Start-ups

I took a break at lunch and went to the variety store and bought another ball of crochet cotton. It's South Maid Crochet Cotton in variegated pink,blue,green,yellow & lavender pastels. See it here. Clearly made for baby things. But I'm really into color variations at the moment. And I found some new motifs to try so I have some incentive to use it.

Last night I started a dragon themed design to use as a gift for a boy who loves the color green and is very into environmental 'green' causes. I'm using three designs from Dragon Dreams: the Dragon of Hope, the Dragon of Air and the Dragon of Fire in a diagonal arrangement. The Dragon of Hope is in the center holding a little earth in his hands. I will stitch in the words, "The Earth is Fragile. Handle with Care", in the white spaces. Thanks to Patternnuts for the suggestion.

I bought a beautiful piece of fabric to use for this from Sassy in a color called Peridot Metallic. It makes just the right green background for the green-loving birthday boy. I'll post a WIP when I'm farther along.

Crocheted motifs

I am so envious of the tatting prowess shown on this blog: Umi and Tsuru. I once learned to tat long ago, but I never got very proficient. So I wondered if I could substitute some crocheted motifs instead to get a somewhat similar effect. Of course I hadn't crocheted in years either, but I rummaged through my stash archives and found a pretty ball of variegated pink knit-cro-sheen thread and a size 7 hook. Then I cruised the web and found some patterns.

I'm a little rusty, but this is what I came up with and maybe I'll try to incorporate these in an upcoming comfort doll finish:

Ooh la la..

A little Mother's Day sachet for my cousin who is not my mother, but who is a wonderful mother. Reminds me of Mae West and
Lillian Russell.

I found some black lace for the trim at my local old-fashioned variety store. The scanner is not so good with 3-d images, so in case you can't see them, there are little red beads around the top and bottom of the bustier and gold beads down the front seam. The ribbon was to hide the uneven lace insertion on the upper left. I'll add some lavender filling and it's ready to go. The design is from the Feb., 2008 issue of Cross Stitcher magazine (UK).

False start..

Why do I insist on starting something new when I'm tired at the end of the day? I wanted to start a birthday card design after I got home from Jazzercise. I found a little piece of fabric that was left over from a large design that I completed years ago. That was in the days before Internet shopping and ready availability of different fabrics. It was hard to find anything but white and off-white and I never thought of dyeing my own. This was a piece of 18 ct evenweave that I stitched over-one in a light brown color. Might be Wichelt Davos. It feels like cotton and is kind of heavy like Monaco.

So after stitching for a while with my eyes getting heavier and heavier, I realized that
a) I hated stitching on this fabric
b) The fabric did not provide enough contrast with the thread colors
and finally, c) I skipped a letter in the wording (Chocholic instead of Chocoholic).

I'll start over with new fabric. We all have such limited time for stitching that it seems such a shame when you have to drop back 5 yards and punt!

Birthday card

Just finished a quickie birthday card for my cousin. I think the waiter kind of resembles my cousin and that's why I picked the pattern. The pattern was in the July, 2007 issue of Cross Stitcher Magazine (UK)

Talk about ambitious...

I found out that my cousin's wife's sister is making a cross-stitch wedding chuppa (canopy) used in Jewish weddings for her daughter who is to be married in Nov. You can see what I'm talking about here: chuppas She hopes that it will be used by her other 2 daughters eventually as well. She is designing it herself. I don't know what the design is like, but I do know she is at the 'gridding' stage now. This sounds like quite an ambitious project. She made a beautiful self-designed sampler for her parents 35th anniversary that had motifs with dates stitched that represented all the key events and milestones of their married life. It was gorgeous so I know that she knows what she is doing. But Nov. can come around pretty quickly! I'll be very interested in seeing this piece.

So much rain

So much rain between yesterday and today in the DC area. Luckily it cleared up for the few brief periods that I needed to drive to and from the Passover seder. But I do love how the weather pixie on the right has an umbrella! That is the cutest little widget.

Luggage Tag

I finished my first attempt at a luggage tag. Let's just say that the finish is a bit 'rustic', but that's OK since I used a Prairie Schooler design. It's the Four Seasons from the cover of a recent issue of the Gift of Stitching Magazine. I just stacked two of the seasons on each side. Once again, I used my beloved crop-a-dile to make the eyelet. An id or business card fits neatly inside. I stitched it on 18 ct Aida. The color is 'Into the Sky', hand-painted by Lauren at Sassy's. The hand-painted fabric is much softer to work with than un-dyed Aida.

The Prairie Schooler Frenzy

I'm stitching a little Prairie Schooler Four Seasons design that was on the cover of the Gift of Stitching Magazine. It caught my eye when I saw the finished version in the art gallery on San Man. I think I'm going to make it into a luggage tag, the kind that you use to distinguish your luggage from everyone else's. I hope to have a little pocket in it to put a card. It's a fun stitch with pretty colors, no fractionals, limited backstitching and very nice use of a small number of stitches to make an effective design. But not the greatest thing since sliced bread.

I've never appreciated these designs before, but lately I see lots of buzz about them on all the message boards. And I see outrageous prices for the OOP Prairie Schooler charts on e-bay. I don't really get that.

Maybe a reader will enlighten me.

Spring exchange

My partner in the Spring exchange on 123stitch just received her package from me. It was her very first exchange. I made her a little needlecase with some images that made me think 'Spring'. Plus a little floss ring fob since I wanted to use my new crop-a-dile to make an eyelet. The pictures only show one side of the eyelet. The back didn't come out that great since the eyelet wasn't quite long enough. Next time I won't pad the fob, just use interfacing. I also included some Vikki Clayton silks floss that I had picked up at the trunk show when Vikki visited DC in December.

Lea is born..

Here's my latest comfort doll. She's not sewn up yet, but the stitching is complete. Her name is Lea and she is from a design by Vavi

I just love how French she looks. I had fun with the little ribbon rose for her hat and the heart charm 'brooch'. I'll keep her around awhile before I send her off for adoption.