Stitching Slump

I haven’t been stitching much the last couple of weeks, so have had nothing interesting to post.  I did have a little finish last night:

Victoria Sampler Summer Biscornu Free Design

I finished this for the contest being held in the Victoria Sampler Yahoo Discussion Group.  Thea published the pattern then invited people to stitch their own version.  There are some beautiful entries already and I added mine to the contest album this morning.  I’m happy with how it turned out, and it is what I envisioned, but honestly feel not worthy to enter up my entry next to the others.  There is a prize being offered, which would be great, but I had a lot of fun picking out colors and thinking about what I wanted to do regardless of any prizes.

I’m feeling a bit in the mood to work on one of my larger projects – maybe Alpine Seasons.  I saw it stitched up and framed at Celebration of Needlwork – it was gorgeous and sparkly with all of the beads and crystals added.  Very inspiring!

I went and saw “Hangover” last night and am still LMAO when I think of certain scenes.

Shopping and Stitching

Saturday I picked up Susan and her son and we headed to LaPorte to visit House of Stitches.  Susan will be moving soon and this might have been our last chance to hang out for a day. 

Susan’s son was kind enough to take our picture out side the shop:

I was looking primarily for fibers for the Victoria Sampler Summer Biscornu Contest (join the group and click on “files” for more info) and found some pretty things…  We also had fun chatting with the ladies who work in the shop.

Anyway, after our shopping, we stopped for lunch then spent the day stitching at Susan’s place.  What a fun day!

Also, I wanted to share the blog award that Eva gave to me a while back.  Thanks so much Eva:

The rules say to nominate others for the award, but I’m short on time so maybe in the future!

Another Nametag

This weekend I finished my stitched nametag.  I based it off of a Victoria Sampler Herbal Sachet design as I did the with the tags posted about below.  I couldn’t mimic the beautiful finishing work that Susan did on the others, so I finished with a beaded edge:

I’m really happy with the stitching, but not nearly as hapy with my finishing.  As a first attempt, I’m satisified enough that I’m not going to start over!  I considered it, though…

Stitched Gift for Mom’s Birthday

My mother’s birthday was yesterday.  I’d stitched this little sampler for her several years ago and never really finished it.  I found it in my pile of stitched-but-not-finished projects and decided to finish it for her birthday as a pinkeep:

Victoria Sampler March Needleroll

I heard today that she loved it and also liked the extra long loop at the top so that it could be hung.    I’m really happy that she liked it.

I’m looking forward to a fun weekend…  I’ll be meeting up with a group of wonderful friends for a day of stitching! 

I’ve kitted up my March Ornament…  Prairie Schooler “Snowy Night” from the 2008 Just Cross Stitch Ornament issue.   I love all of the blues and white.  Its pretty small, so hopefully it will be finished by the end of March. 

I hope everybody has a great weekend!

 

Day of Finishing!

Yesterday I visited Susan at her place and we pulled out all of our combined finishing supplies and went to work. 

Here’s what the table looked like when we took a lunch break!

 
Susan gave me some great cording tips (I’m not very good at it) and I was able to finish the following:

Brittercup Britty Christmas Kitty (January Ornament

Teresa Wentzler’s He Who Indulges

Next Susan helped me finish a VS Beyond Cross Stitch kit as my first ever pinkeep/ornament and I’m totally thrilled with the result! I think I see many pinkeeps in my future.

Victoria Sampler Beyond Cross Stitch Kit 4-06

Susan finished an amazing 5 pinkeeps!  It was a fun, educational (for me anyway), and productive way to spend a Saturday afternoon!

Thanks Susan!

Awaiting Ornamentification…

I recently was showing a friend some of the stitched stuff I’ve done, but never finished and she said, “Those are ornaments!”

She was right…. here is everything that is awaiting ornamentification in my collection of stitched-but-not-framed-or-finished pile…

From top left:

• Victoria Sampler Beyond Cross Stitch Kit – 3-06- Roses
• Victoria Sampler Beyond Cross Stitch Kit – 6-06 – Daisy Chain
• Miscellaneous Unknown Design from a magazine
• Teresa Wentzler Think Snow
• Teresa Wentzler He Who Indulges
• Teresa Wentzler Closionne Ornament
• Victoria Sampler Beyond Cross Stitch Kit - 4-09 – Rose Trellis

DBF and I went to see Slumdog Millionaire tonight – I loved it!!!  The music was good too… I think it destined to end up on the “cardio” playlist on my iPod.

I do have some progres to show on Alpine Seasons, but haven’t had a chance to take a pic yet… stay tuned!

Previously Finished Projects – VS Hearts of America

I just love these little kits…. quick, pretty, and a “featured” stitch in each one.  I’d like to apologize in advance for the fact that these were taken with different cameras, scanners, and lighting conditions, so it’s not a “pretty” post. The finished ornaments were early on in my finishing days and not exactly something that I’d be proud of now, but I was proud of them when I did them…. Hopefully the designs and stitching make up for all that!

I had a goal of stitching one for every state that I’ve lived in… then making ornaments out of them…  I actually did this for my parents – Maine, NY, and Oklahoma.  I still have to finish the Oklahoma ornament for them.

I also stitched Florida as an ornament for my grandparents:

For myself, I need, to restitch NY and Oklahoma, but I’ve stitched the others…  Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Indiana.  I lived in Colorado for one summer while doing an internship and am trying to decide if that counts….

I was soooooo close…

…to registering for the upcoming Victoria Sampler Retreat.  Earlier in the week the retreat design was released and it is sooooo beautiful that I told myself that I could afford it, and it would be so much fun, and loved the thought of being taught how to do a beautiful finishing job like this… and I’ve been to Victoria before and loved the city…  DBF was enabling me… and Susan texted me the phrase “Just Do It….”

I just had a couple of questions to ask the VS people first, and in the time it took to get my answers, I came to my senses. I just cannot justify the cost of the retreat, the flight, and the meals for only two days of class instruction, no matter how much I adore it… at least not with the uncertainty that the current economic situation…

Check out the beauty that tempted me!

Swoon… sigh…  My only consolation is that it will eventually be released as a leaflet or cyberclass… 

My thought for the weekend… thank GOD for the Superbowl…  hours of uninterrupted stitching time and finally… the end of football until next season!  Hooray!

Alpine Seasons Progress and Some Goals

I’ve been stitching exclusively on Chatelaine’s Alpine Seasons since last week and am having fun with it.  I’ve been working my way through the mountains and trees in the upper left hand corner and here’s how it looks so far:

 

I have a goal of finishing up this section before I work on anything else….  At that point I’ll decide if I want to work on more borders in another quadrant or move onto another piece.  I really only have one other WIP right now, so I think something new is in order when I’m ready to move on.

A couple of days ago, I went through all of my old Just Cross Stitch Ornament issues and picked out some ornaments I’d like to do this year.  At Christmas, I wished I had more stitched ornaments on my tree, so have toyed with the idea of doing an ornament a month in 2009.  I came up with 7 and made up a list of supplies I’d need and headed off to House of Stitches on Saturday morning and had a very sucessful trip!  I found everything I needed, got a piece of fabric for Chatelaine’s Alhambra, some pretty gingham linen (called for in one of the ornaments), two JCS ornament issues that I didn’t have, and Mill Hill diamond ornament.  When I got to the checkout, I ended up spending less than I’d estimated, AND received these great “customer appreciation” gifts.  The ruler is magnetic.  They are so cute:

 

Last night I ran across Victoria Sampler’s January/February newsletter and saw that Thea has released the most BEAUTIFUL, HUGE sampler, called Heirloom Stitching Sampler… It’s her 100th publication and this sampler is a full 31″ long!!  It has almost 40 different specialty stitches!  I absolutely love it and just know that I’ll have to stitch it at some point. 

In the meantime, I’m trying to be patient while I wait for details for the Nashua Celebration of Needlework!

Thanks for visiting and thank you for all of the comments that you leave… I love reading them.

More Victoria Sampler Finished Projects of the Week

The finished project of the week series is posts that feature finishes I had prior to starting a blog.  Right now I’m putting more work into my Alpine Seasons BAP (click HERE to see last progress post), and don’t have a whole lot of progress to show just yet…

Here are two birth month samplers by Victoria Sampler done for a friend’s children.  The oldest was about 11 when I did these, and she is the one that picked out the mats and frames with me at Hobby Lobby…. I think she did a great job.  The designs are nice because they are meant to fit in a 5 x 7 frame so you don’t have the expense of custom framing.  We chose to use mats and and 8 x 10 frames instead.

I don’t see this “friend” anymore, so I hope the kids still have these hanging in their rooms: