Meet Miss July 2012

I had a fun, pint-size finish this week as Miss July 2012 came off the stretcher bars.

Miss July is from a series of July 4th children designed by Melissa Shirley. Carolyn Hedge Baird wrote a great stitch guide for this series. Thank you, Melissa and Carolyn! I wish the photograph could do justice to her sparkly personality. She has hex shaped beads on her dress which really pick up the light. I added some star sequins at each corner that I purchased from Amy's Golden Strand this summer. They also add some extra sparkle. The big, blue bow in her hair is the icing on the cake! I have a companion piece from this series that I want to stitch - a little boy holding a flag - so that they can be finished together (whatever that may be).

Last week, I promised you some pictures of the Christmas Parade. This parade just keeps on keeping on! I am so close to finishing it but I think it still has another couple of weeks on the stretcher bars. The bottom border seems to stretch on forever. I haven't worked on it every day this week but it has taken me a week just to get half way across.

I took a break from the border and started the turkey work on the bottom border of Santa's coat. I'm thinking I probably don't need loops as large as I have made them but I suppose it's better to have larger loops with too much thread than small ones and not enough to work with. Larger loops just mean a little more thread is required and a little more cutting and trimming. I must be ready to wrap up this project because right now every section I stitch seems to drag on into infinity! Do you ever feel like that with a project? No matter how much you love a project or have enjoyed the work put into it, there comes a time when you are just ready to be finished. That's where I am with Christmas Parade.

What's the upcoming Halloween season without a Halloween project to stitch? This season's project is Mehitabel from NeedleDeeva. I made a good start on her last night while watching the Georgia-Vanderbilt game. Go Dawgs! Mehitabel has a winning smile that is sure to make her the belle of the Halloween Ball this year!

Robin King has written the best stitch guides for the Creepy Characters of which Mehitabel is a part. Several of her fellow Characters are off at the finisher as I write. Hope they make it home for Halloween this year!

Here in Georgia, our first weekend of Autumn is off to a beautiful start with cool nights and warm days. At Publix yesterday, I bought a beautiful bouquet of sunflowers and eucalyptus to welcome the first day of fall. Pretty, isn't it?

Well, time to go get the slow cooker ready for the Boston butt pork roast that will cook all afternoon. I'll have barbecue pulled pork on the menu for the rest of the week - not a bad thing!

Hope you have a great week ahead!

A Bottle of Frog's Breath

I took a little break from blogging last week to visit with my son and daughter-in-law who were in town to pick up some furniture they bought here over the Labor Day weekend. A locally owned furniture store is having an unbelievable sale and it was exciting to see Andrew and Anna  load up a rental truck with all the elements of a brand new living room.

While the blogging was on hold last week, the stitching was not. I finished my Kirk & Hamilton Frog's Breath Poison Bottle canvas. The stitch guide is by Amy Bunger.

This one will be off to the finisher tomorrow in hopes that it might come back to me before Halloweeen. I'll have it finished as a standup. I was doing a little Halloween shopping at JoAnn's this week and they had some cute "poison" bottles for sale in their Halloween decor area but none had the character of the Frog's Breath bottle.

I was on a mission to JoAnn's this week to buy two specific pieces to add to my Halloween decorations. On an earlier trip there, I had come across a stack of two "books" - Curses and Spells - that I wanted as props for my Halloweenie characters. I held off buying them until I had two coupons that amounted to 60% off. I don't think the ink had dried on my printed out coupon before I was out the door to buy my books.

It's a good thing that Amy's Home Study only included eight characters or else I would have needed a larger mantle on which to display them. I don't think there are any more additions that can be made to the mantle's Halloween display. There's no more room!

If you are looking to add some new pieces to your Halloween decorations, don't miss trips to Pier One and JoAnn's. They both have a fun variety of decorations.

My other addition to my Halloween decor was this witch's hat wreath from a favorite local store, Cudos. It's almost as big as my back door!

My work on the Christmas Parade continues. Each week there are fewer and fewer open spaces left to stitch. I've finished the snowy ground and the trees and have moved on to the final details. I'll have a picture for you next week.

If you are wondering about the header photo I am using for the next few weeks, that's the "Boo" canvas by & More Designs with a stitch guide by Amy Bunger.

Well, friends, that's it from Halloween Central for this week. Have a great week ahead!

Equal Opportunity Holiday Stitcher

I thought it might be a nice break from Christmas Parade to show you some other holiday canvases that I am working on. The Parade has been front and center for a while now but I have found some time to work on a couple of smaller canvases for Halloween and July 4th.

I showed you the Kirk & Hamilton Frog's Breath bottle a few weeks ago.  I have been stitching black on black for a large part of the bottle so there really isn't too much to see other than the fact that I have finished the black areas. Now I can work on adding the frog's fingers, toes, and tongue. I started on the lettering this week and had hoped to get that part finished but I didn't quite get to the finish line.

My little July 4th girl is really coming along. It took a while to stitch that head full of curls. I used Twisted Lazy Daisy stitches for the curls. She has a big, navy ribbon bow in her hair that will be added towards the end of my stitching. This week I finished her blue dress (except for the white beads) and red and white sash. I'll probably work on the background over the next couple of days and then move on to the border.

I added two more canvases to my Kelly Clark Heritage Series of Christmas ornaments this week. I found these on eBay.

Hope you're enjoying the Labor Day holiday and can settle in for a nice weekend of stitching! My Ott Light bulb burned out last night after many years of use so I'll be off to Joann's today to replace it. I'm too dependent on that light  - my primary source of stitching light - to go for too long without it.

Have a good week ahead!

The Fur was Flying This Week!

Have you ever had one of those weeks where you know you put in several good hours of stitching time and yet you don't feel like you have much to show for it? That was me this week.  Perhaps it's that way because the major areas and characters on Christmas Parade are stitched and now I am down to smaller areas and the details.

One of the details I finished this week was the cute squirrel. I love his bushy tail. The tail was stitched using Laura's Turkey Work as is the fur trim on Santa's coat.

Santa now has a furry brim to his hat. I am still amazed that all of those strands of Threadworx can be carefully cut down into what looks like a sheared fur. It's a messy process but tape helps clean up the mess as you go along. I trimmed and trimmed the fur on Santa's hat and decided to stop and come back later to trim some more if needed.

I also finished the majority of the work on the sky. I still have Kreinik tent stitches to add to the sky on the left of the canvas and a few areas across the top of the canvas where I need to fill in with some stitches.

We had a welcome hint of the changing of the seasons this morning. It was a nice cool 64 degrees when I woke up. I know we still have some hot, muggy days ahead of us in September but this morning's temperatures give us hope of cooler days to come.

I succumbed to the siren call of Pinterest this week. Have you made the plunge into Pinterest yet? It's an amazing way to waste a lot of time but have lots of fun in the process. I've picked up some great DIY ideas for projects around the house, holiday decorating ideas, and have cooked three recipes that I found - a slow cooked turkey recipe, a zucchini/squash feta cheese casserole, and crispy baked zucchini fries. Give Pinterest a try - there's no way that you won't find something of interest to you!

To all of my friends who are attending the ANG Seminar in Philadelphia, I hope you have a wonderful time! Learn lots of new techniques and come home and share them with those of us who couldn't make it to Seminar.

Have a great week ahead!

The Parade Keeps Moving Along

It's been another week of stitching progress on the Christmas Parade canvas. Just sit me in front of the television and give me great PGA Championship at a favorite spot along the South Carolina coast coupled with Shark Week and I will show you how much stitching I can get done.

This week I added a good bit of the snowy ground. Before I do too much more of the ground, I think I will work on the trees in the background and figure out how the ground area will work into the trees. On the painted canvas the trees blend into the snowy ground. There is a suggestion of the trees' shapes (tent stitches) that will need to work with the bold bargello pattern on the ground. Should be interesting to figure out!

The wagon wheels are finally complete and you can see just a hint of additional elements to come with the red ribbon bow at the front of the cart. Eventually there will be streamers that hang from the bow and the addition of the ribbon reins that attach the harness on the bear to the cart.

Santa now has a stitched candy cane walking stick held by stitched fingers and thumb. A green sleeve
cuff peaks out from under the fur cuff on his sleeve of his coat. Not that you can tell from the photos but the green cuff is stitched using a detached buttonhole stitch.

This first photo of Santa was taken after I stitched Laura's Turkey Work on the sleeve. The sleeve cuff is a very small area - maybe 15 threads across by 15 threads down (on the diagonal). It took a couple of hours to add all of that Turkey Work that you see in its uncut state. This is the first time I have ever attempted Turkey Work so I was surprised at how long it took. Before starting my work on the cuff, I watched the Turkey Work section on Amy's DVD Just Fur Fun several times. It was just like having Amy sitting right next to me. I highly recommend her How'd You Do That? DVD series if you haven't tried any of them.

The photo above is of the trimmed Turkey Work on the sleeve cuff. It's amazing to see how all of those loops trim down to a thick, sheared fur cuff. I used four strands of Threadworx overdyed floss for the fur. There is still a lot of Laura's Turkey Work left to stitch on Santa's coat. I'll be loopy by the end of this week - sorry I couldn't resist the pun!

Even though I finished the Christmas Banner two months ago, it took until this week for me to finally wrap it up and ship it off to Marlene's in San Francisco. I loosely rolled it and sealed it in a ziploc bag for its trip across the country. It is accompanied by three Creepy Characters Halloween ornaments and a  Kelly Clark Halloween apple ornament. I had a conversation with Matt at Marlene's about how the banner will be finished and I feel confident that the next time I see my banner, I will be one very happy stitcher!

We had a bad storm on Friday that really took its toll on quite a few of the old trees on my street. Last week I had lost a huge limb on the 60 year old oak tree at the end of my driveway. The damage to the tree came from a diseased area within the tree and wasn't storm related but it will require that the tree be taken down. Fortunately, it is the city's problem to handle and won't require my pulling out the checkbook to pay a tree service to do the work. The tree has a notice on it from the city saying that it will be taken out. My neighborhood has been so sensitive (and vocal) to the loss of trees in our area due to disease and also storm-related problems that the city gives everyone a week to voice any concerns about the loss of another tree before it is taken down. The storm on Friday damaged at least another four or five trees  just in my block.  It's so sad to see these old trees being lost.

Well, time to get back to that Turkey Work! Hope you have a great week ahead!

The Night Time Sky

Last week I said that I wanted to concentrate my stitching time this week on the night time sky for the Christmas Parade. And that's exactly what I did. It doesn't exactly make for exciting blog news or pictures but I'm really pleased with my progress.

I knew I would run out of the background color before the weekend so I called Amy's and Jill pulled their last two skeins of the color and dye lot I needed and put them in the mail to me. I think two skeins will be just the right amount to finish up the sky. I spent Friday night and Saturday adding the diamond shaped areas of Kreinik tent stitches.

It is a good feeling to see this much of the canvas covered in stitches. The next big push on this piece after finishing the sky is the bargello snowy ground.


Having the Olympics on television every night for the last two weeks has been a great companion for me as I stitched. As much as I have enjoyed the sports and the athletes' stories, I think I'm ready for it to be over. I abandoned the Olympics on television this weekend for the PGA Golf Tournament at Kiawah Island, SC and thoroughly enjoyed all the views of the beautiful beachfront along the Atlantic Ocean. I know I just spent the weekend at the beach a few weeks ago, but I'm ready to go back!

It's nice to see the sun this morning - especially after the weather we had yesterday. We had 5 inches of rain - most of it coming in a two hour stretch of one thunderstorm after another during the morning.

Well, the blog is short and sweet this week. Maybe I'll have more than background stitching to show you next week.

Have a good week ahead!

Olympic Stitching

I don't think my stitching this week would win me any Olympic medals but watching/listening to the televised coverage provided hours of time to put in some serious work on Christmas Parade.

I tried to cover lots of areas on the canvas this week. The snowy ground is stitched in a bargello pattern with three shades of blue Needlepoint, Inc silk.

The goose needs a bow or ribbon around her neck. I think I found the perfect 1/4" burgundy velvet ribbon in the clearance bin at Joann's yesterday. It cost me all of $.50! My bargain of the week! While I was at Joann's I also found some glittery flat snowflake buttons that I hope I can use on some future Christmas-themed canvas.

It may not look like it but I spent a lot of time working on the sky in the upper right of the canvas. I had decided to start stitching the tree branches in that area and had threaded up my needle with the brown silk when I realized that stitching the branches before stitching the background was not the smartest move on my part. It is so much easier to compensate and count threads for the background pattern if the branches are not stitched. I plan to focus my stitching attention on this area of the canvas this week and get the other part of the pattern that moves in the opposite direction in place.

What is a week without a package arriving from Amy's? Glad I didn't have to find out! Another little treasure Amy and Jill picked out at the Columbus market arrived on my doorstep.

This is one of the Associated Talents Halloween spiders in a sort of Halloween ribbon plaid. Each canvas comes with a stitch guide and the metal spider legs upon which the finished canvas sits. Looks like a fun little project, doesn't it?

I'm looking forward to more Olympic stitching this week. What did I watch in the evenings while I stitched before the Olympics?

Have a great week ahead!