Be Jolly Cross Stitch Finish - Mini Cushion Style

Hey there, hope those of you who celebrate Christmas are enjoying the start of the holiday season. To all my American buddies, I hope you had a great Thanksgiving. I have finally made a start on getting ready for Christmas, don't have my decorations up yet, but will sort those some time over the next few weeks. I have been doing some gift shopping, and also made a Christmas ornament finish! This is actually really exciting for me as I have no handmade Christmas decorations! I usually give away most of my pieces.

Be Jolly Cross Stitch finished as a mini cushion

Looking back through my blog I was fairly appalled to find that this piece was stitched in Feb 2014 and been awaiting finishing all that time. Want to see that post, it's right here! The chart is from Just Cross Stitch Ornament edition 2013, and as far as I can remember I changed all the colours to the DMC equivalents. It was stitched on a piece of 28ct evenweave fabric from a Polstitches grab bag.

Be Jolly Mini Cushion Prep

This ornament was a very straight forward, simple finish. I used the snowflake fabric for the backing, ran it through the sewing machine, leaving an opening for stuffing. Once I had filled it with polyester soft toy stuffing, I used an invisible ladder stitch to close it. It is a bit too large to hang from the tree so I didn't bother adding a ribbon. I will just pop it on a shelf in the house somewhere.

Be Jolly Cross Stitch - Just Cross Stitch Ornament Edition 2013

While I was searching my blog for the original post of this mini project, I was surprised to see how much my photographs have changed. They still aren't perfect by any means but they look a good deal better now than they used to. Don't believe me? Here is the original photo of this piece and a recent shot. What do you think? A big difference?

Old Terrible 2014 Photo

New Less Terrible 2016 Photo

I am currently working on another Christmas mini for a very special project, hopefully I will be able to share that with you soon.

That's all for now!

Bent Creek's Bird Seed Cross Stitch, Finished as a Cube!

Hey everyone, hope you all had a great weekend. Winter is definitely starting to settle in here, temperatures have dropped noticably and the heating is back to running regularly. I'm also making good use of my hand-knit yo-yo jumper/sweater, it's so snuggly warm, just perfect for Winter. I posted a picture of it on my Facebook page recently, click here to check it out and like my page to get updates! I will do a blog post on that in the future, as it recently got a proper photo shoot and I have have lots of lovely pictures of it.

Anyway back to todays post, I have my very first cube finish to show off. I have seen lots of this type of finish around on other blogs and just love it. I have been wanting to try one myself for a while now, so I finally took the plunge and used my Bent Creek Bird Seed finish, posted here, to try it out. I had checked out a few posts showing how to put these together in the past, so I had a good idea of what I needed to do to complete it.

Bent Creek Bird Seed Cross Stitch - Cube Finish

I had two styrofoam blocks I had bought some time ago in my stash. One of these was too big for this project so I used the smaller one. Unfortunately it was too deep, so I ended up cutting it in half with a bread knife. Not the easiest thing I have ever done but it worked. Next time I think I will raid my partner's toolbox and use his saw. Also I will do it outside and not in our kitchen on the chopping board!

I searched through my stash of fabrics and selected a few different ones, before I settled on a tan piece with white polkadots. I pinned the cross stitch to the styrofoam block using flat headed pins, and did the same for the backing fabric. The back of the block was uneven from being cut, so I pinned a piece of batting to the back of the cube under the fabric to even it out.

Cross Stitch Cube Finish - Back

I used a strip of the same tan fabric to cover the sides and top of the cube. I wanted it to go all the way around but alas I didn't have a long enough piece, so I folded in the edges at the bottom and pinned them in place. The whole thing is finished off with a wide green and narrow tan ribbon.

I'm delighted with how this turned out, it was actually a relatively simple finish. There are a few things I would change the next time I make one of these. I would add in a piece of batting to the front under the stitching, as it adds a bit of dimension to the piece. Also the stitching on the front is slightly tilted, so on the next one I will have to make sure it is straight when pinning it in place. I think it just needed to be stretched slightly to get it to sit properly.

I'm really looking forward to doing more of these cube finishes. The next one I have in mind is the Soda Stitch Harvest of Love, seen here, and I think I have the perfect fabric for it but will have to wait and see. Does anyone have any tips or tricks for these finishes, anything you do differently? If you haven't done one before would you like to try it out? Let me know in the comments below!

That's all for now!

My Journey to Improve My Photography - Soda Stitch Harvest of Love

Hey everyone, I hope you all had a lovely weekend and that the week is off to a very creative start.Today's post features a cross stitch finish that has appeared on my blog before. I am re-posting it because I was always unhappy with the photographs I used. In fact there are a number of finishes and WIP's which require new pictures. So the first of the re-photographed finishes I want to share is, Soda Stitch Harvest of Love.

Soda Stitch Harvest of Love - New Photo Shoot

Soda Stitch Harvest of Love - Original Photo Shoot

The first picture is from a recent photo session, the second is the original I posted. As you can see the second picture has a blue tint, which doesn't represent the piece correctly. This is because the light at the time I took the picture had a blue cast to it that came through in the photo. This probably could have been corrected if I had changed the white balance setting on my camera but alas I still haven't quite gotten the hang of that, although I am learning.

Recent Photo Shoot

Original Photo Shoot

While the original pictures give a good idea of what the finish looks like, the blue tint doesn't show the colours correctly. The new pictures are more accurate and I am much happier with the results. Seeing these photos together, I am actually fairly surprised by the difference between the old and the new. I hadn't realised how significant the blue cast was on the originals.

Soda Stitch Harvest of Love - Love that big grin!

There are lots more projects that will be re-photographed in the near future, however there are some that I don't have access to as they were gifts. Hopefully my photographs will continue to improve as I learn more about my camera, photography in general and of course get in that all important, practise!

What do you think of the new photos? Is there a big difference between them and the originals? Let me know in the comments below.

That's all for now!

Bad Pictures

I have been having a look at the pictures I have posted of my WIP's and I have to admit they are fairly bad, which is a shame because I have a really nice DSLR camera, I just don't know how to use it.

I will do a little experimenting and try and get some better pics up and would love if people could voice their opinion about them. Feel free to be as brutal as you like :)