Living in the sunlight, loving in the moonlight

058 - Christmas Bauble

2011-10-06T18:22:00.001+02:00

A first small point on my october goals list is finished! I wanted to finish a started Furry Tales card and finished it last saturday (yeah, I'm late with posting, school has started...)

Christmas Bauble

It's from the same World of Cross Stitch issue as the other Furry Tales card, issue 169.The magazine says is takes about 12 hours to finish one, but as I'm doing the background in half stitches instead of full it only took me 7 hours!

I got a couple of older WOCS issues from ebay. I looove looking for backnumbers on ebay and most of the time find what I'm searching for ^^

I also finally got a subscription for WOCS. They will start sending me the issues by number 183, so I only have to buy one more for the higher price in the German cross-stitch shops. I'm also thinking of subscribing to Cross Stitch Crazy but their issues can be hit or miss for me. The bigger designs they have are really cute most of the time, but their cards and smaller stuff tend not to be my taste...

057 - October Goals

2011-10-01T10:19:00.003+02:00

As I said in my last post, I'll make a list at the beginning of the month with the things I want to do. Hopefully this will help my focus on WIPs and important projects. If I have stitching time left over I can spend that on other projects.

Of course at the moment I focus on christmas things.

~ Stitch 2 Ornaments for my christmas tree 1/2 DONE
~ Stitch 2 Furry Tale cards (~~plus the one which is nearly finished~~ DONE)
~ Finish the Christmas Stocking
~ Spend 5 hours on the Christmas Welcome Sign

I'll update the post once I've completed a goal.

056 - Be Mine Always Page 3

2011-09-30T20:59:00.000+02:00

Wohoo~ Nearly can't believe it, but I actually finished another HAED page!

This time it's page 3 on my project "Be Mine Always" by artist Adele Sessler. The last time I finished a page on this project was July 2010. I was still in Japan at that time. Oh memories!

Alas, on to the picture~

Unfortunately it's already dark outside and I had to take the picture with flash (as I couldn't wait to show my progress on this). The fabric shows a lot at Romeos hair, but it looks much nicer in person.

The flowers in their hair are a massive pain in the ***. So much confetti!

I will post my october plans tomorrow, as I started to make a list how much time I want to spend on each project.

Now I'll sit down on my sofa again and finish another Furry Tales card~

055 - Sleeping Beauty #4

2011-09-26T11:56:00.000+02:00

This week I managed to stitch a lot and get some old UFOs out of their box.

The first of those UFOs I want to turn into a WIP again is "Sleeping Beauty" from Joan Elliott. I found this design in issue 6 of the German magazine Maxxina (which are mostly re-releases of the magazine Borduurblaad from the Netherlands).

The last time I updated her was 18.04.2009!

This was how I dragged her out of her box (save for the beads, I sewed them on before I remembered to take a picture).

I was able to stitch 3 hours on her this week, so this is how she looks as the moment:

Haha, the two pictures look nearly the same! I started stitching the pillow and did some leaves. Not too bad for 3 hours ^^

Here's a close-up! I really want to continue working on her, but I need to get some more christmas stitching done... Cards and ornaments and a stocking are calling for me!

054

2011-09-22T12:00:00.000+02:00

Seems I have a lot of stitching Mojo recently ^^ I already stitched quite a bit this week already and try really hard not to start any new big projects. Starting another big one would be taking my time and mind away from actually working on my UFO pile and the hundreds of christmas cards I want to finish.

Just today I finished another motive for a christmas card!

Again it's from the World of Cross Stitch 169, Fairy Festivities by Joan Elliott. It took my only 7 hours to stitch and it was the first time I added beads to a design! I still need a lot of practice on how to sew the beads onto the design.

How many of your have a subscription to a cross stitch magazine? Would you recommend it?

I'm thinking about getting one for the World of Cross Stitch (and maybe also Cross Stitch Crazy), because it's much cheaper than buying it online every month. A subscription would be 57€, buying it every month is more than double the amount!

053

2011-09-12T16:42:00.000+02:00

Wow, I can't believe it! I haven't finished a single piece yet this year and yesterday night I finished TWO!

The first one was "Giving a Gift" from the Furry Tale Cards. It was made easily in one week and I'm so amazed how the backstitch made this really come to live. Now I'm really looking forward to stitch the other 5 designs.

And the second piece is this cute Gingerbread Lady. It was made with a kit by Dimensions and is part of 12 different tree ornaments. I actually bought and started the kit in 2009 and it really took my that long to finish the first ornament. All those french knots really drove me crazy, so maybe that's why it took my so long to finish her off?

I want to make at least 2 more designs from the kit and turn them into tree ornaments of course, so that I can decorate my small christmas tree with them!

052

2011-09-07T10:00:00.000+02:00

Every year I start to cross stitch a christmas present very last minute in the middle of december and end up not finishing it. I still have the project from last year in my WIP box...

But this year I started super early! I decided to do some christmas cards this year and will see how many I can finish. ^^

I picked the "Furry Tales" set of 6 cards from the World of Cross Stitch magazine issue 169 (I think it was last year's september issue). There are lots of other cute card motives aswell, designed by Joan Elliot in that issue, so if I need more than 6 cards I have more than enough other charts.

Those little guys are really cute, aren't they? I started with the bottom left mouse "Giving Gifts".

That's how it looked on monday. I finished her head now and started stitching the background aswell. It stitches really fast, only the background takes a while. In the magazine it was stitched in full crosses, but I hate background stitching so I'm doing that in half stitches to speed this up (and use less thread).

Have you started your christmas stitching yet? When do you normally start?

051

2011-07-26T20:58:00.000+02:00

Last week I mostly worked on Fly Me to the Moon again. I really enjoy stitching it, but now it's time for a break and this week I'm working on Be Mine Always ^^

(click to enlarge)

I'm already over 1500 stitches into page 6~

In august I won't have the opportunity to stitch, so I'll update Be Mine Always on saturday and will stash away both pieces for a month ^^

050 - Fly Me to the Moon Page 5

2011-07-21T09:30:00.000+02:00

Hello everyone!
Again I'm sorry I haven't posted in sooo long! I just didn't feel like stitching AT ALL. But a few days ago I picked up the needle again and it's as much fun as it always have been. Hopefully I will post as much in this blog as I used to in 2009.

I finally finished the 5th page on Fly Me to the Moon (a page I started in 2009)

Right now I still working on this, but I really want to have some small finishes aswell, so I will raid through my WIP box to find something to finish xD

049 - Good Bye Makeup Fairy

2010-12-14T16:24:00.000+01:00

Bad news for one of my projects.

On mondays I try to work on my UFOs and this month it was the Makeup Fairy from a Cross Stitch Crazy magazines. It seemed under a very bad star.
At first I cut the fabric to short because I didn't think of her long wings. But I solved that problem but altering the pattern a little bit and shorten the wings. And today I worked on her again (missed yesterday) and noticed a small mistake I did.
I missed a whole row when stitching the face and did not notice it until now... I don't want to frog so much and unpick the whole area so the Makeup Fairy will move into my "abandoned projects"-box (which also contains the Bunch of Love QS)

I feel bad because the project is so cute but I rather would move on to other projects.

048

2010-12-03T09:29:00.000+01:00

Just incase you wondered why I haven't posted update pictures and if I'm going to disappear for another three months: I'll not!

This is what I've been doing the last two weeks:

I'm winding up my threads onto cardboard bobbins to make finding colornumbers easier. This is a long process and I only filled up one and a half boxes yet! I ordered 5 boxes and probably will need 4 and a half for those 470+ numbers DMC thread has.

It's HAED SAL week at the Hobbyfrau Forum and because my threads from Be Mine Always are not wound up yet, I'm working on Fly Me to the Moon. I have the colors for that project on thread cards, so I don't need to wind them.
This is how Fly Me is currently looking like:

Fifth page already! I put in 177 stitches yesterday and will hopefully stitch more on sunday.

My goals for December:

Finish winding up the threads
Finish either page 5 on Fly Me or page 3 on Be Mine

047

2010-11-19T09:03:00.000+01:00

Wow I haven't been posting in months!

I moved back from Japan to Germany as my year there is over. At first I was really glad to go back to Germany but now I kind of miss Japan and all those amazing people I met there!
All of my stitching things were stuck with the mail for about 2 months as I couldn't take them in my suitcase. And after I got them back I didn't had any time to stitch.

Recently I got back to some pieces, finished a christmas ornament and continued Be Mine Always.

I already got a little bit more done and will update as soon as I have page three finished.

I'm going to restart the Bunch of Love QS because I really didn't like working on the 18ct Aida. I still have a big chunk of 28ct Linen and will restart it next year using tent stitch. That way I might even finish it one day!

046

2010-07-28T15:34:00.000+02:00

Wow, my last post is from nearly 3 months ago!
I really neglected this blog and my stitching since I'm in Japan... But I will go back to Germany in 20 days and hopefully I will stitch a lot more there! (as I'm having all my magazines there and a big bunch of WIPs)

When I'm back in my own flat I'm going to buy 5 of those floss boxes to be organized a little better. Maybe this way I manage to work on all my UFOs and WIPs without spending half the time searching for the right floss color.

After not stitching on my HAED since march (!!) I finally started again. This month I've done quite a lot! Page 2 of Be Mine Always is finished.

I'm already at around 2000 stitches on the 3rd page! Due to the tent stitch it goes really fast.

And a blog-issue. Since quite some time I always get strange comments from Chinese users with lots of linked content. I never click the links because I know what kind of pages that are.
Could you please stop that???
Or does anybody of the sincere readers has advice how to make that stop?

045

2010-05-06T14:26:00.000+02:00

Golden Week, which is a week of holidays and lots of free time in Japan, has just ended yesterday.
I went to Tokyo for 4 days and spent the last two days in front of my PC with Bones DVDs, Star Trek and of course my stitching.

My motivation for my HAEDs is very low at the moment and I needed some fast finishes which were achieve by digging out my Pokemon charts!
I actually finished two Monsters in the last two days! Charmander and a male Nidoran.
That means I have finished 6 Pokemon by now and 1,2 % at all! Only 487 Pokemon to go!

(Disclaimer: The pattern was made by myself and for private use only. I don't own any of the Pokemon characters or monsters and won't sell them or use them for any comercial use)

044

2010-03-20T15:43:00.000+01:00

Sorry for being away for so long but shortly after the year began my stitching bug took a looong vacation...
But now it is back and hit me with all it's stitching addicted force!!

The last days I worked on the first page of "Be Mine Always" by Adele Sessler and just minutes ago I finished it.

It's tent stitched 2 over 1 on 28 ct Linen. I really like 28 ct so it's good that I bought quite a lot of it. I'm not crazy about tent stitching so this will be one of my only fully tented pieces. I like the look of full cross stitch more.

This is how the pictureis going to look like when it's done:

Image from Heaven and Earth Designs, Artwork by Adele Sessler.

I know that Sessler mostly paints her own characters but I'm always thinking that I'm looking at Romeo and Juliet. The clothing fits into the timeline and I always imagined that the two looked like that.

043

2009-12-23T15:30:00.000+01:00

Oh my, I must be really stupid! I wrote an entry about my stitching anniversary nearly two weeks ago, but somehow didn't post it. What happened??

Anyway, I nearly didn't believed it, but I have one last finish for this year!!
Finally my Tea Exchange is DONE!

I decided not to put it into a frame as it might be damaged while sending it so Germany, so I mounted it (my first time! including lots of double-sided tape and craft glue) and backed it with light green felt. Added a satin ribbon hanger and a cute small ribbon and it's done!

I also added a small New Years wreath and a felt kit (not pictured). And of course, Tea! From my favorite shop "Lupicia".
Lupicia not only has awesome teas but also thinks about what it's making!
I bought famous green tea from Kyoto, as that's some kind of must but also a small try-it-set for the winter flavors.
This years the winter blends are all under the motto "Ways to Paris". The illustrations on the different packagings are georgious!
In the set are "Joyeux Noel", which shows you the winter of Paris, it is black tea with roasted chestnuts; "Gache-Gache", which is the French word for "Hide and Seek", in this tea lots of fruits are hidden, can you find them all; and "Carol", which represents a christmas cake, it combines Strawberry and Vanilla with Rose petals and black tea!

So now I have time to work on my HAEDs again. Who else did join the SK SAL for 2010?

I wish everyone of you a merry happy christmas!! I hope you have lots of fun with you family and friends!

042

2009-12-12T09:53:00.000+01:00

At first I want to thank you for 1000 visits! Wohoo~
Does it mean that my blog is at least a liiiittle bit interesting?
And another big THANK YOU everyone to everyone who stops by and leaves a comment. I'm always really happy about those!

Yesterday or the day before I got another HAED gift certificate for sending Japanese sweets to USA. 30 Dollar to spend while sale, what more do I want?
So of course I got weak again and spend the gift certificate at once AND some extra money because it's christmas and I feel like spending.
Which makes me having 4 (four!) new charts. I have no idea when to stitch them all but maybe I'm just addicted. Matching to christmas time I got O Kitten Tree by Randal Spangler (it's a set of three along with Here Comes Santa Paws and Frosty the Snowcat, and I want those both too!) and QS Holly Fairy by Ching-Chou Kuik. Recently I fell in love with the work of two artists I never spend much attention before. One is Jane Woost Scott and her beautiful town scenes from a long-gone time! I bought The Quilts of Cape Cod and added several others to my wishlist! I've seen the Quilts stitched at two Japanese HAED blogs and it looks so lovely!
The other artist is Linda Ravenscroft. I don't now why I never really looked at her artwork but it's amazing! I would love to have her Zodiac Fairy series but I don't know if I will ever manage to stitch them all. So I got myself satisfied with The Sweet Tooth Fairy. I love this as it's cute yet macabre!

I with this I promise not to purchase any new charts from HAED until my birthday in July!! (except they are going to release From The Mist by Ching-Chou Kuik anytime soon or some of my favorite artists retire which will mean they take the charts down so I have to get them before)

Now it's even harder to decide what to start in February next year!! OHOH.... Maybe I have to allot! At the moment I really want to do the Sweet Tooth Fairy...

And as a blog entry without pictures is kind of boring, here is my update of page 5 of Fly Me. I managed nearly 800 stitches yesterday!!

I hope to have this page (and the first of Bunch of Love) finished by the end of the year!
And I love how the aura of the Fairy slowed slides into the scene! Makes it very misterious.

041

2009-12-05T16:06:00.000+01:00

Puuh, I'm sorry that there was only one update last month. I will try to do better.
It's not like I didn't have time or something like that (more the opposite) but I always forget to take update pics.

I've been working a lot on Bunch of Love and Fly Me and even started a stitching journal in excel to keep track of how much I do on one day. It reveals I don't do much but a few stitches each day make a big finish someday.

Bunch of Love at the moment. She's at around 13 or 14 % right now. I thought I finished more but I miscalculated the total stitches.
I really hope to finish the first page this december.

And this is Fly Me to the Moon. Gets bigger and bigger!
I'm still on page 5 but this also grew a lot when I compare it to my last post. I'm at 12.2 % on this one.
I really need a break right now from all the 939 so I'm paying more attention to Bunch of Love this week.

I got quite some HAED stash enhancement last month. 4 new charts!!!
As I bought Japanese sweets for someone on the HAED BB she presented me Rhyme and Reason by James Christensen. And to pay for the sweets I got a 20 Dollar Gift Certificate. Of course I had to spend that in the Thanksgiving Sale! I actually only wanted to buy two new charts but in the end I couldn't make up my mind and bought three. And the winners are: Beauty and the Beast by Yvonne Gilbert, Queen of Diamonds by Michele Lee Phelan and Voyage of the Basset by James Christensen aswell.
Makes me having 10 charts and that will keep me busy for quite some years. But still I plan to get one or two charts in the upcoming christmas sale (you never know when HAED will close down, maybe next year maybe in ten years, better buying it now than regretting it in a few years) (of course I hope that they will stay in company for a loooong time!)

PLUS I started a Welcome Hanger from Dimensions on plastic canvas and I'm really not keen about it. Plastic canvas is somehow a pain to work with...

040

2009-11-09T04:10:00.000+01:00

It's here!
My sewing machine finally arrived. I made the very stupid decision to buy a sewing machine for my stay in Japan. Some might say I threw my money out of the window, as it will be nearly impossible to send it to Germany. Well, we will see.
My urge to sew has been so big that I just had to buy one. So I browsed lots of Japanese stores and ended up buying a Toyota Poem. It was one of the cheapest I could find but still it is years better than the one I had in Germany (which was loud and sometimes the seams looked ugly no matter how hard I tried)

So my first finished project in Japan is this one:

The skirt is really fluffy!
As I bought a 4 meter pre-cut for 980 Yen (cheap!) I still have around 2.4 meter left!! Now I try to figure out what to do. Make a bustier so that it looks like a dress when worn together? Or make a Bolero?
What do you think?

I really want to sew a lot right now but I don't have the big fabric stash like I had in Germany (I posted a picture of it some while ago). Problem is that I can't find any nice fabric for a blouse online and I don't want to make the 1 hour train ride to Aeon shopping mall again this week (well, maybe on the weekend). So I think ebay has to work for me.
I found the cutest Matroshka fabric which will be turned into a dress!!

As for stitching I got quite a lot done on Bunch of Love but not as much as I wanted... Pictures will wait until the next entry though!
I've finally got Blastoise done! It's number four on me Pokedex!!

(Disclaimer: The pattern was made by myself and for private use only. I don't own any of the Pokemon characters or monsters and won't sell them or use them for any comercial use)

Next on the list is Charmander! And next week will be Pokemon week where I want to finish at least two Pokemon! (My yearly goal is to do at least 7, one for every month since I started in May. 3 more to go)

039

2009-10-27T04:46:00.000+01:00

Finally, here's an entry with some stitching update pics!
Maybe some of you already waited for one?

I started something new again! I know that it's bad and that I shouldn't start so many things because I can't decide on which I want to stitch!
I took the Dimensions Gold Kit "Japanese Maiden" with me and left "Kitty Litter" back in Germany (because my suitcase was too heavy) and made a start on it.

Somehow I managed to get the fabric stained but I hope it will not be visible once I stitched over it.
I devided the picture in 24 section and everytime I finished one section I'm going to rotate to something else. After finishing these two sections I continued to work on Fly Me To The Moon and the 4th page is finally finished!

After finishing a section on Japanese Maiden I will work 3 days on one of my HAEDs. At least that was what I planned but now it's more like "After working on my HAED for three days I will work on something else until it is either finished or shows some progress"
Also I invented the "Pokemon sunday" two times a month and while the first week of the month is HAED SAL, the third week of the month will be "Pokemon week". I really need to finish some of these monsters if I ever want to stitch them all!

And here is the close up of the progress on the 5th page of Fly Me. All done in 1 1/2 days.

The lighter blue indicades that there is going to be something else than just the moon soon! A.k.a. I'm reaching the fairy soon!! Wohooo.
Stats for Fly Me:
4 from 36 pages
31032 out of 268650 stitches
11.55 % done!

I miss my sewing machine. There are so many cute fabrics in the shop but I can only buy patchwork chunks as I can only make small accessory by hand-sewing.
My hostfamily don't have a sewing machine and it would be crazy to spend 300 Euro on something I can't take back to Germany.

038

2009-10-18T08:02:00.000+02:00

Hi Everyone!

Sorry for not being an active blogger the last weeks. I just don't feel like picking up my HAEDs and as I have to write emails every day I don't feel like typing much.
But soon there will be christmas and so I made an order at 123 stitch for some christmas stuff I want to make for my Japanese host family.

Lately I really really had the urge to write letters but most of my written ones kept being unanswered or answered by email ;~;
Is anyone of you interested in snail mail penfriendship? Willing to answer at least once or twice a month? Then feel free to message me and we can get starting (as I know that all of my followers must be really nice persons!)
It's so hard to find some nice penfriends on the internet as the most people are only interested in email-friendship or instant messaging @.@ I hate instant messengers!

I promise I will post about my recent stitching progress soon!!

037

2009-09-28T04:26:00.000+02:00

Time runs so fast here!
Everything in Japan goes on smoothly. I spend yesterday and today at home because yesterday was just too warm and today is dark. Even it is lunch time the sun is still hiding and it seems like dusk.
Next week university will start and so does my job as research assistant. Also I will be able to participate in the Japanese classes for foreign students without having to pay anything! And on the 5th and 6th I will go to Kyoto with the 3rd year seminar who I will be teaching english. I'm very looking forward to that!
The hardest thing in Japan is still speaking Japanese. I have the feeling that I get better and better but still it's really hard to understand what people are saying. I have to study harder!

As for my stitching I grew sick of all the blues and the tiny stitches on Fly Me to the Moon. I really wanted to finish the 4th page before I start the new QS but I just couldn't wait. I have no patience when it comes to these things!
The dark blue sky on Fly Me just didn't seem to grow, no matter how much I was stitching it so I packed it away for now and made a new start on the A Bunch of Love QS by Ching-Chou Kuik. It stitches along so nicely and you can see a progress much faster than on Fly Me. Might be because the hilarious amount of confetti stitches from Fly Me is not existing on this piece.

This is were I'm leaving Fly Me for now. I will continue as soon as I finished the first page from Bunch of Love and then will do page 4 and 5. (Page 5 contains loooooots of color 939 again....)

And this is the floss toss for Bunch of Love. As you can see the colors are totally different from Fly Me!

036

2009-09-17T16:58:00.001+02:00

Sorry that I haven't written for quite some time now!
As you may imagine I had some pretty busy weeks but now most things here in Japan are settled for me.
I live with a very darling Japanese family, have most of the important things (like a bank account) and I got a part-time-job at the Nagoya university where I will be a research assistant. Now the only important things to do is to get a cellphone and manage too speak more and better Japanese.
Thank for lots of your nice comments! I'm glad that there are some nice people actually reading this blog and take part in my life.
If you have any questions about living in Japan feel free to ask!

After 2 weeks of not touching a needle the stitching bug bite me again (between all my moskito bites). This week I finally worked some time on my HAED while listening to TKKG (a german audioplay series for kids) and Terry Pratchett audiobooks. Normally I used to stitch in front of the TV but now I'm not understanding 90 % of the things saidand switched to audio books.

Done for 10,1 %
Once I have finished the 4th page of Fly me to the Moon I will start my second HAED! I decided for a quick stitch by Ching-Chou Kuik as I couldn't stand the thought that it will take me probably 6 years until I finish my first HAED. The design I chose is A Bunch of Love.
Gladly there is a stitching corner in my most visited departement store (Tokyu Hands) where you can get DMC threads for 105Yen (around 0,70 Euro) and I also bought pre-gridded 18ct Aida for making the Kuik design.

Am I crazy because of starting a second HAED?
Some girls on the HAED Black Board have 6 or more HAED WIPs and they are lucky with it! I will rotate the projects everytime I can get a page done!

035

2009-08-28T21:22:00.000+02:00

Hello everyone!
Sorry for not updating this week but I am really busy with organizing everything for my travel to Japan. This week I had to get out everything of my appartement which was a looot to do! But I'm glad this is finished now and I'm sitting at my friends place and relax a little bit. My feet are dead!

I don't know when I can write the last entry but look forward to stitching updates from Japan!

Everyone of you who understands German can follow my journey in my Japan-Blog. The most important things will be written here too of course.

034

2009-08-21T10:24:00.000+02:00

Today is going to be fun! My friend Chrissi will come over as she ask me to teach her how to stitch~
I'm really curious why she wants to learn this new hobby ^^

Here are the promised update pics on my MW and HAED:

I couldn't do as much on this as I wanted as I had a really funny day with my friends on wednesday. But at least another ornament is finished!

The moon grows bigger and bigger! Thursday is HAED day and I managed to add around 600 stitches ^^ Now it finished for 9,1 %
Once I reached the 25 % I think I'll start some other HAED as I need a little reward.

Everything for Japan got sorted out now and I can look forward to it without all these dark thoughts I had the last days. YAY!

033

2009-08-19T10:02:00.000+02:00

The rotation system actually works very good. I made a good progress on pretty much everything.
Here are the current update pics of my Pokemon and the tea exchange.

Blastoise! I did nearly everything yesterday~ Around 1200 stitches. It's the first Pokemon which is stitched on 18ct by me and I think I will continue on 18ct for the following Pokemon too! It's faster to work on.
It has to be done by sunday as I want to give it to my friend Anne. She has her flight to Japan next week and this is going to be a goodbye present.

The colors in this picture are odd. Somehow it was impossible today to take a good photo of this.
Nearly done! Only the second tea cup is missing.

Pictures of Mary Wigham and my HAED will come on friday~

For Japan there are still some problems. My host family is not answering my mails and the professor who organized the family isn't answering either. I'm a little bit stressed about that and don't have the guts to call the university of Nagoya where the professor is teaching.
I guess I have to look for a hotel or hostel...

032

2009-08-13T09:13:00.000+02:00

Finally I decided on a Rotation rythm.
I always searched for the perfect rotation for me but switching the pieces by week does not work work me.

So here it is:
Mon & Tues - Pokemon
Wed - Mary Wigham
Thur - HAED
Fri, Sat & Sun - current project

So my current project is the Tea exchange ^^ If I have time enough I'll start a bear from Swappon for my work place.

031

2009-08-12T14:19:00.000+02:00

Have to go to the post office today as I made a small finish.
Doreen asked in her blog to send birthday cards for her small daughter and as I love receiving cards myself I decided to make something.
So this is what I'm going to send away today once I took a shower and got myself ready for the real world:

Hopefully the daughter of Doreen will be happy about this. As usual I went a little overboard. When I went to Claire's I just wanted to get a small bracelet and then found this beautiful set matching to the stickers on the card! And in DM where I only wanted to get cat food I found the Dreckspatz Bad.
The Hello Kitty chart is from DMC and only took me a day to make. When I'm back in Germany and have my XStitch mags again I want to make more cards!

And I finished the first page of the Mary Wigham SAL! WOHO!

It's so beautiful and fun to work on. I really want to continue with the 2nd page but I have to finish the Tea exchange. I don't want to disappoint anyone and I only have 15 days left in Berlin and 19 days left in Germany *exited*
I think I'm going to be addicted to Quaker Samplers and want to make one with Silk Threads ;^;

And about the visa thing I mentioned before:
The date of expiry (31st July 2010) just means the last day I can enter Japan. Once I entered I can stay there for a year.

030

2009-08-10T01:59:00.000+02:00

Today was a really nice day! Until around 11 pm when I started cleaning up but more about that later...

Well the weekend in general was nice~ Friday I went to Melissas garden to have an outdoor-handicraft-meetup. I had a "Secret Garden" feeling as Melissas family does not have enough time to take much care about it but it was still some kind of romantic. And Chrissi who accompanied us picked plums, wine and goosesberries! It's actually really nice to have a garden inside Berlin (beside the traffic noise I felt a little bit like in my grandma's garden in my home town)
After that we watched Brüno and Night at the Museum 2.

Saturday I had to work 5 hours but stayed at work 4 more hours as it was the Long Night of Shopping and all shops were open until 12 am. Some of my favorite co-workers had the night shift which made me stay longer as it's so much fun to talk and joke around with them.

And today I watched looots of movies. Arte (German-French TV channel) showed Moonwalker (the Micheal Jackson movie from 1988) which I've never seen before. I expected more from it as it hasn't much story but the soundtrack is great ^^ And after that Tele5 showed Little Shop of Horrors which is one of my favorite musicals! I only have one plant in my room and it's called Audrey (well I had another one which name was Frankenstein but it's definitely dead now so I threw it away. RIP Frankenstein!)
I also started sorting out my clothes I want to take with me to Japan. It seems like my clothing pile doesn't shrink whatever I do... Even throwing away stuff, giving them to charity and putting them into clothing bags still left lots of clothing I love and wear very often but I can't take that all with me. I know that I'll spend my first 2 weeks in Japan with shopping... Even worse is my shoe situation! I have around 40 or 45 pairs of shoes and just can't throw them away even some of them are broken.
Anyway I still have a lot of cleaning to do... My mum will come over tomorrow and start to clean out my appartement. I haven't done much until now.

And here is my MW before I started working on it this weekend:

I will post an After-picture later this week.

029

2009-08-05T20:32:00.000+02:00

The days at my mums place where very productive!
I finished page 3 of my HAED and stitched more on page 4. I decided to start the second row of my project as I was sick of all the dark blue. Once I finished the page I'm working on now I will continue with the upper row and make mooooore dark sky....

Too bad that the picture is so red but I think you can see the progress. There are 2 and a half pages missing on the upper row. This is going to be HUGE!
When I come back from Japan and finished the first row of pages I'll will start a new HAED and work on them in a weekly rotation.

BTW Japan~ I got my working holiday visa but still have to sort out the date of expiry... They wrote the 31st of July on the Visa but I want to stay until 31st of August >.< Will have to call them tomorrow.

028

2009-07-29T01:30:00.000+02:00

AAAH!! Heaven and Earth Design just released 9 new charts by Adele Sessler!
Oh my and all those pictures are so beautiful. And they have the Adele Sessler Sale at the moment! It's so mean as I don't really need new charts but I'm definitely going to buy one or two just because her work is so awesome (I especially love her character Luke, the white haired elf guy)
Please look at her HAED page here. I will buy "Beautiful Ruin" for sure as it is my favorite pic by Adele.
I'll sleep one or two nights about it and decide then if I really need new charts.

Today I got two packages. One from Cross Stitch Corner with my new issues of The World of Cross Stitchind and Britains #1 Cross Stitcher. I still don't know how to get them while I'm in Japan...
And~ I got the 220 skeins of DMC I ordered at ebay. Made my order last sunday, it was shipped on monday and today I received it after just 8 days. Really fast for the long way between China and Germany!

Looots of DMC!
I organized them immediately and put them away in my thread boxes and noticed: the boxes are to small or I have to many threads... After Japan I need to think of a new storage system.

My progress on Fly Me To The Moon while the SAL Week. Only two days and 1500 stitches more ^^ Maybe I can finish most of it tomorrow while watching Grey's Anatomy?

027

2009-07-26T17:13:00.000+02:00

End of the week again. Time flies huh?
And only 35 days until Japan WOHO!

I finished my third Pokemon and am so happy about finishing it. Es zog sich wie Kaugummi dahin... (I don't know how to say that in English, sorry)
Next will be Blastoise, because a friend of mine want to make accessory from it.

(Disclaimer: The pattern was made by myself and for only private use. I don't own any of the Pokemon characters or monsters and won't sell them or use them for any comercial use)

Today I started my tea exchange pic for the cross stitch club. It's so much fun and goes on pretty fast and I thing I will finish this sooner than expected.

This is the lower tea cup which will be followed by a heart and another tea cup! It's a really cute motive.

But the tea exchange has to wait next week as the next HAED SAL is going to take place.
This is where I am starting from.

Hopefully I can finish the third page the SAL week.

026

2009-07-23T13:46:00.000+02:00

Two posts in one week? Am I sick?
No! I'm bored! Summer break has begun and besides working I have nothing much to do XDD I'm still stitching Venusaur which annoys me and I'm happy once it's finished!

I only have 38 days in Germany left and on September 1st my appartment has to be cleaned and empty and the cat has to be at her new home ;_; I'll miss Bebe so much! She's my baby...

Sleeping kitty likes Milka.
On Sept 1st my flight to Japan will head off and you can follow my live there on another blog. I will post the link later as I haven't written there anything yet. I'm opening a new blog for my adventures in Japan as my mother wants to read it and she can't speak English (and this is mostly my stitching blog)

Speaking of Stitching~ While the big Heaven and Earth Design Sale I bought two new charts!!

"Curly Tailed Rosy QS" by Annie Rodrigue and "Be Mine Always" by Adele Sessler
I'm collecting these charts like crazy @.@ I have 9 by now and haven't even finished one of them! But I'm working of Fly Me to the Moon whenever I have time.

My collecting addiction is the same with books ^^"
I still have around 35 books in my to-read-pile and I'm still buying or borrowing more... Yesterday I went to the bookstore in the mall I'm working at to buy a 2010 calendar with Alice in Wonderland motives. Of course I picked up a book aswell.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies seems like one of the funniest books ever! It's mostly Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice but with a funny zombie twist. AWESOME! (I love Jane Austen AND zombies)

025

2009-07-21T17:47:00.000+02:00

Today my mail box was fuuuull! Beside a bill which made me not happy, I got a thanking-card from my friend Theresa whose wedding I attended some weeks ago.
And even better: I got my threads from 123stitch and a beautiful scissor-finder from Doreen. Thank you very much!!!

New DMC threads~ For my tea present and some more Pokemon.
I own 255 DMC colors now (and much more skeins, as I have some colors two- or more times) and ordered the missing colors at my favorite ebay-shop. Soon I'll receive 220 DMC colors! I can't wait~

This is the lovely little scissor-finder I got from Doreen. I love the little heart on it~ It's so cute! Thank you very very much and I will think of something very lovely for your daughters birthday ^^

Also I started a nnew Pokemon: Venusaur!
It's the biggest Pokemon by now as it has 3544 stitches (but I only made three so I'm sure there are bigger ones)

This is Venusaur after nearly 1000 stitches. The leaves look great and I'm really looking forward to see this finished.
After it I have to do the tea present for my exchange partner and a small birthday present ^^ And next week will be the HAED SAL and I hope to finish the 3rd page!

024

2009-07-14T10:28:00.000+02:00

Today I got my present from the Tea exchange of the cross stitch club!
It's really lovely so thank you Sonja!

It matches my room perfectly especially with the white frame ^^ And it looks great with my favorite tea cup (which I got from my grandma when I moved into my appartement)
And cancer kitty loves it too!

023

2009-07-13T14:30:00.000+02:00

I finally made progress on two of my bigger pieces!
Page 2 of my HAED is finished and I made two new ornaments on Mary Wigham.
At first here is the Mary Wigham sampler. I love working on this but the lightning in my room is too bad to work on it when it's dark outside ;^; When I return from Japan I'm going to get a daylight bulb.

I really like how the colors look like on the lambswool colored linen. Actually I enjoy to work on linen but as said it's hard to stitch on it when the daylight is gone.

This is how Fly Me To the Moon looks like at the moment. All the progress on the third page was done last week and I'm really proud how much I've done. But now it will have to take a break until the first August week (except thursdays ^^)

Besides working on Mary Wigham from time to time I have the goal to finish at least one WIP before my flight to Japan on September 1st.
Today I will continue the christmas stocking for my mum, the week after it will be either Sleeping Beauty or MakeUp Fairy time. PLUS I really have to start my gift for the Tea Exchange of the German Cross Stitch Club.
Because of the exchange I looked through ebay and now I really have to sort out what to buy... And also I'm really tempted to get some kits for myself. Even I already have charts for the rest of my life.

022

2009-06-30T17:09:00.000+02:00

I have another finish!!
I finally added the missing stitches to Margaret Sherrys Glamour Puss. I started it quite some time ago and now finally finished it as I wanted to make a birthday card for my cousin out of it.

I already finished the card. Put the cat on a pink mount and added a cute pink ribbon to it, which I made myself. The result came out great!

Also here is another finish from last year. I finally took a picture of the cute little robin with a christmas pudding.

I will make this into a card aswell, but I don't know yet how the card is supposed to look like or who will get it for christmas ^^ Maybe my grandma, she seems to like my stitching the most~

Also my new goal is it to finish most stuff in my WIP and UFO stash before starting something else (maybe except Pokemon, want to finish at least 10 this year!)
My WIP box contains: MakeUp Fairy, Sleeping Beauty, Christmas sock, Mary Wigham SAL, my HAED, Rose letter by DMC scent serie, a little blue bird.
Of course I can't take all of my WIPs to Japan, so I'll just my HAED with me and some kits from Dimensions. And of course my threads and fabrics for the Pokemon projects.

021

2009-06-22T19:05:00.000+02:00

I just bought my flight to Nagoya on September 1st. Now only the visa is missing and everything will be nice. I'm so exited!!

Furthermore instead of making a report about ancient scissors for university I stitched and went food-shopping. I continued my work on the Mary Wigham SAL. I'm so in love with this piece as it looks more and more beautiful everytime I finish another ornament.
After 4 days of work and already with a skein of the next color. I really like how the blue looks on the light brown fabric. You can't see it very well as it was really sunny in my room when I took the picture.

Also here is the next update on my Fly me to the Moon~

Slow progress but at least it's a progress. Next week will be the HAED SAL at the cross stitch club, so I hope to finish the second page while the SAL.
It looks more and more like a moon, doesn't it?

And last but not least~ Here is my second Pokemon! Only 491 more to go!

It's Ivysaur! Next is Venusaur and then I'll have the Bulbasaur-evolution completed.
(Disclaimer: The pattern was made by myself and for only private use. I don't own any of the Pokemon characters or monsters and won't sell them or use them for any comercial use)

Also umcoming things I have to do soon:
Hello Kitty Zodiac Cancer Card for my cousins birthday
Wedding Card for an old school friend
Finish the Glamour Puss by Margaret Sherry

020

2009-06-19T18:31:00.000+02:00

Maybe I can manage it to post 4 times this month ^^~

My fabric from 123stitch finally arrived. That was fast! I ordered it just a week ago, got their send-message the next day ande then received it on monday. That's why I love this shop!
And the best this is that I can order from them when I am in Japan too!
And because I got my 40ct Linen and the missing skeins of DMC and was able to start the Mary Wigham SAL by Needleprint. Please have a look at their blog (http://needleprint.blogspot.com/), it's awesome!

Here is my start of the Mary Wigham SAL. 40 ct lambswool linen stitched 1 over 2. Working on this is lots of fun but I'll need quite some time to finish this... I have too much projects going on!
But I want to finish the Sampler until going to Japan and then give it to Mr Nagao or my host family as a guest present. Just have to think of a way how to transport it on a 14 hours flight when it's framed.

And some eye candy <3

She always jumps into my bags by her own! Maybe she misses me so much when I'm not at home that she hopes I'll take her with me when she's sitting in my bag?
She tends to sleep in this bag...

019

2009-06-14T18:32:00.000+02:00

Ah~ sunday, lovely sunday.
The weather isn't the greatest ever, so I stayed at home today. Yesterday was stressful as I had to work and afterwards helped out at the Long Night of Science in my university. It was lots of fun and I cooked and ate Onigiri (japanese rice balls filled with Thuna or vegetables) and drank Japanese beer and Sake!
Also I got some bags of Mugicha for free. Mugicha is Japanese tea made from barley which is served cold. It tastes a little bit like cold coffee ^^

Mugicha with ice cubes~ So delicious!

Today ends the stitching compition at the Kreuzstichclub but unfortunately I haven't finish my compition entry ;^; I had too much projects going on and so I did not concentrate enough on Make Up Fairy. Plus the fact that I still don't enjoy stitching it...

This is how she looks at the moment. Plus a very ennerving red wine stain from last friday.
Let's see if I ever will finish her... I'll continue Ivysaur from my Pokemon series now.

And if you are bored, have a look at my LibraryThing.

018

2009-06-06T12:35:00.000+02:00

I have to work later than expected today so I have time for a new entry (I wanted to try to post at least 4 times a month but already failed for two months...)

I want home to my mum for my grandmas birthday~ She became 70! And because she likes the stuff I stitch I decided to make a card for her.

The card kits was a free gift from the jubilee issue of World of Cross Stitching and just seemed to be perfect for my gran. Unfortunately the colors on the photo are too light, normally the card is really antique white.

Oh my, the stitching compition at the Kreuzstichclub forum ends next sunday AAAH! I'm still not done with the MakeUp Fairy as I got distracted by my Pokemon stitches... And this week is HAED SAL so I'm doing my HAED at the moment. I really need a smoking needle next week to finish the Fairy (because if I don't finish it, I know I'll just put it in some box and forget it)
Here's my starting picture of page 2 of my HAED before the stitch a long.

017

2009-05-24T19:54:00.000+02:00

Wow two weeks no update!
Actually I wanted to post pictures of the finished MakeUp-Fairy but it still isn't finished ;__; I worked on it the last two weeks and still no finish. Right now I'm stuck at the skirt and because there are just pinks I'm not really motivated to continue. I never really see a progress.
But also I didn't wanted to change to Sleeping Beauty or my HAED. I really needed something I can finish in a few days so I decided to start my Pokemon collection!!
For everyone who does not know them: this is Pokemon
The last few days were spent with making Pokemon to cross stitch charts and yesterday evening I started the first Pokemon, Bulbasaur (or Bisasam in German or Fushigidane in Japanese). And finished it today!

Picture taken off. I'm not sure about copyright laws when I'm posting something like this here.

Ah it makes me so happy that I finally finished something again! I can't wait to order the missing threads and continue with Ivysaur.

Other stuff~ I went to the Jewish Museum yesterday and visit the new exhibition Deadly Medicine. I went to the museum around 5 years ago for the first time and the Permanent exhibition about the Jewish culture, life and of course the Holocaust is very interesting.
But the Deadly Medicine exhibition really disappointed me! There was a lot about eugenics and euthanasia and a little bit about twin research but that's what most German adolscents learn in the 11th or 12th grade of school. So I knew pretty much everything. And the "new" stuff they had left more questions open than it answered.
They had this really really small section about Mengele and I really expected that the exhibition would contain more about the horrible research the Nazi scientists did. But nothing.
So I really advise you to visit the Jewish Museum but save the money and only go to the permanent exhibition instead of the special exhibition.

016

2009-05-10T18:55:00.000+02:00

I got back from my travel to my hometown, looked into my mailbox and got two parcels~
One was my Cross Stitcher 184 and one was a free kit from Dimensions. Someone at the Xstitch LJ community gave away some charts and one Dimensions Kit with a Geisha (without Aida) and I was so lucky to get it! Now I want to give the woman who send it to me something in return ^^

Here are the stuff I got recently from some online shops and ebay ^^

Cross Stitcher issues 218 and 184, World of Cross stitching 40 and Cross Stitch Collection 170
the free Dimensions kit, a mushroom kit by Pako, a coaster and a small stitching frame

I ordered some Dimensions kits some months ago from ebay. That's so much cheaper than buying them from a German seller. (difference: Germany = 45 € for a kit, ebay = 25 € for a kit)
They went through customs so I had to wait 3 more weeks to get them and in the end the postman FORGOT to take the 9,11 Euro tax I originally had to pay. I guess I was lucky in the end, but if the tax office sends me a tax-request I would pay the money of course.

It's Kitty Litter and Japanese Maiden. I already sorted the thread for the second one but will keep it unstarted untill I go to Japan. These kits should keep me busy over my exchange year there.

And today is the last year of the HAED SAL from the Kreuzstichclub forum, so this is my after-SAL-picture:

My goal was to finish 28 blocks and finish the half of the site but I only did 20. I am satisfied with that!
Now I really have enough of this for the moment and wait for the SAL next month to work on it again for such a long time (I'll keep working on this on thursdays). Next week is MakeUp Fairy week!

015

2009-05-05T08:06:00.000+02:00

I'm so happy! Getting up earlier really was worth the lack of sleep.
I got up at 7.45 am even I have to head out for university at 11 am! But there was an auction on ebay I didn't wanted to miss out.
Ever since I saw the beautiful Joan Elliott fairy in the World of Cross Stitching 184 I wanted to get it but always missed out. Now I finally got the issue. And from a German seller which means that I'll get it THIS WEEK~ WOHO~
I'm feeling bad about the other bidder who was outbid by me because maybe she wanted the magazine as hard as me but I can't help it!

Today I'll go to Stickwerkstatt after university. I read about it in th Kreuzstichclub forum and saw on their website that they are selling DMC thread. I want to have a look if they are cheaper than the German online store I buy my DMC normally from. They are selling a skein for 85 cent.
I know an ebay store where a skein is only 25 cent plus shipping but it always takes soooo long to get to me (well around two weeks). I only buy something there when I have a really big DMC order like for a HAED.

And I think I have a serious stash problem! I always want to get more and more and more and can't stop myself from buying beside the fact that I can't even take the half of it with me to Japan.
There is this great ebay shop where they sell so mujch nice kits from lots of different companies AND they are having a 10% discount at the moment... But I already have 4 kits to do (Not to mention the 30+ magazines I have and which are still getting more)

And because I don't want this post to be pure rant:
The before-picture of out 2nd SAL week at the Kreuzstichclub forum.

Already done 3 more blocks.

014

2009-04-27T10:15:00.000+02:00

No No No No Noooo!!
Oh my, there is no person out there who is more stupid than me!!
I just searched the Round Robin piece of fabric to finally stitch my part of it, but I couldn't find it. I searched through every box I usually keep my stuff and it's simple gone!
I normally just throw envelopes away because I want to keep my desk tidy and don't have space for keeping them and the only explanation is that the RR was still in the envelope ;___; But I normally check the envelope before throwing it away.
I'm so sad right now because I feel like I betrayed the others, who stitched the RR with me...
But there is no other place I could have put it (I even checked my bags if it's somewhere in there)

013

2009-04-24T19:13:00.000+02:00

Wohooo~ unbelievable but true: Yesterday I finished the first page of Fly Me to the Moon. This gave me even more motivation to work on this and once the first rows of pages is done, I'll start with Sleeping Beauty too!

Only 35 pages to go HAHA~ But I've already done around 400 more stitches.
Instead of just stitch threads until they end I now try to stitch in squares. It makes counting easier and you can see the motive growing~

Also I made progress on the MakeUp Fairy. As I said before I really don't enjoy stitching this but now it's easier as I used some of the other colors.

Unfortunately the picture is not very good. The next one will be better! (the lightning in my room is the horror)
My plan to finish it until the end of April is utopia but maybe May? I have to hurry up, I want to start something new so badly. I just can't to decide which to start next as I have so much stuff in mind~

On sunday my cousin, her boyfriend and their lovely daughter will visit me and I'll cook for them.
I'll make Miso-soup with Tofu, Kimbap (Korean sushi) and Mochi. Well I but the Mochi but that's a secret ^.~ I'm really looking forward to the Kimbap, but it'S been a while since I made them the last time.
Did anyone of you made Kimbap or Sushi before?

And I started watching Star Trek while stitching. I want to get into the right mood for the new movie!

012

2009-04-18T16:50:00.000+02:00

Ah sorry, I haven't posted for a long time!
I don't know why, maybe because nothing really happens. At the moment I'm sewing a lot. I finished a skirt, a bustier and a dress in just two weeks! And as it seems I won't stop sewing. (pictures will come soon)

But as I'm sewing so much I lack of time for stitching...
I worked a little bit on my HAED and on Sleeping Beauty and forced me to work on MakeUp Fairy. I really want to finish this one because I'm not really enjoying it. Because of all the green it's not growing at all. But I want to finish before my Dimensions kits arrive (which are stuck in customs...)

This is how Sleeping Beauty looks now. Finally she looks actually like a human and not like blue and red blurbs.

University started and I have to lessons on thursdays and fridays! Great huh? So I have lots of time to work, stitch and sew~
I worked for 5.5 hours today, now I'm hungry and waiting for my pizza. And in the evening I'll go to Musiksalon in Sailor Lolita (but I'm so tired, I'll probably won't be there for long)

11

2009-03-30T18:19:00.000+02:00

This week will be very busy again. Because nearly everyone at work is sick, I have to work 5 times but it's all for the money! And it's fun too! (I'm glad that I like pretty much everyone of my co-workers and noone is like this horrible woman in my past job)

As I'm in sewing mood again, I started sorting out my fabrics. I have lots of fabrics I don't know anymore why I bought them but I still have a great stash!

I have: (left) Care Bear Cutsew fabric, hot pink fab, organdie (is going to be a petticoat), brown and white floral striped fab, strawberrie fab, light blue soft textured fab, orange lime fab (will be made into kids clothing), soft light green tartan.
(right) Merry go Round pink fab, Butterflies and diamonds pink fab, very light lilac polka-dot fab, rosa flock see-through fab, pink flower stripe see-through fab, cream flower texture fab, light blue fabric.
That makes 15 fabrics at all and I said myself that I won't buy any new fabrics until I haven't used at least 3 from my current stash! I'm currently working on die organdie-petticoat and will start a Jumperskirt out of the Merry Go Round fabric once I've bought lining fabric (which is okay to buy!)

Moreover today our first HAED SAL from a German cross stitch forum is starting~ The best occasion to work on Fly Me To The Moon!
Here is my Pre-SAL pic!

Tomorrow a good friend is going to Japan for a year for studying. I'm sad but happy for her and I'll see her again in september, when I go to Japan too.
So farewell Rina, I'll miss you~

010

2009-03-23T19:15:00.000+01:00

Tomorrow will be my second Japan exam because I failed one of the three exams this year and I'll fail tomorrow again.
I'm totally not prepared because I ignored the test the last weeks and now it's only one night to go and I'll never learn the Kanji and grammar ever in some hours. I had no pratice for nearly 6 weeks and so I can't even speak the most simple sentences... So tomorrow will be failfailfail!

Lolita fashion got me back again.
After I finished the dress you can see in some previous entry, I fell in love with the fashion again.
For the next Musiksalon I will do another new dress. It will be a sailor-themed OnePiece but with Polka-dots and black lace! Hopefully it will be as beautiful as I imagine it but I'm sure as I got the idea directly from Angelic Pretty.
Also I decided to buy these shoes from Anna House and maybe a blouse aswell. And I think about getting some stuff from Bodyline, like two skirts, socks and red shoes.
It's stupid to buy so much stuff before going to Japan in september but I want to be pretty and I want to wear my loli-clothes again!

And now be shocked!
No pictures of stitching today!
But I got my very own first RR back from England and will start my Somebunny soon to completed the RR! I already know where to hang it once it's done~

009

2009-03-16T23:07:00.000+01:00

Yesterday was really nice.
Two of my friends visited me and we made cupcakes!!

The first try went pretty wrong, but the other 48 muffins were very yummy.
Of course we shared with each other and I took my muffins to work because there is no way I could eat all of those. (I want to loose 3 kg...)

Also I finished my second Somebunny for the Round Robin. Phew, finally... I really didn't like this one and now I'm really glad that I'm finished. Hopefully my RR will arrive me soon so that I can start the third and last motive on my own RR.

I heard that Dimensions is closing down at the end of the year. So I ordered two of their designs I like the most. I bought Kitty Litter and Wedding Geisha because I'm afraid that the prices will get higher and higher once their kits become rare.
Maybe it's just an advertising strategy of Dimensions?

008

2009-03-11T19:23:00.000+01:00

Because I don't want to die of boredom I went shopping with my dear Christina today.
Actually Christina just wanted to buy a small bag and I just wanted to accompany her but in the end I spend 120 Euro!! But as long I have the money I can spend it right?
I bought a pink spring jacket (Vero Moda), an antique white skirt (H&M Kids), white socks for work, a really big bag with floral fabric and brown leather, a cream lace hairband (both I Am) and some underwear, a bra and a mint colored gingham shirt from C&A. And some 18 ct Aida fabric~
Pretty good for that money, isn't it?

Because the weather gets better and better I wear more skirts and high heels. I feel much more comfortable in those clothes because I feel "dressed up" and not just like I'm wearing those clothes because I didn't found anything else in my closet.

Here is the promised Sleeping Beauty update:

The gold stitching in the left side is finished by now and now Sleeping Beauty is sleeping in my WIP box because I need to work on my other three projects. I really have to stop starting new projects before one other is finished.

007

2009-03-09T14:22:00.000+01:00

Horror week is over! Finally!
Yesterday I slept until 1 p.m. because I was sooo tired.
Maid Cafe was nice but I really didn't like the location so hopefully we will find the perfect location soon, otherwise no one will come anymore. And Musiksalon was great. Melissa and me finished our dresses just in time but I don't have pictures of us together yet.

This is my new dress:

Made by me, designed by Melissa (who made the dress in lilac and white)
The Bild magazine was there too and took pictures of us so I have to buy the mag today and see if I'm really in it!

No stitching pictures today but I'm finally done with the big red curtain on Sleeping Beauty and even with the gold metallic stitching on the left border. And I did a lot more stitching on Fly Me To The Moon. Maybe I can finish the first site this week?
Also I bought three Perfume Secret Kits from DMC in Strawberry, Rose and Toffee. I started Rose at first and am stitching it on the handicraft meetings of our circle. I thought about doing all 12 kits from the series and hang them on my wall~

006

2009-03-02T14:49:00.000+01:00

This week will be so stressful! Why is all the stuff just coming at once than spreading over the whole spring break?
I had to swap my working shift today because one of the workers is sick and I was asked to come later. That means I have to clean the bins and I was SO happy when I thought I don't have to do this (because it takes forever). Also I work tomorrow evening, thursday morning and saturday. Wednes I'll meet up my cousin and go to Melissa afterwards to sew some twin lolita outfit for the Music-Salon which is saturday night. And Friday is our Maid Cafe.
I'll be dead tired on sunday and will get really bad skin because of the stress.

But I nearly finished the big curtain of the Sleeping Beauty picture! Once it's done, I'll post a picture. As for now here comes the weekly update picture for Fly Me To The Moon.

Not much of a progress, but okay for one week. I really don't know how this blue will look like a moon one day.
I'm glad that I have lots of projects at once so I can change from time to time. Funny thing is that with every project I have to work in another color. It's red for Sleeping Beauty, green for the Make-Up Fairy, blue for the HAED piece and white for the Somebunny RR (which I have to finish soon as I have to send it out next week)

Also I found a really nice site with lots of really cute cross stitch kits.
Please have a look at Pinn-Stitch.
I asked the about payment via Paypal and hopefully they accept that because I don't have a credit card yet.

005

2009-02-28T19:27:00.000+01:00

Fuah! I'm so happy that it's saturday evening! Because tomorrow I have one day free.
The last three days where only work and thursday I made the mistake to go clubbing even I had german-teaching and working the daft after! But dancing in Magnet club was just great.
Next week I have to work monday, tuesday, thursday and saturday! And I'll teach German on tuesday too... It's all for the money.
But teaching German is very nice, because my pupil (Mr Nagao) is very nice and he helped me making a plan for Japan in September! I'll probably go to Nagoya for a year because it's cheaper than Tokyo and staying there seems really nice.

I'm still working on my stitching projects but don't have up-to-date pictures. Hopefully I'll finish the red curtain of Sleeeping Beauty soon. Otherwise I'll go crazy soon, I can't see these red tones anymore!
And On Fly Me To The Moon it's all the blue colors which drive me crazy but at least you can see a big progress everytime you look at it because of the tiny stitches! Here is a picture of last week:

You can't see much of the actual motiv but soon it will be telling more! On monday I'll post a new pic~

Have a nice weekend!

004

2009-02-17T11:26:00.000+01:00

Woho, I'm done with the Cupcakes!
I worked on it the whole sunday and finished it the same evening~ I'm really happy because I can finally give it to Melissa and will receive also a belated Christmas present from her.

It's lovely isn't it? Someday I'll stitch it again for my appartement.

I immediately started with something new. My choice was the MakeUp-Fairy from Cross Stitch Crazy 115 as I already had everything at home. While browing through the magazines I found another really cute motive (a sampler called "Follow your heart... always") which I'll stitch once I've finished something in my stash.
Just when I started the Fairy I saw the stitching-challenge in the cross stitch club at Handarbeitsfrau and I'll take part with this piece. I'll keep you updated with my progresses here (and probably in the cross stitching LJ community)

Also I ordered magazines again from cross stitch corner. I'll get the two 2009 issues from Just Cross Stitch and Bat-Baby by Ellen Maurer-Stroh. Hopefully they will arrive before my trip to Frankfurt.
A friend invited me to Frankfurt for carnival and as I never have been to a real carnival, never been to Frankfurt and never visited her new appartement yet, I'm really happy to go!

003

2009-02-15T14:12:00.000+01:00

I love Spring Break!
Normally I start to clean my room when it's the end of vacation but this time I did it on the first weekend and now I'm really looking forward to two months of doing basically nothing!

I'm working on a Cupcake picture for Melissa (a good friends who's also in our crafting-circle)
Once I'm finished with that I think about starting something new as I totally can't get into the Somebunny motive I'm doing for the Round Robin...
I already bought the stuff for a fairy motive or maybe I'll make something with the scented thread I bought some weeks ago. Ah decisions!

So everyone have a nice sunday!

P.S. Who knows how to make a border around my pics?

002

2009-02-11T11:39:00.001+01:00

My exams are finally over and tomorrow is the last day of university before spring break. I just have to translate a Haruki Murakami text for the last tranlating lesson and then I have lots of time to do nothing, stitch, read and search for a language school or an intership for my trip to Japan.
And I have to go to work of course! I work at Build a Bear Workshop Berlin to earn enough money for my stay in Japan.

Yesterday I continued my work on my Sleeping Beauty stitching to celebrate my last exam.
Current progress:

Since the begin of february I've done all the red you can see on the picture. Hopefully I will finish the curtain soon as it bores me a little bit to stitch all the red.

Also I ordered everything for my first Heaven and Earth Design project! I can't wait until my fabric and the threads arrive because I really want to try something as big as a HAED project.
Wohooo~

001

2009-02-09T23:56:00.000+01:00

When browing throught some stitching blogs, I noticed that I actually own a blog here so I deleted all the old posts because they were soooo out-dated.

I decided that I need a stitching blog even I spam my livejournal with it too but I just feel like it (and maybe it helps me to improve my English)
My current stitching projects are a Somebunny to love RR, a small Winnie Pooh motive, a Cupcake picture and Sleeping Beauty by Joan Elliott.

Three people including me take part in the Round Robin and I already finished my first motive.

Actually the sending out date was today but my exams stress me so I totally forgot it. I will send it away tomorrow so that the next stitcher has enough time to finish her design.
I already got the second RR but the owner wants only small motives so I had to buy a new kit as I don't own any small designs *sigh*

More pictures of my other projects will follow soon when my last exams are over and I have spring break.