A Much Needed Break

Wow, where to begin, it's been a busy couple weeks!  My sister and I drove home with our dogs for a week.  It was such a nice break from my crazy busy life here in Colorado but it's also nice to be home too!  Here's a picture of me, my mom and sister out on the boat with the dogs.

 
While home in Wisconsin I of course got to go to Lynn's and I spent 2 hours there, I think my family was ready to send out a search party!!  But, I had such a good time!  Jean who works there had just finished stitching Susan Rambo so we were looking at frames for that and also for my Mary Roe.  I did a little shopping for charts and then Jean and I pulled a conversion to overdyed threads for Dutch Beauty.  I guess this means that I'm going to stitch on Dutch Beauty!!  It was really fun! 

Also while I was at Lynn's we looked at other options for the gold house in Grace Bridges and found a really pretty BS Pecan Pie.  I tried that and it was the perfect blend of a light gold but still being gold enough for my taste.  Here's a picture of Grace with the new gold in the chimneys and a little in the house itself.

 
By the time I finished that much I needed a break from this sampler (and I admit that I was a bit intimidated by the prospect of that whole house) so I did something that is uncharacteristic for me and started a second project.  Here's my start on Ann Sandles. 

I'm stitching Ann on 36 count Vintage Meadow Rue and don't have much to show yet except how I zig zagged my way through the border to get all the way around.  I tend not to love borders like this so I like to get them out of the way.  My sister was nice enough to drive a big stretch on the way home so I could get the borders to meet.  Yay!  As of this writing the border outline is done but that's as far as I've gotten.  Ann is going to be a fun sampler to stitch once I get the flowers in the border done and can move on to the inside. 

Sorry for all the wrinkles in my photos!  I'm using some Belle Soie silks on Grace which I've seen run so I'm waiting to iron her until she's done but really I'm just too lazy to fire up the iron for every post.  If I had to do that I'd probably never post on this blog! 

The rest of our vacation was nice.  It was hot and humid while we were home so we couldn't spend as much time outside as we would have liked but it was nice just to spend the time together as a family.  I'll leave you with a photo of me playing ping pong with my Dad.  We had some helpers while playing, one who thought it looked like a fun game and the other who figured if there was barking going on then she should probably bark too!   :)
 

 

Mary Ann Blackburn Finish

Well, I took the above picture a little over a week ago.  I had planned to do a progress post of Mary Ann Blackburn by Blackbird designs and then life just got in the way and I've been busy.  So, I'm posting it today even though on Tuesday I finished Mary Ann! 

I love both of the above pictures!  I stitched Mary Ann Blackburn on a beautiful cut of 40 count Sheep's Straw Linen with the called for GAST/WDW/CC Cotton overdyed threads.  I love how the piece is nice with lots of warm browns in the first photo and then how it just pops with the reds in the finished version.  I wasn't sure if I was going to like the CC Used Brick which is what was called for as the red in the piece and had thought about switching to WDW Brick.  But, I do love how it turned out so now all I have to do is pick a frame and get her up on my wall! 

While she waits for me to pick a frame, she's sitting on my craft room table which is literally covered with projects needing finishing or framing.  I had cleaned out the closet in this room over the past couple weekends to make better use of the space for stash organizing and that included cleaning off the table.  I love the look of all these pieces piled up but would really rather see them all up on my walls or finished as smalls.  So, I'd better get busy!  At least I was able to get the box painted for Spring Song! 

I had a helper while pressing Mary Ann for photography today too, miss Kitty loves sleeping in my craft room, who can blame her??   

I have seen several Dutch Beauty finishes of late and most recently Paulette's gorgeous finish!  I am in LOVE with this piece but I have no idea how Paulette had the patience to stitch this with 2 strands on 32 count linen.  LOL!  I added this to my stash a couple months ago and have been trying to pick a linen so I could start it, I'd love for it to be huge but I really prefer stitching with 1 strand now so I have a dilemma.  I've been thinking a nice 35 or 36 count linen would preserve some of the size while allowing me to stitch with one strand and my friend Katrina and I did a floss toss and loved R&R Sheep's straw.  I was all set to commit to 35 count Sheep's straw when I found these...

Two WIP's!!!  Yikes!  I thought I had just one, a drawn thread sampler that just needs the cross stitch portion done.  This is "A Very Fine Sampler" by Birds of a Feather (top) and "Betsy" by Sheepish Designs (bottom).  I started both of these in the last year or two on different colors of 35 cout R&R and set both aside because the linen was crunchy.  Now, don't get me wrong, R&R makes a beautiful linen, I think I just prefer the 40 count.  I stitched on the top piece a bit last night to see how it felt and it wasn't bad and both pieces went into my dryer with a dryer sheet to try to soften them up.  It seems to have helped a bit.  So, maybe I'll go with a 40 count Sheep's Straw?  I'd consider another manufacturer of linen, like Lakeside or Weeks but in 35 or 36 count I need larger than a half yard cut. 

So, now I find myself with Mary Ann Blackburn done, two WIP's to work on and no clear answer to Dutch Beauty.  Sigh.  Maybe I'll just go start something new...  :)