Linen for Christmas!

As I endeavour to keep this blog only for my embroidery, I am not going to go into detail about my Christmas Day, but if you are interested in knowing that, please visit Patra's Other Place. But I decided these items would be of interest to my stitching friends. My sister-in-law and her hubby are still close friends with his ex-wife, so she is included in the family Xmas lunch. She is a beaut lady - loves embroidery and cats -just my kind of gal! Last year I stitched a ginger kitten for her, and she promised she would do something for me this year. The Tiger Lily centrepiece is what she made. Isn't it beautiful? She apologised for the purchased lace edge, as like me, she doesn't crochet, but that didn't bother me at all. My SIL doesn't stitch, but she manages to find things in antique shops for me at this time of the year, and the blue teapot centrepiece was one of her gifts to me. The Morning Tea tray cloth was one of two gifts from S from Beyond The Blank Page who also keeps an eye out for antique linen to add to my collection. She also gave me a gorgeous cross stitch book, which I drooled over for at least 15 minutes before continuing to unwrap other gifts!
The dinner plate was a gift from a very dear friend, who actually collects J & G Meakin ware herself, and she told me she fought bitterly with herself over this plate! She bought it for me because it had the Crinoline lady on, but then she wanted to keep it in her own collection. Apparently her conscience won, and it was in my pressie, along with soap and face towel.

Tiger Lily centrepiece
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Blue teapots centrepiece
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Morning Tea tray cloth
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J & G Meakin crinoline lady plate.
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The best Santa Claus story ever!

If you want to read something very clever and even more amusing, go visit Crooked Paw's Retreat and read the post titled "The Mathematics of Christmas". But if your child still believes in Santa Claus, don't let them see it - it would shatter their illusions forevermore!

Happy Christmas to all, with love from Gina and Topsy.
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Gingham table cloth with purple Sunbonnet Sue (probably a more apt description than Crinoline lady).
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Cushion cover.
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The last two Ebay wins for 2005

And roll on 2006....NOOOOOO!!!! I have too much now! But when I see items like these two going cheap, well...a stunning cushion or pillow cover (not a pillow sham) featuring a blue bird and red blossom - beautifully stitched. The green gingham piece is an unusual one. Not chicken scratch (well, I could be wrong?) - it is a square cloth, so obviously meant for a small table, with the Crinoline lady stitched in several shades of purple. One seems to be complete, another almost complete, and a third one just started. Of course I will never finish it, but for $5 it is nice to have.

Who was my 20 thousandth visitor??!!

Strike me pink - when did that happen? I just noticed that Patra's Place has exceeded the 20,000 visitor mark!! I don't often go in to the Stats counter, but I do enjoy having a look now and then to see not just how many people visit me, but where they come from, and it is amazing to see the number of countries that are represented in those stats. I presume that a number of the visitors can't read English, but I guess they like the pictures! My aim is to please, so do keep coming, and let me know if there is something you want more of, or something you want less of!

This is the napkin that matches the tray cloth. The crochet edge on these items makes them even more special.
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Tray cloth. I love all the stitching on this one; the blue satin stitch is simply perfect, and the lettering is so sweet with the tiny leaves added to the letters.
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Birthday card for a lady whose name begins with S.
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Some little pieces of 'eye candy'...

I was surprised to look at my last post here and see that a week has gone by without me adding photos of anything! Not that it would matter greatly at this time of the year; I suspect most of us have more to do than read/post to our blogs every day! But I do have two new items of interest to my fellow stitchers and linen collectors. The small cross stitch is a birthday card to a girl in the UK whose name begins with S. It is for a birthday exchange we are in, with a MSN Group of cross stitchers.
The other two pictures are of a nice little eBay win I had recently - an old tray cloth. As usual, I couldn't fit the whole lot in on my scanner, but you'll get the gist of it. The smaller item is the matching napkin. I have won a few other nice things on eBay recently, but they are either too big to scan, or not of any great interest to people who read this blog. Well, I might be wrong, but I try to be selective about what I put here, and some of my bits and pieces are just embroidery or cross stitch kits that were cheap and appealed to me on the spur of the moment.

This is my piece on the final Xmas Round Robin I have been working on frantically, to get it back to the USA by Xmas! The flame on the candle has some of Pam's metallic thread in it, which gives it a beautiful sparkle, but doesn't show up on the scan.
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And here is the back of the mail art envelope. I blocked out the name and address for obvious reasons...just wanted to show you how the whole project is finished off. Isn't it gorgeous!
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My very own Mail Art envelope from the USA! Stitched on evenweave (or linen - not sure) and very carefully postmarked by the local post office staff. :>)
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Part of the Scotty dog apron. The design goes right across the bottom of the apron, but it does not all fit on the scanner.
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Sandwich tray doiley. Perfect, tiny stitches.
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Envelopes are written each month by members of the society.
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Front cover page of Calligraphy society magazine.
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My postman is AKA Santa Claus!

Well, that is not strictly correct. We don't have a postman delivering our mail because we have a post office box, so everything is put in there before the posties go out on their rounds for the day. However, it sure felt like Santa Claus had been at the post office when I picked up my mail today! It is 1.30 am and I am too tired to scan everything right now, but will do so later today. Here is what I received:
**A large chunk of Christmas Cake from Ms Robyn - wrapped in Gladwrap, then in a lovely damask napkin, and put in a very old tin (love it!), which was then wrapped in brown paper of course! Thanks Robyn - your cake is DELISH++++!
**The Christmas issue of Post Script - the newsletter of the Calligraphy Society, in a beautifully written envelope.
**An exquisite little sandwich tray doiley with a crinoline lady - via eBay.
**A very cute apron with two Scottie dogs embroidered on it, also via ebay
**And something I have been waiting patiently for now for a month or so: a Mail Art envelope stitched for me by Danielle at A Peacock's Feather. It is absolutely stunning, I am truly blown away by her work.
Pictures of everything coming up shortly - watch this space!!

Some little projects I have stitched...

I have been scanning all my embroidered items scattered through my collection, with the intention of printing off a copy and creating a journal of everything I have ever stitched. Of course there will be a few things missing, as I used to send a lot of my work overseas to penpals for birthdays and Christmas. But I thought that if I start now, I can still have a reasonable record of my efforts. As I am flat out working on my final round robin, I haven't got anything else of my own work to put on here at the moment, so I decided to post pics of some of my earlier non-cross stitch works. Just little time fillers really, to keep up my practice of traditional embroidery. No expert, as you can see!

And another...None of these stamped linens came with any instructions, so I just used up threads and colours left over from other projects.
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Another little UFO that I played with a few years ago. I don't do the edging on these, by the way - just the embroidery.
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I collect old unworked pieces from thrift shops and like to stitch them in my spare moments, just to practice my non cross stitch work.
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My very first doiley - done when I was about 8 years old, I think - can't remember now!
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Received this little gem via eBay last week - a table runner or centre, with the lady at each end.
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