Christmas stitch along
Well I seem to have managed to go months without adding anything to my blog! I suppose that was almost inevitable really, it has been a crazy few months. Alongside launching the website, which has gone so well - thank you everyone for your support! - I have also returned to GP practice management part time and been juggling the teens and their never ending need to be ferried somewhere. Stu and I were talking this week and it is strange to think that since this time last year both of us have changed jobs, Ellie has moved away to university, Abi has embarked on A-Levels at a new college and my baby, Katie, is now in her first year of GCSEs! Time certainly doesn’t stand still.
Stitching is something I still manage to squeeze in though, an essential part of my routine and something I find myself getting quite tetchy about if I end up going a few days without picking up my needle and thread. It definitely does have an impact on my mood!
Small embroideries are a bit of a saviour at this time of year and a project I have wanted to put together for quite a while is a hand embroidered set of hanging baubles for an entirely ‘me-made’ tree. (I should add that I haven’t quite broken the news to my other half that I want a second tree for this purpose yet!) I have varying stitched ornaments that feature on our tree each year but liking matching things I wanted a coordinated set. So, I set out and doodled twenty four little motifs to embroider, and then taxed my poor brain coming up with a construction method I was happy with - yes the air was blue at times!
Having shared the odd snippet on Instagram I thought it may be nice to have others join in, a sort of informal stitchalong. I also wanted to spread a little festivity and say a big thank you to everyone who has supported my little business launch, or just popped along to say hi on IG - it really is appreciated and meant entirely wholeheartedly, makes my day.
I have spread the motifs across four downloads, six per page which can be easily traced, and with each page given a list of the DMC colours I have used to stitch my embroideries. Each day through December in the run up to Christmas I will share a picture of a completed bauble and which of the colours I used to stitch it. The motifs obviously don’t need to be made into hanging ornaments, my good friend Suzie - @loveofhyggeliving on IG - is hoping to make an advent calendar with hers which will be equally lovely!
Through December the motifs will be free for anyone to download and stitch along. The link to download will be below. (A little plea though, please only use them for personal projects, not for commercial gain). If you do stitch along I would love to see so please do tag me on Instagram so I can :)
January 2024 Update
The Christmas ornament patterns have now been removed, I hope you enjoy stitching them if you have downloaded them, please do tag me if you share them on IG so I can see!