Sunday, 21 December 2008

Long Time between Posts

Wow, December has flown by!! Not much creating happening, serious stressing about unfinished Christmas cards and gifts!!!

I have been experimenting with some stitching after my success with the two little stitching kits I recently purchased. Being something of a fontaholic I get regular updates from a site called Lettering Delights. They recently sent a newsletter showcasing a Doodlebat font called Christmas Birds. (A Doodlebat font contains images instead of letters and can be used like any other font.) When I saw this one some of the images were just calling out to be used in a stitching. The font cost me about two dollars. I can create all the stitchings I want as long as I am not reselling them as this would contravene the license agreement for the font.



I used MS Publisher to create my templates, printed them out and then used various methods to put the image onto my fabric.

In my first try I got the size of the outline box a little bit too big for the image but was very pleased with try two. Tries three and four are here in this photo not stitched - they have been stitched but no pictures yet.



Apologies for the not so good image. Night time flash photo! What you can see at the top are the four finished stitchings and underneath are the next two ready and waiting. At the bottom are the printed doodlebats with squares around them. The one on the right had been traced over with an iron on pencil.

I am still not sure which tracing technique is the one I like best. So far I have tried fade-away pen and iron on pencil. Next on the list to try is a fine wash away pen and then after that a brown fine line pen like a pigma pen.

The iron on pencil is easy to use but the vivid red colour is hard to disguise when stitching - particularly with lighter threads. The fade away is only good if I can get all the stitching done quickly - not always guaranteed!

Hopefully after Christmas I will have time to try out some more Doodlebat ideas.

Will wish you all a Merry Christmas in this post as I am not sure how long it will be before I get back to post again. May your Christmas be all that you wish it to be!!



P.S. Check out these gorgeous critters at LucyKate Crafts. I really like the cat.

Thursday, 11 December 2008

Tabitha



Today we farewelled a loved family pet. Eighteen years old - first child in lots of ways - and always cantankerous. She was an RSPCA kitten who turned into a beautiful cat with attitude!!!

The loudest purr, the kinkiest tail, the most awful piteous cry (able to be heard from houses away!!!!!!) and claws as sharp as daggers are all things we will remember and miss.

Unfortunately age caught up with her - going deaf, back legs becoming wobbly and a few dental issues that she seemed able to ignore but must have been hurting and an argument with our car. She came out seemingly none the worse for wear after the argument with the car but seemed to have lost all fear of big moving vehicles - quite scary really. It was time to give her a dignified exit rather than see her go through more pain.



Farewell, Tabitha twitchit with the question mark tail.



Avid Crafter and Crafty Things and the rest of the family

Friday, 5 December 2008

Christmas is coming...

We're definitely heading towards the bust part of the year now! Everything's going on now that the year is beginning to wrap up.

So, a few quick updates on what's been going on.



This photo of my 'Underwater' cross-stitch is a bit out of date but it's mostly boring blue water and the small red fish at the top that I've been working on. I'm at home at the moment with a rotten head cold so more work that usual has been done on the stitching, mostly in front of the TV. It's finally gotten to big for our little scanner so it's photos only from now on!



Speaking of photos, I've been playing around with my camera a bit and this is my favourite of the photos I've taken so far. It's of pins in my pincushion and was taken with my camera's super-macro function. I think that particular function will see a lot of use in the future somehow.



And last but not least, here's a sneak peek of something I've been working on for my new cousin Emma. It's not finished yet and you'll have to wait til after the present has been received to see what the end product will be.

Now I just have to work out what on earth to give for Christmas presents this year, and there's a birthday between now and then too! My family are getting harder to sort out presents for each year.

Thursday, 4 December 2008

Some Stitching is Happening

No posts lately but some stitching has been happening. I recently found two little kits that I have been slowly stitching in amongst doing all the other things that eat into crafting time.

Both the kits are from Hatched and Patched's Simple Stitchings range. The first one is called Ladybug Romp and I have finished stitching it. It is going to become part of a set of bean bags for a little niece.



The second one is called Bear In There and it is still a work in progress. I am not sure what it might end up as yet.



The little pink hoop was a new find too. It is a spring hoop that has a metal spring section that fits inside the flat pink plastic section. It is much narrower that wooden embroidery hoops and I like the feel of it lots.

The list - in my head - of things I would like to make is growing proportionately longer as the time I have to craft is growing proportionately smaller!! I have bags I want to make, fabric buckets, bean bags, bibs, a baby calendar for a new niece, more discovery bags and then there are the Christmas cards that probably should be at the top of the list.

I have made a start on some of the Christmas presents but cannot talk much about them - you never know who might drop by and read this little blog. We went digital with a few things that have previously been much more hand produced. More about that after Christmas.

Many thanks to those lovely blog visitors who have dropped by and left comments. I am thinking of creating an applique pattern for the little owl from the felt book. I am not sure quite how I will tackle it yet. The final version would be a PDF file but I am still thinking about the best way to get a good end product. I have scanned drawings before but they do not look very clear sometimes. I am wondering how others may have done this.