Crossstitchforum - A FREE forum for Cross Stitchers

My friend who is now 80 has been teaching me to spend my money: He complains he is sitting on over three times as much cash in his bank account than his house is worth with no one but the tax man to leave it to. He is very complimentary that I retired at 51 as he made the mistake of working to 62 be...

moment

Learning is all about trying stuff and working out what works and what does not. I am sure if you listed what you learnt you will find it is longer than the to be improved list and I am sure you have a better idea of how to go about doing it next time

Jo

Thank you Ladies,

I have scrolled and forgot to photograph the bit at the top Lower down:



I've added her dress and am tackling some of the single strand over one that is her face and arms.

Jo

I've also brought another gadget to use for quilting: https://i.postimg.cc/FRnrPFxk/P5221503.jpg The books of words say do not Iron your quilting pieces because you "push"/stretch the fabric pieces. Rather you should press the bits flat, without steam. It swallows my quilting bits :shock: ...

The modern sock wool is the bees knees, it comes in special balls designed to provide stripes (which you have to be carefully to match the second sock to start on the same colour from the ball) and fading shades which normally come as a matched pair of 50g balls so they fade from one colour to anoth...

Thank you Mable, I think I might have the hang of piecing these bits together: https://i.postimg.cc/pVDj28Q6/P5211501.jpg I have to put together 36 of these blocks and so far I have done 12. In stitching together these I have used 100m of sewing thread :shock: I am beginning to see why they sell thr...

And it looks good. I love the way the colours and the offset of starting the stitches make the pavement look like it is made of slabs

Jo

I'm still learning ... and I have just learnt that I need to practice the art of unpicking stitches :ribbit: :ribbit: :ribbit: This is because I was religiously following the command: Thou shall fold over your seams towards the dark piece of material. That works until you need to join up the bits an...

Once you have worn hand knitted socks the shop brought ones will never be satisfactory again :roll: Before my friend phones for his usual 1 hour phone call I need to start the second in this pair. Starting by casting on on oversized straight needles and knitting the first row on these - to prevent t...

I'm boring I started off with a basic pattern and modified it and every single sock pair is to the same pattern or the latest variation of it, knitting on 2.25 (No 13), with a 3mm/2.5mm needle for the cuff. The knitting is done of circulair needles except for casting on and the toes. I've tried k1,P...

Thinking about other crafty things I do I remembered socks. How can one forget socks? :shock: I used to knit jumpers, Aran weight jumpers and I have about a dozen of them but I rarely wear jumpers these days and I enjoy knitting (it keeps my hands busy while I am watching TV/listening to the radio s...

Now for some actual patchwork practice... another kit this time for a table top decoration. I have read a lot of books, watched some videos and the long and short the best advice was to have a go on some scraps before trying something you want. So some old scrappy bits of sheet and: https://i.postim...

The sorry saga of me trying to learn to quilt. :lol: A few weeks ago I treated myself to a Bernina 730 sewing machine (which is very nice) https://i.postimg.cc/rmhBGk1T/P3171396.jpg and then was told I needed a portable sewing machine if I wanted to join a quilting group so along came flipper: https...

This piece is proving to be much slower to do than the four season fairies.



That horizontal tacking line is the centre of this piece so I am guessing I am about 1/4 of the way there

Jo

I really enjoy seeing your stitching Mabel. You have enlightened me to other stitching skills/techniques that hither to I was not aware of. My concern is that for a newbie looking to take up cross stitching the pieces I am posting are rarely beginners pieces and where I am happily single I have more...

How about "The creative thread" ....

Jo

Kakistocracy ( - It's essentially the opposite of a meritocracy, where leadership is based on competence and skill )

It's been very quiet on the forum lately. How's everyone doing? What's everyone else doing? I try to limit my stitch posting to once a week because no one else seems to be cross stitching anything. We seem to have lost Wendy when the forum crashed, I saw Nicola commented on a post the other day but...

Spinning Wheels are a nice turning job to work up to after you have got bored with doing the usual bowls, spindles etc (assuming you like working in the brown stuff :roll: ) Here is a plan for a European wheel: https://www.woodworkersjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/WJC196-Spinning-Wheel.pdf A couple ...