Jean Power class

On Monday I was lucky enough to be able to take a class with Jean Power.  My local bead shop managed to get her up here to teach and well it would of been rude not to go :)

The class was for Rivoli Roses and here's how mine came home at the end of the day.

I suspect that if I hadn't made an oops early in the day when putting the components together there was a good chance I would of come home with a completed one.

Here's both sides completed, I decided to go with a red rivoli in both sides

And joined together.

And yes I used 2 different shades of silver so your not seeing things.

And of course Jean brought lots of her work for us to drool over.

I can see some of the instructions be coming part of my stash in the future.

We found out yesterday that the bead shop is closing on Christmas Eve :( which means I'm back to online bead shopping and saving up for bead fairs.   It's going to be missed as it's the only one in the area, next closest now is an hour away so not easy to nip to if I run out of thread.

Now for an OMG!!!!!!!! moment.

You all know how much of a fan I am of Jill Oxton and her magazine,  well back when I finished Henry I emailed her a pic of him and she has printed both my pic and email in full in the latest issue (#87).  That was one heck of a surprise when I got my copy and opened it up I can tell you.  Well it was once I'd looked at the pic and thought that looks like Henry before the penny dropped that it was Henry!!

It's an Angel

I got my arse into gear over the weekend and finished making the pieces for the Mantle Angel to go with the Santa I did a little while ago.

All the pieces ready to assemble

And here she is a few hours later all assembled and her wings stiffened with clear nail varnish.

Now I need to do another one!

Lulu asked where I got the Dragon pattern from in my last post so I thought I'd let you all know they are from Threadabead 

Dragons galore

In my quest to stitch or bead 12 dragons this year with it being Year of the Dragon I've spent some time in the last couple of weeks working on some small dragons that have been dropping hints with sledgehammers that it was about time I got the made up.

First up is a purple dragon that is one of a pair of earrings and will forever remain that way.

Once I'd made him I decided that I'd probably never wear them as earrings so he's going to be worn as a pendant instead.

Next came these guys who have had a few outings now

And I remembered that there was a matching pendant pattern for them so along came this one who had to have a name so he's Norbert :)

Sir Charles Snow

On Sunday I went on another Oak Tree Crafts class this time for a needlecase called Sir Charles Snow, named after an old man that used to look after the grounds of the hall in the village and who was a bit of a character and always called in to see what the latest class was and admire the work.

Here's how he looked when I got home on Sunday.

First thing we had to do was paint the needlecase and while it dried most of us did the hat.

And here he is finished yesterday afternoon.

He's supposed to have a facet under his nose but I didn't like it so left it off

His scarf was supposed to be done in stripes but I didn't fancy that so did a check one instead.

The snowballs around the bottom, they were a pain to do but very effective 

Last weeks stitching

Last week I worked on 4 Season's sampler all week apart from Wednesday when I finished off Winter Wonderland.

I'm aiming to have this done by the end of the year so I'm working on it again this week and hope to finish Autumn.

And here's my very pathetic progress on Runekeeper over the weekend.

In my defence I will say that I finished a beading project and then started and finished another one on Saturday before heading to DBF's for the evening. 

And on Sunday I was out all day on a beading class and then the family went out for an Indian in the evening to celebrate Mel's Birthday.

But at least I worked on it

I'm behind in things I have to post but I'll get there

Trip to WI House

Last week Mum, Dad, DBF and I went to Chester for the day so we could go to WI House and have a look round the archive exhibition they have on this month.

One of the first things you see when you walk in the small front room is this pagoda? that was made by Jackie Woolsey and Daphine Ashby to celebrate 90 years of CFWI.

It's huge and no way could I fit it in one pic so I took several 

As you can see from the pics above there are several flowers panels but this is the only one that turned out ok all the others were blurred

Next to the table it's stood was this table with a few items of WI memorabilia on it which I only took one pic of but that can wait for another day along with the rest of them

Winter Wonderland Finished

I finished Winter Wonderland on Wednesday :)

I think it's the first time I've ever stitched on Perforated paper and I quite enjoyed it but I don't think I'll make a habit of it.

It's really 3d and sparklie but the pics don't pick that up so I thought I'd try and show you

The leftover floss and chart are on my sale page if anyone is interested.

New Weekend project

With finishing Caleb's Birth Sampler last week I had to pick another new weekend project to work on.

Didn't really take me long to decide on what it would be as I've been thinking about working on this for a while now.

This is Dragon Dreams Runkeeper as it started the weekend

and how it ended the weekend

TUSAL time

I thought I'd share a quick pic of my bead TUSAL pot this month before I emptied it into the big one.

This time I've added orts from Caleb's Birth Sampler, Halloween Flip It's, Winter Wonderland, Namaste, 4 Seasons Sampler, Runekeeper and all those ones from the bead pot.

Happy Birthday Mel

Mel turns 21 today.

I'm very proud of the wonderful young woman she is.

Many Happy Returns Mel

I decided I wouldn't post baby pics of her today but I will point you in the direction of them

16th Birthday
18th Birthday

Quick Namaste update

I spent most of last week working on Namaste and got another motif finished.

Only 2 more to go and the list for the back of the eventual bellpull finish

Winter Wonderland progress

It's getting there :) fingers crossed I'll be finished next wednesday

I looked in the viv earlier and saw Peewee fast asleep and it made me smile, both of them often sleep on the top or down the side of the house.  He woke up when I spoke to him and told  him was silly :)

Model finished

I finished the Halloween Flip It's for Sparklies

It's on 28 count Lugana Gingerbread with all the called for GAST and WDW

It'll be on show at Ally Pally this weekend (assuming Royal Mail does it's job) so drop by the Sparklies stand and have a look

Another one bites the dust

AKA I finished the Birth Sampler which makes 6 PHD's that I started the year with finished :)

I had to use the flash for the overall pic so it looks a little washed out.

I think these guys are so cute and the pics have the added bonus of showing the colours so much better

The important bit

Quick update

Here's how the flip its looked Friday evening when I put them down for the weekend.

I'll be finished tomorrow cause I've only got the border to finish off and the buttons to add

Progress & a finish

My progress on the birth sampler from the weekend.  I only have the info panel to do now so fingers crossed I get that done this weekend and I can cross another PHD of the list

I actually finished this panel weeks ago but for some reason never posted it so here it is now.

Before anyone asks it's Knowledge written in Japanese and it's from an old issue of Jill Oxton but which one escapes me right now.

Post Box finished

I finished the post box from last weekends class with Oak Tree Crafts on Sunday afternoon.

Not much else I can say really so I'll leave you to enjoy the pics