Lucy – Page 3 – Hopefully Creative

Tales of the Tundra

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif.

While deciding what to do over the winter break, I was browsing Ravelry to see if there was a fun Mystery Knit along. As we’ve discovered, I like mystery anything-alongs and knitting fits in too. The last mystery knit along that I participated in is still not done, the clues had too many stitches to keep up with in the last three sections, so it’s now a travel project. But that wouldn’t hold me back.

There’s a forum called Upcoming MKAL/MCAL Calendar that lists MKALs that are going to start. There I found Tales of the Tundra Cowl (Knit) by Mary P. Hunt. The MKAL was set to start on the 25th of December, promised daily clues and 12 installments. I figured cowls aren’t enormous, and the other patterns that Mary P. Hunt has made are very cool, so this was setting up to be a good one.

It required three yarns in DK weight with good contrast between A (main) and C (background) and some contrast with B too. I didn’t really feel like dyeing, so I dove into the hoard to find some yarn. I settled on Ultra DK in turquoise dyed in August 2023 for the main colour, Ultra DK with yellow spots dyed in September 2023 as the background and some DK 115 in orange from February 2025 as the contrast.

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif. Clue 1

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif. Clue 2

The pattern included some links to tutorials on colour dominance and jogless rounds and basically set us up for the project. This was super useful to just have in the document itself to refer back to.

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif. Clue 4

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif. Clue 5

Then the first clue dropped and we started knitting. The first section is corrugated ribbing, something I don’t recall having done before. However, it’s quite fun once you get into it. I got to use my relatively newly acquired skills with knitting left-handed to keep the yarns from tangling.

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif. Clue 7

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif. Clue 9

The second and third clue involved some pattern work where we made a cute design – it felt Scandivian inspired to me? And once clue three was done, we broke the B colour and continued with only two. I kept the blue in the left hand and the yellow in the right. I didn’t really see what was appearing as I was knitting it. I discovered the mountains from clue 4 and 5 only once I saw them in other people’s pictures on the forum.

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif. Clue 10

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif. Clue 11

I was also convinced for a while that the snout was from a bear, although it became clear along the way that it was actually a wolf. I guess the pattern image was a good hint towards that. Many people decided to duplicate stitch the eyes in a different colour, but I think that would make mine demonic looking, so I left that off. At some point, a paw print appeared in the sky too. Once the ears were done, the last three clues were almost mirrors of the first three.

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif. Blocking.

Cowl in blues, yellows and oranges with wolf, mountains and paw print motif. Inside.

This project was great. I had a lot of fun discovering the pictures every day and most of the time there were only 7 rows to complete, which is totally doable. I did have to pay attention and count (not my strong suit), but with the help of the line tool in Adobe Reader, I managed to keep track of which row I was on. I’m definitely planning on joining more MKALs if they seem as doable as this one.

Mystery Stitch Along – Tea Party

Cute stitch-along with a tea party theme.

In July, I signed up for a Mystery Stitch Along called Twigs & Tea by Fine Frog Stitching. We only knew the general theme, tea party, that it was going to start August 8 and be completed in 14 installments on December 5. I just bought the pattern and got all the updates along the way.

We started with the frames and then added on different bits each week. Either one of the animals in the frames, the items on the shelves, the landscape, the table cloth and the items on the table. Most of these were fun and exciting little projects. There’s a bit too much pink in it, and this was especially apparent in the awful boring-to-complete-not-to-look-at table cloth. I finished all but the last two clues in the time frame they were intended.

An unironed big cross stitch with 5 characters in picture frames (owl, fox, raccoon, goose and bear), and a table set with a tea pot cups, cake and flowers.

A big cross stitch with 5 characters in picture frames (owl, fox, raccoon, goose and bear), and a table set with a tea pot cups, cake and flowers.

Then I had to give myself a kick up the backside and finally finish the bear and the flower pot on December 24. I was so excited that it was done, that I didn’t even iron it before sending a picture to my friend who was also doing the stitch along. You can clearly see all the creases from my hoop, and it looks so much better when it’s ironed!

Yet more evidence that breaking large projects up into smaller sections and adding an arbitrary timeline increases my completion rate. At some point I’m going to have to sign up for a quilt along, don’t I..

Doggy Bag

Adding some embroidery to a double handle tote bag.

I was browsing Etsy (always a bad idea for the bank account) and found a bunch of super cool cross stitch patterns. This galaxy animal paw from OhMyStitchesShop spoke to me. My brother’s partner is graduating as a vet and they own dogs, so I thought this would be fun for her. There are so many stitches in this, I highly underestimated how much time 5552 stitches would take, even in eight different colours.

Cross stitch of incomplete dog and cat in a dog paw in purple galaxy hues

Cross stitch of dog and cat in a dog paw in purple galaxy hues

I started with the big pad and finished it fully apart from the little stars. I did a part of those in white, before I decided that I wanted to use glow in the dark thread for those, to be extra appropriate. So I took the white out and went on to stitch the small pads and then added the glow in the dark.

Purple bag with cross stitch of dog and cat in a dog paw in purple galaxy hues

To make this a useful(ish) gift, I decided on making the embroidery the front pocket of a tote bag. I stitched some white cotton to the back of the embroidery and attached that to the purple fabric that I used for my Edwardian skirt. Since I am short and I know how annoying it is to have bags drag on the floor, I added a double handle. On the inside are short straps, and there are long ones for over the shoulder too. If I ever make myself a tote, I’m totally doing this again.

Inside of purple bag with double handles

The project was finished and mailed. I hope she gets some use out of it and I had a lot of fun making it. And have thus since learnt that I prefer my projects either smaller, or coming in bite sized pieces, more on that later!

The Misfit

Who is that lurking in the back?

For the last couple of months, I’ve had a zip lock pouch in my bag that held everything I needed to make ‘The Misfit’. A cross stitch pattern kit from Heritage Crafts. I ended up stitching a polar bear hiding in a bunch of penguins. The kit has eight colours of floss, but by occasionally using two different colours in the same stitch they manage to achieve ten different colour combinations. You start with all the cross stitches and then you define the animals by adding the back stitch.

Embroidery of penguins and a polar bear without backstitch

Cross stitched penguins and one polar bear

After I finished all the cross stitches, you could sort of see the critters starting to appear, but by gradually adding the back stitch you can really see them come alive. I didn’t finish this in a few sittings, this thing went all over the country with me since October. It’s small and flat enough to bring anywhere and easy enough to pick back up at any time. I finally finished it on December 20th and have now framed it and it’s hanging on my wall with some of my other cross stitch projects.

Cards for 2026

Embroidered cards for the new year.

This year, I really aimed to finish my best wishes cards before Christmas. The plan had four main parts:
1. Decide on a design
2. Finish the embroidery
3. Make the cards
4. Write and deliver the cards

Step 1 went well. I had found this super cute cross stitch kit from Bothy Threads called Christmas Quackers that I thought would be perfect. Living in the Netherlands, I’m not sure how many people know the English tradition of Christmas crackers, but the duck was too cute to pass up. So once I finished another embroidery, I set out to stitch this one.

Cross stitch of duckling with a red Christmas cracker in a hoop

Cross stitch of duckling with a red Christmas cracker

Step 2 went decently. I messed up a few times (counting is hard!), but managed to fix the mistakes and ended up with the perfect duck. I really love the fly away feathers on the side. I prefer my cards to be not purely Christmas coded, so I replaced the Christmas Quackers text with Quacking 2026. It was stitched with a gold thread that was absolutely awful to work with, not worth it either since it barely shows up when I photographed it.

Card of a cross stitch of duckling with a red Christmas cracker

Step 3 only had minor mishaps. I made three kinds of cards this year. A small version for roller derby (6 per page), a medium version for work (4 per page) and a large version for sending (2 per page). The S was just printed and had a star cut out. The M was printed with two punched stars and a bit of ho ho ho fabric threaded through. The L was printed with two bits of ho ho ho fabric stuck on using a wax seal (in different colours) with stars. The printer was the main mishap machine, with random white lines appearing in the middle of the image sometimes. Luckily I had enough of the linnen paper to print some more.

Step 4 was done in installments but I managed it all before Christmas. I know some have already been delivered but some may still be on the way. So the only bit that was laid by the wayside was writing the blog post. So I hope all the best for you and your loved ones, and a Quacking 2026!

Duck and Slobber

Two baby gifts, a stuffed duck and some spit bibs.

Some time in the past, I was asked by a friend if I could reproduce her sister’s stuffed duck that had seen some wear. So I looked around, found the Crazy Duck Sewing Pattern and thought I could make it work. She was very happy and asked me to make another for a new family member that should be arriving. So I asked for preferred colours and we settled on yellow with orange details. Since it’s for a young baby, I didn’t use safety eyes but embroidery to create his face.

Bottom of yellow duck with orange feet and beak

Top of yellow duck with orange feet and beak

I also found some precut slobber cloths or spit bibs in my hoard when I was reorganizing. I figured I should put them together and they could make a nice set. So I located some white terry cloth that I had no idea existed and cut out the triangles. They were sew together and the snaps were added. I had some leftover triangular terry cloth, so I also made the mice one. That one I’ll keep for future additions. I love these, such quick and fun projects.

Two white, triangular spit bibs one showing the front and one showing the back.

Orange dinosaur wearing a white, triangular spit bib with a pattern of orange girls jump roping and yellow boys on skateboards.

I hope babies necks are about the same size as my dinosaur’s..

Quick Leftover Poppy

After five years, this leftover has become a thing and the hoard is now organized and slightly more empty.

At the start of September, I bought a whole load of new plastic bins to reorganize my hoard. While checking every single bit of fabric, and deciding whether I wanted to keep them, I found some scraps of the red plaid fabric that I used for these linings. I thought, ‘I need to use these or chuck these. They are not staying here for five more years’. So I made another poppy. I think he’s very cute and it’s always good to have some of those in stash for when I murder my own or have someone to gift one too.

I am still exceedingly happy with the way the hoard looks now. 12 boxes of fabric, two of yarn (in this room), a stack of small boxes with lace and haberdashery items and the remainder of the craft supplies in the top row of boxes.

A wall of plastic bins with fabric and craft supplies

Guinea Love Embroidery

Cross stitching some guinea pigs.

So when I was buying the big cross stitch haul for my holiday, I also purchased Eleanor Teasdale’s “I’m Guinea Love You Forever” by Bothy Threads. It was one of the smaller ones and I wanted to make it for a friend. So I got started and honestly, it looked something had barfed colour before the backstitch was completed. Those little blobs were very unappealing. I also had to change the text at the bottom, since ‘I’m Guinea love you forever’ seemed a bit odd for friends, so I settled on ‘Guinea love friendship forever’. This meant I had to do some font designing, but I think it turned out cute.

Cross stitched guinea pig without backstitch

Embroidery of two guinea pigs with 'Guinea love friendship forever'

The one thing I didn’t like about this kit was that I had to interpret the colour chart myself. They supplied a list with the colours, but hadn’t put the actual threads with their correct symbols. I had to do that myself. Somehow, I found this very scary, because who knows how I might interpret colour names and potentially be wrong. In the end, I think it turned out fine, and a second kit from Bothy didn’t have this drawback.

Sailboats Crossing

Cross stitching some cute little sailboats.

In late August, I signed up for a Mystery Stitch Along, where you get bits of a cross stitch pattern every week and sew along not knowing what the final image will be. The amount of cross stitch in the mystery isn’t enormous, so I decided to buy some extra kits to keep myself occupied. The first one was by Alisa, called Boats at Dawn. It’s some quite pastel looking sailboats that seemed very calm and accessible.

Cross stitched sailboats on a misty morning.

Cross stitched sailboats on a misty morning in a frame

I was not wrong in that assessment. It was very calm and accessible, for which the size (6×9 cm) absolutely helped. In contrast to what I was used to, this pattern also used half stitches and backstitches, so I did some new things. It was finished fairly quickly and I like it a lot. I sourced a little picture frame, wrapped it around some cardboard and put it behind the glass. I’ll be able to look at a little bit of pastel ocean scape whenever I feel like it.

Houndstooth Mitts

Quick mitts for winter.

I wanted to make a small gift, and I figured that some fingerless mittens might be fun. Ravelry provided a fair amount of options and I settled on
Houndstooth Handwarmers by Ellen Gill. With favourite colours being blue and orange, I first thought of making them in those shades. However, I couldn’t bring myself to do it because it would be a bit much. So I added white instead.

Two houndstooth knit mitts on a blue blocking mat

The white was leftovers from my striped sweater, and the blue was self-dyed DK weight merino yarn. The houndstooth pattern isn’t too hard to do, but it did mean I had to continually check the instructions. There are four rows that repeat, and I chose to do them mirrored for one of the mitts as suggested by the pattern. The mittens benefitted from blocking a lot, as the houndstooth is a lot less lumpy now. All in all, decent pattern, and fun knit. I’m happy to report that the recipient enjoyed them.

Category: Lucy