Month: Feb 2020

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February Funk and Festivities

Posted on by Kristen Gawronski

Hi Everyone

In roughly a week, we’ll be done and dusted with February and we’ll be moving into March. As I get older, I’m hearing more often from family, friends and work mates ‘where has the month gone?’ or ‘wow! the year is flying by!’ February is a short month – we all know this. But are the months and years flying by because we’re getting busier and not keeping track of our time as much as we did when we were younger?

Nostalgia and reflection is kicking in because it will be my birthday on Tuesday! Getting older doesn’t worry me. Bring on the wrinkles and grey hairs and battle scars. They show I’ve lived a life and survived it! If the wrinkles are in the right places, it shows that I’ve been able to smile at those challenges once they’ve passed.

My birthday on Tuesday also means that I’m a Pisces. Which means that I’m in a constant battle with making quick decisions because I take into consideration all aspects of situation. For example, which chocolate bar should I get from the lolly shop? There are so many options! I don’t want to feel like I’m missing out on anything because I know that all of them will taste really good. But what do I feel like? Will I regret choosing plain chocolate over the gooey caramel? What about the one with honeycomb? The taste and texture and crumbs can be pretty fun to experience. What about trying something new or a little different? What if I don’t like it? I’ll feel like I’ve wasted my money. What if I do like it?

It’s too much overthinking for a chocolate bar, I get it! That said, the image below is one of the signs for the Pisces and shows one fish swimming up and the second fish swimming down in a circular or oval shape. As airy-fairy as this sounds, the image below to me, helps to explain why it can take me forever to make a decision about some of the most simplest of things.

Image found on Pinterest. See Etsy store BirdBlackEmproium for similar images.

Another reason why I’m feeling like I’m in a bit of a funk is that I’m coming down from an amazing last week of January 2020. With this blog I like seeing how my statistics are going for the frequency of visitors, what posts people have been clicking on and which countries the visitors are from. For me, a good week or good day will be a couple of people to 7 people. Sometimes a touch more. During the week of 25th and 26th of January, Oh. My. Gosh! My stats were through the roof! I’m talking an average of 150 or so people visiting my blog in one day! What’s got me stumped is the details. For example, what prompted so many people to come and take a look at my blog all of a sudden? Why that particular week? And how can I make it happen again and keep it constant?

So what does any of this have to do with cross stitch or running or many of the other things I’ve talked about on this blog to date?

Cross stitch gets me out of my head for a while. It stops me from over thinking things. I can just relax and focus on what I’m doing. I don’t need to think about or worry about the feelings of others or if I’m offending anyone by sitting wherever I choose and keep to myself. Cross stitch combined with some really good music, tv show or Flosstube I can partly watch and listen to, is one of the ways in which I can recharge my batteries and become again the person my family and friends know and love.

Meanwhile, the challenge I’ve set for myself with cross stitch for this month, it’s got me thinking I’ve bitten off a little more than I can chew. I’m not sure if I’m going to be able to finish the current pages for my current pages by the end of this week. Even with the time I’m spending on writing this post, I feel guilty that I’m not stitching. But when I take a break from stitching, I’m then feeling guilty that I’m not writing a post for this blog. Agh, that inner turmoil kicking in again!

So, my call to action for you this week is – what can I do for you cross stitch wise? What do you want to know about? How does cross stitch get you out of your funk?

Related posts:

Posted in Cross Stitch Haul and Stitching Progress

How do you support your local craft store?

Posted on by Kristen Gawronski

Hi Everyone

By the time you’re reading this, it will have been a couple of weeks since my boyfriend and I travelled from Canberra, Australia to the New South Wales south coast area of Malua Bay and surrounds. It had been roughly 2 months since we had been able to travel down there since the bush fires and the Kings Highway being open for an extended period of time. Our aim for travelling to the coast was to have a change of scenery for the weekend and to start supporting some of the local businesses.

To us and many Canberran’s who holiday there, it’s our second home and we had seen many news reports and images on the television, and heard about the devastation from a variety of people. But the reality was something different for us as we travelled along the Kings Highway and over the Clyde Mountain. Seeing Pooh Bear’s Corner and the areas that had been burnt and the areas that had been saved was quite difficult for both of us.

Results of Google image search for Pooh Bear’s Corner

Up and down the Clyde Mountain we are accustomed to seeing this beautiful rainforest with a road that winds through it. To me at least, it’s a magical area of the drive and holds a lot of memories of going to the coast for holidays and escaping from every-day life for a little while. To give you an idea of what I’m talking about, below are two images I’ve come across on a Google Image search. The image on the left was before the fire and to the right is after the fire.

Images from Google Image search conducted on 9 February 2020

Everyone who has been involved in fighting the fires has done a phenomenal job. They have saved homes where they could and not all of the drive looks like the image on the right.

The hardest part for my boyfriend and I was seeing the reality of what the landscape and people who were there, (and many who still are) went through during the Christmas holiday break.

Interestingly, as I’m writing this post and looking out my craft room window in Canberra, it’s grey, windy, cool and a little drizzly at times. A stark contrast to last week – even a couple of weeks ago! It also means that the rain we have received – in Canberra and surrounding areas – especially along the coast – the Currowan fire that had caused so much devastation along the south coast and had joined up with other fires is finally out!

It’s going to be years before anything feels like it’s going to be back to normal for the locals along the coast, let alone the tourists like my boyfriend and I. What I’m really looking forward to – now that we’ve all gotten a heap of rain – is seeing the regeneration of the forest. The fire as been a long time coming and I know we’re all glad it’s over for now.

Supporting local businesses

So while we were at the coast, I really wanted to go to Mogo to see the how the town fared after the fire and to support the local businesses. On the Saturday, my boyfriend and I had lunch at our favourite cafe in Mogo and I got to stuff myself silly on an iced chocolate and ham and cheese toasted sandwich. It was really good!

One of the things I was also relieved to see was that the Mogo Trading Post was still standing! I had been really worried that it had been one of the stores that had burnt down. Whenever I step into that store I feel relaxed and it smells really good. I love the smell of the incense, soaps and candles they have and seeing the different gifts they have, ranging from jewellery to crystals and semi-precious stones, home-wares and clothes. I was able to get some really nice presents from there!

The other place I was relieved to see at Mogo was the Rosemont Patchwork Shop. I absolutely love this store. The owners are so lovely, helpful and kind and they stock an awesome range of patchwork and embroidery materials and kits and gifts. What makes this place unique is the sewing machine museum that’s attached to the store. I love it! Every time I have visited the store, I have always found the majority of what I’ve needed and many other things I didn’t know I needed, but had to have! This time around, I knew I wanted to purchase a bucket load of DMC threads for some patterns I’ve purchased in recent weeks. Below are images of my haul…

Threads for ‘Autumn Castle’
Threads for ‘Craft Room’ by Shannon Wasilieff
Threads for ‘Excuse this mess’ by Shannon Wasilieff
Threads for ‘Fight like a girl’
Threads for ‘Koi Pond’ by Shannon Wasilieff

Thankfully I had my boyfriend with me and that he is really tall and has long arms. He was able to reach some of the taller shelves for me to get the threads. By the end of it all, we walked away with about 120 threads! I still need to pick up some more threads, but I’m pretty happy with my haul because I was able to support the business.

How do you support your local crafty store?

To me, purchasing goods from a store is the best way to support a business. The next best thing is to spruik it. How do you support your local crafty store? Especially when times have been tough or you may not have been able to afford to shop there?

Related posts:

Posted in Uncategorized

What’s your pick of the bunch? Flowers and Fruits Cross Stitch

Posted on by Kristen Gawronski

Hi Everyone

Before I jump into this week’s post, I just want to say Happy 1 Year Anniversary! It has been 1 year since I signed up to WordPress and started this blog. I had been so nervous about starting this blog and actively putting myself out there in the blogging world. So I just want to say thank you very much to my followers for sticking around and checking out my posts and hello to any new comers!

Fruits or flowers?

If you had to pick one type to stitch, would it be fruit or flowers? Why?

For me, it would end up being flowers…

Flowers and how gardening isn’t my thing

I admire people who find gardening relaxing and are regularly changing things around in their gardens. To me, flowers and plants can be nice to look at and smell, as long as I don’t have to do too much with them. The plants need to take care of themselves – within reason – because there’s other things I’d rather be doing!

That said, without people who have that strong desire and passion to garden, we may not have any or many green spaces to hang out in or have inspiration for many of the beautiful floral, garden and horticultural related cross stitch designs.

Meanwhile, when I was in my early to mid 20’s, I was interested in renting an apartment that realistically, I wasn’t going to be able to afford and keep my head above water at the same time. If I had been able to afford it, one of the plants I wanted to own was a lily that produced flowers like the pattern I stitched below. Though, I’m not sure how well it would have survived had my financial circumstances been different!

Lily – Designer currently unknown

I stitched this flower from a magazine I had in my collection for many years and within the last few weeks, I’ve donated the magazine to the bush fire relief. So unfortunately I’m not sure who the artist and designers are or which magazine I got it from.

When I had first stitched this flower, I had thought that I would turn it into a card for someone. But as time progressed, I never got around to making it into a card and I’m still working on improving my card making skills! So instead, I turned it into a pin cushion lid on top of a container that holds my pins for sewing.

Side view of pin container with pin cushion lid

I used some styrofoam as the cushion part and Mod Podge glue to stick it all together. The container is from Big W, that originally held cotton tips – 400 hundred of them! It’s taken me years to get through them to get this result!

Meanwhile, what floral patterns have caught your eyes over the years? If you’re looking for inspiration, below are some designs I’ve come across on the Net that I think are beautiful!

SA-Stitch

At the moment I can’t get enough of the designs that are on the sa-pattern website. All of the designs on there are beautiful! One of the patterns that has really caught my eye is the Lilacs, designed by Averina Elena/Lena Averina and the artist is Irina Khimich as shown below. Underneath the Lilacs design are others that have really caught my eye and hopefully there will be enough time for me to be able to stitch them all!

‘Lilac’ by Lena Averina – available on sa-pattern.com
‘Basket with Forget-me-nots’ by Zamorina Alexandra on SA-Pattern.com

Now I know that technically, I should have this image in the fruit section of this post because of the lemons. However, lemon blossoms smell really good!

‘Birdie with lemons’ by Svetlana Sichkar – available on sa-pattern.com

NonStopStitch

Meanwhile, on NonStopStitch’s Etsy store, there’s a beautiful spring flower bouquet to stitch…

‘SpringTime’ by NonStopStitch – available from NonStopStitch’s Etsy store

Cross stitch fruits

One of the things I’m finding really entertaining with writing this section is that I don’t like eating a lot of fruit. Mostly because I don’t like the flavour of many fruits. For some fruits like strawberries it’s about the seeds. For others like oranges and many citrus fruits, I really don’t like the smell of them, let alone the taste and bits of it getting stuck in my teeth.

That said, if any of you stitchers are like me, I can’t go past something that is colourful and looks fun to stitch and is well designed. Which is where many of the following designs have caught my eye…

Victoria House Needlecraft

There’s something about the way The Fruit Collection (artist/designer unknown) are designed that I find aesthetically pleasing. If only I ate more fruit!

‘The Fruit Collection’ – available on the Victoria House Needlework website

Everything CrossStitch

Meanwhile, Everything CrossStitch has some beautiful fruit cross stitch patterns like the Strawberry Kitten pattern below by Heaven and Earth Designs (shown below). How cute is it!

‘Strawberry Kitten’ by Heaven and Earth Designs. Found on the EverythingCrossStitch.com website

What about a photo converted to cross stitch?

Have you every taken a photo (or seen one) of a flower or fruit or seen an image of one or the other (or both), that you’ve thought would make a good cross stitch picture? What about the images below?

‘Purple Wild Flower’ by Kristen Gawronski
‘Wildflowers’ by Kristen Gawronski
‘Jindabyne Flowers’ by Kristen Gawronski
‘Flower’ by Kristen Gawronski
‘Lavender’ by Kristen Gawronski

Alternatively, do you have a pattern in your stash that you’ve been meaning to stitch for ages, that could fit within the scope of fruits and flowers in February?

Until next time, happy stitching!

Posted in Uncategorized

February Finishes and Something Funny

Posted on by Kristen Gawronski

Hi Everyone

Over the last couple of years of watching Flosstube, I’ve found many flosstuber’s talking about Stitch-May-nia and New Year, New Starts, 24 hour stitching marathons and similar playing on words for many months throughout the year. With these things in mind, I’m aiming for a few ‘F’ themed things for February for this blog and my cross stitch that may also help you and hopefully inspire you to do something similar with your stitching!

A few weeks ago, I talked about my aim of finishing some pages of the projects I’m working on because I know I’m not going to be able to fully finish any of them! I’m hoping that this is a reasonable task to achieve considering how much of each page I need to complete for each project. However…February for my family also means a bucket load of birthday celebrations! We have my Dad and sister in the space of 2 days. A week later is my boyfriend’s mum’s birthday and a week after that is mine! Somewhere in-between all of those celebrations are birthdays of friends and a colleague at work. Who would have thought that February could be such a social month for such a short month!

A challenge for you, a challenge for me…

What ‘F’ themed stitching, that’s PG (a rating that’s applied to movies, games, television shows in Australia) / above board, could you do? Is there a funny quote or picture you’ve been eyeing off for ages, but haven’t gotten around to stitching yet?

Funny February Suggestions

Considering everything that has been happening in the world over recent months – even years – we all could do with a really good laugh to try and relieve some stress and feel better for a little while. Also, Valentine’s Day isn’t everyone’s cup of tea and unfortunately the statistics are there to show it. So lets bring on the funnies and have a really good laugh!

Subversive cross stitch – need I say more? We can say so much with just one word or mash-up of words to project a feeling of the time. The links below will take you to some pages that will hopefully make you laugh and inspire some stitching:

What about your favourite comedy or a song that makes you smile or laugh out loud every time? For a long time, I’ve loved Garfield and reading the comic strips. For me, it’s the dry sense of humour of Garfield that I like the most.

Catango Cross Stitch kit from MyBobbin
‘Teamwork’ by Peter Underhill via Arts and Designs

I also like showing my boyfriend funny pictures of dogs and clips of them getting up to funny things like doing mad runs around the backyard or at a dog park – especially if other dogs get involved and they’re all running around madly! Which also means that I’d be showing him pictures like the ones below that can be purchased fro LoLaLotta’s Etsy store:

Funny Pugs range from LoLaLotta’s Etsy store

Fast February?

I’ve entered myself into the 5km event of the Canberra Times Marathon Festival and my aim is to get as close to the 30 minute mark as I can. This year the course has changed, and thankfully it’s easier because it’s a lot flatter and I’ve run a similar course when I use to work on the southern side of Lake Burley Griffin.

The challenge at the moment is getting myself outside running! I’ve found many excuses not to run – some of them legitimate, like it being too smokey or too hot. However, I should use that as an opportunity to get to the gym instead and run on the treadmill to keep myself on track. If any of you have tried running on the treadmill, you may understand why focusing on the ‘dread’mill isn’t always easy!

That said, in recent days, I’ve put together a spreadsheet of all the races I’ve participated in since 2013 and the times I’ve gotten for 5km, 10km and 14km. I’ve found it inspiring and motivating to see how I’ve progressed from running 5km in 38 minutes 29 seconds through to 31 minutes and 15 seconds. At my peak, I had been running 5km nearly every day of the week – Friday’s were my day off from going to the gym and running. My motivation during my peak had been to beat my previous times and to lose a lot of the weight I had gained when I started going out with my current boyfriend. I had relaxed too much in our relationship and I had gained 20kg. Thankfully I was able to lose that weight through a combination of running, group and one-on-one sessions at the gym and changing what I ate.

Well, I hope that this has given you some inspiration and you’re able to get some finishes happening for February!

Until next time, happy stitching!