Stitchy Saturdays

Each Saturday, I will feature either something I’m currently stitching, something I’ve just finished stitching, or something I’ve just designed. I hope you’ll all join me in displaying some of your own work and leaving a link to your post in the comments below.

Stitchy Saturdays – Breast Cancer Awareness Month Stitchables

Each Saturday, I will feature either something I’m currently stitching, something I’ve just finished stitching, or something I’ve just designed. I hope you’ll all join me in displaying some of your own work and leaving a link to your post in the comments below.

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I’ve stitched a couple of items for sale to raise a little money for Cancer Research UK as part of Breast Cancer Awareness month. They’re available now from my Folksy Store.  On top of that, I’ve posted some freebie designs on my Kincavel Krosses blog for your own fundraising efforts.

For Sale at my Folksy Store (All proceeds to Cancer Research UK):

• What Cancer Cannot Do Charity Blackwork Sampler PDF – £3.50
• Think Pink Key/Scissor Fob (x 1) – £3.00 + P&P
• Think Pink Fob (x2) – £2.50 + P&P
• Think Pink Biscornu (x1) – £4.00 + P&P

Free designs to stitch for yourself:

• Think Pink Bookmark
• Think Pink
• Think Pink Biscornu
• Think Pink Key Fob
• Think Pink Key Fob 2
• Think Pink Mini Biscornu

Even if you’re not into stitching, you can help by visiting my JUST GIVING PAGE and make a donation there. Don’t forget to add gift aid if you’re in the UK – it doesn’t cost you anything extra, but it means the charity gets a little bit more.

Thank you!

Stitchy Saturdays – More Designs and Some Charity Stitching

Each Saturday, I will feature either something I’m currently stitching, something I’ve just finished stitching, or something I’ve just designed. I hope you’ll all join me in displaying some of your own work and leaving a link to your post in the comments below.

New Designs:
Design: Vampires Suck
Size: 47w x 47h
Out 3rd October
This mini subversive sampler is perfect for Halloween! Charted for a simple and classy red and black colour scheme, it’s a quick and easy gift for a vampire fan! I reckon this would look great in a coaster or hanging in a red or black hoop frame with a bit of matching ribbon.

Design: Vampires Suck Sampler
Size: 120w x 70h
Out 7th October
A lacy Gothic sampler for vampire fans everywhere. Available from my Folksy Store now.

Design: Vampires Should Not Sparkle
Size: 105w x 87h
Out 10th October
Here’s one for all those who are sick to death of The Twilight Saga (or those who are fans but like a good laugh anyway). Classic black and red for simplicity and style.

Charity Stitching:
I’ve stitched a couple of items for sale to raise a little money for Cancer Research UK as part of Breast Cancer Awareness month. They’re available now from my Folksy Store.

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month!
Please see my For Charity page over at Kincavel Krosses for links to the free charts for charity stitching, and also the link to my Folksy Store for the What Cancer Cannot Do Charity Blackwork Chart. I’ll be posting photos of stitched items there if anyone sends me any!

SAL Group
If you’re stitching my Rules For Life sampler (available from my Folksy store HERE), you might like to join the Facebook stitch-along group. There are quite a few people stitching it right now in so many different ways – the range of fabrics and flosses is stunning.

Stitchy Saturdays – October is Breast Cancer Month

Each Saturday, I will feature either something I’m currently stitching, something I’ve just finished stitching, or something I’ve just designed. I hope you’ll all join me in displaying some of your own work and leaving a link to your post in the comments below.

October is
Breast Cancer Awareness month!

Breast cancer is a subject very close to my heart, and not just because my heart is right under my boobs. I know several people who have battles breast cancer and fortunately won the war against it. As a woman who is particularly fond of her chesticles, I thought I’d draw attention to Breast Cancer Awareness Month and try to do something to help charities doing research and/or providing support for those who have breast cancer, and also the families of those who are battling it.

As a result, I’ve come up with four free designs which I’d love everyone to stitch for friends or charity – anything to spread the word. I’ve also designed a sampler which is for sale in my Folksy store. All proceeds from the sale of that design will be donated to Cancer Research UK (the ones who organise Race For Life every year).

Design: Think Pink!
Size: 65w x 24h
Free design just the right size for cards or to put in a small frame on a desk.

Design: Think Pink Biscornu
Size: 45w x 45h
This perfectly square design would make a lovely biscornu or miniature cushion ornament, or would fit nicely on a card. It’s a quick-stitch and, like all the designs I’ve created for Breast Cancer Awareness Month, features only two colours. Use up those odds and ends in your stash!

Design: Think Pink Key Fob
Size: 21w x 29h
Just the right size for a fob, whether for your keys or your embroidery scissors. It would also be great as a gift tag – just back it with pink card, punch a hole in the top and thread through a piece of pink ribbon to finish it off. These would be very quick and easy to stitch en masse using up all those little odds and ends of fabric that we stitchers just can’t stand to throw out in case they come in handy!

Design: Think Pink Bookmark
Size: 21w x 105h
Perfect for the book lover in your life. Just stitch this bookmark and slip it between the pages to show your support as you enjoy your books. Easily adaptable to make the bookmark shorter or longer, this is a versatile design that can be made to suit your requirements

Design: What Cancer Cannot Do
Size: 139w x 139h
This poem of strength and survival is so beautiful and heartfelt. Spelled out in a simple, clear font and surrounded by a blackwork border stitched in two shades of pink, this would look beautiful in a simple white frame.

It’s available at the very reasonable price of £3.50 from my Folksy Store. I’m only able to list five at a time, so if it’s not there when you visit the store, please be patient – I will relist it as soon as possible. I’m working tonight, so if it’s evening you may have to wait a couple of hours if it sells out while I’m away from home, but I promise it will be relisted as soon as I set foot through the front door.

If you do stitch any of these designs, I’d love to see photos and will create a special gallery over at Kincavel Krosses specifically for them if I get a few.

Some sites you might like to visit:

• Breast Cancer UK
• Race For Life
• Breast Cancer Care UK
• Breakthrough Breast Cancer UK

Thank you.

Stitchy Saturdays Extra…

As I was asked to design something for our February ATC exchange at the Cross Stitch ATCs Facebook group, I thought I’d showcase all the wonderful variations made by everyone who stitched them. There were two designs, one blackwork and one cross stitch, both designed so that they could be stitched on 14-count aida (or a higher count fabric) and still fit on a card the required size (2.5 inches x 3.5 inches). Take a look – I think you’ll be impressed by everyone’s creative flair!

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Stitchy Saturdays – Have yourself a stitchy little Christmas…

Each Saturday, I will feature either something I’m currently stitching, something I’ve just finished stitching, or something I’ve just designed. I hope you’ll all join me in displaying some of your own work and leaving a link to your post in the comments below.

 

I’ve been beavering away creating some seasonal designs over the last few months for my Kincavel Krosses design blog…

There are three small motifs just the right size for Xmas cards and all three of them are quick to stitch, so if you find you’re running short of time you can rest easy in the knowledge that you can stitch these three up quick as you like.

Noel Noel and Seasons Greetings are both blackwork; Xmas is cross stitch, but as simple as can be. If you have an afternoon or a couple of evenings free, you can have these done in no time at all.

The Winter Snow ATC is also small enough to use on a card or as a decoration (if you use a higher count of fabric), or you could use a larger count if you fancy it as a sampler or decorative throw cushion. And the Bah Humbug Blackwork Decoration could also be used on a card as a quick stitch.

Looking for a gift idea for the bookworm in your life? Then the Winter Quaker Bookmark might be just the ticket. This would look great stitched in a metallic blue or silver, or in a pretty variegated floss. I actually designed this with a mind to stitch it for myself – one can never have too many bookmarks!

If you’re a fan of subversive samplers, then you might like this modern twist on a traditional style. The Bah! Humbug Christmas Subversive Sampler is a fun and quirky festive design with Christmas trees, sprigs of holly and Quaker stars in seasonal red and green. And it doesn’t take long to stitch – just four days after I posted the design, Ali-cat had finished her Humbug hanging and it looks great (you can see it in the Gallery of Stitches).

However, if you prefer something a little more traditional, rather than subversive, there’s the Deck the Halls Christmas Sampler, featuring a line from the popular song and surrounded by a border of holly sprigs.

I hope you’ll enjoy these designs and perhaps stitch a few of them. If you do, please send me a photo so I can include it in the Gallery of Stitches.

Kincavel Krosses

As part of my Ultimate Blog Challenge, I thought I’d take a brief moment to plug my other blog, Kincavel Krosses.

Kincavel Krosses is the platform I use to showcase my cross stitch and blackwork charts. I only started designing my own charts at the beginning of this year, and it came out of an unlikely place (or maybe not so unlikely, now I come to think of it!).

I’m a member of Cross Stitch Forum, and at the beginning of the year, we started a group project where each of us would design a few rows of a banner sampler and stitch them in whatever order we fancied to create a work that had been contributed to by all, but stitched by each person as an individual. I rose to the challenge and designed several rows, but in order to share them with the rest of the forum, I had to download a charting programme… and then learn how to use it!

I was lucky – I happened upon a free downloadable programme called KG Stitch and found it very simple to use (I’m not exactly the most techno-savvy person in the world). Within a few days, I was experimenting with more ambitious designs and decided I really enjoyed it. The next step was deciding to start a new blog to share the designs…

My designs only happen when inspiration takes hold of me, and even then, I have to find the time in my very busy days to sit down in front of the computer and chart them (often working from a picture I’ve quickly sketched in my graph pad). They are posted regularly on my design blog.

And if you’re wondering why I chose the name Kincavel Krosses, well, there’s a story behind that too!

A few years back, my Mam bought me a title for Christmas – it was a running joke in our family that I had always thought it would be nice to be “Lady Something”  so I was delighted to become Lady Kell Smurthwaite of Kincavel (which is on the west coast of Scotland). It then made sense to spell “crosses” with a “K” to fit with the Kincavel part of the name and Kincavel Krosses was born!

All the designs at Kincavel Krosses are designed by and copyrighted to me and are absolutely FREE for personal or charitable use, although they may not be sold for personal profit or kitted up for sale. I hope you’ll all enjoy them.

Click on the logo at the top of the post to be taken to Kincavel Krosses and see the designs for yourself.

A Biscornu for May

Design: Blackwork Biscofleur by Kell Smurthwaite, Kincavel Krosses
Materials: White 14-count aida; DMC 310 floss; black tassel; black ribbon; soft toy stuffing

I thought I’d give a 15-faced biscofleur a try as I’d made a regular 15-sided biscornu before, but admired the “tulip” shape of the biscofleur. It was a lot simpler to put together than I had thought it would be.

I designed five blackwork faces and stitched three of each, with the exception of the fifth design, of which I stitched only two and replaced the third with a simple blackwork border around my name and the date.

The designs will shortly be available for download on my design blog (click on Kincavel Krosses above).

Baa Baa Blackwork Sheep Mini Sampler

Design: Baa Baa Blackwork Sheep by Kell Smurthwaite, Kincavel Krosses
Materials: 16-count white aida; DMC 310

I designed this mini blackwork sampler to hang in my hallway at home – I tried to put across a bit of a folksy feel and liked the idea of a play-on-words reference to the nursery rhyme.

A Biscornu for February

Design: Starburst Blackwork Biscornu by Kell Smurthwaite, Kincavel Krosses
Materials: 18-count ecru Aida; Red Heart 187 floss; white ribbon with turquoise stars; silver Celtic beads; Minicraft supersoft toy filling

My second biscornu of the year is a pattern which I designed myself. Because the design on the front is very intricate, I left the reverse almost completely blank with only a star motif in the centre and at each corner, and the details of my name, the month and the year. The silver beads were taken from a necklace I had which broke. They were so pretty I had to save them and I thought the silver went well with the turquoise of the stitching.

The border on both the front and reverse are stitched in two strands, but the rest of the design and the text is all stitched in a single strand.