Boos Mummy

 I've been keeping up with my TAST, not faithfully I must admit and a couple of the weeks had to be done in one sitting. I've enjoyed it though, some weeks I've done the Beyond Tast stitches as I've loved the look of them and others just the basic one due to other commitments.  Next year for the first time since 2012 when I started doing the TAST challenges I'm going to have a break and try something new. I'm going to put 2021 in the centre and give it a wash to get rid of the guiding lines but here are some pictures of my TAST pie.   TAST 2021

 Take a Stitch Tuesday this month has some well known stitches in it. I've used some of them over the years as border stitches and over joins on crazy quilting. The weather in March has been very unusual. We started off the month with dreary skies and heavy winds before it suddenly changed to wonderful blue skies, the sun shining and the flowers starting to pop through the ground. Yesterday on the last day in March we even hit 21° it felt absolutely wonderful...of course today being the 1st April and a bank holiday weekend here in the UK we're back to grey skies and drizzle 🙄 So here is my slice of pie for March.... Week 9 - Couching Week 10 - Chevron Stitch Week 11 - French Knots Week 12 - Cretan Stitch

 The stitches for this months Take a Stitch Tuesday had a couple of my old favourites... Feather Stitch and Herringbone.  The herringbone I've used a lot over the years in things like leaves, it just fits so well into the shapes and contours. Feather stitch is great for crazy quilting, it goes over the 2 pieces of fabric amazingly and also looks wonderful as greenery in scenic pieces or as seaweed, sea grass in ocean projects. However the weather for February has definitely been either very wet or snow and ice. To put that into my TAST I wanted colours that represented the mud, the snow, the wet fields and paths that I've trodden as I take my allowed daily walk whilst in lockdown. After coming home one morning and taking off my very muddy wellington boots I dug out my threads. Seeing the tracks from the tractor and peoples footprints in the very muddy field had given me an idea for the Feather Stitch.  I decided that I had to have a representation of that for this month. ...

 Another year means another Take a Stitch Tuesday which is run by Sharon Boggon over at Pintangle. I'll admit here and now that last year my TAST totally fell apart, with everything that went on from March I just didn't have the time or the incentive. Having 3 teenagers suddenly doing schoolwork from home and then a husband being furloughed and being off work for weeks wasn't exactly helpful for relaxing needlecraft! This year I thought I'd do something different, I wanted something that wasn't exactly a picture as I've done previously but something that I could just do a few stitches each week and it would be a journey through the year. In the crochet world people have been doing a lot of temperature blankets and I thought something similar but on a much much smaller scale would be just the thing. I decided that each month would be done in colours relating to the weather here in Yorkshire during that month. January has been easy as it's been chilly, grey, r...

Week 5 already and this weeks TAST stitch is Herringbone. This is an easy stitch once you get into the rhythm, although it's a lot easier on evenweave rather than plain fabric for freestyle unless you've marked out the fabric beforehand. I decided as the wind has picked up a lot in the last few days that we'd have a windblown Sue holding hard to her hat (just like I was this morning!)  The herringbone is a trim on her dress and couldn't resist adding a few french knots to her hat :-) As well as Sue I've also started my stitch sampler project, not all the TAST  stitches will go on here but I'll definitely use it for some of them. I found a Six Strands Sweet thread called Ellies Raspberry Truffle in the bottom of my fabric drawer and thought the contrasting colours would look good for this stitch.

This weeks TAST stitch is Detached Chain stitch, or otherwise known as Lazy Daisy. Now for those of you who know me or have followed my blog for a while you'll know that this is definitely not one of my favourite stitches. It's not hard to do but I really don't like it 😣 it does make lovely flower petals and leaves though. So for Sunbonnet Sue this week she's holding a flower made of the detached chain, the centres are french knots (that I absolutely love doing!).

This weeks TAST is Fly Stitch. This is a fun stitch and is amazing to use for leaves or just decorative. Once again I've stitched up a Sunbonnet Sue but this time have given her a little flower, the stem is fly stitch but also around the centre french knots and then the edges in a different shade using fly stitch.  She's also got a little bit of it on her bonnet. I'm trying not to put too many different stitches into these Sunbonnet Sue's as each week the focus will be on the TAST stitch so that eventually they'll look like a stitch sampler. I've not used the stitch on my quilt square yet as Lukie was off school ill on Wednesday so I'm a day behind all my chores. Thankfully he felt a lot better on Thursday morning so went back to school (he hates being off) but then that evening I was back at school but for Boo's Mentoring meeting. I can't believe my baby Boo is choosing his options for his final 2 years in secondary, doesn't seem two...

This weeks TAST stitch is the Buttonhole. Sharon has a great page on how to work this wonderful stitch just click here .  I'm sure a lot of us have used buttonhole for many things over the years. It was one of the first stitches I learnt as a child making a table runner on 11ct Binca fabric aged 7 using wool. Nowadays I use it a lot to stop fraying on the edges of fabric and as a cute stitch for some of the quilt squares. It's great as grass on samplers as you can vary the length easily whilst still having the ground. Here's what I've done with my buttonhole this week: Sunbonnet Sue is back but with a buttonhole ribbon on her bonnet and apron. I've used the stitch to hold down the bottom of the ribbon from last weeks stitch and also using 2 shades of brown to form the bottom of a muddy field.

Yes it's that time of the year where the TAST  challenge starts again.  Week 1 is Running Stitch. As I'm also trying to complete a couple of my quilted bits to finally do something with them I thought I'd use them as practice pieces as well as do a series of Sunbonnet Sue squares with all the stitches. So here are my two pieces for week 1. I really enjoy the TAST pieces of work as not only do I actually get a finish but it gives me a change from my regular stitching.  If you fancy having a go yourself then head over to Sharon's page and take a look. Just click on TAST at the top of the page and it'll take you there.

The Take a Stitch Tuesday (otherwise known as TAST) has started again (yay!) if you want to join in hop over to Sharon's site where you'll find all the details. Week 1 was Fly Stitch and week 2 was Buttonhole Stitch. I've decided to do a bit of a band sampler with the stitches on some fabric from my stash so I can see how they work up and it'll be my version of a stitch dictionary. Then I brought out one of my quilt blocks that I've made using some of my daughters old baby clothes, I'm eventually going to put these blocks together to make a memory quilt for our bed as it'll all be made of bits of the kids clothing. After I'd stitched 2 of the button hole wheels I realised they looked like a dolls pram that my daughter had for her baby annabel, the frame is fly stitch and I appliqued a bit of her white fabric to make the hood. Snowflake fly stitch as this dark fabric was from one of her winter outfits when she was 10mths old. The...

I've been working hard on my Noah's Ark project lately, finally I can see some actual progress. The Supertwist thread used for the rainbow has really been a pain  challenge to work with but perseverance with lots of encouragement from Friendly Stitchers has had me plodding along.  Not long to go now before I'm on the last 3 pages at the bottom.... Don't faint either but I've finally finished my Purple Flower project. Sat down yesterday with DH who had the day off work and put the last 2 petals together. Stitches used in this are :- Up and Down Buttonhole Chain Bullion Knots Running French Knots Couching Basque Pistil Sheaf Pekinese A quilt square as well. The centre piece was part of my TAST challenge and I just quilted round it. (seriously must start putting these together soon!) I finally managed to complete part 3 of Around the World in 80 Stitches by Papillion Creations as well...here she is And I couldn't resist putting a p...

During July I've managed to get some work done on Around the World in 80 Stitches and Castles In The Air by Papillion Creations Finally after many months I've finished part 3 on CITA, here's what it's looking like... I've nearly caught up with ATW, part 4 was released during July and I managed to finish part 2 during the week. Must admit that I didn't like the Mordvinian Stitch at all and frogged it after using 2st of white changing it to perle.  Started on part 3, this part has 2 versions; a cutwork and a speciality. I've decided to use both so  the side petals will be in speciality and the vertical petals in cutwork. I've also been working on some of the   TAST challenges, you notice I say 'some'. That's because some of the stitches I've used so frequently in lots of different ways that I will admit that I've skipped that week and waited for something that I've either not done before or that I need practise on. Here...

This weeks TAST challenge is Wheatear Stitch. This is a beautiful stitch that is easy to work and looks very effective. The wing is stitched using Wheatear Stitch This is the whole design so far... The Great Escape designed by Abi Gurden The Stitch Specialists If you want to join in with the TAST challenge visit http://pintangle.com/  

This weeks TAST challenge was Chain Stitch and this is what I stitched for the challenge.... As I wanted the Chain Stitch to form the sea I did it using 2 colours in my needle. It's the first time I've used 2 colours at once rather than swapping them, easy to do once I got the hang of it. The design is by Abi Gurden and she designed it for me in 2009 as part of an exchange with my Friendly Stitchers Yahoo Group. This is the first time I've stitched it using other stitches rather than cross stitch.

Here are weeks 1-6 on my TAST stitch dictionary, still have to do week 7 yet. This is what I made during the week and incorporated Fly, Cretan, Feather Detached Chain as well as some French Knots, stem stitch and Tulip Stitch. Last week I had already been busy stitching up this hanging for our daughter after I refused to let her have my Great Escape Owl. It already incorporated some of week 7's detached chain stitch so I was pleased. If you want to join Sharon in the TAST (Take A Stitch Tuesday) click and it'll take you to her site. She's also on Facebook which is where I found her under TAST 2012.