Bucket List Scrap Booking

The My Memories Blog are having a Bucket List Challenge - create a page to show something you have on your bucket list.  Thought this would be a fun challenge to take part in so here's what I created.

Don't forget about my giveaway - it ends tomorrow at midnight GMT

Baby Patchwork as of 27.05.12 - Happy Dance

Well I am delighted to say that yesterday I stitched the final stitch on Baby Patchwork.  I still have to stitch the baby's birth details but I won't be sharing the pictures here once I've done that.

So here are all the pictures of my progress ending up with the finished piece.

I started stitching this on 21.12.11 and finished on 27.05.12 - just over 5 months stitching on and off with other pieces.  It is stitched on 14 count cream aida 2 over 1 full crosses.

I've really enjoyed stitching this piece.  The simplicity of the design makes a change from what I normally stitch as do the vibrant colours.

Trip to Chester Zoo

My husband and I share the same birthday so we always try and take the day off work together and do something special.  This year it was also Russell's 40th birthday so it was a little bit more special.  We decided to go to the zoo for the day and as it was Samuel's first visit to the zoo it was very exciting (for me anyway!).

I decided to have a play with the My Memories digital scrap booking to see what I could make with the photos we took on the day.  It was so easy - I selected a layout and chose for the program to automatically insert the photos so all I had to do was say which photos I wanted to be included.

I then exported the finished scrap book to a DVD and uploaded it to You Tube.  Here's the link if you want to take a look at my little project.

Chester Zoo Movie

I haven't worked out how to add music or anything yet but for a first attempt I'm really happy with it.

Don't forget I'm hosting a giveaway for another copy of this software - you can see all the details here.

I'd love to hear what you think of my movie and any tips from experienced scrap bookers would be most welcome.

A Review and a Giveaway - My Memories Digital Scrap Booking

I was very interested and excited to receive an e-mail recently from My Memories which is a digital scrap booking site.  They offered me a copy of their software My Memories Suite Scrapbook which is a digital scrapbooking software to download and try out and an additional copy to give away to one of my blog readers.  I've never done any scrap booking digital or otherwise so I was really interested to see what this involved.

I went to the site and followed the instructions given to me and easily downloaded the software.  When you download the software you also get a $10 voucher to spend on anything else on the site.  I chose to download a designer pack called Zoo Time as we are taking my son to the zoo for the first time later in the week and I thought this would be a good project to use for a digital scrap booking project.  I also downloaded the Sweet Tooth - Combo designer pack as you have to use all your $10 in one transaction otherwise you will lose the balance.

There are also lots of free kits to download and I spent ages just browsing through these and downloading more content.

Then I started to play around with the software.  There are lots of templates set up where all you have to do is add your photos.  There's even a feature where you just select the photos you want and the software adds all your photos to the templates for you.

Now bearing in mind I have never done any scrap booking before digital or otherwise, this is my first attempt and I have to say I am really pleased with it.

The great thing about this software is once you've finished your design you can decide what format you want it to be in for example I could chose to print this as a greeting card, as the start of an album or even as an interactive slide show.  I'm thinking that at Christmas time I can make our own personalised cards or make invitations to a birthday party - the possibilities are just endless.

I am very impressed with how easy this software is to use and my only criticism of it is that I think I will want to spend more time using it which will eat into my stitching time!  I would encourage anyone to give it a try as I never thought I would be able to make something like this.  When it comes to creativity I am happy to follow someone else's instructions, for example with cross stitching you are following a chart, but when it comes to putting things together myself I've always struggled.

Now comes the exciting part.  I have another copy of this software to give away to one of my blog readers.

So the way to enter this give away is as follows:

1. You must be a follower of this blog - it doesn't matter if you are a new follower or have been reading my blog for a while.
2. You need to go to the my memories website - click here - and choose your favourite digital paper pack or layout and then leave a comment on this blog post telling me which is your favourite.
3. For additional entries follow My Memories on their blog, on facebook or on twitter (or all three for three extra entries) and leave me another comment telling me where you have followed them.
4. The giveaway will end on 31st May at midnight GMT and the winner will be announced here on my blog soon after.

My Memories are also offering all my readers a $10 discount off the scrapbooking software if you chose to buy it yourself and a $10 coupon for the My Memories store.  Just enter the code STMMMS38740 when you check out.

I think I've remembered everything you need to enter but please let me know if you need any more information.  Good luck!  

Sleeping Beauty's Castle as of 12.05.12

I've spent my last 10 stitching hours working on Sleeping Beauty's Castle.  I'm still working on the cross stitching on part 1 but have started using some of the recommended silks.  I've never sewn with silks before so didn't really know what to expect but I absolutely love them - they glide through the fabric so easily and I love love love them.  I keep telling myself not to get too used to sewing with them as I can't afford to switch all my projects to silk - plus I've got hundreds of skeins of DMC and Anchor that need using up!

So here's the most recent picture of my chatelaine and if you want to see all the progress pictures up to this point please see my chatelaine page.

Secret Project Revealed

You may remember earlier in the year I had a secret project I was working on which I finished.  Well I can now reveal what that secret project was.  Jo from Serendipitous Stitching approached myself and another friend, Hannah, to see if we would be interested in stitching on an Afghan for Dawn's (from Crafty Kitten Fabrics) baby.  We both jumped at the chance and agreed we would both stitch two squares on a six square afghan.  I'm happy to say that Dawn has now received the afghan so I can now show the pictures.  Here's the pictures of the two squares I stitched.

This is the first square I stitched and was done over 1 square.  I have a cross stitch design programme and picked a font I liked on word and translated it into cross stitch for the name and stitched it with a variegated thread.  I have to say working on the afghan was quite tricky as unless you completed one cross at a time the thread slipped under the weave.

I then chose this cute little snail from one of the cross stitching magazines.  I think it was an issue of Cross Stitcher but when I find the magazine I will put the correct details here.  As I had struggled a bit doing over one on the previous square I decided to do this one over two which in itself was a first for me as I've only done over one before.  I like to think it was a practice for the chatelaine I'm currently doing over 2.

And here is the whole afghan in all it's glory with it's gorgeous recipient Sam modelling it.

I just love his expression in this picture it's like he's saying "Ta da".  

I'd like to say here as well that my reason for stitching this for Dawn was simply because I see her as a friend.  I've only "known" her through Facebook, a joint love of HAED, and her business Crafty Kitten where she makes the most gorgeous hand dyed fabrics.  Her customer service is amazing and I'd recommend everyone to give her hand dyed fabrics a try.

So there's the reveal of my secret project finish.  Hope it was worth waiting for!

WIPocalypse - 05.05.12

Baby Sampler - Cinnamon Cat - progress as of 05.05.12 - 80% complete.

Before:

After:

Rules for Life - Kincavel Crosses.  New start this month so no before picture.  Currently at 13.84% complete.

May Goals

Just a short post today, thought I would give setting myself some goals another try so here are my goals for May:

1. Stitch 10 hours on Baby Patchwork
2. Stitch 10 hours on Chatelaine
3. Stitch 10 hours on Hickory Dickory Dock

Hopefully setting myself goals I will be able to achieve this month.