It's raining today. I have a pot of tea with me, and I'm working my way through some intensive documentation for a client. What better way to take a break than to reflect on some happy stitching from this last week? And - lo! a Wednesday WIP post on a Wednesday? My, things are getting better around here.


I've finished the mint stripe on my Up & Away balloon. I love this stripe. It's not only marks the half-way mark on the balloon (not counting the bazillion rays of sunshine that go in the background, of course), it also marks a happy deviation from the pattern which turned out exactly how I had imagined it. While stitching in my mint green, I also recklessly abandoned the dots in between each star's top point which was supposed to be done in yellow and caramel brown. I think that the green is very light, and it just stands out as it is against the pink and yellow stars. I didn't want to complicate it with dots. That also meant that I had to go back and fill in stars where I'd skipped a block for the brown, but that wasn't too bad.


Okay, not all my stitches go the same way. That's mainly due to the stop-and-start nature of the project (I'd like to think). I really like the mint against the warm cocoa brown bunting, like an Aero Mint chocolate feast for the eyes. What an excellent pairing. Ho hum.


In between my stitching, I also cut out the appliqué letters for that bunting project I mentioned. Traced, applied, cut, ironed and voila. We have names. The bunting's going to need another ironing to straighten up those edges, though.


Here's the "boy bunting". I still really like this fabric, it's very cheery. The robots look like they're doing the hokey pokey.


This is my favourite square. Once I've finished sewing up all of the squares, I'm going to stitch around the appliqué letters in a matching thread and neaten it up.

We're off to Paris next weekend. I'm beside myself with excitement.

I've had a quiet stitchery week: I've done a lot of late-night working, and deadline-meeting, and workshop-teaching, and all things work-related. But, still, my Up & Away stitchery progresses for quiet moments of happiness that punctuate the real world. Oh, to be in a balloon away from wi-fi and technology and projects.


Thar she blows! It's looking rather colourful now with the minty stripe which makes me think of this as toothpaste rather than some intensive cross-stitchery. And yes, that is Mary Berry in the background; she's looking rather lovely in her chic French stripes. And what's that big white cloud in the top right?


I may have been working on my Garden Party Quilt. Just maybe. It's slow going. I'm stitching straight lines on my machine, then weaving in all the ends by hand. It's lovely. I'm sorry I didn't dye the back a light duck egg blue (ah, hindsight), but the white will grow on me when I add in the stitched floral borders in pink and green. I think. I hope. I still need to stitch a label for the back so it may suddenly have a surprisingly floral burst of blue on the back. I love those kinds of surprises: the secret kind, that are only found when you really look for them in unexpected places. Like the last Reece's Cup which fell out of the packet and into the bread bin to be saved for later. Or a flowering Orchid bud that has sprouted under a leaf long after all the others have died off. Or even an unexpected bit of fabric that you bought ages ago and has since found its way to the back of the stash pack, wrapped up in a plastic bag. Those kinds of surprises. Mm.

It's Thursday. I know.

I my defence, I didn't have computer access yesterday, and I did try to post this blog post last night using about a thousand mobile thingy-whatsits. It just wasn't meant to be. It's a "Wednesday WIP" in spirit.

















And so, here's my progress. I changed the colours a little bit and have decided to use the mint green instead of lime green. I like it. The stars along the top alternate in bursts of pink and yellow, and then there's another row of the pink sea waves in blue.

It's coming along rather well, despite the frequent colour-changes and details. I do feel that the scalloped detail along the bottom of the balloon might need to be outlined, it seems to get lost in the oatmeal canvas.

In other news: my mother-in-law leaves London today. We're going to jet off this morning to do last-minute visits, and then it's up, up and away. The luggage scale is going to be put to good use, there will be a lot of repacking, there will definitely be a few tears, and I plan on taking my balloon stitchery for the ride. More updates soon!