Ivy: Week 1... And the kitten is framed!

It's been a whole week with this little lady and here is how she's looking so far:

I just love her! She's stitched up very quickly so far, but I think the skirt is going to take a lot longer.  But that's ok, because the main reason I love this design is actually the gorgeous drop and sweep of that skirt: it just looks heavy, and I love heavy skirts. Is that a weird thing to love?

I was also able to find a frame for Whiskers & Wings, and here it is all framed and ready to be hung up:

I wanted a wooden frame, because in my imagination the kitten lives in a wooden cottage. And I wanted it to look old-ish, so I got this distressed wood frame. I'm very happy with the result! I'm going to hang it up next to my craft cabinet, and at some stage I'd like to stitch up Morning Lake by Dimensions as a sort of companion piece, because I do feel like that's where the kitten lives:

Fall is well and truly here now: the temperatures have dropped (although I suppose that means nothing to all of you living further north than I am... It is still around 20ºC in the sun!), and there'll be snow up in the mountains soon. My favorite fall recipes have also appeared on the table: carrot soup, bacon-fried rice, salmon casserole... yum!

I hope everyone's having a good week, and until next time... Happy stitching! :)

Whiskers & Wings: Finished!

You guys. I have finished it!!

Isn't it lovely? Isn't it the cutest, sweetest little stitch you ever did see? (Overexcited crafter over here!) That being said, this one took sweat, tears, and absolute grit to finish. Much as I enjoyed this piece, this last week was gruelling, because just look at all that gray! There is so much of it. But I pulled through it and here we are, two months and a week later, finished. So satisfying!

Of course, part of finishing a project is washing & ironing it, which is precisely what happened on this lazy Sunday of mine:

And now all I have to do is frame it! I can't wait. I'm thinking of a wooden frame, to make it look cozy. It certainly fits the design. But we'll see what I can find. 

Now I'm off to start on my new project, which I will write about next time. Until then, I'll leave you with some closeups of this lovely project which some of you have lived through with me, and bid it a sweet farewell until framing time: 

French knots for the eye shine

French knots for the seeds

The cardinal in all his back-stitched glory

And finally, since we're on the subject of cats... Here are a couple of shots from my own fur babies having a cuddly nap together:

I hope you're all having a great time this weekend, until next time, happy stitching! :)

Whiskers and Wings: Week 8

Well will you look at that, it's nearly finished!

I can't believe we've come this far! It seems like only a couple of weeks ago that I made the first stitch up in the top left corner, and now here we are. All three birds are at the bottom: chikadee, sparrow, and cardinal. I'm extremely pleased with how it's turning out, and hope to have it finished up by the end of this week. 

As this project ends, I have of course been thinking about my next one. I'll make a separate post all about it, as I've been racking my brains out about colors, fabric etc. But for now I'll leave you with some pictures of the stitching in my current WIP, which I'm particularly happy with. Almost a year and a half after having started cross stitching, I can see the progress I've made when it comes to even stitching and having a clean back:

As for the back, I remember that my first couple of projects were a knotted mess. I'm not saying my stitching is perfect now by any means, but I have come a long way:

I have been actively trying to get better at backs, and have carefully studied the backs of projects that people have put up in places like Reddit, where they explained that what they do is think of the back the whole time that they're stitching. Over the last few months that's what I've been doing, carefully choosing where to go down or up with the needle so that the back would be as neat as possible, and it's nice to see my efforts have paid off. It's nice to feel proud of something even if it's a "little" thing, don't you think?

How is everyone doing? I hope you're all well and have plenty of projects to keep you busy. I'll post about my next project this week if I can, and if not, I'll hopefully see you with a finished project at the end of the week! Until then, happy stitching :)

Whiskers & Wings: Week 7

Saturday night update! I'm late in posting this so I'm not sure if this constitutes week 7 or 8, but for the sake of consistency, let's say it's week 7. Here's the project so far:

More snow has appeared, and two more birds! Another chickadee and a beautiful cardinal that just pops with that brilliant red, doesn't he? Again, I feel like the picture doesn't do the project justice, because when I see it in real life it seems to have such depth with all the light and shadow going on. My plan now is to add the third bird, and then fill in all the rest of the snow. I'm hoping to be done in a week or two, and I'm so excited! I really am enjoying this project.

Not much news over here. Work & lesson plan during the week, and during the weekends... sunbathing on the beach! The water is getting a bit cold now, but we still managed to get some snorkeling done this morning, which is great. The tourists have gone now so the beaches are a lot emptier, and the water is starting to get that crystal clarity that means the cold weather will be here soon. 

Also, I've finished this book: 

And it was amazing. It really resonated with me, as someone who moved to the US as a child, and had to learn a new culture/language. The author evidently knows what that experience is like, the good and the bad, and the way she handled the everyday details of it just blew my mind. Highly recommended read for anyone interested in the topic.

And that's me done. I hope you're all having a good week, I'll leave you with a few close-ups of the project so far, and as always, happy stitching :)

Whiskers and Wings: Week 6

I'm extremely proud to present a fully stitched and backstitched kitten at the window:

Isn't he just something else? I love the part the project is at now, with the window and kitten fully finished, and the play of shadow and light on the snow. I find that there is a lot of depth and feeling in this project, and I'm really surprised at how much I'm enjoying it! Also -and this is just a detail- but don't you just love that bit of ice sticking to the window on the bottom right corner, through which you can see a bit more of the kitten? I think details like these are what make certain pieces pop!

I was very tired today as I stitched this, so I curled up on the sofa and put on a nice cozy movie: Safe Haven. Nothing special, but I do tend to gravitate to small-town-by-the-sea stories when I'm tired or just in need of some comfort entertainment. The weather's been pretty bad too, with the worst rainfall this part of Spain has seen in... well, ever, so it's been nice to have some time at home to curl up with some stitching.

I hope you're all doing well, here's a closeup of the kitten's face as he looks at the chickadees, and as always... Happy stitching :)

Whiskers and Wings: Week 5

Well, if these haven't been the busiest couple of weeks, I don't know what! September has rolled around and we have been busy, busy, busy with back-to-school. It's all been lesson planning in this house and training and meeting our new students, and this weekend we've just both collapsed and spent a nice staycation at home, watching movies, lazing around the place with the cats, and taking walks. It's been fun! It's also given me a chance to finally catch up with my cross-stitching, and here is where Whiskers and Wings is at so far:

Cute, right? Just look at those two chickadees! I'm nearly done with the snow around them and then I'll backstitch them, they're really going to pop out and I can't wait. As usual with my projects, this one's taking way longer than anticipated and is looking far more beautiful than I could have imagined. There's a lot of depth to it, although I'm not sure if it comes out in the picture. The colors are quite rich in real life!

Also in cross stitching news, I don't know if you've seen this lacing tutorial by Meg at Live to Stitch, but wow! It's amazing. She goes into so much detail on it, I think it's the best tutorial I've seen on the subject and I am definitely going to use it next time I frame a project.  

I hope you're all doing all right, I'll leave you with some WIP pictures, and as always happy stitching :D

Whiskers & Wings: Week 3

He's here! Our little kitten is stitched, backstitched, and looking out the window:

Cute, right? I still have to add his body of course, and a couple of french knots to bring a shine to his eyes, but I think he's looking adorable so far. Next week is going to be all about stitching more snow, and hopefully a couple of birds. We'll see how we get on. 

We've been so busy this last week again that I haven't had time to look for a frame for the beautiful Mermaid Azure, but I'm hoping to get something soon, because I want to hang her up and see her every day!

Finally, I never thought that I'd share anything other than cross stitching on this blog, but after looking at other crafting blogs and talking to a couple of you, I've realized that I enjoy getting to know a little bit more about the crafter behind the blog. So today I'm sharing a couple of pictures of the area where I live, so you can get an idea of what it looks like around here:

As you can see, it's quite... well, Mediterranean. Blue sea, white-washed villages, pita trees, aloe veras, dry hills. My Irish father-in-law calls it a moonscape (I still find that hilarious) but to me it's home! So I wanted to share it here with you.

I hope you're all having a good week, and as always, happy stitching!

Whiskers & Wings: Week 2

A curious little kitten has appeared at the window!

How are you all this week? We have been so extremely busy with getting back, doing things around the house, and getting ready for the new school year. We haven't stopped, and it looks like this week is going to be just as busy! Thankfully I've had time to sit down and work on my cross stitch for a bit, and I was getting good speed until I got to the kitten... he's adorable, but he is all confetti, so I'm afraid progress is slow.

The other day as I cleaned out my craft corner (again) I came across this little piglet:

And it made me smile because he has a little story to him. I first saw this little guy on the summer we moved to the US. He was misplaced in a Walmart aile, and to my 9-year-old mind he looked lonely and in need of a home because he only had one eye, and I guess I just thought he needed some extra love. My parents were happy to get him for me, and he became one of my favorite toys, and one of the teddies I cuddled at night (yes, I slept with teddies sometimes. Now I have cats!) 

Originally, Mr Piglet here didn't have the sweater. He was just a pink little pig with one eye. But one day at a garage sale, my mom or I (I don't remember who) found the adorable knit sweater he's wearing now. It was too cute and just the right size, so my mom got the sweater for Mr Piglet, which happened to be of an official teddy bear brand:

Once we put the sweater on, it never came off: I somehow thought that having a warm, cuddly sweater would make Mr Piglet feel better about having only one eye, and so you see, he's still wearing it, years later. Who knew he'd end up here in southern Spain? Probably not him!

I hope everyone's doing great. It looks like this will be a busy week so my next post will be a week from now, and hopefully I'll have some progress to show! For now, here are some progress pictures:

My beautiful fur babies! I'd missed them!

Whiskers & Wings: Week 1 and Goodbye Belgium!

This week has been a combination of rest and day trips, so stitching time has been erratic, but I'm happy with my progress so far:

You can see part of the window now! And isn't that snowy effect just the coziest thing? I love it! I've been stitching this piece indoors when it was raining, or out in the garden when the weather was fair. I've been lucky enough to have spent some golden evenings outside stitching this piece, listening to the blackbirds sing and having Luno for company. In fact, I was caught in fraganti by my mother one evening, who caught me in all my Pyjama-Wearing, Cross-Stitching Goddess glory (please note the sarcasm):

What can I say? Not my most flattering picture, but certainly one of the most candid ones that perfectly capture a moment, I think.

Any time I'm in northern Europe in the summer, I find myself falling in love with the landscape and wildlife: the forests, lakes, castles, mountains... The deer and falcons and hares and foxes. These are things that we simply don't have where I'm from, and for me they're so beautiful and exotic, that I always want to take the feeling home with me. And as an armchair traveller, it's natural for me to gravitate towards books, so my summer reading usually consists of novels set in Alaska, or in some other remote northern place. Right now, I'm reading A Gathering Light by Jennifer Donnelly, which takes place around the New York countryside in the 19th century, and I'm loving that northern summer feel. 

That being said, I don't do winters in the north. I already lived in Belgium for quite a few years, and if that taught me anything is that the darkness and cold of the winter are not for me. I need the eternal sunshine and warmth of my beloved Mediterranean, where life is slow and the days are warm. Northern Europe is just a lovely summer dream. 

And so with that piece of inner monologue, I'll leave you with the last picture of Luno for a while, since tomorrow we're going back to Spain. Thank you for reading, and as always happy stitching :)

Whiskers & Wings: Discovering Martha Edwards

A few days ago my mom surprised me with this sweet little kit!

Isn't it adorable? As you know I love cats, and the expression on this kitten's face is so very sweet and candid. I can't wait to make this! We don't get any snow where I live, so for me the snow is very exotic, so for me this scene looks quite magical and cozy. This is definitely going to go in my crafting corner when it's done.

The design is Whiskers & Wings by Dimensions, it came out in 1999 I believe and is now retired. The artist is Martha Edwards, and I've found some of her other stuff, which is adorable:

She seems to really focus on cats, windows and birds, doesn't she? I absolutely love the cozy feel of her art. If I like stitching this one, I'll try getting a few others from her!

In my excitement I started stitching on it already, in breaks between beading my mermaid, and here's how it's looking so far:

I love the way that the design uses the aida canvas as the snow itself, so what I'm actually stitching is the shadows of it. Very clever! I think it's going to look absolutely gorgeous when it's done. A very relaxing project so far, so I'm very much enjoying it. 

And since we're speaking of cats, here is a picture of Luno, my parents' cat:

He may look sweet, but he's kind of mean!

Posing like the cat in Whiskers & Wings

Happy stitching everyone, and as always thank you if you take the time to comment, it always brings a smile to my face :)