Gift Exchange and January TUSAL

I got together with some friends yesterday to stitch and if you remember from my post on Friday we did a gift exchange among friends.  We drew names and each picked a gift to open.  My friend Katrina received mine and here is what was in the box that you saw Friday night:

I really had fun making this fob!  It was stitched on some of the left over fabric from my Frances Eden sampler.  I stitched everything over one except the crown which is stitched over two.  I finished this by hand and was happy with the way it turned out.  So happy that I am tempted to make another one!  The scissors were part of the gift, and are the Elizabeth I scissors by Kelmscott Designs. 

I also received a gift of an adorable pincushion stitched and finished by my friend Theresa (no blog)

Isn't it cute?  She finished it with tiny chocolate ric rac and antique buttons.  I am already treasuring this beauty!  It's also about time for my January TUSAL post, so here is my new pincushion with my January TUSAL jar.  I haven't squished the threads down but with all the stitching that it looks like I've gotten done in January (so far) alone it looks like I will be doing that in future months. 

If you'd like to join in the TUSAL fun, visit this post on It's Daffycat's blog for all the details.  If you're a blogger you can join in the fun at any time! 

Happy Stitching!

What Could It Be?

Who doesn't love presents??  In this box is a stitched gift for one of my stitching friends.  I'm not sure who will get this yet but I'm getting together with a group of friends this weekend and have stitched a little something for a post-Christmas exchange.  Who will get it?  What's in the box?  Well, these questions will be answered right here after the exchange takes place so stay tuned! 

Here's a hint... I loved what I made so much that I'm considering making another one.  :) 

The Attic Retreat

Last weekend I was privileged to be able to attend the Sampler Symposium put on by Attic Needlework in Mesa, AZ with a group of friends, some who I knew from my local sampler guild and others who I've only emailed with.  It was such fun!  And, when I got home my Mom and I had the most fun chatting about my wonderful weekend, the shop, the retreat and how much fun everything was on my trip!  Since I'm not sure where to start I'll just dive right in! 

We arrived on Thursday and our first stop after dropping luggage at the hotel was to go directly to the shop.  I have only heard about how wonderful the shop is but having experienced other nice shops with lots of stitched models I wasn't sure what to expect.  Let me just say that if you ever have a chance to go to Mesa (near Phoenix) you MUST go to the Attic.  It is a fabulous shop!  You walk in and immediately to your right there is the most fantastic wall of samplers that I've ever seen!  Isn't that amazing?!?  I happily spent some time at that little table stitching while I was there too!  This puts my sampler wall (that I'll show you soon) to shame so I really need to get stitching! 

Each of the Samplers is numbered so that you can easily find the chart and the Attic thread conversion (if they've done one and usually they have) for the chart.  I have been reading the Attic's newsletters for awhile now and have read about their conversions but seeing the pieces stitched with them in person was just fabulous! 

I picked up this sweet Margaret Brown chart and the linen and threads to stitch it with as just one of the projects that I came home with.  This picture shows it stitched with the Attic's conversion to a lighter pink silk palette and I thought it was just gorgeous (love that frame too by the way)!    

 

On Friday we went out to lunch as a group.  Although I don't think this is a great picture of me, it's fun to have a picture of our group out to lunch together!  From left to right, this is me, Karin, Sylvia, Tanya, Sandy, Natalia and Katrina.  What fun we had and we went out for Mexican food which is one of my favorites!  One of the things we did after lunch but before the retreat started was... you guessed it... we went back to the shop for more enabling.  In case you couldn't tell, being an Attic newbie I was completely unprepared for the awesomeness in store for me there so was glad to be a frequent shopper over the weekend.  And, all of the ladies in the group helped enable me in one way or another during the weekend.  I was like a kid in a candy store and just got passed from person to person while they showed me what I needed next.  It was really fun!  :) 

Friday night the retreat started and it was great!  To start the evening, Vickie Jennett of Needlework Press shared a reproduction of a sampler that has roots back to who I think she said was the first Mayor of Phoenix!  Here is a photo of Vickie  with both the original sampler and the stitched reproduction.  This chart will be released at market in February so keep an eye out for it!  In addition, we received a chart for a small piece based on the original sampler.  Here is a picture of one version of the chart finished as a great needlework pocket:

Next Darlene Anderson presented a slide show of her sampler ornaments and wow, she brought a bunch of them to share!  Saturday morning she also presented a slide show of the Adam and Eve samplers that she has stitched.  That motivated me to get busy and start stitching!  I know just where I'd hang a collection of A&E samplers too! 

Also on Friday night, Paulette from Plum Street Samplers presented an adorable project called A Lady's Trimkeep.  She also showed us one of her new Market releases called "My Brother's Keeper".  All of us at the retreat got a copy of the chart but since it's a new market release I'm going to hold off on showing a photo.  However, here is the trimkeep project along with two smalls that Paulette made from the Brother's Keeper chart:
Here is Jean, the owner of Attic Needlework bringing the Trimkeep around for show and tell.  I love this project and I really liked Jean, such a sweet woman and her husband is a hoot!

 
Paulette wrapped up our Trimkeep projects in these sweet little boxes, here is mine before I opened the tissue.  You can also see my progress as of last Friday on Paradise Lost also designed by Paulette.
At the retreat, Katrina was the first to dive in and get some 45 count linen from the shop.  We all wanted to try stitching on it so then we had the idea to all put some stitches in each others pieces.  That will make me treasure my Paradise Lost piece even more.  I won't show you the photo of SOMEBODY pretending to blow their nose in it unless I need it for bribery later... :) 

Here is a quick pic of the contents of this box.  I don't know what to stitch on next, whether I should keep going on Paradise Lost or set it aside to stitch this sweet project!
As if that weren't enough, Paulette also designed this cute project for us!  I love how the cherub happens to be holding it up in this pic:

Wow, what a night! On Saturday, after staying up too late stitching and chatting the night before and after copious amounts of Starbucks we started the day with Darlene Anderson's A&E lecture.  I didn't take any photos but was truly inspired!  Then, we spent the rest of the day with Tracy Riffle of Hands to work making some distressed finishes to wooden boxes, a frame and making a cute little paper mache teacup to hold our ORT's.  Mine aren't quite finished yet but here's a photo of Tracy's box.  Cute, huh?  Then, guess what?  We went back to the shop for more stash enhancement! 

Sunday morning we had Catherine Theron as our teacher.  She presented a great project called "A Stitcher's Envelope" stitched with silks and a lot of Florentine stitch.  It is gorgeous!  I started it in class but have a loooong way to go to finish it.  Here's a photograph of the finished piece.
After class ended on Sunday and we were all thoroughly depressed to be leaving the kind folks at the attic, our group of friends and the warmth of Arizona we decided to skip lunch for one final visit to the shop.  This last trip I was finally good to my budget and didn't buy much but instead took the time to walk through the shop and ooh and aah over the models one more time.  It was great!  Here are a few last photos I snapped. 

If you've stuck with me this far, thanks for reading!  I had a wonderful time with a great group of women at the Attic, a shop that you simply must visit!  Now, I really need to get off the computer and get to my stitching, I have a lot of new projects now!

Occasions Mini Catalog

In case you missed it, the Occasions Mini catalog is here and is packed with tons of great products and project ideas!  You can view it through the link above or over to the right or email me to get your own copy! 

Elizabeth Sheffield Finish

Here she is, my Elizabeth Sheffield all finished!  I finished her last weekend just in time for the Sampler Guild of the Rockies meeting.  I brought her just to show a few friends who have been following my progress on her and ended up getting lots of nice compliments on her and showed her during the show and share portion of the meeting.  I've already ordered a frame and will post another picture when she's in her frame and up on the wall. 

I just love the bright colors in this piece and for those who don't know, I stitched her using 35 count WDW Straw linen and the called for DMC threads.  I did make one minor color change but don't have that in front of me at the moment.  I changed the centers of the pink flowers under the brown bird to just mute it down a tad.  I haven't decided where to hang this yet.  I do have another Rhode Island samper that I stitched and was contemplating stitching Anne Anthony by the Essamplaire but I need a break from over one stitching.  I would love to hang a collection of Rhode Island samplers someday but for now I think she'll be pretty hanging in my guest room with other pieces with pretty colors.

It's been nice here today so I've got the windows open for the kitties to enjoy.  Why is it that whenever the weather is great, my black cat sits in the sunniest spot to soak it all up?  I think this would be hot but he seems to enjoy it!  That's all for now!

Jen

Done with Over One!

That's right, I'm done with all of the over one on Elizabeth Sheffield, and there was a lot of it!  I was able to finish all the over one for the people and the windows of the house and now all that's left is to finish filling in the house itself.  The windows were all charted for over one and after finishing up the people I was really tempted to just fill it in over two threads so it would go faster but wanted to stay true to the reproduction so I stitched them over one linen thread as the chart called for.  No picture today but check back soon for a finish! 

In the meantime, here is a photo of my completed snowflakes so I can assemble them at our next guild meeting: 

And, I don't know what happened to the photo I attached of my cute TUSAL jar last time so I'm trying that again...

New Year's Starts

I know that many of you out there in blogland started new projects for New Year's day and so did I.  Only I started not one but two new projects!  First, I started Paradise Lost by Plum Street Samplers.  You might remember that I was trying to decide between this and Ann Grant and this won.  I'm so glad I did too, it's such a fun design!  I started with the verse at the bottom because words are never my favorite. 

I did a little grass above the words so I'd have something other than red done.  :)  I'm stitching this on 36 count Vintage Light Examplar fabric with the called for silks.  Sorry for the poor picture, you'll see better photos when I come back to this.

Then, I started the pre-stitching for a project that we're assembling at our next Sampler Guild of the Rockies meeting, a snowflake biscornu.  I have never assembled or stitched a biscornu before so this was a great opportunity for me to learn!  But, ugh, all that backstitching...  Here's my progress, I hope to finish the rest of the snowflakes in the next day or two:

Once I finish the pre-stitching for the biscornu project then I'll go back and finish up Elizabeth Sheffield.  I made some nice progress on her and ordered a frame at Lynn's when I was home at Christmas.  I'm going to wait to show you an overall photo until she's done but all I have left is the band with the little people and the house:

For some reason I keep thinking that the guy on the left looks like some of my old lego dudes from when I was a kid.  Maybe it's the shape of his face, maybe it's the funny (but cute) smile but I kept thinking Legos when I was stitching.  What do you think?

And, last but certainly not least, I signed up for a couple challenges this year.  One is the BAP (Big Arse Project) challenge hosted by Becky Bee.  Paradise Lost will be my challenge piece for this challenge since it's larger than 10" x 12".  I'll be posting updates here on this blog as I work on her (after finishing Elizabeth Sheffield of course) so check back to see how it's coming along. 

The other challenge I signed up for is the TUSAL Challenge.  For those who don't know, TUSAL stands for Totally Useless Stitch A-Long.  It's where stitchers post a photo on their blogs of a jar filled with their ORT's (Old Ratty Threads) on or around every full moon.  I had a lot of fun seeing these ORT jars on other people's blogs over the last year so I decided to jump in too!  The challenge is open, anyone can join in at any time of the year and all the information is on Daffycat's blog.  I have had this pretty fluted jar in my basement forever trying to figure out what to do with it.  So, I tied a pretty ribbon around it and voila! that's my TUSAL jar.  My first update will be later in January so check back for more photos of this one too. 

Well, that's it, I'm off to go work on snowflakes so I can go back to stitching on Elizabeth Sheffield.  I hope to have a finish on her to show you sometime soon! 

Jen