2022 Christmas Countdown - Mill Hill Santas

Day 17 of my 2022 Christmas Countdown and it's my Mill Hill Santas.  

I have five finished Santas now.  I do recall saying that I would continue making these Mill Hill Santas rather than joining the Prairie Schooler Santa train, but somehow I weakened and I've now made two Prairie Schooler Santas too! 

These kits are so well made and contain everything you need, except the felt to go on the back.  I've just kitted up my next two Mill Hill Santas to take on holiday with me because they're such a pleasure to stitch. 

Here's some closer up photos so you can see the details:

And the felt I glue on the back to finish them nicely.  

2022 Christmas Countdown - Mill Hill beaded ornaments (part 3)

Day 12 of my Christmas Countdown and it's my third and final post on my Mill Hill beaded ornaments.  

Aren't they cute! My favourite is the gingerbread house (of course) but they're all cute.  They're quite quick to stitch, and easily finished by gluing a piece of felt on the back and trimming them.  I like to make a beaded hanger from the left over beads.  

I've still got a few kits in my stash, so there may be more in future years, but this is it for Christmas 2022.  

2022 Christmas Countdown - Mill Hill beaded ornaments (part 2)

Day 8 of my Christmas Countdown.

Here's some more of my Mill Hill beaded ornaments.  I do enjoy making these little kits.  They're quite cheap to buy (approx USD10) and everything you need is included - even the needles!

the purple one on the right is Diamond Holiday

When it comes to finishing these ornaments I cut them out carefully being sure to cut one hole away from the stitching.  Then I glue a piece of felt on the back.  It hides all the threads nicely.

2022 Christmas Countdown - Mill Hill beaded ornaments (part 1)

Day 4 and it's time for my first set of Mill Hill beaded ornaments.

I love stitching these little ornaments.  It's a tradition now for mum to give me a new kit for Christmas and for me to stitch it between Christmas and New Year while watching cricket on TV.  

The perforated paper can be a challenge at first, but once you get used to it, it's fine.  Just don't pull the thread too tightly and rip the paper!

I glue felt on the back to finish the ornaments nicely, and I like to make beaded strings to hand them from because there's always lots of beads left over.  

Mill Hill Santa

This week I started to think about the #12in22ornamentstitchalong again.  And wondered how many ornaments I made before I fell off the wagon! I think it might have only been three - which is pretty poor really, but to regain that sense of achievement that I love, I pulled out my Juniper Santa who has been in my travel bag for a few months now.  

I really do enjoy stitching these decorations.  Everything is in the kit - even the needles, and they don't take long at all.  I think this one has only taken me a week, with other things in between of course.  

I just need to cut this Santa out carefully now and glue some felt on the back.  then he'll be all ready to join his friends on my bookcase this Christmas.  

Given how easy and delightful this Santa was to make, I might just even fit in a couple more over coming weeks.  I do have a stash of Prairie Schooler Santas to make too now, but I just love these cute Mill Hill Santas too. 

Now it's time for the Peacock Party.  Have you been thinking about Christmas decorations this week? Feel free to link up a recent blog post below.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

A Mill Hill Finish

As I said a couple of posts ago, I'm going to try and finish one Christmas ornament a month in 2022. I'm joining Carol from Stitching Dreams on her #12in22ornamentstitchalong

So, I've started by looking at my WIPs.  I found this cute Mill Hill Button and Bead kit in a box while I was looking for something else.  I think someone gave it to me because they didn't enjoy stitching on the perforated paper. 

I love these little kits, and don't mind the perforated paper at all.  If you haven't tried it before, just be very careful with unpicking, because the paper can rip if you pull too hard.

I've ordered a dark green frame for this one, and once it arrives it will be ready to join the others on the shelf at Christmas.

I feel quite pleased with myself that I've finished the first ornament for my #12in22ornamentstitchalong

Now it's time for the Peacock Party.  Feel free to link up a recent blog post below. 

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

2019 is almost over.  I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas with family and friends.  We certainly did here.

I cleared my sewing table in the family room and we put the presents on the table, rather than under the tree this year.

I got 3 new Mill Hill Santas to join the one I've already made.  I love making these little decorations and they look so good on the tree.  Here are some other Mill Hill kits I've made in previous years.

I gave mum some of the new Land Art fabric by Odile Bailloeul to make a Catch All Caddy by Patterns by Annie.  Later today we will find some soft and stable in my stash and mum will be ready to start when she gets back to her house in Auckland.

I received the wonderful Endless Summer quilt kit by Anna Maria Horner.  I just loved this quilt when I saw it in real life during Anna Maria Horner's trunk show in Wellington.  When I saw The Patchwork Pear in Australia advertising the kit, I ordered it for myself for Christmas.

I love those framed images that Monika Forsberg has created in this fabric.

I hope you all received lovely gifts too.  Feel free to link up to the Peacock Party and share how your Christmas Day went.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter

Symposium shopping and other news

I've had a lovely long summer holiday, but I had to go back to work this week and will be working every day for the next three weeks. I'm sure I'll still fit some sewing in, but it's always a busy time when the kids go back to school and work starts up again.

I"ll be taking part in the Grow Your Blog event which starts this weekend. Vicki compiles a massive list of blogs taking part, and everyone can explore blogs which may be new to them. I'll provide a link to the list when it goes live.

In the mean time, here's what I've been up to.

I showed you some of the beautiful quilts from the exhibition at Symposium, but I didn't show you what I bought.

Symposium purchases

I bought Quiltmania because it's got a review of the Sydney Quilt Show (Australia) and I knew there were photos of Wendy Williams' amazing quilts in there.

The Tuscany Tote bag pattern is one that I've considered making for sometime. I won't be using Downtown Abby fabrics, though they do look nice in the photo.

The most significant purchase was those 3 rolls of thread. It's Superior Threads Wonderfil Dazzle, a metallic/rayon with a sparkle in it!!

It's just perfect for this large scrappy quilt which is my oldest WIP. I made this jelly roll style quilt with the leftovers from my Bordered Peacock quilt. It's been sitting in it's current form for about 18 months now, however I'm feeling quite excited about it again now that I finally have a plan. I stumbled across the water drops quilting pattern last week (overlapping circles) and now I have an amazing thread. This thread is quite thick - think Perle 8, but the metallic bits are so well embedded that you don't even feel them and the thread will still glide through the needle. This will be my winter hand quilting project for 2015.

Funnily enough I feel quite naughty each time I walk past this thread on the table. I just know what some of my friends will say about it. However, I don't mind. It's me and I love it.

In other news:

I finished this cross stitch beaded Santa from Mill Hill. I'm not going to put a hanger on him, I'll just perch him somewhere on the tree next year.

Mill Hill Santa

I made the next 4 blocks in the Women of Bible quilt. I'm trying to stick to pink and blue but I did introduce some new fabrics this time. Here they all are together.

Women of the Bible quilt

I picked up Serena's Possum Magic quilt and I'm starting to think about what I will add to it. I'd like to use the two fabrics on the left of the picture. It's very grey at the moment and I think it's my job to break up the greyness. Let me know if you have any great ideas please.

Serena's Possum Magic quilt

Lastly, I've fallen into a sea of la passacaglia pieces. Although I'm planing every step meticulously, I'm still sometimes finding that what I though would work, just doesn't work. The colours still work OK, but I think some of the patterns are too busy next to each other. I don't want to revert to solids, so will just keep accumulating all the spare pieces I've cut, and use them in future rosettes.

Only 3 or 4 of the rosettes are as big as the one in the top left of the photo above. All of the rest are smaller, so I've cracked open my Kirsty Allsopp notebook and devised a system to avoid making too many of the wrong sort. Kirsty is very British, so I was thinking British thoughts while organising my notebook, and thinking that Kirsty would be very proud of me getting organised.

Kirsty's lovely notebook 

Inside the note book

I photocopied the pages from the original book, and then cut them up and put one pattern piece on each page of the notebook. There are only 13 patterns, but I think there are about 40 rosettes in total. Now I can make a note in the book each time I finish one. I need 8 of the type on the page shown above, so I'll note each time I finish one.

That's all for now. Back to the glue stick to prep some more pieces for joining tonight.