I'm back & Take it Further Challenge

Where do I start? I have been back from Yorkshire since yesterday and came home to piles of post, piles of washing (yuck!), piles of e-mails and 179 entries on my Bloglines list to catch up on!! Aaaagh! Pleeeeease, do you think ,when I go away you could all stop blogging so I don't have to catch up when I get back? No? Oh well, just thought I'd ask *LOL* (I still have 150 bloglines to read - should be caught up by Easter I should think! :))

We had a great week away, staying with friends in a log cabin just outside Pickering - more of that later. Oh, and while I think of it, we slept through the earth tremor that shook parts of England last week. It was felt in Pickering but we were oblivious.

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I took some sewing with me and finished both the landscape I am doing for a swap with Glenda and the postcard for the swap with Susan Lenz at Cyberfyber. I also started the stitching on my February Take it Further piece:

Now that I have photographed it and put it on the screen I can see some things that I'm not too keen on. The placement of the small buttons and the blue button looks a bit bunched so I may rearrange them slightly. It doesn't feel finished yet and I think I will live with it for a few days and see what else it tells me to do. I feel it needs some more stitch but this may only be a discreet few small gold stitches. Also, I need to needlefelt a little more around the edges to square the piece off as it'sa bit ragged.

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It is of course now March and the next challenge has already been announced while I have been away. The challenge this month is to consider "the little things, the small moments, the details in life. Sometimes the small things become emblematic for something larger". There is as usual a colour scheme alternative which you can see here and I have not yet had chance to consider whether I will go with the concept or the colour scheme. (I haven't worked out how to get the colour scheme on here either!) The thinking cap will be on for the next couple of days!

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Did I say I came home to piles of post? First of all was lovely Mother's Day card and gift from my beautiful stepdaughter:

Isn't the ktten sweet? And I love the cute socks! My daughter knows I live in trousers (pants).

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Next in the post was the card I had requested in Susan Lenz's Cyberfyber swap

This is the reverse of the card as I showed the front before I went away. Susan says of the reverse "The reverse is a piece of fabric paper created using fragments of late 18th and early 19th century text, handmade paper, polymer emulsion and metallic paints on unbleached muslin. It is signed and dated in free motion machine embroidery." My photograph really does not do it justice as it has a beautiful metallic sheen to it and the colour is richer than the monitor will show.

Also in the post were three ATCs from MixedMediaATCs_UK for the cross stitch swap:

The first is a lovely bright ATC incorporating punchinella (sequin waste) from Becky

This sweet cat is from Satu who lives in Finland. It is beautifully made.

Last but not least is this lovely ATC from Anne W.

I'll save my holiday pics for another post as it's getting late and I need to go read a few blogs. See you soon! Oh, and by the way, it's good to be back. I missed you all :o))