More progress and a finish

Here it is the start of another week, and I am looking forward to seeing how things go. It is going to be a busy week, but I hope that I can continue to find time to work on some of the projects that I currently have on the go. We are dealing with the roller coaster of weather right now, so that means one day it is warm, and then the next one is quite a bit cooler. Hopefully this week, the weather will warm up just a little bit, as I would like to find some time to sit outside.

Arabesque - here is the cross stitch that I picked up and worked on this week. I am happy with the progress that I was able to make and hope that this coming week I can add more to this piece. I have reached the 50% complete, and now I am looking forward to seeing how much more of it I can get done.

If I can focus on this piece for a while I might be able to get it closer to a finish but will have to see how it goes. I do know that I am looking forward to seeing what it looks like when I can see the piece finished.

Easy Goes It Shawl - this is the knitting project that I have been working on and am happy with the progress that I was able to get done this last week. I was determined to see if I could get the piece finished by the end of the weekend and with some focus, I was able to accomplish that. This shawl was nice to work on and now I just need to block it and then it will be ready to wear. The yarn was nice to work with and now to pick up the next project and see how it goes.

I think I have figured out the next project that I will work on but that could change when I go to pick it up. I have been enjoying working on the various knitting projects and am looking forward to working on the next one. I do have lots of fingers and sports weight yarn that is waiting to be made into something so now to pick something up and get to work on it.

Other projects - I haven't worked on any other projects this past week and will have to see how this week goes. I do know that I have things that I would like to work on, but I am trying to keep a focus so that I can get things done.

The one thing that I have made sure I have done even when I have been busy has been to ensure that I take those few minutes each day to do something that I enjoy. It doesn't have to be a long time but even those 15 - 20-minute escapes can make such a difference.  This week I will see what I work on and hopefully next week I will have some progress on at least one project. 

 

Fox and Rabbit Mystery Sampler Box

Here is a blog that I have been looking forward to writing as I was fortunate to be able to get a Mystery Box from Fox and Rabbit when they came available on June 30th here in Canada.  I have delayed this post to make sure that most people that ordered the box should have received it and opened it.

Karen and Brendon Kirk are the owners of this company and they had been mentioning this box quite a few months ago on their Youtube channel. When they told us about the box, they had said that there would be a sampler pattern, fabric and floss in the box along with some other surprises.  

You can probably guess how excited I was when they went on sale, and I was able to purchase the box before they were sold out. It felt wonderful to be able to order the box but then there was the waiting until the box shipped. As the box was coming from Australia, I knew that it was going to take some time once it was actually mailed. The box was mailed on Friday August 12th, and I received the box on Monday August 19th so that didn't take too long to get here. I was tracking the box all the way on its journey and was excited to see it was out for delivery.

The box couldn't have arrived on a better day and when the postal carrier knocked on our door, I was quickly there to receive my box. The box was so nice to see with the Fox and Rabbit logo on it and on the side, it says Mystery Sampler Box 1. It was then time to open the box and see what we received and there was a lot of stuff in this box. Here is a list of everything that we received:

• Half yard of Vintage Sand aida (colour created especially for this box)
• Elizabeth Cheavins 1869 chart
• Fat quarter of Baked Clay linen for chart
• Elizabeth Cheavins Pinkeep chart and finishing instructions
  
• Piece of Baked clay linen, finishing fabrics and LadyDot trim for the Pinkeep.
• Cardboard templates for Pinkeep.
• Pin pack for the Pinkeep.
• Thread pack for both projects
• Embroidery scissors
• Fox and Rabbit enamel needleminder
• Elizabeth Cheavins thread ring and charms
• Bee wax waxer
• Caramello Koala chocolate
• 20% off voucher for PDF charts from Fox and Rabbit
• Fox and Rabbit sticker

As you can see there was a lot of stuff in the box, and I am looking forward to working on these projects. The half yard of Vintage Sand aida will going into your fabric stash for now and it will be used for a special project or two in the future.  

I am excited to start working on some of these projects, but I am going to be good and wait for a little while to make sure that I can give these projects that attention they deserve.

Progress and a start and finish

Here it is the start of another week and yes, I was able to make some progress on some projects in the last week. It was a nice week when I was able to spend some time working on projects and seeing progress on some of them. Now to see what this week is like as I would like to see if I can move at least one project forward a bit and then see what else I can get done.

Arabesque - here is the project that got a bit of attention this weekend as I wanted to see if I could move it forward a bit. I haven't spent a lot of time on this cross stitch in the past week so now hopefully I can get back to working on it as I would like to see how quickly I can get this piece done. I am loving how the colours are turning out on the piece so now to spend a bit more time working on it and maybe get those two missing letters done before too long.

I will see how much of it I can get in the next week because seeing some more progress on it would make me very happy. The only way I can see progress is if I pick it up so that is what I am going to have to try and do in the next little while.

Chew Magna Project #1 - here is the project that I did work on this week. This is a cross stitch that I did based on a picture of this pattern that was in St Andrews Church in Chew Magna, England. My sister saw two cross stitch pieces in the church and immediately thought that it would be nice to stitch it. We couldn't find any pattern, so I charted the piece from the pieces she had. This piece was quick to stitch up as it only took me three evenings to get it done. Now, I need to chart and stitch the other cross that she saw because it would be nice to have both. This church is where our grandfather went as a boy in England.

Easy Goes It - I have been able to make some progress on this project in the last week. I didn't get as much done as I would have liked but at least I have been able to move it forward and that is what is important. Now to see if I can continue to get more of this shawl knit as it would be nice to have it finished before too long.

I am enjoying working on this shawl and it is a pretty easy pattern so just being able to focus on it for a little while would be good so will have to see how it goes in the next week. Being able to sit and knit for even an hour a day is good and I do need to get back to doing that as it moves projects forward and it also helps me regain a focus when things are busy.

Simple Shawl - this past week we were doing some driving so I wanted a project that I could work on in the car as a passenger. I was able to get some of this knit last week and it will be a project that I will pick up and work on either when we are driving somewhere or when I just have a few minutes and don't want to worry about a pattern. This didn't take long before it was growing and now that the rows are a bit longer it does take more time to see progress, but it is still very enjoyable to work on. I am not certain how large this shawl is going to be because I have 115 grams of this yarn, and I am going to just knit until it is finished. I love patterns like this because it means you don't end up with little bits of a colour. 

Other projects - I haven't been working on anything else and given what I was able to accomplish last week I am happy that I had a focus. Now to see what this week has in store as it is a holiday here today so that means that I might be able to find a bit of time to craft, but I also have some other things that I also want to accomplish.

I hope everyone has a good week and you find the time each day to recharge your personal battery because that helps you focus on the things that you need to do. My goal this week is to try and make some progress on a few things and then see how things go. It is going to be a busy week for me so I will see what crafting I can get done. If things go well, I should be back next week with at least a little bit of progress on something.

 

English Paper Piecing - August Progress

Here it is the start of another month, and I have been able to spend some time working on my different English Paper Piecing projects. It feels good to see that I have at least been able to make some progress on things and that is great. Being able to pick up a project and work on it for a little while is always nice and these projects are the ones that do work when you have just a little bit of time to work on something.

Table runner - here is the project that was my focus as I was trying to get all the motifs added to it so that I could say that the top of the table runner is finally complete.

In August I was determined to get the rest of the motifs joined onto the runner and I got it done. It is nice to know that I have the top of the table runner completed and now what I need to do is figure out the backing that I want to use and then do the actual quilting on it. 

Popsy's throw - I am continuing to work on getting more of the motifs made for this throw. The pile of completed motifs is growing so that means that I also need to get back to joining these into flowers so that I can work on moving this project forward.

Other projects - I haven't picked up any of the other EPP projects as I have been trying to focus on just working on one or two projects at a time. Once the weather was cooled down a little bit I may try and work on a couple of the projects that are further along so that I can see if I can get them moved forward and closer to a finish.

In September I haven't decided what the focus is going to be, but I do know that I want to continue to move my projects forward so will see how that goes.

 

Progress and a new/revised project

It is hard to believe that another week has come and done. Things here have been busy, so it has meant that the week has gone by so quickly and am not certain what I really did.

There are still so many things that I would like to accomplish that I need to make a list of them and start working through that list. Hopefully once things are back to normal once summer is over, I can get that list written out and start working through everything.

Arabesque - here is the cross stitch project that got the attention this week. I am happy with the progress that I was able to make on it. I do know that this week I am not going to have as much time to work on the piece, so hopefully next weekend I can work on moving it forward again. It does feel good seeing that I have been able to get some of the letters done. If things go well, I might be able to roll the scroll bars a bit later this week and have a bigger area to work on again.

This project is still a lot of fun to work on, and I think with it being one colour floss it makes it so much easier to do. Using hand-dyed floss can be a bit of a challenge, but once you get into the habit of how you want to do things it makes it pretty easy to do.

Easy Goes It - here is the current knitting project that I am working on. It is a nice shawl that doesn't take too long to do, and it is something that I am enjoying doing. This shawl was started on Wednesday after I made a decision on the shawl that I was working on before. The Miss May Mystery Shawl has now been stopped and all the yarn wound into balls because I wasn't enjoying how it was looking. The yarn that I had picked to use for the shawl has a lot of character in each ball, and the shawl just wasn't looking like I wanted it to look.

It can be hard to make a decision to scrap a project after you have worked on it for quite a few days but if you don't think you will ever wear it, it's better to stop making it then spend all the time working on it and then just not wear it. I know that I will make the Miss May Mystery Shawl at another time, but it will be with yarn that is a lot plainer than the yarn that I was using.

This decision that I made was a little disappointing in some ways but then now instead of having two shawls that I might not have worn I will have four different shawls that I should be able to wear and that makes me feel a lot better.

Other Projects - I haven't had a lot of time to work on other projects this last week and hope that I can at least get a couple of other projects moved forward in this next week. I have also been working on charting some piece so those are things that I hope to stitch up soon if I can just find the time to do them.

I hope everyone has a good week and you continue to find that bit of time for yourself each day to recharge your personal battery. My crafting does bring me join and then life gets busy, I know that if I can spend those few minutes doing something that brings me join.

If things go well this week, I should have something to show you next week, but time will tell what project I can get done. Have a good week and I will hopefully post again next week.

 

Progress on a couple of projects

Here it is a start of another week, and it is starting out cooler than it has been, but that is fine with me. It looks like this is going to be a busy week, so I am going to see what I can get done, but I will try and at least move a couple of projects forward a bit before the end of this week.

Arabesque - here is the cross stitch project that got some attention this week. It didn't get as much as I would have liked to have given it, but at least I was able to move the project forward and that is what is important. It does feel good being able to work with one colour of thread. When I want to work on this project, I just have to grab the one variegated thread that I am working with and I can just stitch.

I hope to continue to move this project forward some again this coming week because it is nice to work on when I pick it up. Now that the large motif is completed some of the other parts of the project should move forward a little quicker or at least that is my hope.

Miss May Mystery Shawl - here is the knitting project that I am currently working on. I started this shawl at the beginning of last week and took a picture of it. This is how much I was able to get done on the Sunday when I started the project, and I was happy with how much I had done but it wasn't worth sharing it then.

Now you can see that I have been able to work on it for a while and yes there are different colours in the shawl, and it is working up at a good pace. The rows are getting longer so that means that I think it will take longer to see progress on the shawl, but I am going to continue to work on it as I would like to know that I have been able to move the shawl forward.

Other projects - I have been able to pick up and work on my EPP a little bit so that is making me happy, and I should have some progress to show at the end of the month on that.

Of course, there are always other projects that I want to work on, but I have been trying to keep a focus and limit the number of projects that I have on the go. It is sometimes so easy to start something but being able to see the progress that I have on my projects makes me feel good.

I hope everyone as good week and you find the time to do something for yourself each day. For me, it is trying to make sure that I have picked up my crafting even for just a few minutes each day as it helps me regain a focus and manage everything else that goes on around me.

This week I hope to continue to move my projects forward and hopefully will have something to show you next Monday. Have a good week and make sure you take time for yourself.

 

Some progress and another finish

Here it is the start of another week, and the weather has cooled down some here, so that makes it that being able to focus on things is a lot easier.

Work has been busy, but I have been able to find some time to make some progress on things and that also makes me happy.

Arabesque - here is the cross stitch project that got the attention and I am very happy with what I was able to get done in the last week. This project has been enjoyable to work on and having the different sections to work on does help. This motif that I am working on has taken quite a bit of time and now I just need to finish off the middle of it and then it will be finished.

This coming week I am going to continue to work on this piece and will see how much more of it I can get done. I am looking forward to getting into some of the other motifs and the alphabet and I should be able to start the alphabet before long.

Forage Shawl - this is the knitting project that I have been working on and it has been something that I have enjoyed working on. The yarn that I have used was from Arcane Fibre Works and it was nice and soft to work with. This shawl called for 100 grams of fingering weight yarn or approximately 400 metres. I was working on the shawl and at one point I did weigh the yarn that I had because I wasn't sure if I was going to have enough to finish the shawl.

The good news is on Saturday I was able to cast off the shawl and then I blocked it yesterday so now the shawl is done. I did have enough yarn to finish the shawl and even had 3 grams of yarn left so that was good. Of course, once I finished knitting this shawl it was time to figure out what I was going to work on next.

Yesterday I did start another shawl but there is no picture of it as there isn't much done on it so I should make some progress on it this coming week and will have a picture of it next week.

Other projects - this past week I was able to pick up and work on my English Paper Piecing for a little while so that is a bit of project on that this month. 

It has felt good being able to see progress on things and I am looking forward to seeing what else I can work on through the next couple of weeks. A lot of what I work on depends on how I am feeling but I do enjoy having different things that I can pick up and do.

I hope everyone is finding the time to do things that you enjoy doing. It doesn't matter what it is as long as there is a little bit of time each day spent taking care of yourself. I have found that when I am busy and don't take that time for myself it makes it harder to deal with the other things that happen that I can't control. Have a good week and I hope to have some more progress on things to show you next week.