A glorious day!

Well, I've got the photos uploaded now, so I can share what we were all up to over the bank holiday weekend.

It was the big weekend of the year as far as my family's concerned as it was my sister's wedding. The wedding was held in Scotland, so it was also Iona's first trip to Scotland and her first long car journey - not something I'd particularly been looking forward to.

Anyway, all the travelling went well, the weather was fantastic, my sister was a beautiful bride and we all had a great weekend.

I need to show you how I finally finished the ring pillow for my sister.

I bought some lace on ebay and overlayed it on some ivory fabric, framing the stitching. It worked really well - the white on white stitching complemented the lace well and almost looked lacy too. My sister and her husband were both really pleased with it.

For the wedding I also made myself a corsage which I was really pleased with.

And the wedding itself.

Finally, Iona's smile. I remember when my son was a baby, trying to take photos of him smiling. All I ended up with was photos of him looking drunk! At least Iona doesn't look drunk, but the photo doesn't do her justice - you just can't see how beautiful she is as the smile lights up her entire face.

A Finishing Dilemma

I'm worried. Unnecessarily (of course). How on earth am I going to finish A Celebration of Love into a ring pillow for my sister's wedding?

I finished the stitching at the weekend so I can't avoid the finishing question for much longer.


I know I'm quite capable of making a small pillow, but I want this one to be perfect! And I want it to roughly tone in with my sister's wedding dress (light champagne taffeta overlaid with white lace).

So I'm worrying about it unnecessarily while scrabbling around trying, mainly unsuccessfully, to find some nice fabric for the pillow. And what about trims or something round the edges of the pillow? I feel in need of a bit of inspiration and not being able to find a fabric I like isn't helping!

At least I'm pleased with the stitching now. I swapped the white DMC for a white NPI silk and I think it looks much better. I like the fine braid too and the hint of sparkle that it adds.


I also bought a couple of nice lengths of ribbon the other day which will be attached in the centre of the middle heart once I can find a nice button to attach them with.

I know I'll get there in the end, I'll just worry about it along the way. That's just the way I am!


Today I'm officially 35 weeks pregnant, so I've definately lasted longer than last time. I've also cut down to only working 3 days a week which is nice and I'm starting to look forward to not working at all for several months!

I my Q-Snaps!

Looks like a new start (and my q-snaps) was just what I needed! I spent the most of my weekend stitching on a range of different things, no apathy or any problem with motivation at all.

Julie warned me that I'd start to wonder how I'd managed without q-snaps up until now, and it hasn't taken long to find out she was right. In no time at all, I was marvelling at how simple it all was to set up, how well it holds the fabric and keeps the tension.

As I was splashing out and investing in q-snaps, I also bought some different sizes - a 8" square, 11" square and a couple of 17" legs. I love the way I can take them all apart to make myself a frame exactly the right size for the project I'm working on. I started out making a 8" x 11" frame and getting started on 'A Celebtation of Love'.


The q-snaps were wonderful, but I'm not happy with the heart in the middle. The filling is stitched in white DMC stranded cotton and I just don't like the way it's lying, despite all my railroading, it just looks a mess to me. I know I'm being over fussy as I want it to be 'perfect' for my sister's wedding, so I'm going to swap the DMC for a white silk and see if I like that better.


Next up was Paradigm Lost as I just had to try out the 17" x 11" q-snap combination.


You could say that I bought the q-snaps specially for PL as I was resisting putting it onto one of my scroll frames and had just been using my biggest hoop. And again, the q-snaps were perfect, just what was needed! I still haven't completely worked out how to keep the extra fabric out of the way, but I'm sure I have some bulldog clips or some hair clips somewhere which will do the trick!

All in all the q-snaps beat the hoops hands down any day! I'm not yet convinced that I'd want to take something as big as MTM off its scroll frame and onto the q-snaps, particularly when it gets bigger than the biggest q-snap frame I can make. But maybe that will become an excuse for buying more q-snaps and the extension thingies you can get?


To finish off, I had another nice visit from the postman on Saturday with a couple of back issues of Classic Stitches I'd ordered as well as this fabric.

Isn't it just gorgeous?