A Busy Week

So, it's been a busy, busy week for me.  So busy that I neglected to post a pic of my latest finish.  After finishing American Pride for our anniversary, I went back to my Janet Carsels (by The Scarlet Letter).  I really have a thing for Scottish samplers.  I love the illuminated alphabets and the fact that they usually are full of bold reds and greens is also an attractive feature for me. 

I'm trying to get ready for the Counted Wishes online needlework show in September.  So I was making laying tools since I was really low on inventory.   So I decided to post this pic of all my new ones in a needlepoint group on Facebook.   Let's just say that not only do I need to make some more, I need to order more supplies.  What a great problem to have! 

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Who Knew I'd Still Be Struggling With the Alphabet at My Age

I think Spring is finally here.  The pine pollen has come and gone so we can open up the house and enjoy a few days of bearable humidity.  I might even take my stitching out to the screened porch for a little stress relief.

I finally got to the motif part of Janet Carsels.  I had to make a couple of color adjustments because the chosen colors just didn't look right.  It could be that the DMC to AVS conversion wasn't accurate or more likely, the colors/dye lots themselves have changed.  That seems to happen a lot.  I had three different dye lots for one of the colors I switched to and the best match was the oldest one.  So even when there's a printed conversion, it's probably best to confirm it whenever possible.  Fortunately, I have a fairly large stash of AVS that makes that possible.  One of the perks of having owned a couple of needlework shops in the past. :)

These illuminated alphabets take a lot more focus, and therefore, time than you might think.  Especially when they aren't necessarily symmetrical.  A little froggie told me that.

 

This is probably a good point at which to switch back to Le Jardin de Plaisir, but who knows?  Stay tuned.

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One Color At a Time

It's the beginning of 'The Season' so things are getting a little hectic around here.  Any of you who live in a vacation or resort area know what I mean.  Even though the weather is still a little spotty, folks seem determined to go to the beach.  I drove into town on Monday and noticed the difference immediately.  Traffic is way up.  Then I went to the grocery and wanted to pull my hair out!  Way too many people already. 

As usual, I didn't get any stitching done while visiting my mom this weekend.  But I'm learning.  I only took one project with me instead of my entire stitching bag.  So after four days of stitching celibacy and a stressful Monday, I was ready to park myself on the couch with my stitching. 

It's been a couple of weeks since I showed you any progress on the two pieces in my so-called rotation.  The plan was to work on each piece for a week and then switch, but I'm am somehow compelled to keep working until I come to, what I consider, a good stopping point.  Now give me some credit because normally that 'good stopping point' is when the project is done.  In this case, I finished the red portion of Le Jardin de Plaisir, so I decided it was time to switch projects. (Just to be contrary, I did a couple of tiny motifs in the black before I packed it away.)

I just love the center arrangement of flowers, even without the black parts done.Janet Carsels continues to be a fun stitch with a variety of alphabet styles and only a few colors involved.

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Frog Fest

I'm not even going to apologize for taking the month off.  Just accept it.  I'm an inconsistent blogger. 

I have found some time to stitch even though I lost about 4 days while visiting my mom.  Things were just too chaotic.  Between creating, photographing and listing over thirty new items to my Etsy shop, I managed to make significant progress on Le Jardin de PLaisir and Janet Carsels. 

Hard to believe that any one of these little sections could be more trouble than another since they're all basically the same, just in a different orientation.  But I stitched one of them three times!  I frogged the first time, but didn't go back far enough. Geez, how dumb.  So I had to rip it out a second time.   But, as they say, the third time's the charm.

JC has also presented some difficulties on what should have been a simple vine.  The flat part of the vine is eight stitches and the angled parts are nine stitches.  How hard is that to remember?  Well, apparently, I'm easily distracted.  Of course, it is NCAA basketball tourney time and I tend to get emotionally involved.  But I can't watch without doing something.  So, stitch and frog it is.

I love stitching reproductions because of the stories behind them.  Even if I just make them up, they feel real to me.  This is the first one I've done where the personalization is at the top of the sampler.  I didn't even notice until I started stitching what I thought would be the alphabet.  And I said to myself, "Hey Self, that's not an 'A'."  Maybe Janet had a little ego thing going on.  Maybe she was worried one of her sisters (and I don't even know if she had any) would steal it and try to take credit for stitching it.  But it's an interesting change to the norm. 

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New Starts, New Finishes, More New Starts

Wow! Time flies between projects.  Actually, I've fill the evenings with some little goodies from The Sweetheart Tree.  But I just don't think to post them because they only take two or three days each to stitch.  These little needlerolls have lots of specialty stitches and, except for the annoying little backstitch vines, they are fun to do.  Unfortunately, I didn't do a very good job photographing the white-on-white stuff, but you get the idea.

 

 

I'm starting a Long Dog Sampler SAL on March 1st.  My project is not a typical LD piece, but I find it very intriguing.  "Le Jardin de Plaisir" is more of a geometric/knot garden type design and I love the original colorway of red, black and gray.  I'm stitching it on 38 count Italian linen (thanks, Laura!) with Splendor silk.

And once again, I'm going to try to work on more than one project in rotation.  Otherwise, I'll finish the SAL piece in the first month.  I have some Scarlet Letter pieces almost kitted and I'll just have to close my eyes and pick one once all the silks arrive.  I ran in from waiting by the mailbox just to post this.  It's kind of cold out there at night, but I'm very anxious for this package to arrive.

Plus, I have been very busy in the 'bead cave'.  It's been a big month for scissor fobs.  Every time I think I'm catching up, I need to make more.  It's a great problem to have except my fingers are too cold to play with the beads for long periods of time.  I'll really be happy to see Spring!  From elegant...

to funky...

there's lots to choose from.  I just hope I don't need more counting pins for this Long Dog SAL piece.

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First Finish of 2014

Well, my New Year's Day start is my first finish of the year.  Jean Scrimgeowr, from The Scarlet Letter, has been a lot of fun and a relatively easy piece to stitch.  I have totally enjoyed the many anomalies I've encountered and can't wait to frame her. 

 

The verse is an interesting mix of cross stitch over two and elongated cross stitch (two threads high/one thread wide).  I had to focus a little harder on the counting than I normally do.  That's usually the easiest part for me.  I will confess to a couple of 'anomalies' of my own, but I'm pretty sure Jean wouldn't mind.  I thought I had transposed a couple of letters at one point, but I realized Jean was apparently not a good speller either.  Then again, "ravished" is a pretty big work for a ten year old.

And, since it is a reproduction, I don't sign my work within the viewable area. So it's only seen if someone unframes it sometime in the future. 

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Don't Sneeze on My Sampler!

Yes, I've had a horrible cold this week that drained me of even enough energy to stitch!  Hard to believe, I know.  But I'm much better now, except for that annoying post nasal drip. Yck.  However, I'm not the one sneezing on my sampler! 
Otis, genus PlayWithMeDon'tIgnoreMe, was looking over my arm while I was working on Jean Scrimgeowr.   Ignoring him doesn't help.  It just brings on the tiny, WhatchaDoin' sneeze.  Thankfully, they pattern shielded the fabric for the most part.

I hope Jean's little dogs (I'm assuming those are hers pictured in the first band) were better behaved than Otis while she was laboring over this piece.  Although, it's hard to imagine a 10 year old sitting quietly stitching rather than out romping with the dogs.  I know what my preference would have been at that age.  Perhaps they provided the distractions that caused so many little glitches in Jean's sampler. 

 Peacock, trees and some unidentifiable animal.

Beginnings of fruit bowl, tree (snake yet unstitched) and Adam and Eve's hair/eyes

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Football and Stitching, What Could Be Better?

It may not look like it, but I’ve made significant progress on Jean Scrimgeowr.  I spent several days with my mom, where I usually don’t get a lot of stitching done.  But I informed her on Saturday that I would be watching football and stitching all afternoon and evening on Sunday.  She knows better than to disturb me when I’m watching football.  So I did get a lot done. 

This sampler continues to be an exercise in diligence and focus.  Lots of the little tendrils on band two are shaped differently, the vine is not symmetrical, the spacing of the flowers with respect to the vine varies…  And I love it! 

I stitched the vine in Holbein or double running stitch, instead of backstitch, just because I can.  Holbein is like working a puzzle for me and I really enjoy it. I wasn't sure how the upright Gobelin would look on the tops of the flowers, but it's quite effective, I think.  

 

This next band is primarily cross stitch, so it should go fairly quickly even though it's huge!  I suppose I should work on the border some more too.  I managed to come down with a cold this weekend, so who knows how much stitching I'll get done over the next few days.  

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What Was She Thinking?

I'm having so much fun with Jean Scrimgeowr that I told my husband yesterday that I might not sell a lot of stuff for a while.  I would rather stitch than promote my Etsy shop.  Fortunately, we don't have to live off the income from my fobs and stitch markers.  And yesterday, I had to take a break to stitch a Habitat for Humanity sampler, so I am really itching to get back to JS.

My New Year's good luck is holding so far...or maybe after decades of stitching reproduction samplers, I have actually learned to look for compensations and other oddities, especially in borders.  As I worked my way across the top border…and unworked my way back a way… I discovered that each repeat of the border motif moves up one stitch all the way across the top.  Now I can hear you asking why I think my luck is holding given that I had to frog a little.  Well, normally, I would make it all the way around the border (and it's a big one) before I thought to look for those aberrations.  And now that I think about it, what probably made me take a second look is one little backstitched tendril extended above the graph and I thought, 'hmmm, wonder what that means'.  So I probably haven't really learned much in all those years, I'm just lucky.  And, it’s a good thing I left a decent sized margin at the top because I thought the top left was the high point in the design.   

What's the lesson?  Never make assumptions when stitching a reproduction.   And it just occurred to me that I'm probably going to go nuts when I frame it!  Do I square up the large border or the truly square inner red backstitch border?  Aaaargh, I'm going to obsess about that until the piece is done.  I hate it when I starting thinking too much.

Another interesting thing I've found is that the vine in the first band is in two different shades of green.  They are so close that it is difficult to tell that they are different unless you look very closely.  It seems to be planned, as opposed to not having enough of either color, but I wonder what Jean was thinking. 

I'm also wondering if the two dogs (one is on the far left side of the first band) are pets, since they are both pictured in two colors.  That green blob will be a bird once I add the legs, beak and eye. 

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It’s a New Year And I’m Baaaaack!

Happy 2014 to all my stitching buddies.  I’ve missed you, so I thought I would give the blog another try.  Since I tend to work only one project at a time, and usually large ones,  I’m always afraid I will bore you to death with pics and updates of the same thing.  But I decided that if you get bored you will just quit reading, so apparently I’m only in this for myself.

Since September, I’ve been very busy with holiday stitching, commonly known as “The Christmas Panic”.  This year’s ornament total was 28.  I planned (resolved) to work on ornies through January, but I’ve already broken that one.  However, I did get eleven done before I switched over to my latest project.  More on that later.  Here are a few of them, but you can see more here. 

 

Business also took a large chunk of my time since I last posted.  My new stitch picker/needle threader sets have been very popular.  I made a set for each person in my stitch group and found these precious pincushions at UpTheCreek on Etsy to go with them.  

Lots of folks must have received scissor fobs and counting pins for Christmas too!  Thanks to all of you who shopped with me at TJBdesigns this year.  I’m looking forward to creating even more exciting needlework tools this year.  Stay tuned.

https://www.etsy.com/listing/174248457/scissor-fob-quilting-sewing-cross-stitch

 My new project is another one that has been in my stash for almost two decades.  “Jean Scrimgeowr” by The Scarlet Letter.  I framed this one for a customer way back in the 90s and fell in love with it then.  Scottish samplers have a special appeal to me and I’m not sure why.  This one is stunning and I have it hanging by the end of March.  Happy Birthday to me.

 

I look forward to hearing from each and every one of you.  Happy Stitching!

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Hang 'Em Up!

It doesn't matter how much I love a piece that I've stitched. Once it's framed it takes on a life of its own and I have to stare at it for a while.  I may go into a trance with this one.

 

I also framed "The Christmas Quilt" by Emie Bishop, that I stitched for my husband for Christmas. Yes, I'm a little behind, but who cares?  I used the same red suede mat behind the piece that is on the front.  It's quite stunning in person. 

Now I'll go back to my little "Bunny Hop".  I'm finishing the carrots and starting the grass tonight.  Of course, the grass takes up about 50% of the total stitched area. 

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Let the Happy Dance Commence!

 

Margret Gatis Sampler

from The Scarlet Letter

Stitched on 40 count linen (color similar to Sandstone)

DMC cotton floss

 

I feel like singing the Hallelujah Chorus! I put the last stitches in this beautiful satin stitch band last night.

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Almost There!

Warm up your dancing shoes! I'm almost ready to do the Happy Dance.

The cutwork band is finished without nearly as much swearing as was heard during the torturous stitching of the 'Satin Stitch Band From Hell'. Perhaps that is due to the excessive knocking on wood by my husband every time I said, "I'm cruisin' now."  Perhaps I have reached stitching Nirvana.  Or perhaps I'm just mellowing. Who knows?  I'm just going to enjoy the glow...until the frog returns.

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