Lili's January Ornament

Hello!

My January ornie!!

Design: Samplers Not Forgotten - Crown on a Pumpkin

(JCS2015 - Halloween Collection Book 2015)

Fabric/Threads: 40 count Sand Linen / DMC floss

Hugs,
Lili
(my blog: Stitching Basket)

Loretta's January Winged Creature

Black Crow by Maria Warmke of The Stitcherhood (JCS 2015 Halloween Issue)

Happy Stitching!!!!

Loretta

January - Winged Creatures.

I love crows.

Threadwork Primitives

Enchanted Crow

★ ★ ★

Cheryl's January Winged Creature

This month I stitched a freebie owl chart from Aliolka.  The owl was stitched on 14 ct plastic canvas and backed with felt.

I really enjoy making ornaments from plastic canvas as they are easy to finish, very sturdy, and flat - which makes them easy to pack away when they aren't being displayed.

Happy Stitching!

Felicia's January Winged Animal

I love finding creative patterns and when I found this bat cupcake I fell in love. It is stitched on 14 ct pink Aida. This pattern is from Dinha Ponto Cruz.

Kaye's January Winged Creatures .....

A spooky hello to you all, here is my January Winged Creature, and it is a Finished Finish - double yay! My first finish for the year.

I made it up into a simple soft ornie.

I was lucky enough to find the perfect backing fabbie in my stash.

A close up of the stitching.

Design: Part of "All Hallow's Eve" by Prairie Schooler (Book *180)

28 ct linen "Rain"

Floss: DMC 310

A very quick, enjoyable stitch.

hugs, Kaye

Rita's January Winged Creature

Happy New Year, everyone!

I chose one of the bats from a biscornu (freebie) design from the old "tantes zolder" site.

The lighting wasn't very good for the picture but here he is:

April's January Stitch

Happy New Year everyone!  Hope everyone got what they wanted for the holidays and you are getting lots of stitching done. 

I put the last stitch in my January stitch tonight, so I am sorry for the wrinkles. I stitched Nevermore from The Prairie Schooler. It is from Book #196.  I loved the Raven and felt it fit the theme for this month so well.  I used a piece of fabric from my stash and the called for DMC.

Can't wait to we more finishes for this month.

F is for Furies, Fairies and Frankenstein - Revisited

When we first started this blog I made a series of posts beginning with each letter of the alphabet starting with A.  Unfortunately, they ground to a halt after L.  So in honour of The Alphabet Club hosted by Chiara I have decided to resurrect the original posts and link up each month with the rest of the Alphabet Club posters.  To learn more about this SAL follow the Alphabet Club link to Chiara's blog.

F is for Furies from A Dark Alphabet designed by Julie and Becky's Note of Friendship blog.

In classical mythology the Furies were avenging deities, fearful goddesses from Tartarus who avenged wrong and punished crime. Usually the furies refer to three sisters, Alecto, Tisiphone, and Magaera, children of Gaia and Uranus.  They were placed in the Underworld by Virgil and it is there that they reside, tormenting evildoers and sinners. However, Greek poets saw them as pursuing sinners on Earth. The Furies are cruel, but are also renowned for being very fair.

You might have been surprised by the next F - Fairies, not really very spooky or Hallowe'eny you might think.  Sorry, Tink, this blog is not for you!!

This is the sort of Fairy you want at Hallowe'en:

Mystic Stitch - Bad Faerie 

After all, traditionally fairies were not the saccharine twinkle toed good guys, they were something to be feared, they would steal your babies and leave a changeling in its place.  Of course, they are dangerous to adults too - if you stumble across a fairy ring in the woods, don't step inside.  Some stories say you will die at a young age, others say you will be spend the night only to return to find a hundred years have passed.  Still more stories say you will dance until you drop dead of exhaustion.

And here's one from my own stash - Nora Corbett's Trick or Treat Fairy.  She was orginally in Cross Stitch and Needlework magazine in September 2008.  I believe you can get hold of a copy by contacting them direct.

Our third F is for Frankenstein.  I looked everywhere for a cross stitch of Frankenstein but couldn't find one anywhere.  This is the closest I could get:

Nerdy Cross Stitch - Scientist Pig

Because the name Frankenstein belongs to the creator of the monster, Dr Victor Frankenstein.  In the book by Mary Shelley, the creature is simply called Monster.  And there are hundreds of great cross stitch designs for Monster!!

I love this one, based on Boris Karloff in The Bride of Frankenstein:

Danielle Sayer Etsy Shop

If you prefer cute, you might like this one:

I am not a Doll Etsy Shop

Or the Happy Couple for a quirky Wedding Sampler?

Lady Beta Etsy Shop

It's been a bit of an Etsy-fest this post.  The smaller crafters seem to be best for the more quirky designs.  Of course there are plenty of Frankenstein's Monster charts in the JCS Hallowe'en specials so maybe you will choose one of them for your Monster subject?  I'm also looking forward to seeing what people choose for the Bad Fairy theme in September.

Carla's January Finish - Winged Things

Jo gave me an idea when she posted her lovely bats this morning!  This idea then led to another idea..my Halloween ornaments will all hopefully look like they are badly stuff with straw.  They aren't stuffed with straw, but they are stuffed badly to give them a kind of creepy rustic look.

It's the Raven and Spider from the freebie Pattern of the Month Series May 2015 "Halloween" by Stoney Creek.

Somewhere on Etsy I found the perfect ornament tree for the Halloween ornaments and if I can find it again I'll grab it up as these will go amazingly well on it.

Thank you Jo for the inspiration AND for helping me have a first finish of the year along side you.

Jo's January Finish - Winged Creatures

This month's theme is Winged Creatures.  That could be Owls, Ravens, Crows or in this case - Bats.

I have stitched this month's design already!  Only 18 hours into the New Year and I had a piece to show.  This is actually the header from a Just Nan design called Counting Bats.  The whole piece is a rhyme a little like the magpies' One for Sorrow.  You will have to wait for each month to see what each  number means.  By a strange co-incidence each section of the design ties in perfectly with our monthly themes*

Because I seem to have altogether too much time on my hands today I have made a little collage using extracts from the main design and rotating them in Paintbox.

The design is stitched on 28 count lilac line, it's a much nicer colour than in the photos.  I'm using AVAS silks for the main design but switched to DMC for the over 1 words.  The AVAS seemed too "bouncy" and wasn't lying nicely.

So, I've set the example - what have you got lined up for this month?  Do you like the themes this year?  I've made them a little more open to interpretation this year.  eg Winged Creatures can cover a lot more than simply saying "Bats".

* of course it's a co-incidence, anyone would think I set the themes deliberately to fit in with this piece!

Cheryl's December Ornament

Itsy Bitsy

by Charlette Dockens

I chose this chart to stitch for December as it is just so darn cute!  I stitched it on 14 count plastic canvas and backed it with felt.  A quick and easy finish to end the year.

"Itsy Bitsy" by Charlette Dockens of Charlette's Collectibles is featured in the 2015 Just Cross Stitch Halloween Issue.

November & December Done and Dusted!!

This is a real shoe-horn post.... I have finished off November's creepy tree finally... and added December's free choice and combined them to be a big hurdle finish on this design - "Dancing in the Moonlight" by Praiseworthy Stitches.

So here we are.... the creepy tree finished.... along with the raven, cat and resident ghosts!

"Dancing in the Moonlight" - Praiseworthy Stitches

I still need to add beads and a bit of back stitch but that will be done at the end when everything else is stitched.

Did you notice my lovely new needle minder?  Just perfect for Halloween stitching - a spider in his silvery blingy web!

So that's me done for 2015.... now I just need to start planning for my 2016 stitching!

Before I go though, I just want to say thank you to Jo for hosting such an awesome blog for all of us that love to stitch Halloween...  It has been great fun seeing all the great stitching over the year as well!

Til we meet again in 2016, have a wonderful Christmas and New Year!  See you all again soon!

December - Free Choice.

Sweeping Cobwebs, The Prairie Schooler

 ★ ★ ★

Jo's December Ornament

Remember the Blue Ribbon Design's Creepy Tree from November?  Well, I liked it so much I stitched all eight blocks and added another BRD to make a Box of Treats:

Here are the side views:

You can read all about it on my blog post here - Serendipitous Stitching

E is for Eek, Eisoptrophobia, Ectoplasm and Enchantment - Revisited

When we first started this blog I made a series of posts beginning with each letter of the alphabet starting with A.  Unfortunately, they ground to a halt after L.  So in honour of The Alphabet Club hosted by Chiara I have decided to resurrect the original posts and link up each month with the rest of the Alphabet Club posters.  To learn more about this SAL follow the Alphabet Club link to Chiara's blog.

E is for Eek from A Dark Alphabet designed by Julie and Becky's Note of Friendship blog.   There are lots of things in this picture to make you go "EEK!" from spiders to ghosts and bats.

One friend of mine was told that to keep spiders away you should place a conker in each corner of the room.  So every time we visited in the Autumn there were little piles of conkers all over the floor as the children wanted to play with them.

Alessandra Adelaide - Spider Banner

I found a great list of Hallowe'en related phobias while searching for Things That Make You Go EEK including this one:

Eisoptrophobia - fear of mirrors, or seeing oneself in a mirror 

E is also for Ectoplasm -  a supernatural viscous substance that supposedly exudes from the body of a medium during a spiritualistic trance and forms the material for the manifestation of spirits.

Mill Hill - Ghost Dance

And when you have ghosts, who're you gonna call? 

GHOSTBUSTERS!!

Wee Little Stitches

The final E is for Enchantment, the act of putting someone (or something under a spell).  Sometimes used as a curse (Sleeping Beauty's Enchanted Castle) or as a Love Spell, we also use the word to describe something which captivates our attention - "your stitching is enchanting!"

Teresa Wentzler has to be the Mistress of enchanting designs and here is one fittingly called The Enchanter:

Teresa Wentzler - The Enchanter

Teresa has this to say about the design on her website:
This piece was designed in response to numerous requests for a "wizard". Since I am an avid reader of fantasy, inspiration for this project was certainly not lacking! The challenge, of course, was to come up with something original: ideally something that was a synthesis of my favorite impressions from all that I'd read and/or seen. I chose to show a young wizard (mage), perhaps an apprentice, studying and practicing his art. Exactly why I decided to show this aspect instead of a grander portrait of a wizard in full regalia doing something appropriately fantastical I'm not sure. Perhaps it's because I feel the process of "becoming" (growing in knowledge) is a journey that never truly ends....


And here is another Enchanted design -

Joan Elliott - Sleeping Beauty

Which designer enchants you most with their creations?

November-Creepy Tree

I didn't finish the ornament I intended to have for this month but, I quickly stitched this tree. After seeing Jo's entry I remembered and added another ornament to my Behind the Gate project.

Behind the Gate

Blue Ribbon Designs 

Gwen

Cheryl's November Creepy Tree Ornament

"Little Owl Sampler"

by Knotted Tree NeedleArt

Pattern was featured in the 2012 Just Cross Stitch Halloween Special Issue. Stitched on a scrap of 14 count "something or other" with leftover bits of floss.  Just for fun, I used a lighter shade of purple for the letters that appear in my name.

 

Themes for 2016

Thank you so much for all your comments on the post about Plans for Next Year.  I am so pleased that so many of us want to continue and you're enjoying the blog.

We had some great suggestions for new themes for 2016 and as ever it was quite hard to choose.  The favourites from this year are Black Cats, Pumpkins and Ghosts so they will all feature next year.  I also amalgamated some categories into one (Bats and Owls have become Winged Creatures).  I have included two free months so you can stitch your choice even if it didn't make the list this year.

So here are the themes for 2016:

January - Winged Creatures
(Bats, Owls, Crows and Ravens etc)

February - Mummies and Monsters

March - Pumpkins

April - Ghosts

May - Spiders and Bugs

June - Free Choice

July - Witches' Accessories
(things like brooms, hats, boots, cauldrons etc)

August - Spooky Words

September - Bad Fairies and Wicked Queens

October - Black Cats

November - Skeletons and Skulls
(including Sugar Skulls and Day of the Dead themes)

December - Free Choice

You can be imaginative with your choices, the theme doesn't have to be the main feature of the ornie as long as it is in there somewhere!

I also have a larger piece which features many of the themes so I'll be showing that too.

Lisa had a great idea of theming the months according to the alphabet.  We thought this would fit in very well with The Alphabet Club posts.  I have done A-D so far and December's will be E.  So if you have any spooky stitching which fits in with the letter E please email me a picture before the 1st December.  It could be a designer beginning with E or a design title beginning with E or an E feautured in the design (Spooky Elephant anyone?).

Just to finish off a wordy post, here is Trixie The Hallowe'en Witch from Brooke's Books looking very elegant:

November - Creepy Trees.

Halloween Tree: Spook.

the Trilogy

★ ★