McLaren & Hamilton – cross stitch

This is the scheduled three-weekly post for the SAL that I’m doing with several other crafty blogs.

Hooray! It’s finished. One cross-stitched Lewis Hamilton in his McLaren F1 racing car. The last section was stitched while binge-watching Nashville.

I’ve really put in some hours on this over the past week. I did the final few stitches last night as I was determined to finish it in time for the SAL update. It looks a tad wonky but that’s probably because I pressed it really quickly to try to catch the last of the natural light for a photo. It’ll straighten up once I frame it. (whenever that may be)

I had my little helper with me several times while working on this. He’s very good when I’m stitching and apart from the odd half-hearted swipe at the dangling threads, he pretty much ignores it and goes to sleep.

I’m now torn between starting a new project for the SAL, pulling out yet another old abandoned project, or maybe moving the African Sampler to the SAL. I think it may be the latter, and then I can concentrate on putting some more stitches into the dreaming cat one too.

For the stitch-a-long I’m linking up to these lovely blogs:

Avis at Sewing beside the sea
Claire at Claire93
Kate at Tall tales from Chiconia
Gun at Rutigt
Alison at Minerva’s meanderings
Jule at From the boudoir
Elizabeth at Garden 4 therapy
Wendy at The crafter’s apprentice
Lucy at Lucyannluna
Cathy at Nanacathydotcom

Do pop over and have a look at their beautiful creations.

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McLaren/ Hamilton – cross stitch

This is the scheduled three-weekly post for the SAL that I’m doing with several other crafty blogs.

I’ve carried on stitching the Hamilton/McLaren project and have made a reasonable amount of progress.

The tyres are almost completed now so if I get a chance to do any stitching, there’s a chance that I may finish this for the next SAL post. With a 12 week old kitten in the house though, I’m promising nothing 😉

For the stitch-a-long I’m linking up to these lovely blogs:

Avis at Sewing beside the sea
Claire at Claire93
Kate at Tall tales from Chiconia
Gun at Rutigt
Alison at Minerva’s meanderings
Jule at From the boudoir
Elizabeth at Garden 4 therapy
Wendy at The crafter’s apprentice
Lucy at Lucyannluna

Do pop over and have a look at their beautiful creations.

McLaren & Hamilton – cross stitch

This is the scheduled three-weekly post for the SAL that I’m doing with several other crafty blogs.

Having finished the Flower Sampler Book for the last update (Hooray!), I needed to find a new project for the SAL. I do have one that would be perfect but I’m trying not to start any more new projects until I’ve got that WIP box down a bit.

So, I had a rummage through the box to see which one I could tackle next. I pulled out a Winnie the Pooh calendar that has sat in there for a few years and spent a couple of hours stitching on it. Then I put it back in the box, where it will probably stay for a good while longer. It’s on aida and has fractional stitches. How I wish I’d swapped the kit fabric out for some nice evenweave. That aida was vile to stitch on.

Next out of the box was one by Stitchtastic that depicts Lewis Hamilton sitting in his McLaren. Yes, it’s another old one, and it feels odd stitching it now that he’s driving a Mercedes. I have done a fair bit of stitching on it though and am determined to finish it. Happily I did swap the kit fabric for something nicer to stitch on so no vile aida to contend with this time.

This is where I left it two years ago.

And, this is what it looks like now.

That’s page three completely finished now, with just page four to go.

This is the section that I’ve just finished off.

Once you get the confetti done, the tyres aren’t too bad to stitch as you get chunks of one colour. They extend a fair way down into page four, so hopefully that won’t take me too long. A couple more updates, possibly? Fingers crossed.

For the stitch-a-long I’m linking up to these lovely blogs:

Avis at Sewing beside the sea
Claire at Claire93
Kate at Tall tales from Chiconia
Gun at Rutigt
Alison at Minerva’s meanderings
Jule at From the boudoir
Elizabeth at Garden 4 therapy
Wendy at The crafter’s apprentice
Lucy at Lucyannluna

Do pop over and have a look at their beautiful creations.

McLaren/Hamilton – March update

I’ve done some more on this although not as much as I’d hoped. We’ve had some issues at home that needed a lot of my attention, namely a leaky tank in the loft. The house insurance is covering it but it’s frustrating that it took away so much of my stitching time.

This is where I’m up to now.

Page one and three are completely finished now so that’s some  progress. I’m not as enthused about this as I was in January, which also contributed to how little got done. I may take a break from it next month and do a bit on one of my other older WIPs instead.

McLaren/Hamilton – Feb update

After the fun I had with the Owls it was time to pick up one of my older, slightly abandoned pieces again. I decided to carry on with this one as I’d quite like to see it finished and last month I seemed to have got some enthusiasm back for it. I felt that I didn’t make much progress last month as it didn’t look as if I’d got a lot done. Much of it was confetti so it did take a while but it also took some time to get back into it.

This month I can really see some progress. There are four pages to this design and now the top left page is complete and I’ve now almost finished the bottom left. I gave it a couple of extra days as I wanted to get that page done but with only a few days left in the month, I do need to start on the Papillon SAL now. Still, it won’t take long to finish off that page next month and get quite a way into the top right page as part of that is already done.

This is how it looks now.

Most of what’s left to do on the bottom left page is one shade of red, which is what I was doing when I stopped, hence the few half crosses. I’d have quite happily carried on with this for a while longer but then I do want to do the latest bit of the SAL too. So many projects, so little time, eh?

 

McLaren/Hamilton – Jan update

As I’ve just read Bernie Ecclestone’s bio, I felt like stitching on this one by Stitchtastic again. It’s been quite a while since it saw daylight so I wasn’t sure how much I’d enjoy it, but once I started I was really happy that I’d decided to try and get it finished. I had forgotten how slowly it stitches up though. You seem to have been working on it for hours and have very little to show for it, but it is around halfway done now.

This is how it looked when I abandoned it just over a year ago.When I restarted it this time, I wasn’t quite sure where to start stitching. I had a few threads parked so I picked one and then stitched as much as I could with that colour before moving on to another. I seemed to make more progress that way, or at least it felt like it, so I’ll continue doing that next month. It only has twelve colours in it, but somehow manages to have a remarkable amount of confetti which gives it some lovely detail.

This is how it looks now. I concentrated mainly on the lower left hand side and did some to the right of the tyre too.

It really doesn’t look a lot for a week. I think I spent more time counting than stitching but once I get to some of the solid areas it will go a bit faster.

I’m back on the Papillon SAL now. I should finish the current part of that easily before the end of the month and then it’s back to the start of my rotation.

Hamilton cross stitch update – Silverstone

I got a fair bit done on this during the Saturday chatter and qualifying but not a lot on the Sunday. As usual I was busy watching the race, and there was just too much going on during this race to take my eyes off the screen. I’ve been doing a bit during the week which is why it’s only just being put up.

I’m quite happy with the progress though. The tyres on the one side are almost done and it’s starting to look like a Formula one car now.

I’ve hit another block of fiddly bits now which is slow going but I’m hoping to get plenty done next weekend.

Hamilton cross stitch update – Canada

I didn’t get as much done to this as I thought I would. Even considering that we spent two hours of the race with the cars sitting on the grid in the pouring rain under a red flag. Usually, I spend quite a lot of the three race days stitching but this time I only stitched during qualifying and the race itself. I think it was because it was an evening race so the timing threw me out a bit.

Even so, I can see a bit of progress. You can just about see that the grey blob on the left is a tyre. A wet tyre, of course. What else would it be after that very soggy race in Canada? I think the next race should see me finish the first page as there’s just a bit of tyre left and the top of the spoiler plus Hamilton’s helmet. I’m going to change the yellow provided for the helmet for one from my stash as it isn’t quite the right shade. Almost, but not quite and it’ll bug me if I don’t change it.

This is what it looks like now.

I’ve just started on August’s section of the Winnie the Pooh calendar, although I’m itching to carry on with an old friend that got picked up again last week. Photos of that to come soon. And a nice parcel arrived from Sew and so today containing another two Victoria Sampler kits, the fabric for the Pixel People Firefly chart and some 18ct Aida.

I’ve decided that I really don’t like the fabric that I started Starry Night on so I’m going to restart it on Aida before I go any further. I’ve been thinking about it for a while, which is why there’s been no progress on it. I decided it would be best to restart it now while there’s only a tiny bit done than to carry on and not be happy with it. I’m not keen on redoing that corner with all the confetti but I know what to expect this time and will be able to keep the back tidier so that’ll be better. I may finish Winnie the Pooh before restarting it so I can give it more attention. Or not. I’m undecided. Sigh. So many projects, so little time.