Give Away

As promised, I hit my 100th post (and got a new job), so I'm having a little giveaway to celebrate these facts.

I'm afraid it's not the most exciting in the world but there's a selection of DMC variagated threads. There are 28 threads altogether, some bobbins and some skeins, but as far as I can remmeber none of them have ever been used. 4 of them, I'm not sure if they're DMC, but I don't buy Anchor so I can't think what else they could be. There's also a really cute (I think anyway) pair of scissors.

Normal rules apply, please be a follower and leave a comment on this post if you want to enter. If you want a second entry mention this giveaway in a post of yours and mention in your comment that you're going to do that. This will close 12.00 (GMT) on Saturday 3rd of April, and will be picked in the very technilogical manner of all names in a hat (bowl) and pick one out.

I'm happy to post outside of the UK if you want to enter.

I think that's everything, good luck

A smush of Dragon Rider

So, here it is, my last Dragon Rider update before it gets put away for a few weeks as I work my way through my other rotations.

I am quite chuffed with how much I've got done, each time I've put a picture up I've really been able to see the difference between the latest and last updates, so that makes me happy, although the fact that I had a week off between jobs really helped that. I'm starting to see shades in it now, which I wasn't for a long time. You can see the greens and browns at the bottom and the splashes of brighter blues look great.

You wouldn't believe it but I've had to do one symbol three times (which yes, means I've had to unpick it twice). I don't know what it is that I had against this symbol, but I kept stitching it in the wrong colour. The first time, I can almost understand my mistake, the symbol was a 6 but I did the colour that was the symbol for 5, but the 5 was directly below the 7 in the list, so I think I saw the shape and asumed that it was the 6. Stupid, I know. Then, took it out and replaced it, only to find that I'd done the wrong colour a second time because apparently I can't read across in a striaght line. But never mind, it's all corrected now.

I am a little disappointed because after two weeks you can't really see anything, it really is just a smush. If you're interested this is the top left page, so it's tree, with light shinning through it, but at the moment it's smush. But I am quite excited because I can see it developing, and I'm already looking at what will be the next page (the page below this one) and there are bits of that that I really want to get onto, but I'm being good and finishing this page before I move on.

In other news, I've now started my new job, I'm settling in and think that I'm learning my way round and working out what I'm going to do. So woohoo!

And finally, I'm thinking of getting Kindle (e-reader). Does anyone have one? What's it like, what do you think of it? Is it worth it? Personally I'd only get a WiFi one, not bothered about the 3G, I'm thinking that they might be quite useful for travelling and holidays. But at the same time, I am a great lover of proper books and I just can't decide.

And really finally - this is my 100th post, so I will be doing a giveaway, but, one of the things that I want to do, I'm waiting for it to arrive in the post, it was posted from America about a week ago so hopefully it'll be here soon and then I can get it all sorted.

Are you a Disney fan?

Then have a glance at this, it might amuse you

I've never tried to put a video into my blog before so this may not work at all. I love the chorus. And whether you're a fan or not, you've got to be impressed by his versitility.
Just in case it doesn't and anyone's interested, here's the link One Man Disney Medley

International Hermit and Stitch weekend

Did you join in with International Hermit and Stitch weekend this weekend?

I actually managed more than I thought I was going to, so I'm quite chuffed, there's actually a noticeable difference. Although having said that it's still a smush that doens't really look like anything. To be honest I'm not convinced that this page is going to look like anything, I think it's going to take hte addition of a second page before you really start to see a picture forming in this one. But it's getting there, not bad for only my second week on this dude.

It's a funny page to stitch to be honest, there's loads of confetti, but half of it's the same colour (black) so once the confetti's done the second half will absolutely fly through.

A New Beginning - look at the smush!

Ooops, a new start, how did that possibly happen?

This gorgeous new design is/will be Dragon Rider by Randal Spangler (there's a picture to the right if you want to see what it's going to look like). I talked about my plans for this one etc so I'm not going to bore everyone with that again. It's going to be a present, I've not told the person in question but it's also not a massive secret. She's not a follower on here, but she knows of it's existence so if she seens it happening I'm not massively bothered.

Believe it or not there are five colours in this so far. I know they're in there and I can still only count three in this picture, and Ben's just flat out refusing to believe me. You can see the black, the green and the blue, you can't see the navy blue and the dark brown though, but trust me, they really are in there. Gotta love the shading and confetti - I know it'll be worth it in the end. I love the turquiose actually, it's a gorgeous colour anyway, and it's such a lovely splash of colour in what is a very dark page.

I'm updating a day early today because I've got a couple of things that I want to get done tomorrow that may get in my way. It's also International Hermit and Stitch weekend this weekend. I'm cheating slightly, I am looking to be a little busy this weekend so I'm going to have my weekend today instead and see what progress I can achieve. As is often the case, as this is a new start it gets to be worked on for a second week so I should be able to get loads more done.

I've finished my old job now, it was my last day on Wednesday, and I'm going to start in my new job next Wednesday which is quite exciting, but also a little nerve wracking.

Oh, and has anyone seen the gorgeous new chart on HAED? Lady of Avalon? She's absolutely gorgeous! I know, I shouldn't have been looking it's Dorothea's fault, she added it to her wishlist and it's stunning. And there's a sale on at the moment - this is just a dangerous thing.

Ooh, and I'm coming up to my hundreth post, so I'm debating a little giveaway to celebrate that and my shinny new job. So keep your eyes out. I've got to wait for something to arrive first but once it has and I hit 100 then something will happen!

Check it out

There's a gorgeous and massive give away over at Rhode Island Stitchers. So pop on over if you link many shiny and beautiful things.

In other news, I only have two days left at my current job, it's quite exciting

Look, a window!

I'm seeing a window arch, and this makes me happy. However, I also thought that I'd done more than I actually have last weekend, so I'm a little disappointed. Despite that there is quite a bit of progress so it's not bad, but I was aiming to get this page finished this weekend, which, to be fair, was possibly a little optimistic on my behalf. I don't seem to quite have the speed and time that other people have.

I am still really enjoiyng stitching it though. There's just under 30 hours gone into this so far, which is a little scary really. I've done nearly 30 hours and haven't managed to finished the first page yet. Be afraid, be very afraid, but as I say, I'm enjoying it, and that's the most important thing.

This weekend, Ben's on yet another conference so I've got another weekend of stitching and dvds ahead of me. The more eagle eyed amongst you may have noticed that another picture appeared in my WIPs pictures on the right a couple of weeks ago, Raymond Spangler's Dragon Rider (another HAED, oops, how did that happen?), so my plan is to start and work on that this weekend. I say plan, I did actually start and do a tiny amount last night so it's already started. I've now got an odd sort of frame which blocks out the size of the first page. More than 50% of this page is the same colour (black, oh joy!) so I did all the black on the outside line of the page to give me something to work around seeing as I don't grid at the moment.

In other news, it's my last day at my current job on Wednesday. I was told I was being made redundant a few weeks ago. I've not mentioned it on here because it was never my intention to use this blog as a big heart out pouring, I'm not really good at things like that, plus, when I was a little worried myself I'm not good at people being nice to me, I'm much more likely to get upset about people being nice to me than I am at the thing that I'm actually worried about so I decided to avoid that happening. However the future is now rosey, I know that a job is there for me and all is good in the world again, woohoo!

Look, it's starting to fill in

I'm strangely chuffed with this weeks progress, despite the fact that I haven't actually got that much done, but what I have done has been little bits of gap filling and (to me at least) it's made a massive difference. I've now got a couple of areas that are completely solid stitch.

I'm progressing with this much faster than I did the last page, and much faster than I expected to, probably because the last page was SO slow and fiddly.

Haven't really been able to get much stitching done this week, there's been a fade in the mojo, however, I'm relatively sure that's it's a temporary lull that's simply because I've got a lot on at the moment. I've got the flat to myself today, so I'm thinking that it's time for a day of stitching, dvds and chocolate (whoop whoop) which should get my mojo back. Now, what to watch...

Happy stitching everyone.

Another month's TUSAL

It's looking much fuller this month, mostly full of greenness due to teh frog incident, but at least it looks like there's something in there for the first time. It may have been a disaster, but atleast my jar's looking fuller!

Gridding?

Has anyone tried that DMC ready gridded fabric. I'm afraid I've completely forgotten what it's called. Two strands are dyed red so that it's ready gridded for you, then when you wash it, the lines fade, at least their meant to.

I bought some 25 count because I thought it would be good for HAEDs, thankfully I decided to do a test piece first, and I'm so glad that I did. I did a square of black and a square of white to test the two extremes and the white has picked up a pink tinge where the reds faded, and it hasn't completey faded so it's completely useless anyway.

Has anyone else tried it? Has it wored for you? I'm just wondering whether I've got a dud batch or whether it's something that I've done wrong, any ideas?

On an unrelated note, for the first time in goodness knows when, I hit my writing target last month, woohoo!!!