FFFoF "Black" Swap Part Two

This is the "black" piece I received from mausheart (check out his Flickr stream here - the owl hoop is so cute!):

I love the use of black embroidery thread on black Aida, it's very effective and the cobweb is amazing! It's also a really unusual hoop (at least I've never seen a metal hoop like this before). It's very "me" - I like most spiders (except for the ones that are mostly spindly legs and the ones that are too big to fit in a pint glass...). I suspect this will end up on my bedroom wall, it will look especially good once I've finally painted the walls purple instead of the current corpse colour, bleugh.

Speaking of local wildlife, we found this guy under a (very diseased) rose bush:

He was HUGE - that's a really big magnolia leaf he's sitting on. I love his fake eyes! I suspect he is an elephant hawk moth caterpillar. I'd never heard of these before this summer, until Miskit dragged one of the moths in (luckily she didn't injure it and we let it go). I was a bit shocked by the size and the way it was skittering around, for some reason I thought it was a crab in the low light...

FFFoF "Black" Swap Part One

This Weave swap theme was quite tricky - "black" has so many possibilities. This is my piece for Sister Twisty of the amazing catfish. I was originally going for black lacy flowers and spirals, but Gavin decided evil sheep were the way to go.

Luckily I'm a bit of a goth so had lots of black supplies. I certainly got lots of practice with french knots.

I ignored everything I learnt about french knots at the RSN, no way was I going to try to thread that many strands through a small needle so I would only have to do one even knot rather than 4.

I've mostly been doing my Frosted Pumpkin Halloween Town cross stitch and designing my next Unexpected Kitty embroidery pattern, but it's been too hot to do much crafting in the south of the UK recently. Flash has also developed a liking for sleeping on my chest which doesn't help! He and Miskit are gradually getting used to each other, a few tiny spats but I caught them both sitting on the garden bench yesterday so I'm not worried about needing Jackson Galaxy just yet...

FFoF Bestiary Craft Swap Part 2 - Catfish!

Look at what SisterTwisty sent me as part of this swap! It's the most adorable thing ever!

There are even little snails!

Her blog post about the piece is here.

Go and look at her Flickr stream (which is where these photos are from) - it's full of incredibly intricate embroidery (here is David Meowie!) and imaginative artwork. I am in awe....

Updated as I realised the Flickr player doesn't work in Feedly, grrrrr.....

FFoF Bestiary Craft Swap Part 1, books and kitties

The latest Fifth Friday Festival of Fabulousness swap was moved from Flickr to Mr X Stitch's new stitchy social network, Weave. The theme this time was "Bestiary".

I made this griffin for Sew Jenaissance (check out her blog for the amazing Doctor Who-inspired piece she made for her partner). He is made out of purple, pink and brown appliqued felt, with different stitching for his birdy front half to his tigery back half, with a fluffy thread tail. (You can also see the hideous wall texturing on one half of our kitchen. Bizarrely, the other half is smooth. The textured stuff is also cracking and falling off in places, especially where I tried to get rid of the incredibly "countrified" tiles. I try not to spend too much time in there.)

I was reading the second Stormdancer book when I was designing this piece, which is how I ended up deciding on the griffin rather than woodland creatures. I would never have normally read this sort of book (Japanese-themed dystopian steampunk/fantasy) but I'm reading along with the book club of the International Geek Girls Pen Pals Club which is introducing me to some fantastic books. Unfortunately, one of April's reads is the first Game Of Thrones book, which will probably take me the next decade to finish.

In kitty news, Miskit has taken full control of the rocking chair in my craft room (she was very confused when she found me sitting in it earlier today) and has started attacking everything that moves, therefore signalling that it is definitely Spring. Noddy has got skinny in his old age (we need to take him back to the vet for another weigh-in in a couple of months to check he's not losing more weight) so we are on a mission to fatten him up. Today's attempt - chicken livers (bleurgh). The internet is being very unhelpful over whether to cook them or not.

Finally, I have started using my Instagram account again. If you are on there, come and say hello!

Phat Quarter Amuse-Bouche Swap

December's Phat Quarter swap's theme was "a tiny visual treat". My piece was for Noodle-bug (go visit her blog) who described herself as a science/maths geek, so I made her a dangly atom, with sequins and a blue felt backing:

I was sent this great piece by Flaming Nora (her blog is here) - she sent me an amazing stumpwork tiny globe hoop - so many tiny intricate stitches, the 3D technique was really effective - I love it!
(Update - here is the blog post where she goes into more detail how she made it)

Here's my progress so far on my Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery Halloween Sampler. I should get my fabric for the Once Upon A Time 2014 sampler soon, so the ween may have to wait...

Phat Quarter "Five" Swap

For the fifth anniversary of Mr X Stitch, this Fifth Friday Festival of Fabulousness swap theme on the Flickr Phat Quarter group was "Five".

This was probably the hardest theme so far for me, it took me ages to think up something. This is my piece for kirstymcguiness:

(because starfish have 5 legs/tentacles/whatever and wood is the present for fifth wedding anniversaries....).
I tried to just glue the wooden star buttons onto the hoop, but after a huge amount of swearing I wrapped the hoop in green/blue wool and sewed the buttons on instead.

This is Lizzibabe's piece for me - I love it!

You can see the rest of the swap pieces in this Mr X Stitch post.

Phat Quarter Swap on Mr X Stitch

My partner's piece isn't on there as she hasn't uploaded it to Flickr yet, I'll get a photo of it on here soon. My "Game Over" piece is though, and I'm geekily excited that I have my own tag on Mr X Stitch!

http://www.mrxstitch.com/stitchgasm-phat-quarter-living-in-the-80s-swap

Phat Quarter "Living In the 80s" Swap

This is the piece I made for Lisa Leggett (check out her blog here  - she has some really gorgeous projects) as part of the latest Phat Quarter swap. I really struggled to think what to make this time. I have learned that in future I should find some waste canvas before attempting freehand cross stitch, and I am crap at cutting circles! I originally wanted the aliens to glow in the dark, but Hobbycraft doesn't sell anything that exciting... I'm really enjoying forcing myself out of my comfort zone and designing things from scratch and I love the overall effect of this piece.

Phat Quarter "Blinded By Science" Round-Up

Mr X Stitch has a round-up of the swap here (including my Tesla Tower) and here.
Loads of awesome pieces!

Tesla

 

This is my piece for the Phat Quarter "Blinded By Science" swap, for HugsAreFun. She told me she loves Tesla, so this is the Tesla Tower if it had been finished, with Tesla's favourite pigeon. The tower is tea-dyed felt (I really didn't think it would dye as it's not wool felt, seems you can tea-dye anything) with beads for the dome.

Batty Goodness!

Swap Bat, my love., a photo by whatisrealityplushies on Flickr.

This is the "Blinded by Science" Phat Quarter swap piece I received from What Is Reality Plushies (flickr photostream here). It is a tube-nosed fruit bat and it is AWESOME. I love that I can play with its wings! The background is also the exact right colour for my craft room (assuming I ever finish painting it). I may have squeeed very loudly in the office when I opened it....

Bob's Travels

Bob appears on Mr X Stitch's latest Phat Quarter Finds (fan girly squeeee). There's some truly gorgeous stuff on the Phat Quarter Flickr group, well worth a look. I'm taking part in the current Fifth Friday Festival of Fabulousness swap there, the theme is Blinded By Science. I've just finished stitching, just need to sort out the back, so it will be on its way to America in a couple of days.