Another Jolly July catch up and a couple of days out

For the second week of Jolly July I had said I wanted to have another three or four new starts. 

That didn't happen.  Instead I had one new start and three finishes.  It suited me much better to finish the small starts than add to a pile of stitching.  So here they are.

Gingerbread House No. 3

Frosty Flakes

My First Christmas by Lizzie Kate

My First Christmas was my only start in week two, but I'm happy to have started and finished three ornaments.  You may have noticed that it says 2nd Christmas.  Well, this is for Jacob, he was supposed to make his arrival in the first week of January and this Christmas would have been his first, but as you know he arrived a few days before Christmas last year, with everything that was going on I didn't have time to make him an ornament, so we thought this would be a talking point in the years to come 😆

The year is supposed to be stitched over one, no way that was going to happen on 32 count!  The fabric is a light blue, which is not showing up on this terrible photo, but trust me, it looks cute.

Jenny's partner, James, is serving in Afghanistan now until the beginning of November so we are helping out with the boys to give Jenny a break at the weekend.  We took them, along with Bonnie on a woodland walk on Saturday.

Arty likes to collect things along the way, sticks, pebbles, flowers, he picks up things until he can hold no more.  He's dissecting a buttercup here!

The Saturday before we took them to Bewdley.  This lovely market town is about twenty minutes drive and makes a nice change for a walk but the river, oh, and they have Teddy Gray's ice cream so worth the drive 😉

The boys really need a hair cut but Jenny hasn't been able to get an appointment yet on a day she's not working.  70's throwback, lol

I went to Bewdley again last week, this time with Joanne, Bonnie and Jacob.  It was nice enough for us to sit and have our lunch in the park, and of course another ice cream later.

Can you see Bonnie has her gloves on?  It was really warm but she insisted on putting them on :-)

That's me all caught up with the happenings here for now.  I hope you are all still staying safe and well and enjoying a little more freedom, if you are able.

See you soon

-X-

Week one of Jolly July

I haven't joined a SAL for quite a while, mainly because I'm not very good at keeping up and I prefer to do my own thing when I feel like it.  But this year I've decided to join in with Jolly July / Christmas in July.  It's not strictly a SAL because the only thing required is for you to stitch something Christmas related.  I don't have a problem with that as it's my favourite season to stitch. 

So, in no particular order, these are my Jolly July starts for the first week.

LHN Frosty Flakes

I'm stitching with the recommended colours on a mystery piece of 32 count fabric.

32 count is not my favourite, I think the stitches look a little bulky using two stands of floss but I'm taking it slowly and I think it looks ok so far.

Next is The Button Tree by The Drawn Thread

Again I'm using the called for threads on some pale grey 28 count evenweave. 

I only started this one yesterday and am already almost half way.  I don't have enough pretty buttons to finish it so will have to search Amazon or ebay for those.

This is Country Cottage Needleworks Gingerbread House #3

Another chart I've had for ages and never stitched before.  

I'm stitching this on 28 count fabric in pale blue with the recommended threads.

  I really love how this one looks 💗💗

And finally, Jacobs Christmas stocking.  

This is Brett's stocking by Shepherds Bush

 I'm still waiting for some of the threads to come for this one, hence the small amount of stitching, hopefully they will be here within the next week.  I could carry on stitching further down the chart but I'm scared of miss-counting and having to rip it out again, I'd sooner wait and get it right.

Next week I plan on having another three or four starts and then I'll work on them all in turn until the end of the month, obviously Jacobs stocking is going to take me longer than a few weeks to stitch but as long as I get the stitching done on it by around the end of September that will give me plenty of time to make it up.

I got the call from work last Friday afternoon, it was what I had expected from the off.  Redundancy.

I won't go into the all the ways that I feel hurt and betrayed by the company I've worked at for the last fifteen years, but lets just say I've shed a few tears because of it and that the Directors are not the people I thought they were.

At the moment I don't feel in the right frame of mind to go looking for another job, I've never been in this situation before and I need time to get my head round it and feel better about myself.

In the meantime I'm enjoying a slower pace to the days and as you can see, getting lots of stitching time.  I know there are going to be lots of people who loose their jobs before we are through with this pandemic and I do feel for you If you are one of those people too.  I count myself very lucky in that we didn't rely on my money but I know i'm going to miss the routine of work and the office banter.

I hope you are all staying safe and well

See you soon

-X-

Half way

Wednesday marked the half way point in the year, and what a strange year 2020 has been so far.  

Who would have dreamt at the start of the year that half of the worlds population would been asked to stay at home and put on lockdown to save lives.  At times it all seems so unreal, thankfully everyone I know has stayed safe and healthy, I don't personally know anyone who has had Covid19 although you have only to watch the daily updates to know that it is indeed real.

We can only hope that the situation continues to improve and that the next six months will be better.

Like a lot of others I'm still not venturing out too far, I still only go food shopping when I need to, and try to go when I think It will be less busy,  I do get nervous when there are too many people about and have come across people who seem to have trouble with keeping their distance.  

In a shop this week a lady asked if she could squeeze past me, I said no, we are supposed to keep a distance, she gave me a look and said, well I've got a mask on!   That's why I don't wear a mask, or gloves, to me they give a false sense of security.  I've lost count of the times I've seen people with gloves on but still touching their face, (or in one case, pulling them off with their teeth!!) or a mask pulled down on their chin so they can speak!  I have nothing against masks or gloves and would definitely use both if I had to use public transport but I'm more aware without them.

Anyway, doom and gloom aside, all this time at home has given me more time to do all the crafty things.  Last week I finished my July Calendar Girl.  I still love these girls, I think so far January and April are my favourite

These are all my finishes in the first six months of 2020.

Loved making these rainbows, and I used up a lot of my little scraps of yarn in the process.

Mine is still hanging on the front door

I've enjoyed all my stitching this year, but I especially enjoyed stitching that cute snowman 

 I didn't think I'd done much knitting until I went though my photos.  Can you have too many dishcloths do you think 😉

I'm joining in with Jolly July this year, stitching Christmas charts throughout the month.  I made a very small start on Jacobs stocking yesterday and have chosen ornaments to stitch for the grand-kids.  Apologies to those who don't like to speak about Christmas until December but most of my posts in July will be Christmas related 🎅🎄🎅 

Still no news on the job situation.  I was called into another meeting on Monday, a very short meeting in which I was told I would get a call within 48 hours with the outcome.   I thought that was it, I came home and was really upset for the rest of the day.  But there was no call until today and that was to say that there is a board meeting tomorrow and the final decision will be made then.  I know they usually have the board meetings in the mornings, so hopefully around lunch time they will let me know, I hate being in limbo.

See you soon, take care

-X-

A Tuesday catch-up

Looks like the hot sunny weather is back with us again.  I've had a lovely quiet day so far, all my chores are up to date and I've had some time sitting in the garden listening to my audio book.

Yesterday I managed to finish stitching July's calendar girl and will have a go at fully finishing her tomorrow.

I knitted five new dishcloths last week.  I'm a fairly new convert to knitted dishcloths and have developed a bit of an obsession with them

Yes, there are a couple of Christmas ones in there too 🎄🎅

I've wanted to knit the Dandelion cardigan for quite a while now so today I took the plunge and cast on.  Yarn is Drops Nord from stash

I haven't heard anything from work regarding my job.  I had to go into a meeting last Friday which didn't really tell me anymore.  There was another new position on offer which at first looked promising but I have since found out that it is more specialized role for which I do not have the qualifications.  The role of PA / Admin is no longer an option either because they have changed the goal posts and decided that the person who takes on this role will need to have I.T qualifications to assist in the day to day I.T issues .  That leaves the Service Coordinator position which to be honest I don't want.  So, It looks very much like I will be made redundant unless by some miracle they find another role I can fill.  I'm not holding my breath.

On a more pleasant note, I went for a lovely walk last week, up to the Wychbury Obelisk.  This is another local to me walk and there are several paths you can take to get to the top of Wychbury Hill, this time I took the public footpath not far from our house.

The Obelisk Is 84 feet high was built in 1747 under the instruction of Lord Littleton.  

The graffiti, Who put Bella in the Witch Elm first appeared on the obelisk in the 1970's and  refers to a local murder mystery from the 1940's

Apparently on 18th April 1943 four local lads were poaching or bird-nesting in Hagley wood and they came upon a skull in a hollowed out trunk of a wych elm tree.  The younger of the lads confessed the find to his parents and the police were told.  An investigation was launched but apart from discovering that the remains were female the body was not identified.

The views from the top of the hill are fabulous, you can see for miles and is well worth the climb

See you again soon

-X-

This post is brought to you from the new blogger interface.....

And so far I don't like it one bit.  The only reason I used to was because blogger wouldn't let me upload photos from the old interface.  I know you are supposed to be able to revert back to the old style blogger but as yet I can't see how to do that.  (If you have discovered how then do let me know in the comments).  I don't much like change so this is going to take some getting used to!

More news about change later, but first finishes.

I have two finishes to show today.  The Weathered Garden was finished Friday night, it should have been finished a few days before that but those satin stitches and eyelets, (last photo) drove me mad.  I found I had an inability to count three spaces!!

But it's done and I like it, despite the colours not being as per the photo on the chart 😕

                                                                                   

My second finish is another shawl / scarf.

My daughter, Joanne bought me the yarn for this for my birthday when we went to Yarndale last year.

The pattern is the Sandstone Shawl by Drops, a free pattern on their website and the yarn is Drops Fabel and Drops Delight.

I can't remember which stall we bought it from now, they had it knitted up as a sample and provided a link for the pattern with the yarn

At first I thought it was going to be a bit dark, but It came out way better than I expected.  It's going to be lovely and warm come the winter.

So, other changes.  After all these weeks on furlough, (is it about 12?,  I've lost track) I got a phone call last Monday to say that they are thinking about doing away with the reception role altogether.  We, me and the other receptionist, are now under threat of redundancy.

 They are making the assumption that because the calls have been low while all this has been going on that the call volume will stay low afterwards.  I really don't know what their thinking is with this.  We have both had to email with a list of our duties and there is going to be a meeting this week to decide our fate.  So, as you can imagine, lots of different emotions going on at the moment.  

There are two new positions that we can both apply for should they decide to do away with reception, I have decided to apply for both, the other receptionist has decided against applying for either.  Although ultimately I would like to carry on with my job as it was I'm not ready to give up work just yet but we'll have to wait and see.

Well, that's all my news for this week

 The weather here has changed from hot and sunny to wind and rain.  Although today and yesterday the weathermen got it wrong, we missed the thunder storms that many had and it was really quite warm and sunny again.

I hope you are all still keeping safe and well, I'll see you soon

-X-

The Weathered Garden

I dug down deep into my stash for a new start last week.  I've had this chart for so long I can't remember when I bought it or where from.  It contains two of my favourite things to stitch, alphabets and houses, so goodness knows why it's taken me so long to get round to it.

I'm using 28 count vintage country mocha and the recommended threads, so how come my colours look nothing whatsoever like the picture???

I'm a bit disappointed to be honest, I mean, you know there is going to be some colour change in the photos, but this is just nothing like!   I know I could have gone back through my threads and pulled out some that look more like on the picture but once I'd started I just didn't want to go in search all over again and I still like it despite the difference.

Something else that was buried deep in my stash, a little stack of mini solid granny squares.

There were just enough to make Bonnie a blanket for her dolls bed.

I haven't been buying much in the way of charts or yarn this year but I treated myself to a Red Work stitchery last week after seeing Katrina's post on IG.

I've never done one before but have always admired Katrina's work when she shows them on her blog.  Can't wait to get started on this :-)

This particular one comes with the design already printed on the fabric, so all I need to do is sort out the thread.

We've had lots of time sitting in the garden this week, making the most of the beautiful weather while we can.  I'm happy with how the garden is looking at the moment, I've put the cosmos in this week and still have the zinnias to do, hopefully between them they will give us some lovely colour over the summer.

The roses are just starting to appear, not many white ones on the climber just yet but the others are doing well.

Have a lovely week.

-X-