EmnEllie Cross Stitch Blog

  Photo by  Ray Hennessy  on  Unsplash Happy Monday! “April showers bring May flowers,” is how the saying goes. But so far here at the Castle, it’s been April  and  May showers! Not that I’m complaining about rain- I love a rainy day. This year has been strange for my garden. I planted a bunch of seeds, but only got my okra to germinate. 100% germination too! But the peppers and eggplant refused to germinate. So I went back to the drawing board (or seed container in this case) and placed the new batch of seeds in a paper towel. I sprayed the paper towel with water, placed it in a plastic container, and left the container in a sunny spot of the Castle. Over the next few days, I made sure that the paper towels stayed moist. After that, I planted those seeds in a seed tray. Well, the paper towel seemed to work wonders for them! I’ve got Italian Eggplant! Thank goodness too, because I adore Eggplant Parmesan. Now it’s just a waiting game for the bell peppers. W...

Photo by Alice on Unsplash   Happy Monday! Do you collect buttons? Let me put that question another way; do you have a button tin? In the Castle there’s an ancestral button tin that’s filled with buttons from garage sales, from family members, clipped off of coats that were on their last legs, and from trips to Hobby Lobby or Michaels. I think that a button tin is an essential part of every house. What if you need a new button? Go to the tin. What if you want to add an accessory to a finished piece of cross stitch? Go to the tin. As the years go by you’ll amass quite the collection! I recommend using a cookie tin for button storage; cookie tins give your button collection a bit more gravitas. More of that, “ephemera is here,” feeling. Plus you have an excuse to eat cookies. Win-win! Here’s a very interesting and informative post about Czech buttons. For instance, did you know that the Czech were famous button makers? I certainly didn’t.  Here's the link to the article. Moving...

  Photo by Lightscape on Unsplash Happy Tuesday! Have you seen any auroras lately? A few days ago there was a solar storm that caused these beautiful lights to appear in the sky. According to an article from Space : This time, skywatchers around the world were treated to dazzling aurora borealis displays that reached as far south as Colorado and New Mexico. In Europe, auroras were spotted as far south as France and Germany. At the other end of the scale, the aurora australis was spotted as far North as New South Wales' central west, Australia.  Definitely click on that article link, it’s got so many gorgeous aurora pictures. No auroras were spotted here above the castle, unfortunately. Even though we didn’t see any astronomical light show, we did have a unicorn sighting. I have the pictures to prove it too:  Three legs, a tummy, and a tail. So far so good! Hopefully by the next blog post, I'll have started stitching the head. I have a confession to make- I really love wa...

 Happy Friday! I am having a very happy Easter, and I hope you are too. The other day, I was deeply disturbed to learn of a new-to-me Pepsi flavor... Peep flavored Pepsi. Absolutely not. Nope. Never. Mind you, I've never liked Peeps anyway, but to mix that and Pepsi? No thanks. Here's an article about it from Food & Wine: Pepsi's Peeps-Flavored Soda is Back Besides finishing the right hand side of this band (yay!) I've also started stitching the unicorn. Voila: Hoof, tail, and a bit of his rear. Also, check out that flower and clover. I like the way the flower at the top is bright red. The top and bottom part of this band is wonderfully repetitive. It's quick to stitch, and looks amazing when it's done. This time I have a movie recommendation for you. It's called, "Sachetorte." It's not only the name of the movie, but according to Wikipedia it's also: [A] chocolate cake, or torte, of Austrian origin Once you watch the movie, you'll...

  Paolo Uccello, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons Happy Monday! It's been over a week since my last post, and since then I've made some pretty big progress on Medieval Menagerie. To see the dramatic change, here's my last WIP update picture:  Medieval Menagerie by Fox and Rabbit Got a good look at where I was? Good! Now here's where I made it to since then. Drum roll please... Medieval Menagerie by Fox and Rabbit  Hurrah! Got a band finished! It's amazing how much stitching time you can get in when you put on a podcast or an audiobook. More pictures: Medieval Menagerie by Fox and Rabbit Those stags were so fun to stitch. For the next band, I decided to start on the right hand side, so I would start stitching the Unicorn first. When I think of Unicorns, I go down this train of thought about the TV series Inspector Lewis and Italian Renaissance painter Paolo Uccello. The Wikipedia page of his painting The Hunt in the Forest  has this tidbit that makes my train of...

 Happy Monday! It was a little difficult to put away Nikolai last week. Once you get into the flow of stitching 10 x 10 squares, it's a little weird switching gears and going to a non full coverage WIP. However, at the end of my first full week of stitching on Medieval Menagerie I'm pleased to report that I'm enjoying stitching Medieval Menagerie as much as I enjoyed stitching Nikolai! Instead of working 10 x 10, I'm working motif by motif. My goal is one motif finish a day (unless it's a big motif, then I'll work the motif bit by bit). Here's my progress so far: That flower and vine were a joy to stitch. The flower pot looks very curly. Doesn't that DMC 115 make it glow? Lately, I've been adding some new listings to my Etsy shop. If you're interested in browsing my new charts, the link to my shop is here. There's really nothing like a nice, cold cream soda. It's been one my most favorite sodas since I was a little girl. It's crisp an...

Happy Monday! I'm so happy with the progress I've made on Nikolai this Winter. It's been so fun to see first his coat, then more of the sky, and finally the horse head appear. Here's what he looked like when I picked him up at the beginning of Winter: And here's what he looks like now:  That's pretty good in my opinion! Those creams, lavenders, and blues were so relaxing to stitch these past few days. Now, Nikolai can go back into his project bag until next Winter, knowing that his horse has a head. As for my next WIP, I've decided that Medieval Menagerie is next in the Q Snap. Here's what my progress is on it so far:  This one will be my WIP until June. In June, I'll pull out my American Flag WIP, but after the Fourth of July, Medieval Menagerie will come back. Click this link here to see what Medieval Menagerie looks like when it's done. Now, I might be slightly over-ambitious, but I think that I have a real possibility of a finish on this one...