Celebration Sampler Progress and a SAL!

Hello dear blogging friends, I hope the first few days of 2014 have been treating you well!  I am so happy to have some stitching to share with you in my first post of the year.  I have made a little progress on the Celebration Sampler, which was featured in the Just Cross Stitch Magazine in 2013.  

Look at this lovely section of the sampler, I was even brave enough to stitch '2014' in the space for the year - I will definitely have to persevere with this piece :) 

Here is my progress so far, the words look a bit funny at the moment, but will make more sense once I put more stitches in it!

It is such a pleasure to stitch, I am really enjoying it - here is a close up of the Bargello section - always so much fun to stitch!

This year I decided to join a SAL for a beautiful Hardanger piece by Mamen, which is kindly being hosted by Ticoeur on her forum.  The piece is called 'Bambu' and I'm stitching it on 28ct antique white Quaker cloth in DMC perle thread.  Here you can see my first step and the threads that I'm using - I decided to break away from 'tone on tone' Hardanger stitching and I'm having great fun with the lovely pinks! 

I am also starting another SAL on the 1st of  February with my dear friend Michelle from the UK.  There is a lovely sampler in the Sampler and Antique Needlework Magazine (SANQ) that we both want to stitch - I'm really looking forward to our SAL!

In other needlework news, I have been working on a quilt!  My cousin in Oregon had the most precious baby boy last year and I am making a quilt for him - the quilt top is made and the basting is done, now I have to machine quilt it.  I will show photos in a few weeks (after they have received it), since they haven't seen any photos yet - only snippets of fabric!

Well, that's it for now!

Have a great week and Happy Stitching!

Michelle