Wednesday, November 29, 2006

Winter Mail Art - personal swap

Yesterday, the Winter Mail Art (MA) has safely reached Zarina, my stitching friend in Penang. I felt a great relief! Congrats to Pos Malaysia. It is a rather quick mail delivery service, I thought it wouldn't be any earlier than Wednesday.


Stitched on 28ct Lugana colonial blue using some leftover overdyeds and DMC. Pattern by Little House Needleworks (LHN) - I did some adjustments to the pattern. I love LHN charts as well as Country Cottage Needleworks charts. Stitching on darker fabrics is tricky when it comes to backstitch. Normally, mail artists will backstitch the addresses, but I had to stitch them over one thread. Trust me, stitching the addresses took me longer time than stitching the house & snowman.

If you happened to wonder why both of us (Zarina & I) decided to stitch a winter-themed MA while in the contrary, we live in the part of the world where snow never fall. The answer is simply because we have lots winter patterns from the magazines and hardly stitch any. It was fun for me actually, I enjoy stitching the snowflakes.



The MA is lined with flannel. I couldn't find a matching cotton fabric. There is no winter-themed buttons in my collection, simply stitched a snapper as the closure and embellished with heart-shaped bead. I really enjoy stitching the Winter MA and really satisfied with the outcome.

Sunday, November 26, 2006

Time flies & Mail Art incident

Yesterday was baby Alya's 1st birthday. She began toddling already (most of the time cruising though) and tried to leap once. Like her sisters during their toddling time, Alya doesn't seem to have problems with climbing the bed & the couch, and able to get back down on her own. You don't have to guess, Alya's toddling time is a nerve-wracking time for me *LOL*. This is not my first time. All my darling princesses do. When they grew bigger, I can laugh at memories of the hard times they gave me. The sweetness of parenthood is what they called it.

Alya loves to mimic us talking on the phone, she will grab the remote control and say "ho oo". And when sees us eating, she will say "nyum nyum". She loves music too. Will stand up on her feet and wiggle her body to the music. How time flies quickly. Last year, she was just a frail tiny baby.

And also yesterday was my 1st time visiting the Post Office , about 150 metres away from home. Our neighbour's daughter is the who help me with the mailings before. I wanted to mail out the Winter Mail Art. Finished it almost 2 weeks ago but my friend and I agreed to month-end mailout (it is a personal swap). FYI, there are some complaints & incidents, mail artists experience when to mail their finishes to the recipients . e.g.last time in Miri, they declined to process the mail art when my hubby took it to the small PO in the neighbourhood.

This time, I was armed with a mail art I received in my bag . The air-conditioned PO with glass door & panels greeting the visitors is rather small yet convenience. There are 3 counters and a lady officer was behind the counter when I took out the Winter mail art. She refused to process it.
Oh no! Be cool.." I told myself. Then I showed her the mail art received from Wendy. She called the p-o-s-t-m-i-s-t-r-e-s-s (read POSTMISTRESS) and discussed the situation. "Oh please! please please" I was practically begging them *LOL*. Well, they were admiring the mail arts actually and after moments of thinking, Mrs Postmistress finally said "YES!". I was brimming with joy & relief at the same time. And now I hope in the next few days, the mail art will be in the hands of my friend safe and sound.

Saturday, November 25, 2006

Good Luck To Farah

A simple stitched card for my niece. It is actually a not-so-new finish, almost 2 weeks ago, I just forgot to share the photo here.

Stitched on 28ct linen over 2 threads using Six Strands Sweet (colour : Berry Medley) and DMC for backstitch. The chinese character is 'yun' means 'luck'. The card blank is from the collection I gathered for the last 2 years from purchases and gifts. It's exclusively made by Nik. The chart is from Cross Stitch Card Shop magazine issue 46 complete with flower and border, I only stitched the character/calligraphy though.


Tuesday, November 21, 2006

Some pics uploaded ....

Hi!

Some of my stitching friends had requested for step-by-step pics of a pincushion I made earlier this month. I made another one and 've just uploaded the pics into my Craft Tutorial album.

I forgot the measurement. Will update later. Pretty busy with some finishings.

Thursday, November 09, 2006

Stitching Bloggers' Questions


How many different brands of “complete” embroidery floss sets do you own? How do you keep track of it? (i.e., spread sheet program, index cards, palm pilot, etc.)

None of them are complete. I only have almost complete DMC set. My Anchor collection consists not more than 50. And overdyeds collection is variety - handful of Six Strands Sweet, several GAST, WDW, NN, Crescent Colours & some silks.

I printed out several copies of a DMC embroidery flosses list (from DMC official website). One copy I used as my shopping list and the rest I sticked unto the flosses boxes for easy reference.

Since my Anchor flosses are used for stitching certain charts only e.g. Forever Friends bear, Newton's and Wordsworth; I usually kit them up together with other stitching stuff (fabric, needle & chart). And I have only one flosses box to store them after I finish stitching. The same goes to my overdyeds collection.



How did you decide on the title of your stitching blog? Was it random, or does it have a special meaning to you or about you?

Lil' Honey Collection is decided way before I jumped on the blogging bandwagon. I started needlecrafting in January 2002 and not long after that, I was pregnant with Hanie (my eldest darling princess) developed more & more interests in needlecraft. Since then I've been actively sewing & stitching during my leisure time. Hanie, her name is pronounced as 'honey'. I love to call my finishes , the 'Lil' Honey Collection' as my earlier needlecraft projects were always been inspired by her.

When I wanted to start blogging, I simply put '
Lil' Honey Collection' as the title of my blog. And I always get a pat on the back from Hanie every time she sees my finishes. She would say something like "It's beautiful, mom", "I like it!", "Wow!", "Good job, mom" etc

Thursday, November 02, 2006

Pay it forward

I saw this on Judith's blog and thought it would be a fun "Pay it forward" kind of treat...

The first five people to respond to this post (via the comments section) will get some form of "art" made by me. Be sure that I can email you to get your snail mail address. Think of it as something to look forward to getting in the mail. It will be original, made by me (sorry), but it may not be immediate, as I haven't made them yet. I am about sure what it will be.

There is a catch, of course, the way this works is that if you sign up, you have to blog this as well and continue sharing.