A Christmas finish and a stitchy start

I don't know what happened to March, I blinked and we are almost at the end, how did that happen.

It's been funny old month, i can't seem to get going with anything, and if i start anything i seem to create more mess than there was before.
We are going for a weekend break to Liverpool on Friday and then on Sunday we are continuing up to Berwick for the rest of the week and as typically happens in the week leading up to a holiday, i decide to add an epic cleaning list to an already filled week.  Why on earth i feel that i must have a deep clean of everything in sight is beyond me, but i do it to myself every time.

I need 3 weeks holiday, one week before, to prepare, one week away and a week to recover and get back to normal, lol.

I am looking forward to a week away though, and Liverpool in particular, i have lots of Beatles related things for us to do there :-)

Not a lot of crafting to show for this month, although I did stitch and finish this little Pineberry Lane Santa.  I've had it in my 'to do' pile for ages and when Christine put it up for the Needlecraft Haven monthly ornament it reminded me.  Although i didn't meet the NH stitching deadline, (i'm not good at stitching to a time limit), i have finished one of my intended charts.

(Apologies for the terrible photos, they were taken on my phone at night too, not a good combination)

  

I think he is a rather cute Santa.  I noticed that a lot of people chose to leave the year off this one, although i did consider it i stitched it as charted in the end.

The fabric i used had already been tea-dyed at sometime so i didn't bother ageing it anymore. 

Like many of you i probably spend far too much time looking at the work of other people and new things that i would like to do and not enough time getting on with it.  This year i have tried to put that right and have done more stitching in the last few months than i think i did for the whole of last year,

they might only be small finishes but i think I've got my act together enough to be trusted with a larger project now.

I stitched Molly, one of the Carriage House girls years ago, must be 4 at least, (i'm too lazy to look back and see!), but it was a while ago.

Yet more terrible grainy photos...sorry

I always intended to stitch the others but kept putting it off, until now.
This is Elizabeth after 18 days.

I like stitching blocks of colour, (must be the OCD gene in me), so i'm not fed up, although i will be giving her a holiday next week and taking something else away with me.

 I don't know how much i'll be on line next week, i shall probably only have internet access on my phone and will have to catch up on blogs and commenting when i get back.  Wishing you all a 'hoppy' Easter and I will catch up when i get back from my jollys and bore you all with (better) photos of my time away and hopefully some new stitching too :-)

-X-