Guess the Cross Stitch Volume 5 – round 2

There weren’t many guesses for the first round of “Guess the Cross Stitch”. Is this one too hard or is everyone just busy/bored with my blog? Either way, before we continue with round 2 I will present the guesses I’ve had so far.

Here’s what you had to work with:

 

Maia thought it might be a teddy bears’ picnic, with the checked part being a blanket.

Erin guessed a castle.

Jack thought it might be a TARDIS (I knew someone would ;-))

Kezzie thought maybe a Monsters, Inc. character or Thomas the Tank Engine – both very fitting for a 1st birthday card.

And that was it. Just four guesses this time. Nobody got it right, so on to round 2. Here’s a new photo with more completed:

So, now can you guess what I’m stitching? Answers in the comments…

Photo an hour: 17 December 2016

Saturday was the final photo an hour of 2016, so obviously I had to join in. Some of you might have seen that I posted some of the photos on Twitter when I had a wifi connection, but for most of the time I was out and about with no Internet, so the majority of these are totally new. Here’s what I got up to:

10:30 a.m. A different start for a change – checking what’s in my advent calendar (don’t worry, the kettle was already on and tea was had shortly after!)

11:30 a.m. Time for a shower.

12:30 p.m. On the tram heading to the train station.

1:30 p.m. Just arrived in Laufenburg (clock as evidence that I took my photo on time 😉 )

2:30 p.m. Cherry mulled wine in the German town of Laufenburg

3:30 p.m. Back on the Swiss side of the river to catch a train home – the train you can see in the photo is the one we took.

4:30 p.m. After a quick stop in town to pick something up, we were waiting to catch another tram.

5:30 p.m. Home, taking advantage of the brief free time to make some more Christmas cards

6:30 p.m. Another card made up and ready to post.

7:30 p.m. Feuerzangenbowle at Basel Christmas market.

8:30 p.m. Meeting a friend for dinner.

9:30 p.m. In my 2016 recap, I said I was meeting friends for fondue. Since the person who suggested fondue was ill and the rest of us had eaten it recently, I went for something equally Swiss: raclette. Yes, that is pretty much a plate of cheese!

10:30 p.m. Heading home – the window display in the toy museum looked rather impressive!

11:30 p.m. We were in for the night, so that meant time for pyjamas and fluffy socks. I was in bed by midnight so this was the final photo of the day.

Linking up with Jane and Louisa, as always.

What did you get up to on Saturday? I hope it was lovely, whatever it was.

Christmas cards 2016

A few weeks ago I shared a bit of this year’s Christmas stitching with you. Now that I’ve made a few cards, I thought you might want to see what came of some of those designs, plus a few more that I’ve stitched since then. Obviously I couldn’t take all the photos in the same place, because that would be too professional or something?! (Insert eye rolling smiley here)

Any favourites here? Personally I like the “Santa stop here” one, because although it’s simple it’s effective. And I think the JOY one came out well too.

Apologies for the quality of the photos. One day I will figure out how to take good pictures of cross stitch!

 

Christmas stitching 2016

I should really do another travel post to try and catch up, but the thought of sorting out all those photos just makes me feel tired, so instead here is some of the Christmas stitching I’ve done so far this year. All of these will be made into cards.

Do you have any favourites among these? Personally I love the snowman most, although I do also like the bauble in the “JOY”.

Now I just have to make sure none of the people who occasionally read this blog receive the pictures featured here 😉

Celebrate good times… with cross stitch

Many people will not look back fondly on 2016… they will remember it as the year of Brexit, numerous celebrity deaths and Trump making a mockery of everything. But for some people 2016 brought happy events. Pregnancies were announced and babies born (12 to people I know so far this year – and I’m not even exaggerating!). A friend got married and my sister got engaged. Here are a few of the things I’ve stitched for those occasions. Names have been cropped out to protect people’s privacy.

So far for next year all I have is my sister’s wedding to attend, but I’m sure many more things will come up by the end of 2017 that require me to get my needle out. For now though it’s all about the Christmas cards at Confuzzledom Towers!

Lights, camera…

Is it really Wednesday already? This week is going fast!

Today I want to show you the birthday card I made for my brother, who recently turned 26. He did film studies at uni and is really into TV and films, so the popcorn cross stitch that was featured in one of my magazines ages ago seemed perfect for him.

Embellished with a printed out clapperboard, that I added “Happy Birthday” to, it ended up being a card that I’m actually quite proud of.

I cut out the hole for the popcorn myself using a punch, which meant there wasn’t a back bit to put over it as there usually is with aperture cards, so I backed it using red and white checked card. I didn’t take a photo of it, unfortunately, so you’ll just have to take my word that it made the inside look more interesting 😉

The popcorn was fairly simple, but I actually quite enjoyed stitching it. It was fun doing the back stitch and watching the pieces of popcorn come to life where previously there had just been a block of weirdly shaped stitches!

Would you like to receive this birthday card?

Stitching for boys

I find it incredibly difficult to stitch for the little boys in my life, mostly because my stitching magazines tend to feature cute, anthropomorphic animals, flowers and things that are generally more often associated with girls. (Yes, I am aware that boys can like cute things and flowers just as girls can be into superheroes, cars and dinosaurs, but quite frankly most of my friends’ children are boys and they are into stereotypically boyish things, while the one little girl I stitch for is perfectly happy with fairies and cute critters. I’m not about to make something up just to prove how open-minded I am am!).

Occasionally, a cross stitch magazine does include a “stitching for boys theme”, but they’re few and far between. So when I ordered a cross stitch book entitled “Babies & Children” I was over the moon to discover it contained entire pages of dinosaurs, rockets and planes. Between that and my magazines, I was able to stitch up quite the collection for all the boys’ birthdays I needed to cater for within a 27 day period in August and September! (All my friends’ little boys seem to have their birthdays close together as well…). Here are some of the boyish birthday cards I stitched up this year.

If you took part in this year’s guess the cross stitch game, you should recognise the dragon.

Which of these is your favourite? What would you stitch for a little boy? Give me some new ideas for the next set of birthdays!

Guess the cross stitch volume 4 – the reveal

We will not be moving on to round four of this edition of guess the cross stitch because we’ve already had some correct guesses! Yes, that’s right, plural. More than one person got it right.

But before we move on with the reveal, let’s look at what you had to work with last time and your responses.

Beth from Ami im Schwabenland guessed a pony or more specifically, a rocking horse, although the head is kind of big. Possibly a rocking dragon, but I’ll stick with rocking horse – with a rider. One of those guesses was close…

Lady of the Cakes, who previously guessed a lake full of naked people, said “Oh no, the naked people have peed in the lake!“. Funnily enough, that’s not what I was stitching…

Maia guessed Yoshi, which I liked a lot.

Kerri from Life as Unusuals thought it looked familiar and maybe like Spyro, except he was purple (a purple dragon from a computer game for those who don’t know). She then went on to guess some kind of dragon and gave a pirate map as her second guess.

Elaine from I Used to be Indecisive thought it might be a seasick clown. Not quite…

BerLinda said that I was turning it into a tap-dancing frog. At least she’s consistent 😉

Charlotte said she was going to guess either Yoshi or a winged dragon, but people had already said those. It still counts if you guess the same as other people, Charlotte!

Kezzie guessed two dinosaurs fighting up a tree. So creative!

Finally, TexErin listed every green animal she could think of and asked “Is it a parrot? Or a dinosaur? Or an alligator? Or crocodile? (because we know it’s not a frog or a turtle – haha!)”

So what on Earth was I stitching? Here’s your answer:

Well done Beth, Kerri and Charlotte! It is indeed a dragon, although not a rocking one.

Thanks for playing everyone 🙂

Guess the cross stitch volume 4 – Round 3

Nobody guessed right in round 2, so we can move on to round 3. But first let’s have a look at the responses from last time.

Here’s what you were working with:

And here’s what all my lovely readers had to say:

Lady of the Cakes said I had ripped off one of her photos and was stitching a swirly lake with naked people in it. The perfect card for a little boy, don’t you think?

Sarah from Life of Ryrie guessed a witch, possibly the one from Room on the Broom. As soon as I read that I immediately saw the witch! Unfortunately, that’s not the answer.

Kerri from Life as Unusuals thought it might be a ninja turtle. The recipient would love that, I’m sure, but nope.

Zoe guessed The Grinch Who Stole Christmas. A bit early in the year maybe?

BerLinda was mostly relieved that I’m not already doing Christmas things! And guessed a tap-dancing frog. I actually love that idea 😀

Erin from TexErin in Sydneyland also guessed a frog, based on her strategy of thinking of anything green! It’s actually not a bad guess, but it’s not the right answer.

Elaine from I Used to be Indecisive thought it might be the Loch Ness Monster. Since nobody actually knows what Nessie looks like it definitely could be 😀

Finally, Kezzie guessed a leprechaun, since she was on a boat to Ireland, and also asked whether I was deliberately stitching in an obtuse order to confuse you all with colours and shapes. As if I would 😉

For round 3, I’ve added a bit more colour for you. Maybe that will help? What do you see in this picture?

Answers in the comments, via Twitter or on the Facebook page!

 

Guess the cross stitch volume 4 – Round 2

Since I’m away this weekend it seemed like a good time to put up round 2 of guess the cross stitch. But before I show you your new photo, let’s have a look at the guesses from round 1. This is what you had to work with:

And your guesses:

Cliff1976 of Regensblog guessed it was going to be a teapot.

Kezzie guessed The Incredible Hulk. The boy I’m stitching it for would love that, but unfortunately I do not have an Incredible Hulk pattern.

A popular guess was a duck. Charlotte, my friend K (via Twitter) and Emma from Ever Emma all guessed that (actually, K went with duck “because Cthulhu is probably not suitable for a small child”).

Kerri from Life as Unusuals guessed a green monster, which is actually not bad!

Finally, Elaine from I used to be Indecisive went with a dinosaur. Again a good guess, but not the right one.

Since nobody got it right straight away, we can move on to round 2. Take a look at this picture then tell me what you think I’m stitching:

Answers in the comments (or via Twitter if you prefer).