February are finally over, it’s been a cold one here in Sweden and I’m really looking forward to some more sun and warmer weather. With spring coming I’m changing my schedule to upload new flosstubes every other week. Spring always brings so much other things I want to do instead of stitching so with that slowing down it’s just natural that the videos do too.
I did finish off my Full Coverage February stitches, worked a little bit on the Castle Homecoming SAL and started my easter ornament stitching. There are also some new things coming to the shop, my choices for the #millhillsantasal2024 finally arrived and are up in the store and so are the complete Spring Collection from Mill Hill!
So in todays video I’m showcasing all I have been stitching on, how I plan for my easter ornament to fit on my fabric and also sharing my plans for march and the rest year, including my WIPGO board!
Disclosure: Links may be affiliate links, this gives me a little kick back to no cost of you.They might also be links to my etsy shop The Craftybit Shop.
Works In Progress (WIPs)
GAMER NOUVEAU
This was started in March of 2023, and as with all of my full coverage stitches I wanna get some good progress this year. So for #fullcoveragefebruary I’m doing 500 stitches per project per letter allocated in the acrostic CONFETTI. Gamer will be stitched on 2 times for a total of 1000 stitches for the letters N for Nouveau and E for gamEr. And I have now stitched all of them!
DETAILS: Pattern: Gamer Nouveau by Gecko Rouge This is no longer sold by Gecko Rouge. The artist is selling it on her own etsy which you can find here: https://etsy.me/3vTXUKP Fabric: 25 count Easy Grid Evenweave by Zweigart Stitched in charted DMC 2 over 1
CHRISTMAS HOUSE 1
This is my oldest full coverage project, started in 2018, and I would really like to at least get to 30% this year. For the acrostic CONFETTI this project will be called 3 times. For C as in Christmas, for T as in roofTop and for I as in Ice sickle. And in total I stitched 1500 stitches on it.
DETAILS: Pattern: Christmas House 1 by Artecy Fabric: 25 count White Evenweave by Zweigart gridded with fishing line Stitched in charted DMC 2 over 1
MINI SUNSET OWL
I started this freebie in October of last year when joining in with a SAL. For the acrostic CONFETTI this is called for O as in Owl, F as in Feathers and T as in Talons. In total for the full coverage february I stitched 1500 stitches on it.
DETAILS: Pattern: Mini Sunset Owl by Artecy (out of print) Fabric: 25 count Potato Evenweave by Zweigart Stitched in charted DMC 2 over 1
CASTLE HOMECOMING SAL
The Castle Homecoming SAL has ended so I really need to gets some stitches into it so that I can start the new Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery SAL when it comes out. So I put in about 4500 stitches! Still have loads to go tho.
We moved around our furniture in the apartment and my mini christmas tree ended up in my office, so know I need to make easter ornaments for it, as I haven’t made anyone yet. So I have started and finished so far 8 ornaments! Let’s see if I’ll stitch more in the upcoming week.
DETAILS: Pattern: Easter Wishes, World Of Cross Stitching Magazine Issue 334 April 2024 Fabric: 14 count Celadon Green Aida by Zweigart Stitched in charted DMC
Plans
In march I will add about 1500 stitch on each of Christmas House 1 and Gamer Nouveau as part of my WIPGO goals. I will also start on my #millhillsantasal2024 makes. Below is the list of the santas & gnomes that I will be choosing from, I will be finishing 12 of them by the end of 2024:
Finally I will be stitching a couple of the Mini Mill Hill Ornaments that was part of my store update the other day. The ones I know I want to get to is Papa Rooster and Mama Hen. And maybe a couple of more.
Thank you so much for coming to my blog, hope you enjoy the content and I’ll see you in two weeks time!
This year is the year of the dragon, so of course I needed a new start with a dragon! But that is not all the new starts that I had in the past three weeks. I have stitched over 14000 stitches on 6 projects and gotten some really good progress. Btw I totally missed to write a corresponding blog post to my last video, but let’s continue on like that didn’t happen.
Disclosure: Links may be affiliate links, this gives me a little kick back to no cost of you.They might also be links to my etsy shop The Craftybit Shop.
Works In Progress (WIPs)
COZY CAFE
This project was started in April of 2023 and I really want to have it finished before April 2024, so I have put in 8 days of stitching in the past three weeks and will return to it either later this month or in march. I am skipping the beading for now and will add the beads after I finished stitching, washed and ironed it,
This was started in March of 2023, and as with all of my full coverage stitches I wanna get some good progress this year. So for #fullcoveragefebruary I’m doing 500 stitches per project per letter allocated in the acrostic CONFETTI. Gamer will be stitched on 2 times for a total of 1000 stitches for the letters N for Nouveau and E for gamEr. So far I have stitched 500 stitches.
DETAILS: Pattern: Gamer Nouveau by Gecko Rouge This is no longer sold by Gecko Rouge. The artist is selling it on her own etsy which you can find here: https://etsy.me/3vTXUKP Fabric: 25 count Easy Grid Evenweave by Zweigart Stitched in charted DMC 2 over 1
CHRISTMAS HOUSE 1
This is my oldest full coverage project, started in 2018, and I would really like to at least get to 30% this year. For the acrostic CONFETTI this project will be called 3 times. For C as in Christmas, for T as in roofTop and for I as in Ice sickle. So far I have stitch 500 stitches on it.
DETAILS: Pattern: Christmas House 1 by Artecy Fabric: 25 count White Evenweave by Zweigart gridded with fishing line Stitched in charted DMC 2 over 1
MINI SUNSET OWL
I started this freebie in October of last year when joining in with a SAL. For the acrostic CONFETTI this is called for O as in Owl, F as in Feathers and T as in Talons. So far I have stitch about 600 stitches, 500 for O and 100 for F.
DETAILS: Pattern: Mini Sunset Owl by Artecy (out of print) Fabric: 25 count Potato Evenweave by Zweigart Stitched in charted DMC 2 over 1
New Starts
LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD PARADE
While on retreat, I believe that I have the right to have a new start. And as I enjoy traveling with Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery projects, I dived into my folder of patterns, and decided on the Red Riding Hood. Maybe to give as a gift to niece. The colors really pulled me in and I knew that this would be a great new start.
When I saw the #yearofthedragonsal on instagram I new I just had to join. I have had the kit for the Dragon Ride laying around since 2016 and I have always prioritized other projects before this. But I love it so much and I could just stitch on this all the time!
DETAILS: Pattern: Dragon Ride by Teresa Wentzler (out of print) Fabric: 28 count antique white evenweave Stitched in charted DMC according to chart
It’s been over 2 months, that is years is internet time! My migraines has been really bad and I haven’t been able to sit in front of a computer at all. But it has finally calmed down (just in time for vacation). So here is the last update for the year as I have now arrived in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. I’m sitting beside a rooftop pool while I’m writing this, having a great time! But before leaving I did have time to record the last video. So here it is and below is close-up photos of all the projects and the details about them.
Links below may be affiliate links or links to my etsy shop.
Fully Finished Objects (FFO)
MINI HALLOWEEN ORNAMENTS
In my living room I have a small Christmas tree, I have it out all year around. Mostly because I taped down the cable to the lights so that my cat Leia can’t bit it off and I just don’t want to re-do that. But I have started to decorate it seasonally, but as this is the first year I don’t really have that many ornaments.
So I decided to make a bunch, sadly I didn’t get them fully finished before Halloween. But I still fully finished them as then I don’t have to think about it next year. I have gotten all of the designs from the design library in the World of Cross Stitching Magazine, they have a new mini library in every magazine with mini designs perfect for ornaments or cards or really anything small!
These are all finished as little flat-lays, on some poster board with one layer of batting. The back is the same size of poster board with some matching quilt fabric. In between I attached a small piece of ribbon, and then I added some bakers twine as the string.
Details:
Patterns: World of Cross Stitching Magazine Issue 259 October 2017, Designer Jenny Barton Fabric: 28 count Orange Fizz Evenweave by Zweigart Threads: DMC as charted except for changing the backstitching to 310 black
ROCKIN ROBIN CHRISTMAS ORNAMENTS
After stitching up all of the halloween minis I still had the itch to stitch minis, so I decided to pick out a couple of libraries for Christmas Ornaments. The idea was to send them out to family and friends, however I ended up fully finishing them fairly late, but hey they are ready for next year! (You might be seeing a trend here, self-imposed deadlines are hard!)
I finished these as I did with my first ever cross stitched ornaments (which I made a tutorial for back in 2011, the quality is not really good but ou can find it HERE). Just adding it on some felt with my sewing machine and then backing that felt with another piece stuffing it a little in between.
Details
Patterns: World of Cross Stitching Magazine Issue 195 November 2012, Designer Lucie Heaton Fabric: 14 count Parchment Aida by Zweigart Threads: DMC as charted
KAWAII CHRISTMAS ORNAMENTS
I wanted to make a little babies first Christmas ornament for my brothers little newborn. But as you might have noticed I tend to overdo things just a tad. So decided to stitch another bout of mini ornaments. And again I took them from one of those mini libraries, I’m telling you they are awesome!
I finished them the same way as the other ones, but this time changing up the color of the felt. I also got better at making them as I went, practise makes progress. Must say felt is harder to cut a perfect outline in than paper. I also choose to use some other ribbon than before. Mostly because I need a bigger stash of satin ribbons to be able to match my felt.
This kit from Mill Hill was one of those I really wanted to finish before Halloween. I still haven’t gotten a frame for it, but I have some ideas that I want to try on home made frames for these Button and Beads kits. I really enjoyed stitching on it and it even have a couple of glow in the dark beads.
I had a delivery of some really cute Mill Hill kits, some new and some from 2019. I felt that the taboo kitty and the rest of the 2019 collection worked so good together with this years halloween/fall button and bead collection, sadly my health made it impossible for me to get them online before halloween. But they are online now! I did start stitching on my store copies though, and this one is probably my favorite.
This was officially my October Santa for the #millhillsantasal2023, but I was working on some other projects toward the end of October and I was having so much fun so i just didn’t want to put them down. So I started this in the beginning of November. But he is so cute! And this was the last santa I had on my list, the other ones was gnomes. Now to make a list for 2024!
This ended up being the last santa/gnome I stitched during 2023, technically I did end up stitching 12 of them as I stitched this one twice. I shared one of the gnomes in a Mill Hill group on facebook and was told that these kit has enough material to stitch the gnomes twice! Now they are only kitted for one, so there is no guarantee that you will get multiple out of them. But my kit did have enough for 2. Also they are mounted in my handmade kit frame. I will be remaking it in the future, and if I was using poster board as I am here, I would use one or two more layers of the board as it is a little more bendy than I would like. But the frame worked much better than attaching it to fabric in my qsnap.
I was on a beading spree, wanted to stitch all the beading kits. But after stitching two of the same I decided I need a little break with something smaller so I picket up the Canada Goose from this year winter collection. It was a quick and fun stitch!
The last Mill Hill kit I stitched this year was this cute little penguin. I left it in the second kit frame that I made. This one had wider borders which made it easier to be held in my lowery stand, and it also made it a bit more stable. These are still just testers and I have some ideas for another kind of frame in the new year.
If you have been with me for awhile, you might have noticed that with my cross stitching I’m very much driven by my feelings. I stitched on what I feel like when I feel like it. I still have some rules as having to many WIPs on the go makes me uncomfortable. But this December I really have felt like stitching Christmas and ornaments. But I also wanted to stitch some Dimensions kits as I starting to have a couple (still under 10). So I decided to stitch one of the ornaments in the Christmas Village Ornament kit. I did read the pattern into Markup RX to make it a little bit easier to read the pattern, and it wasn’t until then that I realized that there are over 4000 stitched in them! They don’t look that big! But that is about as many there is in a Beads and Buttons Mill Hill kit, so I knew it would take me about a week, which it did. I love how the dimensions look, but the amount of backstitching on these pieces is just insane. I usually try to do the backstitching as I go, but I didn’t with this piece and I kind of regretted it. But now it’s finished and I love it.
I started the winter cabin last December while vacationing in Florida. So a part of me wish I can finish it this December white vacationing in Gran Canaria. I also spent a bunch of days on this in October as the first snow came to Sweden and I just felt I had to stitch some snow on snowy days. I think this kit was the one that brought back my love for Dimensions kit, they look so great when they are finished.
I found this pattern through instagram. There was this stitch along that was going to start first of November, and of course I started before that because I can’t read, or more I really wanted to start it as I love the colors. The pattern is no longer available.
Details:
Pattern: Mini Sunset Owl by Artecy Fabric: 25ct Potato Evenweave by Zweigart Stitched in charted DMC 2 over 1
Hi friends! Starting in the middle always confused me, but here we are! This weeks cross stitch podcast? report? update? not sure what to call it, maybe just flosstube video? Well what ever it is, it’s full with stitching! You can watch it below or over at youtube. Under the video I will showcase the projects I have been working on and add all the details!
Disclosure: Links may be affiliate links, this gives me a little kick back to no cost of you.
FFN (Finish For Now)
A finish for now is a project that isn’t finished but you can’t work on anymore, for example a mystery stitch along, where you get a new part of the pattern on a regular schedule.
Castle Homecoming SAL – The Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery
I’m a big fan of The Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery, I love their cute and adorable style and I have stitched many of their patterns! This is their current Mystery SAL, which I’m finally caught up on. Now to wait for the next clue to drop in the middle of October. But if you are like me and is itching for some more, they did release their new halloween patterns yesterday!
A SAF is a project that has been started and finished inbetween recordings of flosstube videos. For example the SAFs in this post was started after September 23rd and finished before October 6th 2023.
Baby Sampler by Lucie Heaton
When I saw this sampler I just fell in love, I loved the colors that it was in, however I needed some more pink in my life. So I decided to do a color conversion to some pinks, purples and blues! I also choose a pink fabric to stitch on tom make it even more sweet!
Last year I made 18 ornaments that I sent out to friends and family, and I really wanted to make it a tradition. However the part I didn’t want to make a tradition was to stress stitch them to get them to friends and family before Christmas. So I decided to make my first set of ornaments already here in September. I picked out designs from a design library in the World Of Cross Stitching Magazine designed by Lucie Heaton. I ended up choosing 15 designs, I counted the sizes of them and then laid that out in a grid. I’m unsure if I should count these individually or as one project. What do you think?
A new start is a project started since the last time I recorded.
Into the Woods by Mill Hill
If you been with me over at youtube you know how much I love my Mill Hill Kits! And this one has been on my todo list for awhile. And as it usually happens, I was scrolling through instagram and saw that Christine from calico_whimsy had started hers and I knew that I needed to start this. It took me a couple of days as I did finish the robins first. And this is how far I have come.
I hoped you have enjoyed this little post. If you have read this far, please comment down below and tell me if there is something more you would like to see here on my blog!
Hope you have a great week and see you next Saturday!
Marika Stitches 