Assisi table cloth.

My latest eBay win - Assisi cloths are not commonly found - I rarely see them here anyway, don't know about overseas. Detail of the lovely stitching.

Two opshop finds from a friend!

A good friend who also collects linen and tours opshops regularly, keeps an eye out for unfinished things for me (she doesn't stitch). She found these - this Fautleys doiley with cross stitch deer, one end nearly complete - and a Lanarte unstarted cross stitch kit.

UFO/WISP Challenge report for February.

Here he is...with a couple more of the fluffy white balls completed, and a mistake fixed! (a friend spotted a small area of colour which 'didn't look right', and when I checked the pattern, I could see where I had fudged it. Fortunately only half a dozen stitches to unpick and redo).

Two Centrepieces/large doilies

Here is one end of this lovely doiley. As usual, I didn't get around to ironing the creases out before I scanned this one!

Latest additions to the collection.

This is one end of the centrepiece of a duchess set. One of the matching doilies is here too.

What's on the go, and what's in the pipeline.

What is on the go, is my Indian Chief UFO. Late last year, I put my name down as a participant in a UFO/WISP challenge (UFO = Unfinished Object. WISP = Work In Slow Progress). My chosen project was the Indian, and now that I have completed my Valentine Heart for Nicole, I can go full steam ahead with the Indian. Today, being another day unsuitable for anything except staying inside with both airconditioners working overtime, I phoned my friend L. to invite her over here to do some stitching. L. lives in a house that has no airconditioning, and a steel deck roof like ours, which means the indoors temperature on a day like today can be up to 35 deg.C - very uncomfortable. She is an occasional cross stitcher, i.e. only when I am around to motivate her! So she was happy to spend the day here and stitch along with me in between cold drinks and cups of tea.
What's in the pipeline is a photo or two of some lovely doilies I received from my friend M. in Queensland, who happened to mention my passion for linen to her local Vinnies lady. I said I would happily pay the cost plus postage, and last week unannounced, I received a COD package, which at first I was going to refuse, but when the post office staff told me who the sender was, I twigged - M.'s Vinnies friend had found some linen!
It is not far off midnight as I type this, and still dreadfully hot and steamy (it rained for a few seconds earlier), and I just can't get up enough energy to scan the Indian and my new doilies, but at least I've written about them so you can expect piccies here in the next day or so.

Valentine Heart Swap for Nicole.

I hope Nicole doesn't see this before she receives it - otherwise it will spoil the fun of unwrapping a mystery exchange gift! This is what I stitched for Nicole for the Valentine Heart swap.

New links on the sidebar (unrelated to stitching.)

The trouble with surfing the Internet is the more you look, the more you find. The same applies to blogs, to the point where sometimes you lose track of old favourites because you are finding so many new ones all the time! I love cooking and cookbooks, and there are some wonderful foodie blogs around the world, including this one by Miss Eagle of opshopping-with-Gina-fame. Do have a look - Miss E. is a whiz with her digital camera, and I have begged to accompany her on her next trip to George's Food Hall in Melbourne.....YUM....

Announcement regarding Swap Cards Blog.

Yup. I have finally got around to creating another blog to show my swap card collection to those who have asked about it. I have named it Patra's Swap Card Collection for obvious reasons and you can find it here.