Butterflies!

I was very excited to wake up this morning to find that the first two Nora Corbett models that I stitched have been released, so I can finally share pictures! Nora has designed pixies based on butterflies, and the wings are so pretty; this is Miss Solar Ellipse:

And Miss Lole's Daggerwing:

I can't really choose a favorite, as I love them both!

I'm actually working on a couple more NC models right now that are a rush job; they were due on September 20th, but the original stitcher ended up not being able to do them. I received them on September 1st, finished the first one on the 8th and should finish up the second one by mid-week next week. And I already had two more waiting to go, so I guess I'll be busy for a while!

Hope everyone has a great stitchy weekend!

Eclipse trip

I didn't blog last week, as I was pretty worn out from our trip to St. Louis to see the eclipse. We drove down on Sunday and came home on Monday; even though the trip home actually went faster than the trip there, it felt longer, and over 17 hours of driving in two days tired me out pretty well for a couple of days afterwards! However, I am really glad that we went, and that I was able to experience something so amazing with my son; he just turned 16, and the time I have left with him at home feels so fleeting.

We missed the totality by a few miles, but it was worth it as we found a nice little park in downtown St. Louis to watch it from, near the Gateway Arch:

At the peak of the eclipse the outdoor lights came on and the locusts started whirring and a swelling "oooh" from the crowd made the moment truly magical. I took this picture a bit earlier (the picture I took at the peak is just a tiny dot of light):

The day before we left I was able to finish up my Book of Spells project; I finished the stitching on Friday and mounted it on the box Saturday morning. I always wish my finishing skills were a bit more polished, but I'm happy with the result:

The name is a bit hard to read, but it's Ida Kerstum--try saying it out loud...

The project even got picked as project of the week by The World of Cross Stitching magazine on FB:

Part 5 of The Great Cheshire Pumpkin SAL was released the night before we left for our trip, so this past week I was able to finish as much of it as I'm going to until the next part is released:

It just keeps getting cuter--those naughty kitties have broken a jack'o'lantern!

Now I am back to work on the Rosewood Manor piece, until the next part of the SAL comes out.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

In the mood for Halloween stitching

Back-to-school registration, less humidity during the days and cooler nights--it's starting to feel just a bit like autumn, and the Halloween stitching bug has bitten me! It started with the Great Cheshire Pumpkin SAL, which has now released half of the design:

Still a lot more fun things to come with this one; the next part will be released this coming weekend, but I won't be able to start it right away. My son and I will be driving to St. Louis for the solar eclipse--sure hope the weather cooperates and our eclipse glasses get here this week!

Last week my mom came to visit for my son's birthday. so of course I needed something I could do with my hands while spending time upstairs. It's getting harder and harder to stitch without the lights in my craft room, so I decided to pull out the wooden "book" box I bought last year and paint it in preparation to mount a design on it. Here is the picture I took last year:

And here is the finished box, along with my start on The Goode Huswife's The Book of Spells:

I've been working on Book of Spells for a few days now, and here it is as of last night:

The only color that I'm using from the pattern is the black; as it is a "primitive" design it is charted with a fairly muted palette. I'm going with my preferred palette of bright colors, and adding quite a bit of Kreinik for sparkle. I've had to rechart the bottom, as it was too long to fit on the box as charted, so we'll see how it turns out.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

More ghost kitties!

I don't know why these little ghost kitties are so appealing to me, but there are two more in part 4 of the Great Cheshire Pumpkin SAL. This part was released Saturday afternoon, and I should be able to finish it today; there is another ghost kitty, which will be next to the little black bird, another regular ghost further down the tree, and then I just need to finish stitching the moon:

I am having so much fun with this adorable design!

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

There's a ghost kitty!

I finished up as much as I'm going to of part 3 of The Great Cheshire Pumpkin SAL, and I absolutely love the little ghost kitty!

Looking forward to part 4 being released this coming weekend so I can finish up that moon (which was charted in pumpkin colors, but I changed mine to green cheese colors!).

I've also spent some time on Nora Corbett's Un Ricamo Per Rinascere, and am enjoying watching it come to life. It is amazing to me that Nora can take seven colors of floss, with no back stitching, and create detailed stone work like this:

I'm going to spend this week working on the Rosewood Manor piece, so I can work on the next SAL part guilt-free when it comes out.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Designers helping Italy

A couple of years ago  I was lucky enough to be able to tour (and shop in!) Casa Cenina's warehouse in Italy; here is Aida, their "warehouse" cat:

Casa Cenina has brought several designers together to aid in the efforts to rebuild after the earthquake that struck a year ago; the designers have donated exclusive charts, and all of the proceeds of sales will go to the Italian Civil Protection. An especially nice feature is that the charts are available for download, so there are no shipping fees; the charts that are available (and information about the project) can be found here: Casa Cenina.

Nora Corbett is one of the designers who donated a chart, which I bought and printed out yesterday. As it hasn't been stitched yet, there is no actual photo, just Nora's pencil sketch on the front page. It looks like it is the statue of an angel, holding an urn of greenery; I picked a fabric that reminded me of a garden to stitch it on:

I'm hoping to make a small start on it this week; it's always kind of fun to see a design appear when you haven't seen an actual picture of the finished piece.

Before I start I want to finish up part 3 of The Great Cheshire Pumpkin SAL, which was released this past Saturday (I nudged Deb into a bit of an early release, and she was an easy sell!). I'm hoping to finish it up today; here is where I left off last night:

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

All caught up...

...and ready for the next part, which should be released this Sunday or next Monday; The Great Cheshire Pumpkin SAL by Tempting Tangles:

Of course I'm playing with colors, brightening it up a bit and adding some sparkle. The witch's dress and hat were stitched with Silk Lame Braid, which has a metallic woven in, and I used beads for the decorations; the beads are actually citron, to match the socks (because every good witch has to color coordinate!), but they look more gold in the picture.

I'm also using some Silk'n Colors in place of DMC; the broom bristles were stitched with one color, and the leaves with another. It's nice to get a lot of variegation without having to change colors all the time.

I'm hoping to stay up-to-date with this one, to have it done before Halloween, and in the meantime I've made a good start on a Rosewood Manor model.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Stitching for me!

Last Friday I finished up Hallow-day Inn, and it will be on its way home to my customer later today:

The entire time I was stitching it I was thinking about which colors I would use if I stitched it for myself. I was tempted to buy the chart and do it, but I just have so many other projects I already own that it seemed silly.

I have a Rosewood Manor piece and two Nora Corbetts already in my possession, but I decided to take a few days to work on something for myself. Tempting Tangles has another terrific SAL going, called The Great Cheshire Pumpkin SAL, and it's perfect for my overwhelming desire to stitch with bright, cheerful colors. It was supposed to be a mystery SAL, but when Deb tried to put a small preview on Etsy it ended up showing the entire design; I think that's okay, though, as a lot of people commented that they liked seeing the whole thing.

Part 1 was released a couple of weeks ago; I stitched the partial witch from it on Saturday, using PTP's Haunted on Belfast:

Then part 2 was released just yesterday, so I was able to finish the little cutie:

And here is where I am as of last night:

I'm hoping to finish part 2 this week, then I'll start on the RM piece and work on it until part 3 is released in a couple of weeks.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Stitching I can share

I am stitching Breanda Gervais' Hallow-day Inn for someone I met through Facebook, and while I like the design I am not thrilled with the look of one strand of floss over-2 on 32ct fabric. It is what the directions call for, and I did make sure that my customer was okay with it (she was, as she likes the primitive look), but as a two-strand girl it is just not my cup of tea!

I also think the chart photo is misleading, as I am 99.9% sure that the model was stitched with two strands; look at the difference:

I know the fabric in the model is darker, but just looking at the stitches I don't see any way that it was done with only one strand of floss. But, all that really matters is that the recipient is happy with the result!

I'm hoping to have it done within the next week or so:

Hope those in the US have a happy Independence Day, and to everyone a great stitchy week!

Wow, almost a month...

...since my last post--I'm a bad, bad blogger! And it would have been another week, but today I got the call that I've been waiting for for almost five weeks, that my framed pieces were ready to pick up. I would have made it over there even sooner, but I had to wait until our AC unit was serviced!

Here is Mirabilia's Andromeda:

Nora's Alphabet, designed by Nora Corbett for Golden Heart Originals:

Chatelaine's Mini Mandala Circle 02 (the mat is a copper metallic, not orange):

Finally, Rosewood Manor's Bucklebury Sampler:

I'm going to hang this one by RM"s Past & Present, and then hopefully get a few more of my returned models re-framed with glass and have a whole wall of them.

It was also a good day because I finished the second of the Nora Corbett models, and they have been accepted and are already on the way to Wichelt. Now I just have a relatively small piece to stitch for an individual (finally, something I can show pictures of!) and then I really want to take a little time to work on my own "stuff"! Although I've already received the next Rosewood Manor design...

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!