Showing posts with label Stash. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Stash. Show all posts

Tuesday, July 20, 2010

What Happens When My ADD Rears Its Head

I have to give a shout out again to Valerie once again for winning my giveaway.  I'm so thrilled you won!  Actually I wish that everyone could have won, but I don't think I could find enough flower frogs.  Perhaps in the future!

I have made so little progress on stitching.  I don't know what it is - summer?  And I notice a lot of my blogging buddies are experiencing the same thing.  I know that I have a hard time sitting down at night.  But I got a little more done on my A&E sampler:

Not much since the last picture.  It's been too hot to sit under the Ott light even after the A/C was fixed.  I even started a new stitching project although there's not much to show - a non A&E!!  Hopefully, I'll have a progress picture next time.  All I have now is a lot of green!!

All this weekend, I had a song going through my head - Let's Go Crazy by Prince.  Not my most favorite songs by him, but I couldn't get it out of my head.  My intentions were to get into my craft room and clean out the closet for my sister's arrival so that we could put the shelving in.  Well, one thing led to another - resulting in a huge mess.  I know, my blog started off as a stitching blog, but bear with me - you just gotta go with the flow, right?


All the Farmer's Wife blocks done for the month.  The pink and green one at the bottom was the one I had to recut and piece over.  Now I'm caught up and awaiting next months!!

Next part done on the red, black and white quilt!!!


Two more Civil War blocks.  Although the one on the left seems to have a serious problem that I didn't notice until I went to iron it out.  I know what I did and have since ripped it out to resew, along with those blocks from my last post - UGH, I hate ripping things out.

Now this is where the ADD comes in.  Those pictures above were done here and there during the week when I could catch an hour or so. Then I thought it was time to get into the closet and clean it out for the anticipated shelving, but what resides in the closet?  Well, pizza boxes with quilts in some form of cutting, or finishing - along with a multitude of other things that catch my attention.  I've posted a picture of the infamous pizza boxes before.  They're just the right size for holding my projects.  Anyway, I start peeking into the pizza boxes (even though they're all labeled) and I come across projects all cut out and ready to sew.  I have a tendency to go through marathon cutting sessions so that I can sew to my hearts content when I have the time.  Now my mind is much more into sewing than clearing out the closet, so ADD kicks in and this results:


Four blocks from a quilt called As Time Goes By.  Aren't the colors wonderful?  Do you see why I just had to sew and not clean???  They were all cut out - calling my name!

And if that wasn't enough, more ADD kicked in and I decided to now start on something else.  I posted these blocks a while ago:

At the time I posted them, I had good intentions of moving right along with the quilt.  But I think that was when I painted the room and packed everything up.  Well, I couldn't find the blocks after.  Not anywhere.  Well, they made an appearance in the closet cleaning (in an unmarked box), so I started on the next section:

Nothing much to see here except 12 blocks in progress with the next row pinned on and ready to sew!  The quilt will look like this when it's finished although that will be awhile seeing as I have some kind of problem sticking to just one quilt at a time.  But variety is the spice of life, isn't it?

All this quilting craziness resulted in this mess - it looks like a bomb hit this chair:

Now surely you can see the garbage bag to the left side - I honestly was trying to clean - honest!  LOL  Well, it has been cleaned, but that's what everything ended up looking like when I was finished for the day.

And then to add to the craziness I had to purchase these - like I don't have enough going on, right?  I couldn't resist - I saw them on Amazon and had to have them.  Just love Amazon for those great prices:

I just love working on the Farmer's Wife quilt so much that I want more!!!  I think I have to be totally certifiable with the Nearly Insane quilt though.  I've seen it done in red and white fabrics.  Stunning.  I'd post a picture, but hate to snatch a picture from someone's blog that I don't know.  Just let me say, that my heart did a thunk when I saw it.  So in addition to starting on Dear Jane here in the near future, I'd say I'm set.  Or perhaps crazy!  Crazy is good, don't you think?

Well, that's been my week.  I'm off now to string lights into a huge (stage sized) piece of fabric to replicate a night sky for my DD's play.  I can't believe the performances are next week.  This summer certainly is flying by.  The next couple weeks are going to be crazy ones with my sister coming in and a small vacation, but hopefully I'll find time to keep up with blogs and maybe some stitching and quilting too.

Thanks again to everyone that entered my giveaway and to all the new followers - I was overwhelmed how many new ones I saw.  I'll be tracking down your blogs soon and  I hope that you'll stop and say hello every once in a while.  I love reading your comments!  Have a great week!

Thursday, October 8, 2009

Stashing and Framing (But Barely Any Stitching)

Woo Hoo!  I finally got some framing back from Joanne's.  It took forever, but they had one of their great sales again, so I was all over that!  Usually it only takes a week or two, but it took four weeks this go around.

Cape Cod Girls
The Primitive Needle
36 ct. Highland Fabric
GAST Threads


I just love the frame for this one.  This picture doesn't do it justice, but it looks like fish scales with small flecks of gold in real life!  Very perfect for the piece!  Sometimes it surprises me that Joanne's actually has some great frames.

I also picked up Queen Bee by Shepherd's Bush:
 

Queen Bee
Shepherd's Bush Kit

I love the framing on this one too!  These are not the best pictures.  It's been cloudy as heck with little bursts of sun.  Taking a picture inside is hopeless, and just as I'd get outside, the sun would go away again.  Michigan weather for ya!

Stalking of the mailman proved successful this week!  He hates when boxes or large envelopes come because our mailbox is at the curb.  If he has to get out of his truck and walk up the drive and walkway, he gets cranky.  Poor man - he'll get over it!  The day he brought this package, the squirrels were in our Oak tree tossing acorns down at the poor guy.  He came up rubbing his head telling me we had vicious squirrels!  HA!

But I was doing a happy dance.  I love getting stash in the mail!  The box included Paradise Lost by Plum Street Samplers, A Mind Independent and Free by Carriage House Samplings, In the Garden by Milady's Needle (and Lois from the Elegant Stitch also included the Little Gems scissors with it), and the Kelmscott Adam and Eve Needleminder.


Then I just had to have The Multiplication Table Examplar (although I don't know if I'll dish out the $80.00 for the hornbook - may have to be a project for my FIL), and Sarah Woodham by Shakespeare Peddler. 

Then, of course, I just had to add to the scissor collection, so I got the Tudor Rose Scissors, and then while picking up my framing, I found the new scissors by Gingher which I had to have.  I have a lot of flower frogs to fill.

Then a couple of weeks ago, I won a Giveaway on M Designs site:


Sisters Needleminder by Kelmscott Designs

It was a great giveaway that included the JCS Christmas Ornament Issue (which I was tickled over because I couldn't find it in my neck of the woods), four of her Angel Charts, Miss Mary Mack's Pincushion and Miss Mary Mack's Needleroll.  She also included the Sisters beautiful Kelmscott Needleminder.  Okay, now don't you think that's enough?  Well, I guess I didn't.  I must be getting really itchy for some stitching on something else besides Ann.  I ended up ordering three more charts from The Strawberry Patch yesterday because they were having a Wacky Wednesday sale and all Country Stitches patterns were on sale.  I definitely think that my DH needs to take that smokin' charge card out of my hands. Either that or he'll divorce me when that bill comes!  But hey, 30% off is 30% off, right?  I'm saving money, right?

So lots of stash, and no time to do any of them.  Once again, stitching has taken a backseat to everything else - basketball games (DD's team 3-0 - Go Vikings), parent/teacher conferences, DH being out of town so for some reason I don't sit down until late, so no pictures of Ann this go-around.  I know you're all probably getting sick of her like me!  Okay, I'll give you one - does this thing not look like some kind of Pterodactyl?  It seems huge in comparison to the rest of the piece.

I actually tried to get myself to stitch something else the other night.  I pulled out a cute Halloween piece by Mary Garry, found some fabric and the threads and thought that it would only take me a night or two to stitch.  Did I?  Of course, not!  I started to pull the threads out and that danged bird above started screeching at me!  Dang!   Ann is relentless, let me tell ya!  Although, quite truthfully, I think it's me.  I really want to see her done and hanging near And They Sinned.  I started her December 31st 2005.  I'd really like to (if I'm not lucky enough beforehand) to put the last stitches in before December 31st 2009.

Well, that's it for me.  Thank you everyone for the wishes about my cold/flu thing.  I'm feeling much, much better now.  My SIL said that it had to have been Swine because the regular flu hasn't even hit the State yet.   I'm still coughing and sniffling, but that's nothing compared to what it was.  All I know is that it was miserable. But thanks so much for the wishes and for your comments. I love every one of them. 

Have a great weekend and make a lot of X's.

Sunday, August 16, 2009

A Finish,Some Stash and I Should be Shot!

Happy Sunday everyone! Hope that everyone is having a great weekend! It's hotter than heck here in Michigan (about time is all I can say), so I figured I'd save myself some sweat and delay housework until another time (I can always find an excuse to put off housework!).

This week I finished up Queen Bee by Shepherd's Bush. I love these projects because they're fun to stitch with all the different stitches and you can have a finish in pretty short order:





Just in time to use all those 60% off Joanne's coupons I've saved up. DH is going to divorce me for sure with this framing. He looked at me with raised eyebrows when he saw last month's framing expenditure. All I can say is - HE'LL GET OVER IT!!! LOL
Last Sunday was my son's 16th Birthday. It's so amazing how quickly these kids grow up.



Here he is, but don't tell. He doesn't want me putting pictures of him on my blog. He thinks it's lame. He's reading a long note that my DH and I wrote to him about how proud we were of him. I think he thought that this note was lame too - you know how kids are at that age. But we are very proud of him - he's a hardworking kid, gets great grades, volunteers and mentors. We spent the day at Race Rochester - an indoor race car place - it was hotter than the dickens in those helmets, but he had a great time. Then his favorite dinner and cake and he was all set. What did he ask for? Well, an IPod Touch, of course. His older one broke and he was using mine. I'm glad to have mine back now - especially because of some of the songs he downloaded on it - I like rock and roll, but.............

DH has a tradition that on my kid's birthdays, I get flowers to re-celebrate their birth and to thank me for giving him his children (I guess he had a little bit to do with that, but why remind him - LOL). He can be a sweetie sometimes:


The week has been busy as usual. Three weeks and the kids are back to school so I'm sure that everyone is familiar with the drill. We've gone to see a couple of movies this week. DD and I went to see Julie/Julia. I had read the book and enjoyed it, but I didn't really enjoy the movie. I was expecting there to be more of the cooking mishaps and maybe that really gross scene near the end with the maggots (not that I enjoy seeing maggots), but most was left out. There was really more about Julia Child in this one, than Julie doing the cooking. I was disappointed.

We also saw Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. It was good - long - but good. Now I haven't read past Book 4 (I used to read them to my son when he was real little before he could read them), so I really didn't know the whats and wherefores after that point, but it was still good. Oh, and while I'm on the subject of entertainment, I finished up a book this week that I really enjoyed. It was called "The Little Book" by Selden Edwards. It dealt with time travel to 1897 Vienna and three generations of a family. I really enjoyed it.

I managed to accumulate some stash the past week or so. I think I get like this every year when I really want to just tend to what I want to - stitch, etc., - but it's more for spending time with the kids. I really should be shot is all I can say. I finished QB and I'm almost finished with Cape Cod Girls so my demented brain tells me that it's time for more stash. I am seriously ill! LOL
Anyway, not that I want to blame anyone for my purchasing of below mentioned stash items, but.......I have been somewhat enabled.


I have been watching Sandra's progress on the Betsy Davis sampler and have been enthralled with her progress and beautiful stitching, so I broke down and had to order the chart. Sandra and I have has some email discussions about these beautiful samplers and at one point she had mentioned a very similar one called An American Sampler which was published years ago in an issue of Treasurers in Needlework. Well, she sent me a picture of it so I knew what it looked like, but this weekend there was an estate sale in our neighborhood (no, the economic situation has not gotten better around here even though I'm hoping my stash purchases will help things out somewhat - LOL). Anyway I zipped through the house and the woman must have been a crafty type of person. I saw a whole box of craft magazines and what do I find:



An American Sampler published in 1993. So now I'm happy as a clam. But it's going to be hard to decide which one to stitch first.

Then because you can't just order one chart from the Scarlett Letter and I wanted to keep Betsy company in the envelope, I had to order two more:





I've been watching the progress of Margaret and Tanya working on Rebecca Robinson and just had to have it. The Flame Stitch sampler is one that I've had my eye on for a while because of the bright colors in it. These purchases were partly because I wanted to start working on Suzanne Lane 1776.


Why did Suzanna make me buy more you ask? Well, she's been in my stash for ages, and seeing how I haven't really worked on a traditional sampler for a while I thought I'd start this one. But pulling her out made me just want to take a glance at the Scarlett Letter site and I started nosing around. Bad move - I remembered Rebecca and the Flame Stitch sampler and it was all over. I just must have been in that kind of mood. Anyway, I wanted to start Suzanna, but alas, no fabric that fit it. Did have the called for fabric but an inch too small all the way around. So, what does one do???? Get fabric, of course, which was not a good thing. Like I said I should be shot.
I tore out of here first thing yesterday morning before everyone woke up for the 50 minute hike to my not so local LNS. Now mind you, I just needed fabric. Well, I got fabric, but between us girls (and any men that might read this and enjoy stitching), just getting fabric - well that just IS NOT GOING TO HAPPEN!!!! Look what jumped into my hands and screamed, BUY ME!!

Just because these represent two of my three favorite things. Plus I like having some small projects.

The Riddle - I have seen this popping up on blogs and love the colors in it, so had to have this one.

Then Sailor Collar by Shepherd's Bush. Now there is a reason I got this one (well, I talked myself into having a reason to buy this). I wish that I could be SAL stitching Sail Away with all the other girls, but I already did it. When I saw this on the wall of my LNS, I decided this could be my piece. I won't post on their blog, but I'll have a nautical theme thing going too. (Note: I am an honorary member of the Sail Away SAL - thanks Glenna!). But there was another reason. Last Spring, our Sampler Guild had an auction and I bought the companion piece, Cranberry Pinafore, for $10.00. Now I can have both of them stitched and hang them together. I think that's a good reason for buying this, don't you? Of course, you do! LOL

Then I get an email this week from Colonial Crafts posting their latest things. I'm surprised the subject line in the email wasn't, "Dear Sucker - Do We Have Some Things For You".

I love these fabrics. Now I haven't quilted much in a while, but the line of this fabric just jumped out at me. If I remember right it's called the Williamsburg Sampler line. I'm going to get a couple more pieces of it. I'm not into collecting whole lines necessarily when I do a quilt, but I thought these two pieces from the line would be great for backing pillows, pinkeeps, etc. Love it!!!

I think that I have done enough damage this week. What I want to do now is come up with a 25 project list. My friend Di and I were talking about this and the fact that we have WIPs all over the place and just keep adding. It's time for action. So the two of us are going to put together a list of 25 projects that we want to do and get them done. I'm doing it because I have so many WIPs going (some from 20 years ago that I still love), that it's becoming lunacy. So my project for this week is digging everything out and making a list and figuring out the rules. Maybe if I publicly embarrass myself before all of you, I'll get some of this stuff done (like all three of the HoHRH pieces).

Well, that's about it for now. I should get some cleaning done even though it is so hot. Maybe I'll just go play with stash! LOL Oh, one more thing. I don't know about anyone else, but I've had a horrible time with Blogger this week. I would try to make a comment on someone's blog and I would get error messages. It would clear up for awhile and then start again. Then it threw some of the blogs I really like to follow down to the bottom and wasn't bringing them up when new posts were made. So, if I haven't made a comment, I'm definitely not ignoring you! I obviously don't need to be enabled anymore (at least for a month) by all your wonderful stitching, but I love reading and seeing everyone's projects. Have a wonderful week!!! And thanks again for all your comments.

Monday, May 4, 2009

And All I Wanted Was A Flippin' Thread

Happy Monday everyone! Hope everyone had a stitchy weekend! I'll explain my title to this entry in a minute! This may be a long entry (with pictures, of course), so grab some coffee (or tea).

It's been a busy week around here! Cleaning, and more cleaning. I actually got to spend more time in my stitching room. I took pictures of the god-awful mess I've made down there, but I'll hold those until I don't have anything to talk about (like that's really going to happen - LOL). Okay, since I know you want to see it - I'll show you a pretty clean closet.
Well, it's prettier and more organized than it was before. I'm kind of hoping that I can convince DH to build shelves in here instead of using the wire shelving, but it works for now. It's been a lot of fun finding things I've completely forgotten about. And also going through some boxes that haven't seen the light of day since we moved almost four years ago. I haven't even started going through the charts yet. DD keeps saying "Oh, I like that Mom", everytime I'd put something in the donation/Ebay pile. Can't get rid of stuff like that!
Anyway, let's get to the stitchy stuff so if you get bored with the rest of my ramblings you can high-tail it off to another blog!
Block #3 is done! YES MAMA! I like this block the best so far! I had the fleeting thought of going on to Block #4 as it doesn't look too stitch intensive, but decided to get out of the water before I turned into a pruney mess. So I picked up The City Stitcher's Adam and Eve and made a little bit more progress on it.
Before:


After:


I absolutely love stitching this. Yes, it was some wonky quarter stitches and backstitching, but I am really enjoying this! I'll probably work on this for a few more days and then put some time into Cape Cod Girls.

Okay, now I'll explain my title to this entry. I needed a thread. Just one stinking thread. Yes, I probably could have subbed in something else, but I'm anal (yes I'm the one with the alphabetized spice rack and my charts alphabetized by designer and then all the designer's charts alphabetized), and I'm damned proud of it. Anyway, I needed the thread so I jumped in my car and drove at least 50 minutes to the LNS. I did try the two needlepoint stores in the area for naught first, though! Anyway, you just can't go into this store (The Rocking Horse) and just buy thread. You just can't. The store has floor to ceiling framed pieces of cross stitch. Next time, I'll take my camera. It's unbelieveable.

Well, you know how it is, you see a chart and think - UGH!!, and then you see it in person - stitched and framed! Well, that's what happened to me.
First off, a couple La-D-Da charts. The Leaping Cat one I saw stitched one-over-one on 40 ct. silk gauze. Now, before you think I'm some kind of nut case, I don't think I'm going to go there, but maybe one-over-one on 32 ct. In The Forest was also hanging there framed and both pictures combined into one. Kind of made me think of Adam and Eve of the rabbit world, so...........need I explain myself here?

After seeing that evil enabler (opps - did I let that fly out of my head), pardon me, Stitching Sister, Siobhan 's Stories to Live By - Eve, I knew that it would be an excellent addition to the A&E wall. But I couldn't stop there, I also got Jonah, because, well......you know.....it goes with the nautical bathroom theme!
Moving right along with the religious theme, I also picked up these two. The one on the right is a book put out by Leisure Arts quite a few years ago, but what makes it cool is that Diane Arthur of LHN did these and for $4.00 and eight designs, I had to have it.
Okay, now this one I ordered from the Online Needlework Show. Sorry the picture isn't better. Have to tell you, that I can't wait to start this - I found a piece of fabric in my stash. But if any of you are familiar with Heaven and Earth Designs, well, that's what the chart is like. But at the rather moderate size of about 5" x 10", it is highly doable. When it's doable is the question.
Then, like I think I'm going to have all the stitching time in the world, I had to pick up these - French Heart and Thoughtful Heart. Mainly because the guest suite is Shepherd's Bush and these are not the normal long samplers. I needed some smaller pieces to balance out the wall. Then there was the To Thine Self Be True by LHN that I just had to have. A quickie is a good thing once in a while! (Okay, get your minds out of the gutter)! DH asked me what I wanted for Mother's Day. No, I didn't tell him a quickie (may hamper my stitching time). I handed him the bag and told him the wrapping paper was in the closet! LOL

This weekend I missed my monthly Guild meeting. Dang, and they had a lot of fun too as Terri mentioned in her blog. Check it out. They had a class project of a Mermaid pinkeep. Our Guild President designed it. It's so sweet! And then one of the women brought her almost completed Dutch Beast, oops, I mean Dutch Beauty. It is truly stunning! But it looks big enough to sleep under. Anyway, the meeting sounds like it was a lot of fun, but I had my reasons for not going. This weekend was the first of my daughter's recitals. She has three.

Here she is in her Jazz costume:


Such a sweetie! That make-up is a little bit over the top though with those cat eyes!

And in her ballet costume. She's been dancing with most of these girls since she was three years old. I remember her with a pull-up on under her tights just in case she got too excited dancing and had an accident! And by the way, for those few that haven't seen her in a while - she's 5"1" tall and her feet are as big as mine! Where did my baby go???

Well, if I haven't bored you enough, I'll probably bore you with this one. It's the continuing saga of my tooth and the cracked root. I finally had my periodontist appointment this week. Prognosis - remove the tooth, do a sinus lift due to bone deterioriation (okay what the heck is a sinus lift - I'd rather have a breast lift, butt lift or face lift - not something that no one is going to see). Then they will implant bone crystals. After a few months, they will put in the implant post so that the new (read: fake tooth) can be put on. Now the total cost of this (and you will understand why I went on the stash splurge now - there will be no money later)- are you sitting down????? $6,700!!!!! For one FREAKIN' Tooth - of which my dental insurance only covers $600. Also, not included in the cost of this is the actual fake tooth that goes on the implanted post! Oh, my aching mouth. Or it will be aching. I'm now on my third round of antibotics and the surgery won't be done until May 20th! Definitely not something I'm looking forward to.

Okay, I hope that I haven't bored you too much. Maybe I should learn to post more often. But I always think that I have nothing to say, and then suddenly it's like I can't stop! Like eating potato chips.

Anyway, hope that everyone has a great, stitchy week! It should be a fun one here - Tuesday DD and I are going to a sheep shearing at a local farm, and Friday I'm meeting up with Terri and a couple of her friends for Girl's Night Out in Holly (antique city). So have a great week and thank you for all your wonderful comments. I love hearing from you and visiting your blogs too!