Expect a Miracle

Last night was the series finale of a summer documentary series on ABC-TV called NY Med.  It was a fascinating look into the workings of New York City hospitals, every bit as watchable as the old ER dramatic series that I was so fond of.   If you missed it and are interested, I think you can actually watch episodes online here.

The final show featured some patients with very serious medical conditions whose odds of survival were very slim.  In each case, the outcome was wildly successful, and the word 'miracle' seemed like an apt description of each.  I had to laugh after I thought of that, because I had been finishing up a piece of stitching with the title, "Expect a Miracle", as I watched.

This is a design by Gail Bussi from the June, 2009 issue of JCS.  It's a square for a World of Charity Stitching birdhouse-themed quilt .  Looks a bit different from the magazine photo since I used the DMC equivalents instead of the hand-dyeds.  And looks different in my photo than the real life verson.  I think I like my photo better than the real life one actually.  In any case, it was a fun stitch with pretty colors and very delicate.

Meanwhile,  Pumpkin  let me know that she received the little gift I made in honor of her latest miracle, Junior Pumpkin.  You can see photos of him on her blog.. just the cutest little guy ever.  The card design is an old Halloween motif from San-Man Originals.   Seemed perfect for this little newbie.  And I had those scrapbook overall brads around for a long time just waiting for the right project.

 

The birth sampler is the JBW French Country Pumpkin design, appropriate for the purpose, and not too girly for a boy.  I won that trimming fabric in a contest a couple of years ago, and I've been hoarding that too.  Glad to see my stash treasures finding a good home!

 

Time for Tea Zippered Pouch

One of my Jazzerbuddies took a pretty nasty fall during class a couple of weeks ago.  She has no idea how she lost her footing, but she went down during the cardio portion of the workout and broke her ankle in three places.  Required surgery no less.  Luckily our class is in the same building as the Rescue Squad and they gallantly carried her to the ambulance and whisked her to a nearby hospital.  I think the worst part for her is having to miss class for so long.  Meanwhile, as all good stitchers would do, I made a little stitchy gift for her.  The sampler for this little zippered case is from a freebie called "Tea Time"  and you can find the pdf on Echevette's blog.   My friend should have plenty of time for tea in the coming weeks.   This is stitched on 36 count Edinburgh linen (and re-stitched, and re-stitched due to excessive frogging I might add). 

 

These are the finishing fabrics I used.  The blue is the back side of the case and the  red is the lining:

 

Hope this brings a little cheer to an unfortunate situation.

By The Bay SAL Camera Pouch

Seems like my stitching and finishing go so slowly lately.  Part of it is just not being able to stitch for long periods anymore without my eyes getting too tired and part of it is the dreaded frog.  I always try to find away around mistakes without frogging, but sometimes the mistakes are just too egregious to deal with that way.  So I have a small piece in progress that is taking way too long and hopefully I'll show that when it's soon done.

In the meantime, I finally got the motivation to do something with my By The Bay Mystery Sal finish.   The stitching was finished a while ago and the fabrics have just been staring me in the face for too long.  This weekend I made a pouch for my camera using the same method that I used for my Nook Tablet pouch (tutorial).  This one fits its intended device much better.  Of course, I couldn't take a photo with the camera inside, but you'll get the idea.