Maison Fleurie

This little freebie, "Maison Fleurie" by Chantal Jordan, caught my eye and just cried out to be stitched. I had a lovely piece of pale pink hand-dyed Vikki Clayton linen that was perfect for it. Of course, my camera had other ideas about the color. The first image is closer to the pink color, but not nearly as pretty. I don't know where that little flaw in the center came from. It's not on the real thing.

I used to make these coasters all the time. I guess this kind of finish has gone out of fashion, but it's so easy to finish a design this way. The stitching is protected, and this particular type of coaster is large enough to hold a mug comfortably. I have a lot of these all over my condo.

Milady's Needle with CQ

Can't seem to get this CQ type finish out of my head, so I stitched another little piece to try again. I have plenty of fabric scraps in my stash from ornament finishing over the years, so this is a good way to make use of them. The little sampler is by Milady's Needle from the 2010 JCS Ornament issue. I stitched it over-one on 32 count Bay Rum Jobelan. The thread was a sample freebie from Rosace, a Spanish company trying to compete in the standard DMC floss space. This was a 115 equivalent. I really did plan to have the sampler straight up and down, but life's too short to worry about they way it leaned. And this is crazy quilting so, why not have the piece askew? The embroidery stitches include chained cross stitch, feather stitch, slanted blanket stitch, long and short blanket stitch, and loop stitch. I used a stem stitch to embroider around the butterfly and dragnonfly wings on the left. Plus I added a few stems with green beads on the ends. Of course, all the colors are more vibrant in real life (or whatever passes for real life). Might as well send this one to Attic for the fundraiser as well. It's quirky, but interesting I think.

Monster Bubbles 4 + CQ

There was one quirky design from last year's JCS Ornament issue that had been on my 'to-do' list for a while. I just loved 'Four' by Monster Bubbles for the four calling birds with their pretty beaded collars. I stitched it up on a piece of 32 count linen from Vikki Clayton and then I waited for inspiration to call me so I could finish it. I decided to try something new for me and see if I could make a kind of Crazy Quilt block. I cut the stitched design into a 5-sided shape and used the sew and flip method of foundation piecing to create the block. Then I used some embroidery stitches as seam treatments... closed blanket stitch, blanket pin wheels, coral stitch, spiny chain stitch and a poor imitation of the cretan stitch. Nothing perfect like the way Pam Kellogg would do it with waste canvas. Just my eyeballing everything. And I only barely read instructions for sew and flip.. just muddled through on my own. The charm is a little heart from Blue Moon. Special thanks to Kerry for all the stitch ideas in the sidebar on her blog. This finish is going to Attic Needlework for their annual Breast Cancer fundraiser.

Princess Parade and Printer Cover

Today was a pretty good day. Sent off my latest Love Quilt square. Pressed another finish so it's totally done and I could take a photo. Plus I got my hair cut and colored, always a way to feel brand new.

The LQ Square is for Hailey G, who wanted bright colored princesses, especially orange and purple. I picked out the "Princess Parade" pattern from Country Cottage Needleworks. Of course, the design called for beautiful, muted, pastel hand-dyed floss. Hand-dyed doesn't work for LQ squares since the quilts need to be machine-washable. So I picked some brighter shades of regular DMC. The fabric in the photo may look like light blue, but it's really white. I made the clouds blue to compensate. I think it will work pretty well for the theme.



And I found a use for my "Sisters" Stitchery. My poor printer stays in a corner and doesn't get much use. Quite the dust catcher, so I decided to make a dust cover for it. I used this simple tutorial for an ottoman slip cover. No piecing of the fabric, just four 'darts' and a hem. Then I used Stitch Witchery to fuse the stitching to the top center and added a blanket stitch around the edges. Certainly not perfect, but definitely does the trick. And definitely an improvement over the old pillowcase that I had draped over it before. I understand the construction principles now and I think my next such cover will be better.

Finished cushion & village shake-up

Finally got in the mood to finish my Sampler Girl pillow. Probably because we are having an early summer heat wave here in DC and I just didn't want to spend too much time outdoors. I found a pretty rosebud print fabric so I used that instead of the printed corduroy I had planned on.



Got a bit of a surprise when Sandy released the May installment of the Birthday Village. The motif she designed is a church with a bride and groom outside. I couldn't decide whether to skip this month or re-chart. And once again, I didn't like the people either. So off to the drawing board. We now have a shul instead of a church. And a somewhat changed bride and groom. This is kind of weird. I really didn't want to stitch anything religious, but I couldn't think of a reasonable substitute. Better start thinking of a December idea now.




Last week I received the best little surprise in the mail from Nia. She made me this sweet little bunny sachet filled with super-fragrant lavender. Hope you can read that accompanying card. It really made me smile on a day when I could use cheering up.

Sisters with Brutus the Cat

I got in the mood to do a little more stitchery. It's hard to find patterns to my liking. I don't like the old-fashioned, vintage designs. And I didn't want anything too modern and funky either. I do like the kind of whimsical designs that I see on a number of Australian sites. Maybe this style has become more trendy in Australia. I finally decided on a block from the Red Brolly Catalicious quilt. I used the suggested colors, but I did mostly stem stitch. There are a few other stitch changes and slight modifications due to my poor tracing of the original design. Now I just have to figure out what to do with this piece. I haven't been in the mood for really finishing anything, so it may just wait a while.

Holds Upon Happiness

I seem to be in a somewhat unproductive period these days with respect to stitching and crafting. Too many distractions I guess and not in the right frame of mind. But I did finish stitching this very sweet design from The Sampler Girl. This is done on a piece of 32-count hand-dyed Lugana from Sassy. The fabric looked so different in various lights that it was tricky to pick colors. But I'm pretty happy with the results. I'm planning to make it into a pillow trimmed with the print corduroy fabric in the photo. Just didn't have enough of that for a backing too, so I have to find the right backing fabric before I sew it up.



Spring break is over in the Birthday Village and the kids are going back to school. I tried stitching the kids just as they were designed, but since I had changed the girl on the swing, the new kids just didn't match. So they are all completely re-charted to be a little more in proportion. Don't know if I love them, but I was definitely ready to let them stay as is after stitching them.

Bunny SAL and Carmela's Garden

I was one of many to join Kissy's Bunny SAL, 3 parts in 6 days, a commitment I could handle. I had a small piece of old fabric in my stash from Sassy's Fabbys from the days when she did the hand-painted technique. This was done on a lovely color called Spring Shamrocks. I changed up the colors to work with the fabric and just to be a little different. I loved stitching this and I love how it turned out. I made it into a little zippered bag since I never seem to have enough of those to store stitchy things and other small items.



Just finished a Love Quilts Square for a quilt with the theme of "Girls Being Girls". This design was a freebie displayed by a blogger named Carmela who has since closed her blog. She always had the cutest designs. I think I saved this one with the thought of making a Comfort Doll from it. I added the little motifs outside the border just to make the design a bit larger. Those come from some hardback books on my shelves by various designers. Just when I think it's time to get rid of those books, they come in handy!



Finally, here are some iPhone photos of the various t-shirts and onesies designed for my Jazzercise instructor's new grandson. My instructor was moved to tears by the efforts of some of her students. You can see my shirt with the owl in the top photo.

Moulin Rouge at Dusk & a T-shirt

After I stitched that Moulin Rouge Dancer, I couldn't stop looking at a design of the Moulin Rouge at midnight in the same booklet. I wanted to stitch it, but the design was done on white with the the entire navy blue sky background stitched in. That sure didn't sound like fun. I thought about using a dark blue fabric, but that didn't sound like much fun either. So Lauren at Sassy's Fabbys came to the rescue and made a medium blue color for me, a bit darker than her standard Ebb Tide color. That way I could do a Moulin Rouge at dusk instead. As usual, the camera just wouldn't do justice to the great colors that really pop on this 18 ct Aida fabric.



One of my Jazzercise instructors just became a first time grandmother. Some of us agreed to decorate a t-shirt or onesie in some way and the collection will be presented to her as a class gift. I thought I had kind of mastered the technique of stitching on a t-shirt, but this little thing was so incredibly stretchy! From a distance it's pretty cute and the baby will outgrow it in a few months. And it will be given with a whole set of interesting shirts, so I'm not worried that it isn't perfect. The design is a Stickeule freebie you can fine here.

March Birthday Village

I'm still here, but life seems to have interfered with my crafting so not much to show. I did manage to complete the March installment on the San-man Birthday Village SAL. Looks like the little girl in the pink house has come out to play on the swing. I completely re-designed her. I just wasn't happy with the way the original came out, and even with my "no frogging" policy, I felt compelled to re-do her. Proportions are a little weird on this design, but I do like her better now.




And for SherryA, who asked for the link to the double flower dishcloth pattern from this old post, here it is.. Click Here