My Awesome Sister

This week a project I have been working on for a long time has finally been finished.  Unfortunately I cannot take credit for the finish.

In May 2009 I found out I was pregnant and began searching for cross stitch designs that I could stitch for my child.  At the beginning of September 2009 I found out I was expecting a boy and that helped me decide which designs I wanted to stich.  I decided to stitch the 8 animals in the Charlie's Ark series.  My sister also chose a bigger design that she was going to stitch as a birth sampler.  So about 15 months ago I started on these designs.  I found them very difficult to motivate myself to stitch and I think it is because the pattern is not the best quality.  It is difficult to see what colour some of the stitches should be because of the back stitch.  I wish pattern designers would provide two copies of a pattern, one without the back stitch and one with.  I am sure it would make it so much easier but probably more expensive.

Anyway I had completed all but two of the designs and they have been hung up in my sons room.  About two weeks ago I finally admitted to myself that I would probably never find the motivation to get these two projects finished so I asked my awesome sister if she would do them for me.  She hadn't really enjoyed stitching the birth sampler that she had done but she agreed to do them as she knew how much I had been avoiding completing them. 

So on Christmas Day we all went to my parents house for the day and my sister arrived with the two finished designs.  What had taken me nearly 15 months to do six designs took her less than 2 weeks to complete two.  I was so grateful to her for taking this project on for me and very happy to see them finally finished.

So here are the pictures of the two designs my sister completed for me.

And here is the whole display on my son's bedroom wall.

I am so happy that this project is complete before my son is old enough to say he doesn't want them on his wall anymore!!  I am sure as he gets older he will enjoy looking at them and I will love telling him that his Aunty Louise and I stitched every little cross with love just for him (I might not mention how much we hated doing it!!)

So this is just a big big thank you to my awesome little sister for helping me out with this.  She is the best sister in the world and also my best friend.  Love you Lou xxx

Just a little update

Well I've finished the birthday card for my niece and here is the finished article.

I've also decided to change how I work my rotation.  I found I wasn't getting enough accomplished in a week to see any progress which was getting me down a bit.  I have therefore decided to work on each project until I either complete a page or get fed up working on it - which ever comes first.  So the projects I have on the go now are:-

1. Shy Baby
2. Butterflies Galore - SK
3. Masquerade - SAL SK
4. Train of Dreams
5. Christmas Stocking (Non HAED)
6. Christmas Cards (Non HAED)
7. Charlie's Ark (Non HAED)
8. Hickory Dickory Dock - QS
9. Samuel (Photo of my son charted by HAED)

So I probably won't be posting every week but will just post every time I change project.

Pee - Charlie's Ark - Completed 20.08.10

Well this week has been my non-HAED week and I have completed another of the Charlie's Ark projects for my son.  I have to say it is nice to have a finish!

So I've just got two in the series left to finish Zeep and Putty and then my husband has said I can buy another HAED chart and some more fabric!!

Millie - Charlie's Ark

Last year when I was pregnant with my son I decided I wanted to do some cross stitch pictures for his bedroom. I decided on a series of pictures from Charlie's Ark. There are 8 smaller pictures which each feature one animal and then my sister also did one of the large pictures as a birth sampler for my son.


The picture my sister did is:




I started off sewing Emm as I have a definite thing for Giraffes.




I then went on to sew Spud.





Then Scrump & Joey.




Next came the bain of my life, Buss. This one really stumped me, I really couldn't get into sewing it. I think it was all the colours in his mane and all the back stitching (I hate back stitching!!). Compared to a HAED design these pictures are like children's colouring but as easy as it should be I just couldn't bring myself to finish this design. Because I couldn't finish this one I didn't feel I could start another one and the series was put on hold. My son is now 6 months old so probably 12 months after I started stitching this series my wonderful sister offered to finish Buss off for me. She took it home and literally finished it in two nights.






So that left me free to start a new design. So on 9th July I started on Millie and 5 days later here she is finished.





So that leaves me to sew the final three Pee, Putty and Zeep. Once I have completed the set I will put up a picture of all nine cross stitches as they are displayed on my son's bedroom wall. I hope he appreciates all the work I put in when he's older.

All the images on this page apart from the last one (Millie) are taken from pictures shown on a website selling these charts. If you are interested in purchasing any of these charts the website I bought mine from was from a company called Stitchability and there is a link to there site in my favourite website bar at the side.

So these charts are obviously not HAED charts and therefore this week I haven't accomplished anything towards my half yearly goals but I am glad that I have finally got back into sewing them before my son gets too old to tell me he doesn't want them in his bedroom!!