Cross Stitching Orders!

One of my previous jingle cubes

Very recently I was asked to design a small owl motif for a stitcher who was making a bookmark for a friend. I obliged and was very pleased that she liked it.

Today, another friend asked me to make a couple of jingle cubes for her friend who has just had twin girls! I’m chuffed to ribbons that anyone thinks enough of my designs and my stitching to want me to do such things, as I really do love doing them.

So, now I’d better get my stash out and start stitching! And, of course, I’ll be showing off the finished cubes when they’re all done.

Easter Eggs-Change

Stitched on ecru 14-count aida in DMC 111 variegated floss

I’m hosting a stitching swap over at Cross Stitch Forum which has me rather eggs-cited. We’re all stitching an egg to set dimensions, everyone has free reign over the design and the finish of the pieces. All the stitching has to be finished in time to send so that they will arrive for Easter (which is 4th April this year) and of the twenty participants, five of us have a nice, big “DONE” next to our names. It’s lovely to see the pictures trickling in and seeing how everyone has stitched their own eggs.

I designed my own blackwork egg and stitched it in DMC 111 variegated floss, which is a lovely gold-to-brown toned thread. The intention was to make it look a bit like a golden egg without having to use metallic gold floss as I hate using the stuff (it’s a bit of a faff, it frays and I always end up with my stitching looking a total mess). For my finish, I settled on a needle book, so I stitched the exchange details on the piece for the back and sewed two flaps of felt onto each of the inside pieces. Then I whip-stitched everything together, adding a piece of ribbon at the open edges so that it can be tied closed. I’m quite pleased with the finished piece and can hardly wait to see the rest of the eggs all stitched and ready to eggs-change!

Book Review: The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson (Millennium 1)

The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson (Millennium 1)
Rating: abandoned unfinished
You might like this if you: like media-hyped novels; aren’t easily disappointed by media-hyped novels

Synopsis:
Forty years ago, Harriet Vanger disappeared off the secluded island owned and inhabited by the powerful Vanger family. There was no corpse, no witnesses, no evidence. But her uncle, Henrik, is convinced that she was murdered by someone in her own family – the deeply dysfunctional Vanger clan. Disgraced journalist Mikael Blomqvist is hired to investigate, but when he links Harriet’s disappearance to a string of gruesome murders from forty years ago, he needs a competent assistant – and he gets one: computer hacker Lisbeth Salander – a tattoed, truculent, angry girl who rides a motorbike like a Hell’s Angel and handles makeshift weapons with the skill born of remorseless rage. This unlikely pair form a fragile bond as they delve into the sinister past of this island-bound, tightly-knit family. But the Vangers are a secretive lot, and Mikael and Lisbeth are about to find out just how far they’re prepared to go to protect themselves – and each other.

Review:
First off I want to say I did not finish this book, but I think I gave it a very good chance – I read over 200 of its 530-ish pages. After hearing so many people sing its praises, I wanted to enjoy it, but it completely failed to impress me on every level.

One would expect something to happen within 200 pages of plot, but on this occasion one might be forgiven for believing nothing had happened at all. Small, seemingly inconsequential things happen, but there was little, if anything, of excitement. I wanted at least one or two small thrills to keep me hooked into what was happening, but I was sorely disappointed.

None of the characters seemed to me to be particularly “real” and they all felt like caricatures – the rebel computer genius; the journo with integrity; the evil big business man; the old guy with a kooky family – and I found I didn’t identify or sympathise with any of them. I didn’t find any of what I read to be all that original. The characters have all been done before and I had my suspicions about the missing girl from the beginning. I strongly suspect (highlight to view potential  spoiler) that she’s alive and well and living somewhere else and that it’s she who sends the flowers to her uncle on his birthday. I found I didn’t much care why she left.

The amount of character back history given in the middle of what’s happening “now” was far too irritating. It jarred and annoyed me. Part of the problem is that I didn’t actually like any of the characters. Actually, I found them very annoying – especially Lisbeth (who I suspect I’m supposed to like) and Blomkvist (who I’m pretty certain I’m not supposed to find plodding and pedestrian). As they’re the two main characters it ruined any enjoyment I might have got from the story.

I really do wonder what all the hype is about (I came to the book knowing nothing about it except that a lot of people are banging on about it and the sequels – honestly, nothing more than the title!). To be perfectly honest, the only reason I continued as long as I did was because I’d already invested a fair bit of time in getting that far with it and could see myself getting very angry for having wasted the time if I didn’t finish it. It didn’t pick up and I wasted even more time on it.

I didn’t even care enough about Harriet to find out if my previous prediction was correct.

Apologies to all those who enjoyed it, but I found it pretty dire. I’ll be getting shot of the book pretty quick-smart and I won’t be bothering with the sequels.

Everybody Hurts – Helping Haiti

I couldn’t believe they chose this song for the Haiti relief charity single! Honestly – “Everybody Hurts”? Yes, they do – they’ve been buried under tonnes of rubble! I honestly thought it was a sick joke when I first heard about it. They could not have been less sensitive in their choice if they’d tried.

I’ll admit, I also get a bit narked that all these rich stars will do a charity single to sell to the general public to raise money, but precious few of them actually give much of their own cash. John Travolta is my hero at the moment. He flew his own plane filled with relief aid packs over there himself. That’s a man with integrity.

I’d have far more respect for the stars involved in this project if there was a proviso that all the participants also give a hefty chunk of their own money to the cause as well.

Anyway, it’s nice that they’ve all got together to do another Band Aid kind of thing, but I really wish Mr Cowell had thought a bit harder about which song to use.

UFO Week: 1st – 7th February

This UFO week, I had planned on completing N, O and P on Xander’s alphabet afghan, but as I was so busy doing other things (playdates for Xander and a killer migraine were two such examples) I only finished N and O. This little set-back means my schedule for UFO week now looks like this:

• March – P, Q and R
• April – S, T and U
• May – V, W and X
• June – Y and Z
• July -  iron-on interfacing and fringing

N is for Necklace and O is for Octopus

A Lovely Gift of Stash

A very generous gift from Ana Luisa!

Our Postie was much earlier than usual this morning (he usually gets to us some time between 10am and 1am, but he was here by 8.30am) and through my narrow letterbox tumbled an unexpected package. It had travelled to me from across the sea and contained seven skeins of DMC floss in various shades of green (which is my absolute favourite colour, by the way!) and a very long length of red aida band with metallic gold edging.

This bounty was sent by Ana Luisa, who is a very talented crafter of stitching and crocheting (take a look at her blog and you’ll see what I mean – gorgeous stuff!). Thank you so much, Ana Luisa! I will certainly look forward to allocating my lovely gifts to new projects. I suspect some of the green may well be put to use in my Bibliophile Bookmark, which I plan to stitch very shortly, and more of it to go towards the Cross Stitch Forum Band Sampler SAL. And I plan to design a beautiful blackwork bookmark design especially for some of the red aida band. Watch out for the photographs as I stitch my projects!

Thanks again. It was such a lovely surprise this morning and it really made my day.

Shiny New Tooth!

Xander enjoying his first seesaw ride a couple of weeks ago
Check that cheeky, toothy grin!

We’ve been waiting and watching so closely for Xan’s bottom left molar to pop through the big bump it’s making in him gum, that we completely missed his bottom right molar coming through until this morning!

Really, we should have expected that as every time a tooth has come through, it’s looked like the one on the left will pop through any moment and then the right one beats it to it. Anyway, that makes a grand total of nine teeth with another on the way. Our gorgeous little boy is getting an even toothier grin!

Film Review: The Addams Family (1991)

Film: The Addams Family
Released: 1991
Starring: Raul Julia; Angelica Houston; Christopher Lloyd; Christina Ricci
Director: Barry Sonnenfeld
Rating: Excellent

Synopsis:
For 25 years uncle Fester has been missing. An evil doctor finds out and introduces a fake Fester in an attempt to get the Adams Family’s money. The youngest daughter has some doubts as to the sincerity of the new uncle Fester. The fake uncle adapts very well to the strange family. Can the fake doctor carry out her evil plans and take over the Adams Family’s fortune?

Review:
In many ways, the Addams family themselves are actually the perfect family. Think about it – take away the creepy kookiness and you have Gomez and Morticia who, after many years of marriage, are still desperately in love with each other; they adore their children,Pugsley and Wednesday, and Wednesday shows almost genius levels of intelligence; the whole family love one another and care about each other’s welfare. It’s a case of “the family that plays together, stays together”.

This film adaptation of the classic TV show (and.before that, the comic strip) is fantastic fun. Raul Julia, now, sadly, no longer with us, was born to play Gomez Addams, and there is great chemistry between him and Anjelica Houston as his statuesque wife, Morticia. Could there have been a more perfect choice for Fester Addams than Christopher Lloyd? He relishes every second of the role! The wonderful Christina Ricci simply IS Wednesday Addams.

The plot is well constructed, the direction marvellous and the performances hilarious. This is a family film that EVERY family should watch, and the Addams family themselves are perhaps what every family should aspire to!

Film Reviews: Get Smart (2008), Jurassic Park (1993) and Inkheart (2009)

Film: Get Smart
Released: 2008
Starring: Steve Carell; Anne Hathaway
Director: Peter Segal
Rating: Very good – well worth a look

Synopsis:
Based on the sixties hit TV series Get Smart follows the perils and adventures of Agent Smart (Steve Carell, The 40 Year-old Virgin) as he is sent on his most dangerous and important mission: to thwart the latest plot for world domination by the evil crime syndicate known as KAOS.

When the headquarters of secret U.S. spy agency CONTROL is attacked and the identities of its agents compromised, the chief (Alan Arkin, Little Miss Sunshine) has no choice but to promote his ever-eager analyst Maxwell Smart, who has always dreamed of working in the field alongside his idol Agent 23 (Dwayne Johnson aka The Rock). Smart is partnered instead with the other agent whose identity has not been compromised: the lovely but lethal veteran Agent 99 (Anne Hathaway, The Devil Wears Prada). Chaos and hilarity ensues in this action-comedy.

Review:
If you enjoyed watching Carell in The Office: An American Workplace or The 40 Year Old Virgin or Evan Almighty, then you’re going to love this comedy homage to the spy and slapstick genres. But it’s not just physical comedy – it’s surprisingly intelligent, and the comic timing of the cast is superb. Perhaps surprisingly, there is a lot of great chemistry between Carell and Hathaway and they make for a very convincing, if initially reluctant, double act.

The laughs come thick and fast, there’s never a dull moment, and even The Rock (Dwayne Johnson) shows that he actually has some talent in comedy as he plays it hammily straight to great effect. It’s a fun way to fill an hour and 45 minutes – you could do a lot worse.

Film: Jurassic Park
Released: 1993
Starring: Sam Neill; Laura Dern; Jeff Goldblum
Director: Steven Spielberg
Rating: Excellent

Synopsis:
Steven Spielberg directed this blockbuster thriller based on the popular book by Michael Crichton. Millionaire John Hammond (Richard Attenborough) asks two dinosaur experts (Laura Dern and Sam Neill) to act as consultants on his entrepreneurial endeavor–an amusement park with DNA-cloned live dinosaurs as the main attraction. The paleontologists, along with a mathematician (Jeff Goldblum) and Hammond’s two grandchildren, takes a run-through tour of the park. But soon the joyride turns to terror when an impending hurricane, an unscrupulous engineer (Wayne Knight), and the rebelling dinosaurs begin to destroy the park. Spielberg considered the most popular star of the film to be a computer-generated Tyrannosaurus rex. The special effects in general are spectacular.

Review:
This is a fine example of a film that hasn’t really aged at all. The effects that were state-of-the-art at the time still hold up and the dinosaurs still look real 99% of the time. The cast all put in sterling performances – even Dickie Attenburgh couldn’t ruin it with his hamminess, and the kids were surprisingly good (I’m not usually a fan of children in movies, although there are a few exceptions to that rule). The unlikely pairing of Laura Dern and Sam Neill really worked; their banter seems natural and they’re pretty convincing as dino-experts. For me, though, it’s Jeff Goldblum that adds the extra sparkle and class as the rock-star-looking, chaos-theory-loving mathematician with wit and style.

It doesn’t stick rigidly to the source material, but it’s certainly faithful to the spirit of the book and this excitement-filled blockbuster is one to watch and watch again. Go on, dust off the DVD that you’ve had sitting on the shelf for years now, pop it in the player and enjoy it all over again – you know you want to!

Film: Inkheart
Released: 2009
Starring: Brendan Fraser; Andy Serkis; Paul Bettany; Helen Mirren; Jim Broadbent
Director: Iain Softley
Rating: Excellent

Synopsis:
Mo has the special talent to bring characters out of books. One night he brings out three characters from Inkheart, a story set in medieval times and filled with magical beings. Capricorn and Basta, two villains, and Dustfinger, a fire-eater. Now, 10 years later Meggie discovers the truth and it’s up to her to escape Capricorn’s evil grasp.

Review:
I happened upon this film by sheer chance and upon realising what a stellar cast it has decided to watch a while and see what it was like. Before I knew it, I had watched to the very end!

It’s a gorgeous fantasy tale of stories within stories with engaging characters (both “real” and storybook), and the seemingly outlandish idea of Silvertongues who can read characters out of books and into the real world seemed strangely plausible. All turned in wonderful performances – from Paul Bettany to Andy Serkis, Jim Broadbent to Helen Mirren; the cast list reads like a who’s who of British talent which complements the American blockbusting addition of Brendan Fraser to ensure success in the US market.

I’ve not read the book, so I don’t know how faithful an adaptation this is, but I now WANT to read the book, so if that’s any indication of how good this movie is, then you can count it as one of the better family films of recent years.

Blackwork Biscornu Design

I’ve been playing around with a cross stitch programme and had a go at creating a design for a blackwork biscornu. This is my first attempt at using a computer programme for cross stitch designs – I usually just sketch things out on graph paper, but that’s not exactly handy for uploading the designs to the web and sharing with other.

I think I’ll stitch this one for my February biscornu.

If you like it, please feel free to use it and send me a photo of your finished piece.

Now for the permissions bit:

• This design is copyright to Kell Smurthwaite.
• You may use, copy and/or share this design, and you may change it to your liking for your own use. You may not sell this design in any form or use it to make up kits.
• You may sell the finished piece for charity, but you may not sell it commercially.