DIY ombre butterfly cross stitch

After the success of my cross stitch bunny over Easter I was busy searching for inspiration when it struck in the form of ombre butterflies, of course. I’ve had this three part frame for a few years and never got round to filling it with anything personal (it came with some illustrations of Indian ladies in, it wasn’t empty!) anyway the spaces are almost too small for photos so a few small cross stitch designs seemed the perfect plan and I love how they’ve turned out.

I couldn’t find a suitable butterfly pattern on the internet so made my own by counting the number of cross stitch squares that would fit nicely in each frame then drawing a design onto squared paper. Easy!

Then I simply chose three threads in various shades of turquoise, my favourite colour, stitched away and then arranged in the frames from dark to light. If you don’t have a frame with three spaces you could use three small matching, or contrasting frames – which would look great hung on a wall.

I hope you’ve all had a great week, it was my birthday on Wednesday and I was lucky enough to visit the Harry Potter studio tour...  It. Was. Amazing. I’ll share some pictures next week!

Weekend nails – mint

This is probably one of my favourite nail colours and as ever I used a few dots to make it slightly more interesting (I must learn to do something other than dots with nail art)! But anyway, I like the effect of having the dots like a French tip. I painted them this morning in the sunshine; so happy that spring has finally arrived.

Topshop – Gone Fishing / Collection 2000 – French White

This week I’ve been...

...buying a bargain blazer - £7 from h&m, how could I say no? It also replaces my old, once black but now a rather faded grey, blazer from Primark and is the perfect size, not too fitted, not too big.

...sorting through all my important documents, keeping the ones that are actually important and filing them into these pretty storage boxes (£2.50 from tesco). It’s a job that’s been hanging over me for a while and I feel much better now everything is more organised! Plus shredding stuff is quite fun.

...trying my first night cream, I’ve used this nivea pure and natural cream every night for a week now and my skin feels much healthier. I’ve also discovered that Sudocreme is brilliant for getting rid of the odd spot in a hurry.

A day at Drusillas Park

Last weekend the boyfriend and I visited Drusillas Park, a small zoo in East Sussex. It was a beautiful sunny day and although the zoo is really more for families (there’s loads of interactive stuff and huge playground) we had a great time looking around. I’m never really sure how I feel about zoos, seeing wild animals in cages just doesn’t seem right, but I know how hard many zoos work to contribute to conservation and protect endangered species. So, while I remain unconvinced it was still a chance to have a practise with my camera. I love taking photos of animals, particularly close ups, as you can probably guess!

It's the little things - cross stitch bunny

Work has been so busy in the last two weeks and one of the few things keeping me sane has been stitching this cute little bunny. I’d hoped to have it finished in time for an Easter card but that didn’t happen, so I’m still deciding between framing it or saving for a card next year.

I found the pattern after searching for 'free bunny cross stitch patterns' on google – here.

More things cheering me up have been pastel yellow nails - catching a glimpse of them while tapping away on the computer at work definitely brought a bit of sunshine to some long days. Much like these daffodils...

Thankfully, it’s the weekend now and I’m planning a shopping trip today and hopefully a day out with the boyfriend on Sunday! Hope you have a great weekend.

I heart knitted fingerless gloves

Not that I want to go on and on about the weather but I’d assumed I wouldn’t get to use these knitted gloves until next winter, but after finishing them a few weeks ago they’ve come in very useful! They accompanied me on a walk last weekend and as you can see they were perfect for layering over some thin black gloves.

The pretty heart pattern is one I found on ravelry – which I’m now obsessed with, free knitting patterns AMAZING. I’d highly recommend trying this one out and it encouraged forced me to learn magic loop knitting (see earlier post for a tutorial) and something called an afterthought thumb, which isn’t explained on the pattern but this step by step guide is really helpful.

They took just a few #creativesunite sessions to complete, once I’d figured the magic loop thing out and I think I’ll be doing some more for Christmas presents later in the year.

They also look good worn without gloves underneath; perhaps I’ll try this outdoors when the temperature rises a bit!