Birthdays

I've been reading Stitch Bitch blog for a while now and her stories of her grandmother, Maggie, have always amused me. So, when she put out a call for birthday cards to be sent to Maggie on her 89th birthday, how could I say no? After all, this is a lady whom I hope to emulate when I'm her age ^.^

Two weeks before the big day, I put on my thinking cap. Once again, I went on my trusted Stitching Cards website for inspiration and made this.

I really love this design. The basket is stitched with metallic gold thread and gold beads are added to the flowers for that extra sparkle.

I think the card arrived a couple days late but at least it didn't go missing which I'm grateful for.

22nd March was once again my best friend, Adeline's birthday. As with years past, I had a kitty design stitched and framed for her.

I, for one, think it would be perfect in the baby's room but that's for her to decide, of course.

Dede, another good friend of mine's birthday is also coming up in April. Remember my Passione Ricamo piece I had stitched? It was first intended for her birthday last year and then postponed to Christmas... It is now framed too and finally ready to be presented to her.

Other than that, I've also been working on New Birth of Spring sporadically and this is where it stands at the moment.

However, it has now been put on hold while I try to catch up on Romantique Sampler. Part 2 stitched.

First month is now complete.

Working on the second month. Here is Part 3.

Onwards to Part 4... But I have a Birthday Exchange due in May...

Talk about a full plate! I have only myself to blame but I'm enjoying every single minute of it :D

Awards, Silk & Framing

I got two blog awards within days of each other. First is the Beautiful Blogger award given to me by Jan. Thank you, Jan.

As with each award, there are certain rules:

• Accept the award
• Thank the person who gave you the award
• Add a link to the person who gave you the award
• Put the award on your blog
• Write 10 things about yourself others might not know
• Pass the award on to 10 others

So here are 10 things about me:

1. I love both coffee and tea. And Gummi Bears.
2. I play the piano. In fact, I have a Grade 8 qualification. However, I am ashamed to say that I have not touched the piano in years.
3. I have a HUGE thing for Forever Friends bear. Cutest bear in the world!
4. I am a complete bookworm and my favorite books are romance novels. I also collect books. If I have a book from a series, I usually end up with the whole series.
5. I love watching Stargate TV series.
6. I visited Phuket, Thailand for vacation three times within the last two years. My partner loves that place!
7. I speak three languages (English, Mandarin and Malay) fluently and two dialects (Cantonese and Hokkien) not so fluently.
8. I love assembling jigsaw puzzles. The more pieces, the better. I like the challenge.
9. I met my partner online through a dating website.
10. I play World of Warcraft and my main character is a druid.

My second award is from mbroider. Thank you!

Once again, here are the rules for this award:

• Put the logo on your blog or within your post
• Pass the award to 12 bloggers
• Link the nominees within your post
• Let them know they received this award by commenting on their blog
• Share the love and link to the person from whom you received the award

I'm gonna bend the rules a little. For BOTH awards, I nominate the following bloggers:

• Andie of Stitchitandie
• Chiloe of Chiloe's Corner
• Christine of Mtrl Girl's Material World
• Cindy of Stitching Corner
• Dani of Dani: Black Belt Stitching Wizard
• Dovilė of Žydinti svajonių pieva
• EeKoon of CraftyPretender Projects
• Elizabeth of Sew in Love
• Hazel of Quietly Stitching
• Helen of Stitchery Nook
• Lillie of Home of a Little Needlecrafter
• Lisa of Lisa's Blog

As to what I've been working on, I'm two thirds done with Berry Time.

Did I mention I love silk? Especially variegated ones which this project shows off to perfection? If I didn't, well, once again, I LOVE silk!

I've switched back to stitching on Love With A Capital L for now. This is the progress so far:

I would like to personally thank Christine here for bringing to my attention some discrepancies in the bottom half of the design which the stitches were not centered properly. She has recorded the errors on her blog here if you need more details.

Now that's done, look what came home from the framers last week.

This was presented to Adeline on 22 March, her birthday. I'm happy to report that she was trilled with it though I gotta admit I mentally facepalmed myself when I had to literary explained to her that the kitties represented her two cats. She unwrapped it, took one look and went "Oooooh... a black cat and a white cat! So cute!" >.< In her defense, we were in a karaoke room with dim lights but still...

And here's Esperanza again.

She is awaiting the arrival of my partner. Hence, I won't be online much for the next couple of weeks. He will be here in Malaysia as will his brother who is visiting Malaysia for the first time for the Formula One race this coming Sunday.

I've Lost My Mojo...

Can you help me find it please? I've tried everything, from looking at new releases to looking at your WiP pictures and lovely finishes to fondling my stash (which I had fun doing, by the way). Things that had helped in the past but to no avail now. I have the desire to stitch but not the drive. Does that make sense? I mean, I'll pick up something intending to work on it but few stitches in and I just cannot bring myself to continue on. I'm frustrating myself. Argh!

This is why, even after eons of absence, I have only one small happy dance to show. If you remember, from my last post, I was working on Little House Needleworks' Coffee Series. The first of the accompanying Tea Series is Spiced Tea.

I gotta tell you, it is not without struggle that I manage to finish it. For such a small design, it is quite a big accomplishment for me.

Design: Spiced Tea

Designer: Little House Needleworks

Fabric: Zweigart's Vintage Country Mocha (Marbled) 32 count Belfast linen

Fibers: Crescent Colours Belle Soie

Other than that, I've also managed to complete the middle section of my Little House Neighbourhood.

And that, ladies (and gentlemen), is all the stitching I have to show. Pathetic, I know :(

On to other stitching related (but not actual stitching) news :P look what's back from the framers.

I think my framer did a splendid job. He's my father's friend and all my needlework with the exception of Be My Valentine by Ellen Maurer-Stroh have been framed by him. I usually leave it to him to pick out the mats and frame which so far, he has yet to disappoint.

Check out a close-up picture of the gold-colored frame. I especially love the aged effect.

Oooh... the postman was just here and look what he left behind!

Cindy had a giveaway of charts on her blog couple of weeks ago to celebrate more than 10,000 hits. I was one of the lucky few who won something :) Thank you, Cindy, for your generosity. If you had not visited her blog before, head on over and you'll see why it had generated so many hits. I believe you won't be disappointed.

Till next time, take care and happy stitching.

Another Wedding Sampler

For another pair of newly wed. This year seems like a year of wedding for my friends! Anyway, this is for Sean and Chee Hooi. The pattern is once again a freebie from EMS which I modified into a wedding sampler. The words that read "Two Hearts, One Love" are taken from the book "Cross Stitch Sentiments and Sayings" by Joan Elliott and the border was designed by me. There're actually opalescent beads stitched around the border too but from the looks of it, they're pretty much invisible. Only in real life can you see the subtle sparkle in the piece. I also substituted the cotton floss outline of the wedding rings to metallic thread but again, there's hardly any difference in the picture.

And here's the framed piece which I just handed over to the couple earlier tonight. Yup, in fact, I just returned home from the wedding not too long ago. This time I didn't take any wedding pictures with my camera but as an aspiring tailor, I had made an evening gown to be worn to this special occasion so if you're curious enough, here's a pic I took of me before I left. What do you think of my gown? Just bear with me... shameless self-advertising here. LOL!

Happy Mother's Day!

To all the mothers out there, hope you have a wonderful day. I finally collected the bunny I made for my mum from the framers yesterday. I had sent it in last week and it has been ready more than a few days ago but I had been busy and it wasn't until yesterday that my dad helped me picked it up and snuck it into the house when my mum was out. Thanx Dad! Last night, I left it wrapped up on the table together with a set of clothes I had made for her to find in the morning. I was bedridden most of today by a horrible headache and as she had some church meetings to attend, it wasn't until later in the day that I she told me that she likes my gift.

It had not been an easy feat keeping it a secret from her. I remember how she came into my room when I was still halfway stitching the bunny. Boy, did I scrambled to get everything hidden! Actually, I just rolled it up and it was still in plain sight on the table. Since I've shown everything I've stitched to my mum, she assumed that I wouldn't mind her taking a peek at this one too so she must have been shocked that I practically shouted, "don't touch!" when she reached for it. Well, at least I managed to invent a reason, albeit a lame one, saying that it's not finished yet. At last, the cat is out and I can rest easy.

Adeline's Birthday Present

Well then, after finishing this weeks ago, I only got it back from the framers today, just in time to present it to Adeline. You know me, I was delaying going to the framers, that's why it took so long. Had it done at the same place as the wedding samplers. Well, since tomorrow's her birthday, I'm technically a day early so no harm, right?

Met up with her for dinner and as I doubt I'll be seeing her again tomorrow, I gave it to her tonight. Just like I predicted, she loved it. Stayed out with a couple more friends for non-alcoholic drinks after. She was really tired and I think anything remotely resembling alcohol entering her system would have resulted in knocking her out. Besides really liking the pattern, this is what she said about it: According to her, she's the cat and I'm the sheep and Woei Yang, a close guy friend of ours is the flower. Hmm... Oookay... wonder how much sleep she needs to catch up on.

On another note, I've been busy catching up (or at least trying to catch up) with the EMS Cross Stitch Board Seasonal Topiaries SAL that I've been participating in. I think I'm behind. Or am I on time? Not too sure about that but I know I'm definitely not early. Anyway, pictures of my day to day progress can be found at my Webshots. Am too lazy to upload it here. This series is a downloadable freebie by Passione Ricamo. However, I don't know when it will be taken off the website so better download it while you still can. I've been so busy with RRs and exchanges that it feels good to be working on something that is completely mine for a change. However, don't get me wrong, that doesn't mean that I don't enjoy working on those as well. I do too, very much in fact.

Framed!

The wedding samplers are back from the framers and I'm back from the wedding. It was an elaborate event and I had a lot of fun. Go to my homepage to see some wedding pictures, including a picture of me presenting them with their gift. The couple couldn't believe I made it for them. I'm happy that they like it. It feels great when someone appreciates your gift.

It's been a while since I had anything framed and I've forgotten how big a difference frames can give to a project. Don't they look nice? Simon, the framer, certainly did a great job with them. If anyone's wondering where I had them framed, the shop name's Rainbow Glass Studio in Taman Tun. I'll be presenting Puvan and Dede with their gift sometime this week. Can't wait to see their reactions as well.