Tea Kettle Pinkeep

My dear friend Clare recently celebrated her birthday so when I came across this chart I knew it would be perfect - it's the Tea Kettle Pinkeep by Pineberry Lane.  

I purchase all my Pineberry Lane charts as e-patterns directly from Pineberry Lane - instant gratification!

Stitched on 30 count parchment linen using Red Pear thread by Weeks Dye Works, I trimmed the pin keep with some Lady Dot Creations chenille trim, vintage colour way & backed it with some lovely red fabric.

I also attached one of the little charms my friend Kath gave me for Christmas.

See you soon xx

Special Gifts

Happy New Year dear friends - I hope you have had a great start to 2017 so far. We had a very quiet evening on New Years, a barbeque, a few glasses of bubbles and in bed well before midnight, I don't think we've seen the new year in for quite a few years now.

I was intending to finish off the last of my 2016 Christmas stitching and the wonderful gifts I received on here before we went away on our annual family holiday to Lake Taupo, but didn't quite get there so I will share a few pics today and then be back soon with some snaps from our holiday.

This year I decided to make my friends a Rosalie Dekker stitchery design using these gorgeous doily frames I purchased from the Country Yard. I used a variety of Cottage Garden Threads.

I really enjoyed making these for all the ladies.

I was very spoilt and received some gorgeous crafty and other gifts from my stitching friends.
From Kath, this neat fabric Santa,

Several charts from my wish list, yippee, which to do first?

Some new T2 tea to try, delicious.

From Wendy, this lovely little set for drinking tea

From Clare, this very cute ornament for the tree

and a Gail Pan Pattern and gingerbread ornament.

My friend Elizabeth stitched and finished this little mat beautifully.

She also made a set of felt ornaments for Hannah and I, I just love these.

I am so thankful for my wonderful stitching friends, and I look forward to our stitching catch ups again during 2017.

See you soon x

Gifts for a Friend

My friend Clare celebrated her birthday last weekend and these are the little gifts I made for her.

A hexagon needle case, the pattern by Leanne's House

The inside of the needle case.

The fabrics I've used are Independence Trail by Minick and Simpson for Moda, and the stitchery was done with DMC 347.

A bookmark using a free stitchery by Anni Downs of Hatched n Patched, I also stitched this design in 347.

I think I'll have to make myself one of these bookmarks too!

Birthday Gifts for a Dear Friend

On Monday my lovely friend Kath celebrated her birthday so of course I had to stitch a couple of little gifties for her.

This Lizzie Kate design is from the UK Cross Stitcher magazine, November 2014.

I wasn't really sure how I was going to finish it so went looking through my fabric stash for some inspiration and came across some fabric to use. I thought about a project bag of some sort, or even a q snap storage bag.  I was pretty happy with how it turned out. 

I'll have to stitch this again sometime for myself!

Next up is this red work Christmas stocking. This is a Marg Low pattern and I stitched the design with DMC 221, to match some Lynette Anderson fabric I wanted to use for the backing.

For many years now I have given Kath a Christmas ornament on her birthday - you may have already seen this one on my blog recently:

I hope you had a super day my friend!

Gifts for a Friend

Hello friends

I hope you are having a good week. I'm back today with photos of what I made for my friend Clare for her birthday last week.

Such Friendship by Annie Beez Folkart Design

stitched on 28ct natural linen with recommended threads

When I spotted this lovely friendship design I thought it would be perfect to stitch for Clare, we have been friends for many years now :)

Pincushion from Little Bird Sewing Set by Gail Pan Designs

stitched with Cottage Garden Thread

Such a cute birdie :) 

Happy crafting xx

Forget Me Not

Hello friends, 

here's little pillow finish to share today. This was a birthday gift for my dear friend Petra, who lives all the way over in Sweden.

Forget Me Not

by Beth Twist - Heartstring Samplery

Issue 71 March/April Gift of Stitching 

stitched on 32ct linen with recommended threads

Have a wonderful day x

Gift Making

Hello friends,

During February and March I have several friends and family members with birthdays so I decided to get busy and make up some gifts to put away in my pressie cupboard :)

I found this great tutorial a few months ago so here's my version of a Tissue Pocket:

With the cooler and wet "summer" days recently, I've felt like knitting so out came my knitting needles, a few balls of DK wool and a pattern I've made up lots of times now:

(My friend Wendy made these little gift cards for me last year to attach to knitted gifts, aren't they neat)

I've also made a few mug cozies to give as future gifts.

This particular pattern is from Mollie Makes, Issue 7. I'm so pleased that I've found a NZ source, Sew Pretty, to buy this from as its a great source of ideas and so many pretty pictures :) I have also bought a few digital back issues through Zinio, but I'm hoping I'll be able to source paper copies of these eventually.  

Thanks for dropping by, see you soon xx