Archive for the ‘Drawn Thread’ Category
Busy Sunday!
Filed under: Birds of a Feather, Drawn Thread, Finishes, Hands to Work, La-D-Da, Prairie Schooler, Sheepish Designs |
Comments (7) Surprise! Here I am again. And there’s only a little more than two months between posts this time, so I’m getting a little faster. 🙂
I’ve been stitching regularly and have finished off a number of small projects recently, including these two:
Designer: Prairie Schooler
Pattern: Designer Series: Forget-Me-Nots
Designer: La-D-Da
Pattern: Letters & Leaves (freebie)
After finishing these two and two others (gifts I can’t show) rather quickly, I became curious about just how many pieces I had in my unfinished finishes boxes (yes, plural). You can see some of those in this picture and read about them here and here:
Turns out I have more than 50 pieces that are rolled up or stored, not forgotten exactly but certainly not ready for display either, so I decided to start chipping away at the pile. I managed to frame these today:
Designer: Drawn Thread
Pattern: 12 Houses
Designer: Sheepish Designs
Pattern: Those Bloomin’ Flowers
Designer: Hands To Work
Pattern: Patience 1898
Designer: Birds of a Feather
Pattern: Alphabet Sampler
Whew! I’m glad to have those finished, and it’s given me some motivation to finish even more. Only 46+ to go!
Now back to stitching. I think I’ve earned it, and besides, I have more room in those storage boxes now.
P.S. I’ve gathered together some patterns for sale and hope to update my sale blog soon. Stay tuned!
Remember me?
Filed under: Drawn Thread, Finishes, La-D-Da, Ornament, Over one, Prairie Schooler, Quaker |
Comments (17) Shall I give you a lame-o excuse about why I’ve been MIA, as chosen from the following list:
- working too many hours
- nonstop personal commitments
- negligible stitching progress
- a kaput-and-now-replaced computer
- photo editing software inoperable with new system and not yet replaced
- blah
- blah
- blah
Or shall I just cut to the chase and show you stitching pictures?
WAIT! WAIT! I know the answer to this one, so here goes . . .
(DANGER, Will Robinson! Bad photography ahead! Proceed at your own risk!)
Designer: Prairie Schooler
Pattern: Book 115, Pins and Needles, “My Thread Is Cut” Scissors Case
(Stitched on 32-count white linen of some sort using the recommended DMC threads)
Yes, it’s rather wonky. What do you expect? I finished it somewhere around 4 a.m. on Christmas Eve. (Yes, I know I said in my post from that night that I was headed to bed at 2 a.m., but I was so sleep-deprived that I forgot to go and stayed up to finish this instead.)
Bad Photography Excuse #1: It was 4 a.m. on Christmas Eve morning. By the time the sun came up, this was wrapped and nearly delivered.
Designer: Drawn Thread
Pattern: Thanksgiving Sampler
(Stitched with 1 strand over two threads on R&R 40-count Crème Brûlée linen using floss on hand)
Borrowed a pattern to do this quick little finish. Made for a very dear friend. It brought tears to her eyes, so I kind of think she liked it.
Bad Photography Excuse #2: Late-night finish. No sun. No sleep. (Are you seeing a trend here?)
Designer: La-D-Da
Pattern: Quaker Alphabet
(Stitched with 2 strands over 2 threads on 32-count Zweigart overdyed linen of some sort; changed from the specified blues to a green colorway, using WDW Kudzu for the Quaker motifs and WDW Bark for the alphabet)
This was HUGE! I’ve been working on 4o-count for so long that working 2 over 2 on 32-count seemed GINORMOUS! Chose the larger size so I could work on it in the car . . . then only worked on it in stationary buildings. Go figure. Finished size is 7×9, so it isn’t so ginormous.
Note to self: If you want to have a car project kitted up and at the ready, then you simply must set aside said project when you are not in the car. Otherwise, said project gets finished and you are once again left with no car project.
Bad Photography Excuse #3: DH took digital camera to Thailand. (Honest!) This blurry, shaky, sorry-excuse-for-a-photo was the best I could do with DS’s camera phone in the interim.
Designer: Drawn Thread
Pattern: Random Thoughts
(This is a kit, so I’m stitching it as kitted, using 1 strand of Needlepoint Silk over 2 threads on 32-count Belfast Summer Khaki linen)
Pulled from the depths of this pile (second one from the left) in honor of the current Winter Olympics games. Started during the 2000 Summer Olympics held in Sydney, Australia. Intended for a finish during this Olympics, but that would mean that I’d actually have to find time to watch some (any??) of the current Olympics. [sigh] Ah well, maybe I’ll have this finished by the 2012 Olympics in London.
Bad Photography Excuse #4: See “Bad Photography Excuse #3.”
* * * * * * *
P.S. Thanks to those of you who e-mailed or left a comment to say that you missed my posts. Honestly, I’ve started to wonder why I even keep a blog anymore (and yes, I’m defining what it means to “keep” a blog very loosely). I simply couldn’t believe that I hadn’t posted since Christmas. Feels like maybe a week has gone by since then. To quote Calvin and Hobbes, “The days are just packed.”
By way of explanation, I started my blog when I was a self-employed freelance editor, working part-time from home and setting my own hours. Nearly three years later, I’m working more than 40 hours weekly and putting in time on far too many evenings and weekends as well, including the past three weekends and, by tomorrow, this one as well. Don’t get me wrong, though. Not only am I very grateful to have a job in this economy, but also I am extremely thankful to have a job that I like working with people who are simply wonderful.
So for now my stitching is getting neglected and so, by default, is my blog. But thanks to all of you faithful bloggers out there who have allowed me to live vicariously through your awe-inspiring stitching progress pictures and inspirational finishes.
The Sampler Game Answer Key
Filed under: Bent Creek, Birds of a Feather, Blackbird Designs, Brightneedle, Cricket Collection, Drawn Thread, Finishes, Hands to Work, La-D-Da, Little House Needleworks, Prairie Schooler, Quaker, Sheepish Designs, The Examplarery, With My Needle |
Comments (7) It’s time to reveal the answer key for my Sampler Game. One last time, here’s the pic:
. . . and the list below has the answers (numbering samplers from left to right). If I’ve already posted about the finish, I’ve added a link to the entry. If not, well, I guess I have some fodder for future posts!
NOTE: Some of my older posts have tiny pictures. To see a larger image, simply click the photos.
1. Prairie Schooler, “Johnny Appleseed”
Recognized by Karen; most recently mentioned here.
2. Drawn Thread, “Random Thoughts”
Recognized by Karen; no blog entry yet.
Actually, this one is a finish wannabe. It should have been in the WIP pile.
3. Prairie Schooler, “Autumn Sampler”
Recognized by Glenna; post found here.
4. Blackbird Designs, “Live Each Season”
Recognized by Brigitte; no blog entry yet.
5. Hands to Work, “Patience 1898”
Featured here.
6. Birds of a Feather, “Alphabet Sampler”
Featured here.
7. Birds of a Feather, “Sarah Spencer Sampler”
Featured in my very first post, found here.
8. La-D-Da, “Bless This House”
Featured here.
9. Cricket Collection, “A Walk in the Woods”
Recognized by Barb and Janice; featured here.
10. Birds of a Feather, “Happy Hearts Sampler”
Recognized by Karen; featured here.
11. Brightneedle, “Lo, How a Rose”
Recognized by Karen; featured here.
12. Sheepish Designs, “Those Blooming Flowers”
Featured here.
13. With My Needle, “Quaker Samplings I”
Recognized by Karen; featured here.
14. Prairie Schooler, Book 76, “Farmer’s Alphabet”
Featured here.
15. Little House Needleworks, “Moon and Stars”
Featured here.
16. Bent Creek, “Flag 1998”
No blog entry yet.
17. (folded) The Examplarery, “Tudor Rose”
No blog entry yet.
Thanks to everyone who played along. And thanks, too, for motivating me to do some finishing. I promise to keep chipping away at these until they’re all done!!
Now that’s more like it!
(NOTE: This post edited to increase the size of the photos. Thanks for the suggestion, Barbara!)
After I posted my “Happy Hearts” finish on Tuesday, I decided to work on my Drawn Thread “12 Houses Sampler” again, which I last posted about here when it looked like this:
So on Wednesday night, I did this:
On Thursday, I did this:
On Friday, I did this:
And on Saturday, I did this:
Which means that it now looks like this:
Designer: Drawn Thread
Pattern: 12 Houses Sampler
Stitched on 35-count Northern Cross (Norden Crafts) clay linen using 1 strand over 2 threads; mostly used recommended DMC floss with a few overdyeds thrown in; random color substitutions made for personal taste and to accommodate color of my linen choice.
Finishing this up so quickly was the fun part. The not-so-fun part is that since I’ve dragged out the project for so long, I’ve lost a charm, which came with the pattern and is supposed to go where the “O” would be in the alphabet. I’ve looked everywhere and even organized my stash a bit in the process (Wow, do I ever have some wonderful patterns and fabric awaiting my attention!!), but alas and alack, I couldn’t turn it up. I think it was an unwitting victim of multiple transfers between various stitching totes and plastic storage bags.
I’ll have to find some sort of substitute eventually, but for now, I’m counting this one as DONE!
Does this count as a neighborhood?
I’ve barely had any time to stitch lately since work is keeping me way too busy, thus explaining why I haven’t updated my blog in ages. I need time to plan the next round on my “real” neighborhood, but in the meantime, welcome to my mini-neighborhood:
Designer: Drawn Thread
Pattern: 12 Houses
Stitched on Northern Cross (Norden Crafts) 35-count clay linen using one strand of recommended DMC floss over two linen threads
I started this project on February 20. After quickly stitching up the inside and outside borders, I abandoned the project because I thought I wanted to tweak the color scheme a bit. Well, months later, I guess I finally realized that I didn’t have time to fuss with the changes, so it’s getting stitched as recommended.
This has become my in-between/travel project: “in-between,” because I stitch on it in the five minutes here or twenty minutes there, in between the other things I have to get done; and “travel,” because I’ve brought it along occasionally for those times when I’m stuck waiting somewhere.
With such nonexistent stitching time, I haven’t made much progress. Still, I recently finished the alphabet (letter “O” is a charm) and started on the houses that require basic cross stitch. Many of the houses have some specialty stitches mixed in, so I’ll work on those when I have time to do them properly, which doesn’t look like it’ll be anytime soon.
[sigh]
