Vacation Cross Stitch

Well the summer is almost over here, it hasn't been a great one, far more rain than sunshine & really busy keeping the twins entertained all day, everyday.  As you can imagine, not an awful lot of sewing or stitching has been taking place over the last 6 weeks.  I did managed to take some Cross Stitch on our holiday, I even managed to finish a piece too :)

First up is Lizzie*Kate - Normal Is Just A Setting On The Washer.  This was started on 4th January 2012.  The first pictures shows my progress when at the start of my holiday & the second picture shows it completed.

Next up is Lizzie*Kate - Boo Club!.  Again the first picture is progress at the start of our holiday & the second is progress at the end of the holiday.  I'm totally unsure if this will be complete by Halloween of this year but you never know!

Another busy couple of weeks ahead while we prepare for the twins to start school & after that it'll be business as usual & the sewing frenzy will begin.

Don't forget that you can keep up-to-date with what I'm doing on my Facebook page too, I'm there almost every day (between playing with dolls houses, cars, lego & playing referee!) with little snippets of sewing, cross stitching, quilting, selling, fabric & all the fun stuff.

www.facebook.com/LisaGCreations

Happy Stitching :)

Back From My Holiday

What a wonderful break I had. Everyday was spent on the top deck of a ship in the glorious sunshine. I had my stitching in one hand & a cocktail in the other :-)
The trip wasn't without it's moments. When we got to our stateroom our luggage was already waiting at our door so we decided to unpack straight away. It was at this point that I found I had packed the incorrect bag of cross stitch :'( I had sorted out two small WIP Lizzie Kate designs to complete & the Lizzie Kate Boo Club series to make a start on. I was slightly gutted as our whole trip was based around us doing lots of stitching. The good news is that I did at least pack some stitching, it was my other Lizzie Kate SAL.... Christmas By The Letter.This is what it looked like at the start of the cruise & this is what it looked like at the end:

I have one other piece of stitching to share & it's not cross stitch but instead a mini quilt. I know I haven't posted a picture of Roberts finished quilt yet but thats because I still have some more finishing to do but it is getting there... promise. My newly finished quilt is to double up as a logo for my new blog/shop/thing which I've been (slowly) working on. It'll be called Lisa G Creations & I hope to sell a mixture of the little things that I make & with any luck some of the bigger things that I intend on making too. I hope you like my little quilt, it took me a week of evenings to complete.

I used a charm pack from moda called Boutique by Chez Moi, a fat quarter of cream with gold stars for the centre panel & plain cream for the border, binding & backing. I managed to get hold of a fat quarter of one of the red Boutique fabrics to use for the "L". Eventually I'd like this to hand in my studio behind my work station... well one of my workstations :-)

More to share but it'll have to wait until next time.

Happy stitching :-)

Possibly My Shortest Post

I'm off on my weeks Stitching Holiday with my mum... Bring on the cruising :-)

Back next week, happy stitching loving people.

One Week.... Three Hats :-)

Hat Number 1
Earlier in the year my friend Franney & I went to the Sandown Park craft fair & I was lucky enough to be granted a wish of a new hat made by Franney... all I had to do was pick the yarn :-) This week my hat was completed, our Wednesday sewing day saw the final stitches knitted up on my new hat & it was trying it on time...... Perfect... I love it. The colours, the size, everything. It's wonderful, what do you think?


Hat Number 2
This week the weather over here suddenly took a turn for the better, someone switched on summer. Yesterday we saw temperatures of about 25c. I fished out the twins sun hats & sun cream & then went on the hunt for my sun hat. Well I couldn't hunt forever as I was due out, for a picnic in the sunshine. I headed down to town & on route to the picnic bought myself a nice new sunhat.... to start with a picked up a white version but then just as I was about to pay I spotted this version (the photo makes it look lighter than it actually is) & thought it was much more "me". I totally love it & I do believe it will look fabulous when I'm on my holiday next month... yay, just 30 days to go :-)

Hat Number 3
I think you'll just have to wait until after my Race For Life to see hat number 3.

Happy Sunshine Stitching :-)

Good, Bad & the Ugly - Friday

Friday is a 3 fold day... where most of the busy-ness took place.

Up at 4am, yes thats right 4am (not that it matters much to me as I'm usually awake every hour on the hour atm). The parents arrived in their bus & it was off to the airport. We get to take them to the airport & then have the use of their vehicle for the duration of their holiday, provided that is that we pick them up again after their holiday! For those of you that don't know (or realise!) that this is the day that Greg & I would have been flying off to the sunny caribbean for a relaxing 10 day cruise (thank you very much parents). We'd have been accompanied by other members of the family as we celebrated both parents 60th birthdays. Alas... for us.... it was not to be (thank you very much twinlets!). We are over it now... no really we are, we get babies, not just the average singleton but the more special twin variety & for that we are grateful & how ever much that I (we_ would have loved to have gone on the cruise I do remind myself that there are people that are unable to have one baby, let alone two at the same time... for that I am eternally grateful.

For those of you that are in the know... the un-named wench was as expected... nuff said!

Ok... so thats the bad & ugly covered :-) Now for the good!!!

From the fun & frolicks of Heathrow we headed into & across town to The Baby Show... back to the Excel centre for us at Docklands. We got there at 8.30am, show doesn't start until 9.30am. Today we decided to up our ticket for the car park, rather than 2 hours we paid for 5 hours, worked out cheaper than doing it the other way. We had checked the show details the evening before so had an idea of how big it was, what stands we wanted to see & what else was on offer. Being a subject that neither of us have any real experience of we decided it would take us a while to work our way around. Oh how right we were. After spending our initial hour relaxing with a bacon bagel & orange juice we made our way into the show & starting our browsing. We collected every freebie we could, signed up for a ton of junk mail & made mental notes about what we'd like to purchase before leaving. Well a good 4 hours later & a few hundred pounds lighter we left the show & managed to fill up the entire boot space in the parents Galaxy. Lots of new toys for the new babies..... so much fun :-)

Happy New Year

Well it's here... 2008... seems like only yesterday we were in New York for our summer holiday, how time flies.

This year will be one of the most... erm.... adventurous.... challenging & hectic that I believe we'll have.
The flat it up for sale & we are desperate to move, the sign is still well & truely planted in the front garden so long may it continue. Fingers crossed we'll be inundated with phone calls from our agent with potential purchasers lining up to get a view at our spacious rooms & tranquil garden enterance.
The shop is still an enormour thorn in my side at the moment. The property has been available for a bit & while we currently have one potentially interested party (for the business too) we are still hopeful of more interest.. you can never have too many people interested! Back to the business sale, we are waiting on the accountant (still) & this is most frustrating. Without that information our buyer is unable to progress with either the business purchase or building signing.

Random comment: I love my new mouse mat & wrist rest :-)

Work in the new year is going to become increasingly difficult for me. I am already larger than the average pregnant person at my stage & it seems that this isn't going to slow down.. good for babies... tiring for me!! I have already reduced my working hours from when I start back on Thursday. I will open from 10am to 4.30pm with the shop closed all day on Weds & Sundays. It takes me longer to do anything at the moment & I am finding that I am breathless quite often, thi is something I've never had to deal with in my life so it's a bit of a change. There will also come a time when I am unable to serve my customers adequately by going up & down a ladder (something which many think I should have stopped already!) but then the bags would just be all over the place & thats not my idea of a tidy shop. When running down my endless list of hospital appointments I also noted that with so many & on a weekly basis sometimes the shop will start to spend more time closed than it does open..... I only hope we get progress on the sale before too much longer.

We've been discussing now for quite some time if we should find out what "flavours" we'll be having when it comes to our babies. The answer to that changes on a daily basis. With one baby we certainly didn't wish to know until it was born so that we had a delightful surprise, well hey ho... surprise... it's two babies. We've had the biggest surprise of all so would it now be more prudent for us to find out what exactly we're having so that we are better equipped to plan what we'll need to purchase (apart from house & car!) to accomodate our little brood? Sometimes yes, we'd love to know... other days we just aren't sure we'd like to know. The likelyhood is that we will eventually find out because I have another 4 scans booked so it'll become almost impossible to miss. I wouldn't want to tell anyone though.... i'd still like it to be a surprise for everyone else but when you know something that everyone else wants to know it can be difficult to keep it to yourself......... a dilemma which will no doubt continue until the morning of the scan... 7th Feb!

I've started my 2008 Stitching Challenge for the group. I designated two designs, both nice & new. One is Under The Arch by John Clayton, reminds me heavily of Pride & Prejudice so I can't wait to get that one stitched up... thats on 28 count evenweave. My second choice is to be a new kit that the parents bought me.. Street by Michael Powell, it has to be my favourite design of his & I think all of his designs are either love it or hate it, you either like the style or you don't, I like some of them but this is my fav.. it's on 14 count aida (annoyingly it comes with Anchor threads & I hate them but I really can't be bothered to switch them to DMC's as I have to make some progress on it today for it to qualify for the challenge)
My UFO challenge pieces are Welcome House by Cinnamon Cat.. I know this was last years design but I just didn't get it finished so here it is again. The second here will be Who's Watching Whom by Dimensions which it works out was started & shelved in 1999 so it'll be good to make some further progress on this long awaited design.

Enough for now I think.... need a cuppa!!!!

This time next week....

Friday, October 5, 2007, 12:15 PM

...we'll be in sunny Portugal. AND in case you are wondering I have checked the forecast (she says, quickly looking again!) ok so the 10 day forecast has it at 22oC from the day we arrive.. I can live with that. Not stifling hot & not cold either although anyone that knows me well will know that I'll probably be cold no matter what.

My stitching has been going well lately. At home I'm working on "Under The Arch" from Heritage, it's growing quite nicely & will most likely be the project I take on holiday (if indeed I can be bothered to take one on holiday). In the shop I have the "Welcome House" which is making good progress, recently started on the top section which is the last part. Updated image on gallery this afternoon. I also have the HAED Dragon Riders which I had planned to do week on/week off but with the Welcome House making such good progress I have continued with it so no image to upload on that one yet.

Warcraft has taken a bit of a backseat the last week or 2, so many other things to be done that take time it is truely difficult working out how to fit it all in but we shall do what we usually do, get back into it with a vengence I'm sure.

Lunch time soon, nice Orzo pasta salad for me with slow roasted tomatos. Washed down with some West Wing season 5.... luv it!

Lise xx

Tis The Season....

Friday, September 7, 2007, 10:02 AM

... no not that season... holiday season. Yes thats right it's holiday season for the Butler (& Gillies) family once again.

Mum & dad headed off to Cork in Ireland this Wednesday just gone. Happy anniversary to them for 6th September, how they managed to put up with each other for so long is beyond me but there you go.

Monday Lee, Sharon, Jackie & Nephews are off to Centre Parcs for what I believe to be a week but don't quote me on that. Happy birthday Lee for Sunday, you'll have to wait until 23rd for your gifts but I know thats not a problem as you'll have more than enough to deal with when it comes to holidays, computers, dvd's, ironing & Alex starting school... eek.... scary!!

We have 34 days until we head off to sunny Portugal for our annual visit with Scott & Kerrie. This time we won't be staying at Colina with them but Scott has very nicely found us a villa in Carvoeiro with our own pool etc etc. Jessica & Patricia will also be coming along so we should have a highly entertaining few days.

Now all we need is to work out how to get to the airport!!!!

Lise xx

The Ever Growing Fabric Mound

Wednesday, June 13, 2007, 10:19 AM

Ok so we've been back from holiday what 2 days now.

The unpacking is now complete although I have no idea why this appears to take such a long time & although our nice new suitcase & hand luggage bag are empty & in their rightful storage area... you know the spare room... the entire contents of the cases is now in the lounge so that just looks like someone broke in & trashed the place.

I have managed to "play" with some of my new toys. Went out yesterday with the new Ipod & the Nike+ trainers for a nice walk, was very good, very impressed with this amazing little device that sends info from the trainers to the ipod & then when you get home you plug the Ipod in & that sends all the info from your walk or run to Nikeplus.com where you can track your progress, ie distances & times etc. Like it lots.

Haven't dragged out my new "stash" yet of stitching goodies, am saving that for when the lounge is in some kind of order & then I shall sit & look at everything that I bought... can't wait

Until that time I have to deal with the laundry which when it comes to washing isn't really that bad, you chuck it in the machine & an hour later hey presto, if the sun isn't shining then it does tend to hang around for a bit on the clothes airer & then comes the worst part.. yep.. you got it.. the ironing... the time grows nearer to deal with the ever growing fabric mound!!!

Lise xx

Night time!

Sunday, June 10, 2007, 09:09 PM

We're off out..... should probably be in bed by now but when you're wide awake you just have to go a wandering.

We'll see if we can grab a night time piccie of the Chrysler building as it's about the only one we don't have a picture off we have almost everything else in New York but thats what happens when you give Gregory a new toy!

I'll be looking forward to picking up our last Starbucks & bringing it back for while we finish packing.

Won't be long, ttfn!

Lise xx

The end is nigh

Saturday, June 9, 2007, 05:21 PM

Ok, so we're knackered now. Just been for the last walk of the holiday, to Macy's, Times Square and into Planet Hollywood. We popped into the M&M store, I tried to get the album but they only sold sweets - shame.

It's still really hot and humid, and my nose is now peeling. Off to the room now before a farewell drink in the hotel bar. Have to be up at 3:00am to get to the airport on time - oh joy.

See you all soon.

Greg & Lisa

PS John, I got the 18-85mm USM IS Lens with the camera, it's great!

Hot! Hot! Hot!

Friday, June 8, 2007, 01:53 PM

My word it's extremely hot today. It's almost 2pm, just got back to hotel from a morning out.

Visited Chinatown... hated it.. it smells funny & just didn't like it.
Little Italy... appears to have been taken over by the chinamen!
Soho... just "average"

Rode the subway lots, it's kind of fun, much easier to negotiate than the London Underground but I guess thats reflected in the fact that there aren't as many stops.

Haven't been able to post any piccies on here yet, my cable is at home & haven't tried Gregs new one. The internet is free in the hotel but you are limited to time so can't stop, must fly.... lunch time!!!

Lise xx

New York - It's Rubbery

Thursday, June 7, 2007, 12:46 AM

Japanese tourists - don't you just love 'em!

Went to the Statue of Liberty today, on the boat I assisted with a family photo. They were very pleased, but I couldn't understand a word. Got a great photo of about 100 people on an organised trip from Japan, all wearing matching baseball caps, and camera's in hand. Took a stroll through the financial district to see the building site that used to house the World Trade Centre. Strange place now, with flowers and tributes still being stuck to the fence.

On from there we had the biggest meal ever in Hard Rock Cafe, and have struggled to do anything since. Now it's time to try to walk off some of the fries.ttfn.

Achey today!

Tuesday, June 5, 2007, 05:24 PM

Another busy day, feet aching today, lots of walking & lots of spending.

Started with a trip to the Museum of Natural History, wasn't interested in the museum bit, just the planetarium show, enjoyed it lots. We got the subway there, was better than I thought, no mugging, no guns, pretty boring ride up town really. One thing that was different, although being in the subway was hot the trains themselves were air conditioned so it was as cold as you like.... a far cry from Londons Underground!

Other places visited so far today:
Bloomingdales-----shopped
Apple store-------shopped, magnificent building, check it out online.
Nike store--------shopped

Saw some really posh stores, the Nike store is next door to Tiffany & Co & opposite YSL & Chanel.. very posh area.

Up to the suite for a rest now before we debate doing the Empire State this evening or not... did I mention we have 9 pillows on the bed with some in the cupboard too... madness!!!

Lise xx

Monday

Monday, June 4, 2007, 03:42 PM

Monday @ 15.40.. ish. It's finally stopped raining. Some local tropical storm created lots of rain that started last night. The rest of the week is "supposed" to be nice.

Headed off to the stitching store today. The Port Authority Bus Terminal was something else indeed, they have like over 400 different gates with buses departing all the time, it was chaos. The ride to the store was about 35 minutes & the driver told us exactly where we needed to get off, it was, as the shop owner had emailed me, almost right outside their door. I shant mention exactly how much I spent but it was enough

Had an afternoon nap & now heading back out on the town for some shopping, photography & Starbucks.

Lise xx

New Toys

Sunday, June 3, 2007, 08:57 PM

As Lisa said - "We're here!"

As I didn't bring my camera, I had to go buy one today.
We went to B&H Cameras, a Jewish run electrical and camera store - one of the largest in the world.
The cameras and telescopes were amazing, and I had to be very restrained not to spend too much.
Unfortunately, I failed and am now the proud owner of a Canon Eos 30d, complete with zoom stabalising lens, 4GB CF card, tripod, bag, etc,etc. I guess I've just taken up a new expensive hobby Tried to get discount, but was told "No ma boy, our products are already at discount prices"I'll be posting some piccies in the gallery when I work out how to get them on to this PC. Best go now, and RTFM.

p.s. we should have brought a brolly!

Evening... Morning... Afternoon... whatever!!!

Sunday, June 3, 2007, 07:49 PM

It's Sunday evening here in wet New York... at least I think it's Sunday & it could well be evening, either that or the cloud is just toooo dark.

Flight here was good, an hour delay, the stupid people at Heathrow took ages loading our luggage, but it only took 6 & half hours to get here so that was fine, we had plenty of space too, very nice indeed. It was some ridiculous UK hour that we arrived but only 10.30est so the night was young.. apparently!

Hotel..... well the less said about that the better, will share more later once I can get on the photos that we took before checking out of the hotel after only 18 hours & moving a little up town to a fantastic Marriot Residence Inn, brand new & a stones throw from Time Square.

Today was B&H Cameras... Gregory can share more about that but you can guarantee we'll be going back before the week is out. After that was Macy's.. The Biggest Department Store In The World. Thank you Miss Lotay for recommending concierge for our discount card, most useful

Off to New Jersey tomorrow... my fav shoppping date.

Finished at the bar for the evening, off to our Studio Suite now for some relaxation before brekkie in the morning.. yes.. this Marriott comes with breakfast included

Lise xx