besides the farm house there are 3 big bushes which are all French knots. Actually over the last couple of days I have done a lot of French knots. The big tree in the house is full of them as is the single tree beside the gazebo and so are the bushy trees above the big house etc. I find I am becoming an expert at them along with stem stitch lol.

Yesterday I picked up my copy of The Sampler and Antique Needlework magazine and saw an ad for their Just Cross Stitch magazine. Apparently this sampler was in it recently. I did this one about 25 years ago. It is really beautiful but I was a bit disappointed when it came back from being framed as the framer had put non reflecting glass on it and I found that all the beautiful blues etc. couldn't be seen to their best advantage.

I also noticed at the back of the magazine that The Scarlet Letter is featuring Elizabeth Cox Sampler in their new ad.

I haven't posted much over the last couple of weeks as my DH has been ill with a serious flu bug which affected him in the throat. He ended up sounding like The Godfather. Also we have still been having trouble with the computer that I normally use freezing all the time. It ended that it had to be sent away. Hopefully it will be back soon.

Well, I can feel the weather changing. It is amazing as soon as Autumn kicks in I can start to feel the change. Must be getting old lol.

I hope you all have a lovely week and wherever you are the weather is kind to you.

Ah Some Cross Stitch At Last

2009-03-03T10:57:00.006+11:00

Well as you can see Elizabeth is s l o w l y growing into something that I think will be spectacular. In case you are wondering what those 2 pointy things are they are hay stacks. They took quite a while to fill in with stem stitch. I like the way that when you do stem stitch row upon row it ends up looking as if it is knitted.

The little house besides the hay stacks is in cross stitch. Yipee, finally I get to do some and then the tree (yes it is a tree) is filled in with French knots. Also a good hour of so to do. The next building besides the hay stacks will be done in satin stitch and yes, yes, yes more cross stitch with 2 trees that are done in it.

I have taken a photo of a photo of the sampler all ready finished so that you can see what it will end up looking like. I am sorry about the surrounds of the photo. I had a little trouble with the paint program on the computer. Everytime I tried to cut it out the whole thing moved so I thought :stuff it" the whole thing can go in.

I am lucky with this sampler because when I was young I used to do a lot of embroidery on tablecloths etc. It is all coming in hand.

For all my friends that I have made in Victoria, I hope you are safe today. In case you didn't know the bush fires are still burning hot and strong down there. Today has been classified as an extreme fire day and a lot of townships are in a lot of danger today due to very strong winds fanning the fires towards them this afternoon and this evening. Yesterday, people in Victoria received a text from the Government to prepare to evacuate.

In case you were wondering about my Son who plays bowls. He played in 2 big games over the weekend. His team won the Pennants game on Saturday. He was made Man of the Match which made him happy. On Sunday he had the big game from the week before. It was the State President's Fours Championship in their Zone. He and his 3 partners ended up playing in the Finals where the ended up being the Runners Up. The winning team was also from his Club. It was a team which contained Australian Champions and World Champions. So he did good. We are all very proud of him.

Now I have received 2 lovely awards. It is always nice to be appreciated. The first one is from Suzanne from Squazi and The Chickens.

This award is for Friendship. I met Suzanne a few years ago via blogging. Suzanne lives at the bottom of the mountain where I live. I have never had the pleasure so far of actually meeting her and her beautiful daughters, but we have a common link which is The Stitching Post our local Needlework store. Apparently we have had many close encounters but as yet haven't actually met. Maybe one day.

I am supposed to hand this award on to 5 other ladies who I have made friends with via blog land, but I notice that they have all received this award. But I will tell you the names of a few lovely ladies who I have become really good friends with.

The first one is Judy of Crazy4books Joanie of Joanie's World, Deb of Lavender Rose Ramblings, Kathy of Kathy's Sit and Stitch and finally my friend Robyn who doesn't blog that often. Her blog is called is called Rambling Rose Stitchery.

Then Judy from Crazy 4 books also nominated me for another award which is Best Blogging Comments Award. Seeing that I am starting to have a lot of trouble doing all these award things I think I had better stop while I am ahead. I also had 2 little logos for the above Awards and they seems to have disappeared. I would like to nominate all of you lovely ladies who are so gracious and leave lovely comments on my blog regarding my work.

It is always lovely to be appreciated for what you enjoy doing. I always regard my samplers like my children. I usually spend such a long time with one and as with our children it is always lovely have them praised.

Elizabeth Update

2009-02-24T11:11:00.004+11:00

Elizabeth is slowly coming along. I am looking forward to finishing this row of stem stitch, long and short stitch and back stitch. I love the olive greens. Would you believe there is 3-4 shades of olive green in the leaves.

Below this there is a farm scene with a farm house, buildings, fields, trees etc. I think it will take me a little while to get it all worked out before I get down to the nitty gritty of it all. In other words it is very interesting. There is also a little bit of cross stitch among this part of the sampler.

I haven't done any work on Beatrix Potter for the SAL this month as I have been concentrating on Elizabeth. I noticed that we only have to post 10 posts instead of 12 which is good for me. Knowing me though I might come to a point with Elizabeth where I need a break and I will end up concentrating on Beatrix. I already have the frame and the spot picked out for her. I was going to hang her with Sarah Moon and An Emblem of Love. I thought I'd hang all my Quakers together.

Well we are still having crazy weather. Last week it got so cold in the mountains that we had to light our fire. It certainly is a crazy country at the moment. Floods in the north, bushfires in the south and 4 different seasons in the middle of the country. No wonder my youngest son has been ill with a bad dose of the flu.

Had a nice weekend, my middle son turned 21 on Sunday. We travelled down to Sydney to spend the day with the birthday boy at my Dad's and Sisters. My eldest came along, but unfortunately my DIL had to work so she couldn't be there. The only problem was with the birthday boy. He plays lawn bowls and was playing in a district championship on Saturday. He and his partners won all their games on Saturday and had to play on Sunday. They won all their games on Sunday as well. They now have to play in the semi-finals next Sunday.

After all that we only saw him for about half an hour before we had to leave, as his brother had an appointment and we had to give him a lift.

Thank you for all your lovely comments regarding my work. I try to visit people and leave a comment, but I keep finding that I keep getting side tracked and before I know it the day is nearly gone.

What An Awful Weekend

2009-02-09T14:56:00.006+11:00

Before I start talking about my needlework, I would just like to say how sad I feel about the loss of 128 people so far in this terrible bush fire. The current number is expected to rise and there are so many people who have suffered burns or other injuries. Not only have these poor people lost their lives, but hundreds and hundreds of people have lost everything that they own. All they have is what they are standing in. There are over 700 homes lost. To go through an area after a bush fire has been through is one of the most awful experiences that you can go through. Usually all that is left of a house standing is the lone fire place and chimney. It is such a sad sight.

I have been on the edges of a few bush fires over the years and some have been quite close to us. They are one of the most scary things you can imagine. Once they get on hold on there is no stopping them. My DH and one of my DS are in the RFS (volunteer fire fighters). During the last big fire we had in the mountains in 2007 my son recorded on his phone the sound of the fire approaching. It is so scary and sounds like a freight train coming towards him. When they get called out to go to these fires I always pray that they will come home safe and sound.

A lot of these fires on the weekend have been started by arsonists and some by lightening strikes (dry storms). The fires in Victoria have been going for over a week. They have had such terrible hot weather down there over the last few weeks, over 40 degrees C. We got this really hot weather on Friday and it was so hot. It was to hot to do anything except to hope that the evening would hurry up and come along. Not only has there been fires in Victoria but NSW and now Western Australia. There is not just one or 2 fires in a State, but there are 20 or 30 of them. Plus to go to the other extreme a third of Queensland is flooded. The floods have been there for weeks.

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Well as you can see I have framed my 2 samplers. I think they came out ok. The above one with my Mum's name on it is now hanging in my bedroom. I have hung Sarah Moon in my DS's room. I decided not to put it above his bed, but on another wall. I had a couple of smaller Quakers and they are all hanging together. I think they look quite good.

I also took another photo of Elizabeth Welfare as the previous one wasn't such a good photo.

This is my current update date on my current work. It has been too hot over the last few days to do much. This part of the sampler reminds me of crewel work. There is a lot of this work to come.

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Joanie of Joanie's World kindly nominated me for the Addiction Award. I am sorry but I am not very good with posting Award pieces etc to my blog.

After seriously thinking about the 5 things that I am addicted to, this is what I came up with.

1. My family of course.

2. My needlework. I love my antique repo's and I also love doing hardanger.

3. I love reading Classic novels.
When I find an author who I enjoy reading I find that I buy all their novels.

4. I love making and designing jewellery and also collecting Pandora charms for my bracelets.

5. I love a good cup of tea.

I am supposed to nominate another 5 people for this award, but all those who I would nominate have already received this award to I nominate all those lovely ladies who give me the honour of visiting.

Jitterbug Dance Time

2009-02-02T09:29:00.005+11:00

Its happy dance time with Sarah Moon or as Vonna kindly called it "Jitterbug Dance Time".

But first I have been working over the last few days on m Elizabeth Cox from Scarlet Letter. I love the olives and the grey/blues in this one. At the moment I am in the part which is all stem stitch and long and short stitch, with a bit of satin stitch in the top leaves. It doesn't look like I have done that much, but believe me there is many many hours of work in the leaves. The 2 olive leaves beside the name took me around 4 hours to do. They are filled in with stem stitch. The part below all this is the part that is going to be interesting as it all has to be back stitched out and then filled in with the 3 stitches above. In other words it is going to be "very interesting".

Well now to Sarah. I think she is a beautiful sampler. I love all the colours that are in her. I still haven't decided where to place her when I sit down and frame her. I had thought of either putting her in my hall way or above one of my son's bed. He currently has a collection of small samplers there that I quickly did to replace the ones that my eldest son had there. I was thinking of removing all the small ones, putting Sarah Moon there instead. My only concern is that it is such a big sampler that it might become to heavy there and fall off the wall while DS is asleep and hit him on the head. Don't know what I am going to do with the small ones though. That is the problem I have living in a small house.

My goodness it has been hot here. Although thankfully not as hot as in Melbourne and Adelaide. But at least because I am in the Mountains we don't get the humidity as they do in Sydney. We can also get a good nights sleep. I believe tomorrow and the next few days are going to be even hotter. I hope I don't have to go down to Sydney then.

I would also like to say thank you for all your lovely comments regarding my work. It is lovely to know that what I do is admired and appreciated by others. If I don't leave comments on your blog, please excuse me. I keep having a lot of trouble with stupid computers. I don't know if it is Mozilla that I use or what but after about 10 minutes all I get is blank pages. The screen tells me that whatever I have clicked on is done but there is nothing there. It does it on a couple of the computers. It is such a pain. Sometimes I get lucky and I am able to leave a comment and at other times I can read a blog but I can't get into the "Leave a comment" section.

Anyway thank you again. I really appreciate it. I hope that you all have a lovely week and that the weather is kind to you all.

A Sarah Moon Update

2009-01-23T09:52:00.005+11:00

Well, as you can see, Sarah Moon is nearly done. I only have a couple of motifs to do then it will be "Happy Dance" time.

I have been concentrating on just this one as I have found a large frame for her and I don't want the glass to be broken. So hopefully this time next week she will be hanging somewhere in the house. I haven't decided where yet, but I have a few ideas.

I also thought I'd show you one of my china dolls that I made many, many years ago. When I finished working on her I gave her to my Mum as a present. She has lived in my Mum's bedroom for many years and a few months ago I bought her home to live with me.

When I was in my china doll period I made around 6 dolls. It was something that I really enjoyed doing, but I decided that as with all things I had enough so I ceased making them.

She is a German bisque doll called "Hilda" in case you were wondering. Usually she is a baby doll, but when I dressed her, I made a little dress for her, and dressed her as a small girl.

We have been having a lot of hot weather over the last week or so. I think tomorrow and Monday (Australia Day) are going to be very hot. We have had a few small bush fires in the mountains and down at the bottom of the mountains. As with every year, we are just waiting for the " big one". I always have a bag packed with photo's etc. that if something happens I can grab as I grab the dog and rush out the door. I was just sitting thinking if I had to do a exit quick which samplers would I throw into the car. I am still thinking about it, so maybe next time I will show you the ones that I would take. I know for a fact that my Dutch Beauty would be first on the list as there is no way I could do that one again LOL.

Next week is the last week that my son is home on holidays. Yipee she says. No just kidding. But it would be nice to be on my own again during the day. I find that I get more housework done.

Current Stitching Update

2009-01-05T10:47:00.007+11:00

Well as you can see I have finished Lois and she now has my Mum's name on her. I just have to find a square frame for her and then she will be finished. I think she is absolutely beautiful and I am sure that my Mum would have been proud to have her name placed on her.

I have now started working on Elizabeth Cox from the Scarlet Letter. Elizabeth is one of those samplers that challenge a person's needlework abilities. Not only is there cross stitch, but long and short stitch, satin stitch, stem stitch, back stitch and I believe there are French nots in there somewhere. In other words, she is quite a challenge.

As you can see, this is my progress so far. Every thing at the moment has to be outlined in stem stitch and then filled in with either long and short, satin and stem stitch. The flower is done in long and short.

In keeping with my naming samplers after family members on the female line I have decided to dedicate this sampler to my grandmother who I unfortunately never knew. She passed away on my Mum's birthday a couple of months before I was born. Elizabeth was one of her middle names and Cox was her maiden name. She was also born in England, so this sampler is perfect for her. My Mum had these amazing tablecloths that she had made when she was younger. They were all done in the most beautiful long and short stitch. Mum used to use them on important family celebrations.

Yesterday, I thought I had better get my Beatrix Potter out and do a couple of motifs for the SAL that I have joined. As you can see I worked on the top 2 motifs of the border. Because I am so far along, I thought that if I only do 1 or 2 motifs a month I should be on target with the other girls.

While looking for a frame yesterday, I came upon a huge square one that my Sarah Moon would it in. That was one of my concerns with doing it over 2. Anyway, I have decided to also work on Sarah Moon during the evenings. Because Elizabeth has so many speciality stitches, I think I am better working on her during the day. My next problem with Sarah is where to hang her.

My dear friend Karen gave me this amazing gift for Christmas. She knows that I love Scarlet Letter samplers and she bought me the beautiful Grazing Sheep sampler. She also bought me the beautiful needle minder. She knows that I love angels.
Well I had better get off and go and investigate something that my son has told me was in the back yard. He was doing some weeding for his Father and a baby tiger snake about 30 cms slithered past him. He is now in panic mode. I wonder why. They are quite venomous. Usually where there is one there are a few others. Oh help.

Merry Christmas Everyone

2008-12-24T10:12:00.002+11:00

Hi everyone, I would like to wish you all a Merry Christmas and I hope you all have a lovely New Year. I hope everyone has a lovely day tomorrow and are able to spend time with their families. I also hope Santa will be kind to us all. Or as the Butcher told me yesterday, "Be Kind to Santa" LOL.

Well as you can see I am now in the home straight with Lois. I just have to finish the rose in the right hand corner. Do another butterfly over one next to it, finish the border and then work my Mum's name down the bottom. I decided to put my Mums full maiden name, where she was born in Sydney and also her date of birth. This is nearly all done over one. I have to do all the over ones during the day as I can see it better (must be getting old LOL).

So hopefully when I next post I will be finished as I will also be able to show your some work on Elizabeth Cox. Elizabeth is I think going to keep me occupied for a little while as there is a lot of speciality stitches in it. I also have to do some more work on Beatrix Potter seeing how I have joined the SAL for her. I have worked out if I do one large motif or 2 small motifs I will be on track with everybody else. Mine is half done.

Well again, have a Merry Christmas and I hope you all get to do some more stitching.

2008-12-03T16:19:00.005+11:00

I took 2 photos of Elizabeth Welfare that I framed the other day. She is hanging in my Dining Room which comes off the Kitchen. I have a small wall that is covered in cork for some reason that I have never figured out and Elizabeth is hanging there. I was having trouble with the curtains letting in light and reflections so I have posted both photos. She does look lovely hanging there. Don't know how much longer the cork will be there.

I decided to take a break from blogging for a while. I seemed to be always on the computer and I was having trouble with my eyes so I restricted my self to just reading my emails occasionally.

Lois Minshall is coming along nicely. In fact I don't have that my much to do. I hopefullyt should finish her by the end of the month. I have to sit down and work out my mothers maiden name and DOB to put on her.

I decided to do the border which I always find a right pain. It is such a relief when it all joins up the right way.

This is my next project. It is called Elizabeth Cox from The Scarlet Letter. I first saw this one a few years ago when it was in the antique stage. When I saw the name I knew that if I could find it I would buy it as my Grandmother was a Cox. Also my Mum's middle name is Elizabeth. How knows, there could be a connection.

When I found that my second favourite needlework shop had imported to Australia, well what can I say. She is now MINE. This one though is going to be a right challenge. Not only does it have cross stitch, over one and two, but wait for it, it also has long and short stitch, satin stitch, French knots and stem stitch used as a filling stitch. I think this one will be a right challenge.

On the domestic front my son passed his driving test on the first go. He was also offered a job in Sydney which he has taken and now spends the week living with my Dad and Sister. He comes home on weekends.

My Beautiful Roses

2008-10-31T09:42:00.004+11:00

Aren't these beautiful. This is one of my favourite roses called Monsieur Tillier and it is a Tea Rose. I love old fashion roses and have quite a few in my garden (or my jungle as my DH calls it LOL). I have always loved this rose as it changes all the time. Currently it is this colour but as the season progresses it will be a darker pink. At the moment it looks as if it has been dipped into tea. Absolutely glorious.

The beautiful doily on my table was made by my dear Mother-in-Law. She was a very talented lady with a crochet hook. She passed away in 2000 and she made me some beautiful doilies that I cherish.

I have all these beautiful roses coming out at the moment. Last weekend was the 1st Anniversary of our Mum leaving us. I think all these roses are her way of saying that she is ok and happy. I know that she used to love this particular rose and my bush which is quite large is full of them at the moment.

Last weekend I picked a beautiful posy of all the beautiful spring flowers that I had in my garden. My Mum used to do the most beautiful floral work and used to enter in a lot of shows etc. with her arrangements. She taught me how to make posies a long time ago and I enjoy making them on special occasions. As Mum doesn't have a grave for us to visit, this is our way to letting her know that we are thinking of her. In fact I think of her every day. Sometimes I have some interesting conversations with her. One way of course LOL. If I ever got a reply though I think I would freak out.

Well, as you can see I haven't done that much on Lois. I have been busy doing some secret stitching with my friend Karen and also driving. One of my sons is going for his drivers licence in a few weeks. They have to have a certain number of hours recorded in a log book that they give them before they can go for their licence. My son has done the required number of hours and has booked his test. We are still going on little practice trips, so sometimes I am away for 2 hours at a time. Eats into my stitching time. God I hope he passes then I won't have to drop every thing every day to go and pick him up. So please cross your fingers for him.

It's very windy in the mountains today. There is a total fire ban up here and in Sydney. I believe it is going to get up to 38 degrees later in the day. I have to go to Penrith this afternoon so I'm sure the heat will get me. Anyway, tomorrow it is supposed to be raining so hopefully it will cool down.

Well I hope you all have a lovely week end and if you celebrate Halloween, I hope you have a lovely time.

Updates

2008-10-12T12:24:00.006+11:00

I'm sorry that I have had a big gap in blogging, but as usual life gets in the way. Since my last post I really haven't done that much on Lois, but I am starting to get into the swing of her.

One of the reasons I couldn't post is because my youngest son ended up in hospital for 3 days with Pneumonia. Unfortunately for him it was the start of the school holidays so he hasn't missed any school LOL. He is going ok. He has been on 2 courses of anti biotics and has to have another chest X-Ray in another 2 weeks to see if it has cleared up.

So this is my current progress on Lois. I still think she is beautiful. There have been a lot of over ones. Some of you have asked if I have trouble doing it and also if I do cross stitch or tent stitch when I do it. I actually do cross stitch. I also find I can do it easier during the day. I do have a magnifier, but usually during the day all I need is my glasses. I must admit though that doing over 1 is much easier on 32ct than on 40 ct.

I have also made a couple of necklaces while I have been absent without leave LOL. Jewellery wise there are 2 things that I really love. That is pearls and cameos. (I have already posted a photo of 2 cameo pearl necklaces that I love last year).

The first one is a string of Lapis Lupis that my parents gave me as a birthday present a long time ago. The same with the cameo. One day I was sitting looking at them, thinking now that would work if I put them together. Anyway I think it works ok and everytime that I wear it I always get admiring comments.

The third one is a Wedgewood pendant that I bought on my first trip to England when I was young, rich and single. (Now I am married and poor LOL). It was originally on a silver chain and I never wore it so it is now on pearls and I also wear it quite alot.

Now the middle one is very special. On one of my trips to the Medici Chapel in Florence there was an old lady who was supposed to be 80 years old. She was a minaturist and was painting a small portion of the figures that were on the ceiling on a small piece of ivory, which was quite amazing. She was also selling minature portraits. They are also painted on ivory and can be worn as a brooch or as a pendant. I fell in love with them and bought this one. I used to wear it as a brooch for a long time, but I decided to turn it into a necklace. This is the result.

I was told that the original was supposed to be painted by Michelangelo. She is supposed to be one of his girlfriends, but I think they were pulling my leg LOL. Anyway I don't care who painted the original as I have always loved wearing her.

If you love reading Jane Austen and the Bronte Sisters, can I recommend Elizabeth Gaskell to you. What a writer. She is brilliant. Some of these books I have had for a lot of years and they were on my "to read" list. I started reading Cranford which is a collection of stories that the BBC have made into one of their brilliant series.

The second book I started reading was Ruth. What a brilliant book. I started reading it while my son was in hospital and couldn't put it down. (Luckily he was sleeping a lot at the time LOL). I am now reading Mary Barton. Both Mary and Ruth help you understand life in the early 19th century.

Elizabeth Gaskell was the wife and also daughter of a Minister (funny how Jane Austen and also the Bronte's fathers were all ministers). After a great tragedy in her life with the loss of her baby son she started writing. She started writing about things she knew a lot about re life in Manchester and also the unfairness of the way women were treated.

She became friends with Charles Dickens and wrote stories for his magazine and she also became really good friends with Charlotte Bronte. She was asked by the Bronte family to write Charlotte's biography.

If you would like to read any of her books and have trouble finding some of them trying looking in second hand book shops. That is where I found some of my harder to find books.

Quick Update on Lois

2008-09-19T09:56:00.004+10:00

This is just a quick update on Lois. Isn't she beautiful. I'm stitching her on 40ct and as you can see there is a lot of over one in it. I find that its better for me if I do this during the day.

I love the colour scheme of this sampler. Besides the verse in this photo the rose bud is also worked over one.

It's amazing when you are tired and work on a sampler (which is something I really mustn't do). When I started working on the wave pattern above the verse I had either the pattern or the colour upside down and you guessed it. I misread one of the symbols. Anyway to cut a long story short. The wave pattern should be blue with the same symbol facing the other way and it ended up being worked in grey. I decided that I quite liked the grey so I kept it there (or in other words, I couldn't be bothered undoing it LOL Shhhh).

Yesterday, I decided to have what I call a "bliss" day, where I would sit and watch the second part of a DVD that I had been enjoying and that I would also sit and stitch. I watched my second DVD of "Wives and Daughters" and happily stitched the bell flower over one. It was 3 hours of pure heaven. I didn't have to go and pick anybody up and take them anywhere.

Well I better go and do some of the dreaded housework. My eldest son and Daughter-in-Law are coming to spend the night so I had better get on and do some work. I hope you all have a lovely weekend. Looks like we are here. Spring is here. I have forget-me-nots everywhere and my blue bells are starting to open. Heaven.

Happy Dance Time

2008-09-11T10:57:00.006+10:00

I finished Elizabeth last week, but wanted to wait till I had visited my Dad for Father's Day to take a few photo's of "The GG Grandmothers". I had the photo's on the computer but lost them when our computer crashed. Silly me also deleted the photos off the camera. Darn.

Elizabeth is my GGG Grandmother on my Mum's side of the family. Her daughter was Lois Kimber below. I decided to do this series of samplers with family names on them for my Mum. She was quite ill at the time and unfortunately spent most of her time sitting in her beautiful bedroom. Mum had a few of my samplers around the walls of her bedroom and they were all greatly admired by one and all. Lois was above her bed.

Lois's daughter was Jane Stevenson and she was my beloved Great Grandmother. Unfortunately for me her daughter my Grandmother passed away a few months before I was born on my Mum's birthday from Breast Cancer. So my G Grandmother was a huge influence in my life. I think I got my love of England and all things English from her. I remember I used to spend a lot of time with her as my Mum was quite ill when I was young. My G Grandmother taught me to knit and I think I also got my love of needlework from her.

Unfortunately, the sampler is only a small one as I wanted to give it to my Mum for Mother's Day and I didn't have time to do a large one befitting someone so important in my live. Anyway, my Mum loved both of them appreciated all the work that went into them.

I just have to find a beautiful sampler now to dedicate to my Grandmother Annie.

With Beatrix I have finished another 2 motifs and started a third. I think this will be a sampler that comes out every now and then.

I have started working on Lois Minshall which is really beautiful. I wanted to start this as I want to dedicate it to my Mum and as the 1st anniversary of her passing is coming up next month the time to do it is now.

The say on Lois is -

A Mother's Love, how dear the name,
What bliss unfolds it sacred power
Then ever may its fairest flame,
Illume my evry given hour.

To all my friends that I have made in the US I just want to say that you are all in my thoughts on the anniversary of this terrible day. I remember waking up the next morning and hearing about this tragedy. We hastily turned the TV on and the whole household sat in shocked disbelief at what was happening.

The End is Near

2008-09-03T11:12:00.005+10:00

Well, as you can see Elizabeth is nearly finished. I just need to do one more motif and then it is "happy dance time". The motif that I have to do is the same as the one on the other side. I scrolled down my blog to find out when I started this sampler. Looks like I started it in the middle of June, so it has taken me around two and a half months to complete. Not bad.

I thought that I had better finish Beatrix Potter before I start on another sampler. I am around half way with it. I had better get back into the swing of stitching over one again. I don't mind doing that as I find the samplers are much finer and there's always the hanging room factor LOL.

I had a great time in book shops recently. I love classic novels and I found these ones that I have been after. I used to have The Three Musketeers by Alexander Dumas, but my eldest son loved his books. When he moved out before he got married they all went with him and I am trying to get my youngest son to read them. I also found one of Alexander Dumas's books that I didn't know about. It is called "The Last Cavalier" and is a lost book that was found in the National Library in Paris around 2005.

The other two books are by Elizabeth Gaskell. I have always loved "Wife's and Daughters" and have been looking out for North and South and Cranford for quite awhile. My local book shop which is a really good independent book shop had them on my weekend visit, so I bought them. Now I just have to find time to sit down and enjoy them. What with samplers, blogging and the dreaded housework, it will take me awhile to get through them all. Oh and I still have a lot of Charles Dickens books to read as well. What is a girl to do.

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After a couple of lovely Spring days it has turned cold and it is also raining. We need the rain but I could do without the cold.

I hope that everyone has a lovely week and weekend. Next time I post Elizabeth should be finished.

2 Lovely Awards

2008-08-26T16:25:00.003+10:00

I have received 2 lovely Awards - Brillante Weblog and also I Love Your Blog Award from MJ at Sampler Stitcher.

Thank you so much for the awards. I really appreciate being given these awards. It is really nice to know that other people appreciate the work that you do.

I have to nominate some people whose blogs that I enjoy reading and who also inspire me. The trouble for me is that I do not know who to pick. Everybody whose blogs that are on the right hand side of my blog do that, so I nominate all of you lovely ladies.

I am currently having a hair pulling time putting this post together. I wanted to put the award below up with the other one but this stupid computer won't do it. My computer expert (13 year old) is too busy chatting away to his mate to come and help me. This is what I call an AHHHH moment.

Now back to normality, thank you again I really appreciate it. Last year when I started blogging I never thought that I would met such lovely ladies from all over the world and also that they liked my work.

Strawberries Are Very Addictive

2008-08-25T09:39:00.006+10:00

Over the weekend I made something that I have always liked and have always wanted to have a go at making. I made myself some strawberry pincushions and I found them quite addictive. I made 8. 4 of them have emery powder and the other four have just wadding. 2 are covered with golden beads and the rest are just covered with 3 running stitches. I think they are lovely.

I found the pattern a long time ago on the Martha Stewart website. I hope the link works.

Some of them have different shaped tops as I felt like being a bit different. They are so easy to make. All of mine are made by hand. In other words I didn't use the sewing machine.

As you can see Kitty is now called Elizabeth Welfare, 1806, Sussex. Elizabeth was my GGG Grandmother and she continues my collection of samplers dedicated to my Grandmothers. When I finish her I will group the other 2 samplers that I have done so you can see them.

I really haven't done that much as I haven't been feeling very well over the last week. I have one of those backs that if I sneeze the wrong way I end up in agony. The past week was one of those occasions. I haven't done much stitching or been on the computer for long as I couldn't sit for long periods were I was comfortable.

My Hestera Harmer pattern arrived on Friday, so she is all kitted up and ready to go. I have worked out that I have around 7 large samplers that I have kitted up that I want to do. I don't know where I am going to put them. Maybe I will have to buy a bigger house LOL. Don't tell my DH.

Over the last few weeks I have met another lovely lady in blogland. Her name is Joan and her blog is called My Place...My Little Place?

If you have a few moments to spare, please stop by and welcome her to blog land.

Kitty Update

2008-08-11T10:15:00.004+10:00

This an update on Kitty. I decided to travel down to the bottom and do that before I do the other side. Kitty still looks lovely and I am enjoying working on her. The right hand side is a mirror image of the left hand side. I have decided to call her Elizabeth, so she will soon be known as Elizabeth Welfare, Sussex, 1806.

I have 2 pages of my book to go, so hopefully I will finish her in 2-3 weeks. Below is a close up of the bottom section.

My DH is suffering from a serious sprained wrist (just joking). I have ordered Hestera Harmer from America and I hope it will come sometime this week. I'm still pretty sure that I am related to her which I find quite interesting. It was one of those charts that I just had to have.

On the medical front, I spent a few hours up at the local hospital with my youngest son. He was doing swimming for sport, (now don't laugh). He was swimming along happily with his eyes closed and crashed into the wall of the pool and broke his nose, damaged his cheek bones and ended up with mild concussion. Thankfully it could have been worse and now besides having a sore nose and a slight headache, he is ok. The Doctors at the hospital wanted to know if he was training for the Olympics. One of his brothers wasn't at all sympathetic and told him that he was always calling "Big Nose" from "The Life of Brian" for years.

It's been very cold in the mountains over the last few days. We woke up this morning with a light dusting of snow everywhere. It started to snow yesterday afternoon. My DH was playing golf in it. But the sun has come out so hopefully it will start to warm up soon.

Well that's all for now. Thank you for dropping by and for leaving your lovely comments. It is really lovely to think that someone appreciates your work.

Hestera Harmer 1843 Sampler

2008-08-03T12:45:00.003+10:00

Last Night I downloaded The Attic's Newsletter and their "Sampler of the Month" and there is a photo of this most beautiful sampler above. It is called Hestera Harmer 1843 by Queenstown Sampler Designs and when I read the name I thought to myself, "That's interesting", as I have a GGG Grandmother whose maiden name was Ann Harmer. Then when I read that she came from Sussex, I thought now "that is really interesting" and I think that somewhere along the line I am related to Hestera.

I know that Hestera's parents were John and Jane Harmer and that my Ann's parents were William and Mary Harmer. I have previously discovered that all the Harmer's on the Sussex line all go back to the mid 15th century to a John Harmer. I think that Hestera and my Ann are related. I haven't found out if they are cousins or Aunt or Neice yet, but I am following this story with interest.

I can see that I will have to do a bit of arm twisting to see if I can send to America to purchase this truly beautiful chart to add to my collection. All I can say is that I have fallen in love with this beautiful sampler.

Presents

2008-07-29T08:26:00.009+10:00

I was going to post these last week, but with one thing and another I never got there. These are a few of the lovely things that my Sister bought back from her trip OS. From Paris she bought me a beautiful pair of earrings. From Venice she bought me a gondola charm (which I just noticed you can't see) for one of my Pandora bracelets. While in London she went to the Cath Kidston shop and bought me one of her book bags in a beautiful blue print.

This is the gondola charm amongst my collection of charms. I really love my Pandora bracelets. The only trouble is when I wear them on the same wrist, after awhile my wrist starts to ache. I know, I know what you are thinking "Why wear them both on the same wrist?" It's just sometimes I like to wear them together. Not all the time though. LOL.

Aren't these earrings pretty? They have little blue flowers up the top that look like Forget-me-Nots and also each earring has a small blue stone on the top. They are silver with a enamel wash over the silver. Very pretty.

As I have previously told you she went to an exhibition in Paris on Marie-Antoinette. She bought me the above Pill Box and Ruler. She thought that I may be able to put them into my sewing box. She has also bought me a few other things which I will receive for my for the rest of the family.

Last Friday was my Mum's 78th birthday. My Dad, Sister and I decided that because Mum doesn't have a grave at the present time and we can't go and visit her there on her birthday, that we would each buy a bunch of beautiful flowers each and place them in our homes, as we feel that she is around us all. My Mum truly loved flowers and had the most beautiful (still does) gardens.

When I saw the above sampler called Lois Minshall 1832 from Threads of Gold I mentioned to my friend Joanie from Joanie's World that I had seen this beautiful sampler and that I would love to do with my Mum's name on it. It turned out that Joanie had the graph and kindly sent it to me. Thank you I really love this sampler. I have kitted it up and I am planning to start working her probably after I finish Kitty Biggs.

Talking of Kitty Biggs this is my progress. I really haven't done that much since my last post. I haven't been feeling too well over the last week with some sort of virus . Also with the very cold weather we have been having I have discovered that I have been having trouble holding the needle with one of my fingers. It has the dreaded Arthritis in it. It's something that I am unfortunately full of. I think I'm starting to take over from my Mum as she used to have a lot of problems with it. I think I need to move to a warmer climate. Don't tell my DH. He would have the For Sale sign out the front quicker than you could say "Goodness, it's cold!". LOL.

Blogging Award

2008-07-28T16:11:00.003+10:00

Suzanne at Squazi and the Chicken and my friend Joanie from Joanie's World have nominated me for a Kreativ Award.

It is really lovely to be nominated and to know that what you do is enjoyed and appreciated by other people.

According to the rules I have to nominate and link my blog with 5 other blogs that I enjoy visiting. The problem I have is I can't seem to pick 5 as I enjoy visiting all the cross stitch blogs that I have listed on the right hand side of my blog. All of you ladies are so talented.

I asked my 13 year old DS if he could put the award on my blog for me but unfortunately he doesn't know how to do it. I think I will have to try an older DS. Unfortunately he lives in Sydney, so I think I am up a creek without a paddle.

Hopefully tomorrow morning I will be able to up date my blog with photo's of the lovely things my Sister bought back for me. I tried to do it this morning but I had trouble finding where 13 yo DS had put the plug for the camera. Anyway that is a long story for another time.

Book with Pattern for Kitty Biggs

2008-07-17T14:26:00.003+10:00

Louise wanted to know the name of the book that I am working Kitty Biggs from. It is a book called Australian Needlework - Cross Stitch, Counted Thread and Canvaswork - series Editor Jennifer Sanders. It is published by Lothian Publishing Company P/L and was published in 1993. I don't know if it is still available as I have had mine for a long time.

Kitty a/a Elizabeth

2008-07-16T10:51:00.007+10:00

Just thought I'd let you know that I am still here and I haven't fallen off my perch yet LOL. This is my slow progress on Kitty Biggs also known as Elizabeth Welfare. I really haven't done that much over the last couple of weeks, but she is slowly moving along.

She is really quite pretty as she is stitched mainly in golds and turquoise shades. Along with the cross stitch there is also a lot of satin stitch which really moves it along quite fast. I love the border as the flowers have satin stitch surrounded by cross stitch.

I have been quite busy over the last few weeks. My Dad came up for a few days while my sister was away and we went for a couple of lovely drives. On one of the days my DH took the day off work and we went for a drive out to Bathurst. It happened to be a day were we had snow, so my Dad was excited to see it. We didn't have much in Katoomba, but there was a lot in the pine forests on the way to Bathurst. The snow looked quite beautiful among all the trees. Unfortunately I forgot the camera.

On the next day Dad and one of my sons and i went for a trip down to Richmond, where my Dad's family originally came from. We went on a gravestone search looking for my GGG Grandparents and we had a lot of success. I knew where they were buried in Richmond and I had tried to find these graves at the beginning of the year when I went to a funeral where these particular graves are. Unfortunately after a quick look in the rain, my DH and I gave up and decided that we would come back another day. It is seemed the appropriate place to go for a drive while Dad was here. He was the one who found them and it made his day.

this house in Richmond is where my Dad's G Grandparents lived and it was also where they started the family business. A business that went for over 100 years until my Dad and Uncle had to retire early.

In the travels with my Sister, she comes home on Thursday after a lovely time in Paris, Venice and England. I believe she is having trouble closing her suitcase LOL. I wonder what goodies she is bringing home. I hope to travel down to see her and my Dad on the weekend, so I will let you know. I know a couple of the things she has bought and I know that they are lovely.

The Computer is Back

2008-06-25T15:56:00.006+10:00

After a lot more drama we now have our computer back and I can start putting photos on my blog again. It's good to have it back.

While I have been without this particular computer I have been busy working on a few samplers. I seem to have 3 of them on the go. It's something that I don''t usually like to do as I usually do one at a time, but what the heck I now have 3. The one above is the one the keep talking to me, telling me that she wanted to be done. Her name is Kitty Bigg and she is from a book that I have on Australian samplers. But they think in the book that she was actually worked in England. The original is in a Museum in Sydney. She is quite pretty as she is in the golden tones with hints of turquoise throughout. I am doing her on 40ct Antique White. Below is a photo of the original.

One thing with her though is that it is pretty certain that she is going to have a name change. Her name is probably going to be Elizabeth Welfare who was my GGG Grandmother on my Mum's side. She will continue the tradition that I started with a couple of my samplers that I did for my Mum being named after Grandmothers.

This is my progress on Sarah Moon. Sarah was one of those samplers that I fell in love with when I first saw her. My only problem with her is that I wish that I was doing her on 40ct instead of 32ct. 40ct wasn't available when I first started doing her.
This is my progress on Beatrix Potter. Another sampler that I fell in love with. Beatrix is over one on 32ct. Unfortunately I haven't touched her for a couple of weeks.

Well my Sister has had a lovely timee in Paris. She celebrated her birthday by spending up BIG. Can't wait to see what she has bought.

She rang me on Saturday all excited to tell me that she had gone to the Marie Antoinette Exhibition and got caught in this LONG line waiting to go in. Everyone was grumbling about having to stand around when she suddenly saw a small group of people going through. A lot of the people were complaining about how come these people got to push in in front of them all.

When she looked at the woman she knew why. It turned out to be Queen Margarite of Denmark and her husband Prince Heinrich with a small party. It was one Queen visiting another Queen. Anyway, it made my Sisters day.

Today, she flies over to England for a few days before flying to Venice for a week. Some people have it rough.

The Computers Back and Gone Again

2008-06-16T11:37:00.003+10:00

Well, I think this computer is cursed. We travelled down to Penrith yesterday to pick up the computer after it being away for 5 weeks.

Well, you can guess what happened. We travel up the mountain again, get home, disconnect the boys computer, plugged the main computer in and you guessed it no power. The darn thing wouldn't turn on. My DH rings the store to tell them that he's not happy about the computer not turning on now and is told, its probably the leads or the power point. He tells them that another computer was connected to all of the above 5 minutes before and all was working well.

So to cut a long story short I had to drive all the way down the mountain again and take the psycho computer back to the store. Hopefully it will back on Friday. They tried to get us a new one but unfortunately its "No deal".

On the stitching front I have a sampler that has been talking to me for awhile to do. It is called Kitty Biggs and on the weekend I unfortunately gave in and started to do her. So now I have 3 on the go. When will I learn.

My Sister flies out for Paris tomorrow and I told her to go and check out this amazing exhibition that I found on Marie Antoinette. The link is here http://www.boutiquesdemusees.fr/en/shop/special/169-marie-antoinette-exhibition.
(hopefully this works). It looks as if it could really amazing. I have already told her what I would like from the gift shop. Hopefully she will remember LOL.

A "What The?" Moment

2008-06-04T10:47:00.004+10:00

Still no news when the computer will be back. Hopefully next week sometime, so I can't post any new photos.

I've been having a disasterous time over the last 24 hours. It has been raining quite heavily since the weekend and it is also misty up here in the mountains, especially where I live. Last night when I went to get my husband from the train, I had a major tyre blowout on the highway where they are doing highway roadworks. They are putting in an extra 2 lanes. The road between Katoomba and Leura has become simply shocking with potholes everywhere. This is a major Highway between Sydney and the West (Outback).

Outside the Hospital (quite appropriate) there was a HUGE pothole that you couldn't see in the dark wet conditions. You guessed it I hit it and heard such a loud bang and I said to myself "What the Hell was that". I thought I was a goner for a moment or two but the car seemed to be handling ok and as I only had a short distance to travel I thought I'd try to carry on to the Station to the damage. As I went along I discovered that there was no where to pull over to check as all available pulling over spots were already full with people checking their cars and all were changing tyres. There were cars everywhere. At one spot it looked like a used car spot.

Anyway to cut a long story short I discovered that I also had a flat tyre and that there were around 20 of us in similar situations. I think I am lucky as some of them apparently have front end damage as well. At this stage I have to get a new front tyre which I have been quoted at $155.

After my DH had changed the tyre there were a few men looking at the hole (what is this with men and holes) and directing people away from it. This morning, I had to go and take photos of the hole and the damaged tyre to lodge a claim with the RTA. Would you believe that they haven't filled the hole/s in yet. All they have done is put witches hats around the hole. The part of the Highway where this happened isn't that wide and we have all these semi-trailers rattling along. It is a wonder that someone hasn't been killed there or injured. I found out while at the tyre place that apparently this hole had been reported to the contractors at 7a.m. yesterday morning. A good case of hmmmmm.

On the stitching front I have been working on not only Beatrix Potter, but Sarah Moon as well. I started Sarah early last year on 32ct and did a little bit. I couldn't make up my mind whether to carry on with her or wait and start again on 40ct. She is beautiful, but I was a bit worried about the size of the finished sampler, as my house isn't that big and I'm running out of hanging space. I decided to carry on last Friday and have been working on her. So I have 2 Needleprint Samplers on the go. Decided that when they are finished, I will replace some of the earlier works with them.

Well that is my excitement for the day. I hope you all have a lovely week and I'm looking forward to getting our other computer back.

Update on pot hole situation - apparently 22 people turned up yesterday at our local tyre shop to get replacement tyres. One poor man had 2 tyres that had to be replaced. Then how many other people have replaced their tyre/s and travelled down further to another tyre shop.

Would you believe this is Thursday today and 2 days after the event and they still haven't fixed it. - Sorry if I'm ranting about this, but gee wiz what does it take to fix a HUGE pot hole.

Computers Gone Psycho

2008-05-24T14:53:00.002+10:00

I just thought I'd let you know that unfortunately I can't blog at the moment with photos. Our computer which is only a couple of months old went slightly psycho two weeks ago and has had to be sent back to the store to be repaired. It probably won't be back for another 2-3 weeks. It kept continually shutting down when you were in the middle of things and programs like iPod kept disappearing.

At the moment we have to use a smaller computer that my sons use to play games etc. on and I don't want to put the programme on it for photos.

My Beatrix Potter sampler is coming along nicely. I am nearly half way there. I think because there are no colour changes all the time, you can just get moving along at a steady pace.

I have had a lovely morning. My Dad and Sister drove up to the Mountains to see me. We had a lovely morning exploring all the lovely shops around Leura which is town next to Katoomba. I saw some lovely things that I like but I will have to save up to get them.

My Sister is travelling overseas next month. She is going to Paris for a week (I could take this quite easily), then to England to stay with some friends. Then they are travelling to Venice for a week (also could take quite easily) and then back to London for a week. All together she will be away for a month, While she is away my Dad might come up and stay with us for a few days, which will be lovely.

It is a beautiful Autumn day today. The sun is out and the birds are singing. I hope you all have a lovely weekend.