Olympic Stitching

Like many of you, I decided to start a new project for the Olympics.  I wanted to stitch on something patriotic so I chose "One Nation" by ByGone Stitches.  I changed the threads and my local shop had a beautiful piece of 40 ct. R&R 18th Century Blackbird.  The only problem?  The piece would only fit if I stitched it over one.  So, that's what I decided to do! 

One Nation, stitched on 40 ct. 18th Century Blackbird Linen, over one

I just love how the colors look on this linen and the advantage of over one on this size is only needing half a cross!  Yay!  I had a friend over for the opening ceremonies so I cooked a Portabello, Bacon and Spinach risotto and we stitched and I started this.  I had to use the magnifier on my Dazor.  It was dusty, I haven't had to use it in years...  Oh well, it's going to be pretty when I finish it! 

I had hoped to at least get the outline of the stripes done during the games but I'm finding that it's tough to stitch on something this tiny and switch between stitching and watching TV.  So, I've set it aside and my new Olympic stitching project is Ann Sandles!

Ann Sandles, stitched on 36 ct. Lakeside Vintage Meadow Rue

Ah, much better!  And, now that I have a little color in her she's proving to be so much fun to stitch!  I think she'll go pretty quickly (except for the 24 strawberries inthe border).  I don't know that I'll finish her during the games but I'll sure enjoy stitching on her! 

I'm getting ready to do some framing, my frame for Mary Roe should arrive next week and I still need to lace up my Paradise Lost plus I'm sending a few things out for their frames including Mary Ann Blackburn and Grace Bridges.  So, I decided to press everything and it is fun to see all my recent stitching piled up on the bed together.  My Mom has already offered to take some of it off my hands if I have too much!  LOL, nice try Mom!!  (In the picture below, Paradise Lost is upside down, just in case you're wondering why it looks a bit funny here.)

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...  :) 

Mary Ann Blackburn Start and a Peacock Finish!

This week I have a teeny little start on Mary Ann Blackburn by Blackbird Designs to show you.  I have the most lovely piece of 40 count R&R Sheep's Straw linen that I'm stitching it on.  It's nicely aged and overdyed and to make it a bit more splotchy I spritzed it with water.  OK, that was an accident but I like the way it turned out and am loving these colors on it!  I'm stitching it with the called for Gentle Arts Sampler Threads by the way and even though I haven't gotten very far yet I think this one will go quickly!  I initially wasn't sure about the rooster/peacock that is in the center of the sampler (on top in my photo) but in the end I'm very glad that I stitched it as charted.  I did think about swapping it out for one of the peacocks in Grace Bridges or the one in the Peacock Pinkeep but decided to leave it as is and am happy I did.  Of course, now I am jonesing to start Grace Bridges.  Good thing I have that all kitted and ready to go as she may be next!  :)

I must be on a peacock kick because I also started and finished the Blackbird Designs Peacock Pinkeep in the last week.  I also did the bonus needlebook chart while I was at it.  If you're not familiar with this piece, the peacock pictured in the upper right of this picture is the top and the band at the bottom wraps around to form the sides of the pinkeep.  When it's all done it will look like a drum.  Normally I would crop this photo but as I was taking these pictures I had the pieces laid out on the couch to get a decent snap and the kitty was looking for attention, that's her foot peeking in the very bottom of the photo so I had to leave it in.  :)

I purchased this chart, the pattern and the Belle Soie when I was at Attic Needlework back in January and it's been in my bag to stitch every since.  Now she's stitched and will go off in the mail to my finisher this week.  I can't wait to get her back and display her! 

This week I dog-sat for my second favorite dog in the world and I happened to pick up a new piece of training equipment over the holiday weekend.  I was working "off contacts" with both dogs and had them each on an end.  Maverick sat down as I took this but I thought it was a cute photo and thought I'd share a bit of what I do in my free time when I'm not stitching.  You can see more about my adventures with Sage over at my dog blog.  Enjoy!

Spring Song Finish

Well, I finished Spring Song last weekend.  Here she is in all her glory!
I love the Old Blue Paint fabric threads and am really happy that I took the time to remove and reweave to get this look!  I have the box and went to get a piece of matboard yesterday so I'm all set to do the finishing. 

I also made a great deal of progress on Mary Roe.  I was enjoying this sampler but I needed to add some color so I did the strawberries in the vine to brighten it up a bit.  This is such a fun stitch especially with all these bright colors!  Once the vine was done I started on the Rice Stitch mounds at the bottom. 

I enjoy rice stitch so this part went really fast and now I'm ready to move onto the shepard and sheep at the bottom left.  I haven't decided if I'll work up from the bottom (although it seems as though that's what I'm doing now) or if I'd like to go up and finish the vine.  We shall see I guess.

Unfortunately, I need to set Mary aside for a few days to do the finishing on my Mary Little pincushions and to do some stitching for an EGA project.  I thought I had an extra week on the EGA piece but panicked a bit when I realized I need to have it done for our meeting next week!  I have some pretty blue ric rac for the trim on Mary Little but also ordered some blue chenille from the Attic.  Either one would need to be attached after the cushion is assembled so I'll probably do the finishing and when the chenielle arrives then I'll make a decision on the trim.  I can't wait to get these finished, they are going to be so cute!!

Here's a close up of those beautiful rice stitch mounds.  I just love this sampler!

   

Happy Stitching!!

Done with Over One!

Yay!!  I finished the over one verse on Mary Roe!  I love how Miss Mary has a backward "s" toward the end of the verse and I just love the way this looks now that all the lettering is done!  While it may not look like I made a lot of progress, this is huge for me because now I can move on to the flower band and all the fun motifs below that.  I may start by stitching the strawberries in the border next though.  I am getting together to stitch with some friends this weekend and the berries in the border will be easy to do while carring on a conversation since it's the same berry all the way around the vine. 

I had hoped to have a finish on Spring Song to show by now but I did basically no stitching during the first part of the week so it's not quite done.  I absolutely love this piece, it keeps pulling me back to it when I sit down to work on Mary Roe.  I guess that's why I usually stitch on one at a time because there's usually one piece that just speaks to me.   I'm stitching this on 30 count R&R Sheep's Straw as charted and it is simply beautiful even if my camera does seem to wash it out a bit.  I really want to finish this so I can start the main sampler in the booklet, Mary Ann Blackburn.  I will be stitching her on 35 count though. 

I came home tonight to find some special packages waiting for me.  What could this be?  Stay tuned to find out...

My Intro to Rug Hooking and an April TUSAL

Wow, it was a busy, busy weekend but also very productive in many ways!  One of the things I did on Saturday was to take a Rug Hooking class at a shop called the Wool Basket in Loveland.  I had been up a few weeks ago to check out the shop and ended up signing up for class then!  The ladies there are very nice and it was a fun lesson.  Here's my progress so far:.

It doesn't seem like much to me but I was assured that I picked it up quickly and made more progress than a typical beginner (this made me feel good and I am very encouraged to keep going)!  And yes, I am hooking a black cat rug, that pretty much sealed the deal for me since I love black cats! 

I haven't been stitching too much since I've been so busy.  I did get to work on the letters of Mary Roe a bit, and I was able to get a start on the vine.  I was traveling on a plane with this piece and the little over one letters just would have been too much so I moved on to the vine since it's over two.  I'm loving this little sampler!  I'd like to go back and do some more on the words and then maybe put the strawberries in the vine for some color.  I can't wait to get to all the fun motifs below the vine but for some reason I tend to like to get the hard stuff out of the way and then save the fun stuff for last.  It's not so much that the over one words are hard, they're really not, but they're just not as fun as the colorful motifs below the vine.  I absolutely love the way the little letters look and was inspired to see Tanya's model when I was at the Attic a couple weeks ago.  That alone made me want to keep going with the words and get to the super fun stuff!  Actually, these little letters are reminding me so much of stitching Elizabeth Sheffield's sampler!

I've also put some time into Spring Song lately and I have to say that even though it seems weird to me to be stitching with two threads I am really enjoying this piece!  And, stitching with two threads instead of my normal one thread is really filling up my TUSAL jar quickly!  Here's a progress pic:

And it's a new moon so it's time for my latest TUSAL pic.  Anyone can get in on the TUSAL fun, it's not too late!  Just go to this post on Daffycat's blog for details.  I decided that the jar always kind of looks the same and that the added weight of the ORT's each month just push the whole layer down just a bit.  So, after I took this picture I squished the whole thing down and oh my, it really squished tiny!  Oh well, it will give me room for more ORT's even though some of you may wonder if I've removed any when I post next month.

Happy Stitching!

Mary, Mary Quite Contrary

At least that's how I think the poem goes.  Why oh why did these little girls in the 1800's stitch with teeny tiny letters on teeny tiny linen??  I started the words on Mary Roe the other night, mostly to get placement and partly to get them out of the way. 

I decided to stitch one thread to start each line so I could add the vine and make sure I had the placement right.  I had really wanted to stitch the whole verse to get it out of the way but I suspect that maybe I'll do one or two strands of verse with each sitting alternated by the fun stuff.  This is a really fun little sampler and I can't wait to finish her and have her hanging up on my wall!  But, that's going to take me a little while.  :) 

I did manage to finish Mary Little.  Here's a snap of her all completed. 

I actually stitched her twice, one for me and one for a gift.  I'm thinking that once I do the finishing work that I may take the second one to the pincushion exchange at the May Sampler Guild of the Rockies meeting.  Since she is out of print and was hard to find I was thinking that would make my exchange piece more special.  And of course I used my own initials instead of those on the chart.  She was such a fun little stitch!  I used 40 ct. Autumn Gold linen and switched to overdyed cotton threads. 

The third Mary I started is the box top in the Mary Ann Blackburn chart by Blackbird designs called Spring Song.  Here's where I am so far (sorry for the wrinkles in the photo):

 

One of the things I loved about this piece is the blue marking lines.  On Friday night I caught a peek of my friend Katrina's start on this piece and decided that I needed to start it too.  I have done this type of weaving of linen threads before on drawn thread work but this was so much fun!  I had a super busy weekend so when I finally had a little bit of time to sit down on Saturday afternoon I found an Indiana Jones movie on TV and started with the blue lines.  It was such a relaxing, easy and fun project to start, and for those of you keeping track I now have more than one project going at once...  

I'm stitching Spring Song on 30 ct. R&R Sheep's straw linen with the called for Gentle Arts Sampler Threads.  I have to say that stitching on something with stitches this big and with two linen threads has taken some getting used to!  I had purchased a beautiful cut of 32 ct fabric originally to start Anniversaries of the Heart on but was fretting about stitching with two threads as I prefer to only use one.  I ended up calling Lynn's to order a piece of 36 ct. Vintage Pecan Butter for my AotH and I can tell after starting Spring Song that it was the right decision for me! 

This past weekend was our seminar for the Sampler Guild of the Rockies and it was so much fun!  On Friday night we had Jackie du Plessis in to teach us the finishing for the Briar Rose Etui.  I now have a finishing kit and great instructions to get started.  Sunday she was back at our guild to talk a little about her embroidery and finishing and she had some great make and take kits for sale.  Of course, Sampler guild is so much fun!  Getting to visit with friends there, stitch and see others work, it is always my favorite Sunday of the Month!  When I got home the sky looked threatening even though we didn't get a drop of rain at my house.  I'll leave you with a snapshot of what the sky looked like.  Happy stitching!