I've started the Queen of the Needle kit from Just Nan, the one that was an exclusive from the Silver Needle, here's some progess pictures:


These were in fact taken on Friday, but Blogger wouldn't let me post then, for some reason, so there is a bit more progress now, and I will post that when I have some pictures.

You can see the pink and white checked Graziano linen quite clearly, it is very nice to work on, and it's great for counting. It's been designed to use the squares in quite a logical way, as well, and you know how much we IT people love logical embroidery!

There is a LOT of work in it, I think it is several weeks of stitching, never mind the finishing, so I will be concentrating as far as I can on this, even though I now have the threads for Catherine Agnes and Toccata, they will both have to move down the queue.

I did get to Ostend over the weekend, no photos, as it was so, so wet......... I very brilliantly missed the train on the way there, and had to reroute via Lille and Ghent, but that was no great drama, as there are plenty of trains, I just got there a couple of hours later. Ostend is a lot busier than I expected, mostly with groups of English tourists, who seem to come on very cheap coach tours and wear wristbands to show that they are entitled to free drinks in the hotel. So much not my sort of holiday! I was out seeing the museums and the promenade, and eating delicious fish in restaurants. I have a thing about the shrimp croquettes that you get in Belgium, and always make a point of having them at least once when I am in Belgium.

My Flemish is still dire, I can read quite a bit, and practically everything on menus, but I can hardly speak a word. Apart from please, thank you and shrimp croquettes........ so mostly I speak French or English there. They don't seem to mind speaking French in Flanders, which is the opposite of what I was told, although it is true you do come across people who do not speak French.

Back in Paris, it also rained very heavily last night, and it seems there have been floods in the Pas de Calais area. It is also quite cold for August, only about 20 degrees, but I think this is preferable to the alternative, blistering heat and the canicule. I actually feel not bad now, athough I still have a staggering amount to do in the apartment and I have to go back to Cyprus on Saturday. It really has taken a good two weeks to get over the horrors of working with you know who and his exploitatation of his colleagues. Looking back on it, I think he really just expected us to work and work, no matter what, and if we died in the attempt, he would have just stepped over our bodies on his way to the phone to order some more victims. Nicky says I exaggerate slightly, but I am not the one who used to refer to him as "Hitler".

Nicky, by the way, seems to be doing OK in Ireland, he is spending his time working or else running in the rain. Belfast possibly has less to do even than Nicosia - I mean, for the visiting IT consultant, it's probably a lovely place to live if all your family are there and so on, but places are different when you go there just for work.

Well, had better go, I am actually at work - no-one else is here, and nor should I be, as it is a bridge day before a public holiday. I shall go home and do more tidying up and Queen of the Needle.