Mill Hill Violin

I stitched this bead kit for Sam's Christmas ornament. I hope everyone is having a wonderful Christmas season.

I have a picture of Janet Casey's Snow Cone Santa which I have finished stitching, but the computer seems to have eaten it. Maybe I will try again tomorrow.

Snow Cone Santa

I have been busy working on my Janet Zickler Casey Santa. The Shining Needle Society is offering him through their online groups. I love these designs! It is fun to play with the different fibers and "see" how they look. The hat is Very Petite Velvet and Krenik braid. The hat brim is very sparkly because it called for Arctic Rays. I really like the nose as it has 3 layers of satin stitches. I hope to get his mustache in today.

Next week the group is starting Candy Cane Santa. Sam wants to do him so I may have to wait as I only have 1 set of 12 inch stretcher bars...Yes, I could buy another set, but I would rather wait and spend my money on fibers or kits. I am sure I can find something else to occupy me from my stash.

I am debating on finishing this guy myself. He has so many curves that I worry about being able to do it...I will put in some tent stitches this time...I do not want it to unravel!

Mystery in a Corner done....almost

As you can see I have almost finished MIAC. I am trying to do a tent stitch border so that I won't have the expense of matting the piece. The centers do not show it very well, but I used DMC 210. The photo makes that color look white. It looks very nice in person. I would love to see all the finished MIACs from Gay Ann's classroom in person. I bet they are all stunning. I am following Cynthia advice and putting it aside for a while. I am working on Janet Casey's Snow Cone Santa right now and it is very addicting... I will see if she will allow me to post my progress.

This cute pin was stitched by Sam. It is a Mill Hill bead kit called Dazzling Dragonfly. It has been sitting in Sam's "to do" pile for a while and he finally decided to finish him up. I think I will have to steal it from him... Just joking!

Sam is currently working on a beaded bug for a friend. When he gets it done, I will post it.

Sam's Beaded Bottle

I finally had a moment and Sam helped me figure out how to aquire photos. He has been doing it for his computer illiterate mom...Anyway, here are some photos of Sam's completed beaded bottle. It is a Carolyn Sherman design and he really enjoyed doing it. I did not help him at all. I told him that he could give it to me, but he said no. Rats!

Bottom of bottle

Base of bottle stitched.

Here is some pictures of my MIAC. I have been busy working on my spaces and corners.

This next picture shows the area I need tor rip. The light purple is just not right. It is ok, but every time I see it I think to myself, that needs to be darker. It has been loads of fun to stitch and a challenge to figure out what colors to use.

Finally Finished

After a lot of stalling, I finally finished my October Crazy Quilt Square. I still need to start my November square. I have a feeling I will be a little behind for a few months and then catch up after the holidays. I really want to finish my MIAC before the end of the year and I still have some Christmas ornaments to stitch.

Some changes in MIAC

I added some lavender to my MIAC. It definitely helps. I hope to get one of the spaces worked on soon, but I am trying to finish my October crazy quilt square. I need to start on my November square or I will be way behind for the Beaded Journal Project.

Crescent Claus was started and finished in a week! I think that is the fastest I have ever finished anything! My oldest son has claimed it as his for Christmas.

This Mill Hill kit took me longer. He is San Nicolo. He looks adorable in person. I love Mill Hill bead kits. They stitch up quickly and I normally have plenty of beads left over. In fact, I am using some of the extra beads on my crazy quilt. And one last plug for Mill Hill: the few times I have run out of beads, they have sent me what I needed with no questions asked. A great company!

Santa's almost done

As you can see, I have almost finished San Nicolo. He is a lttle Mill Hill bead kit that I've had in my stash forever. I try to stitch ornaments for each of my kiddos and some for a neice and nephew. So far I have two done this year and I am worried that I won't get them done!

I have also spent some time working on my MIAC. For some reason this picture came out blue tinted.... I spend a lot of time wondering if I even like my colors. The photo doesn't look too bad, but in person in looks stripey. I think I should not have put green in and tried to find a lighter value of the blue or purple. Too many medium values and not enough contrast. Sigh. Oh well, it is a learning piece and I used colors I don't normally use. My kids like the piece so I will keep working on it. I would have to rip too much to change it and sometimes I kind of like it.

I have finished stitching my October crazy quilt square; I just haven't had time to put any beads on it. Hopefully that will change this week!

Thanks for your Comments

Thanks for your encouraging words ladies. My finisher does such a nice job, but I hate spending the money on finishing when I could use if for stitching supplies. I am thinking about making next year a Santa year. I think I have at least 3 Janet Casey Santa's to do. If I stitch them, I may try (again) to finish them.

Why I hire a Finisher

As I promised, here are some photos of my attempt at finishing. A friend told me I could do it and that I should lace (not glue) the ornament together. She gave great advice, but it was wasted on me! I sewed some edging around my ornament, after I had trimmed the excess canvas off. But I cut too close to my stitching and somehow missed some of the edging while sewing and soon my santa was unravelling. Horrors! But I remembered that Pat and Jane both used glue so you KNOW what I pulled out....Yes, my glue. I was ready to cry at this point. All that stitching and time and money down the drain. But I took the advice that I always give my kids when they get frustrated: take a break. The next morning I was calmer and decided that I had no choice but to use glue for the project. It did not make me "bad"-just a lousy finisher!

I did sew the cording around the front, because I wanted to cover as many mistakes as possible. But the back was another matter! These last two pictures do not show the horrible job I truly did.


I ended up having to add another piece of cording around the back to cover some of the problems.

Yes, I used glue! This piece will never be shown at the state fair or at my local guild, but I did finish the piece and I will hang it in my home!

The moral of this story is find a good finisher!

Where has the time gone?

Well, I finally had a moment to retake a picture of my September Crazy quilt square and try to post. I hope you can see the spider I placed on my web. He was fun to stitch. I also finished a beaded lizard from Jill Oxton's Cross Stitch& Beading magazine (issue 68), but I forgot to take a picture of him before I loaned him to the library. He was supposed to go on the quilt square, but he looked too big. I can always add him later.

These next two pictures are of Sam's beaded box. We took the class through the Mississippi River Valley Guild of EGA. The design is by Carolyn Sherman and called Wildflower Box. Sam plans to show it at our local homeschool art show this month and I hope to enter it in the fair for him. He did a great job, and I am very proud of him. We will not discuss my box or the lack of progress I have made on it. Top view of Sam's box.

I have finally finished Part I of Gay Ann's Mystery in a Corner. I will try to post a picture soon. I also decided to take the plunge and try to finish my North Wind Santa ornament myself. Big mistake. Once it is totally done, I will show you why I pay big bucks for a finisher. Yes, I know Jane of Chilly Hollow can do it and so can NCPat...in fact, they encouraged me to try! (Not knowingly, I assure you.) But I am not sure that I will attempt it again.

And don't forget Gay Ann Roger's is having a sale starting October 15!!!

September's Crazy Quilt Square

This is a small section of my quilt that I beaded heavily. I had an empty space that needed to be filled.Here is a picture of my square. I have a few more things to add to it and it will be done! I need to put a spider on my web and finish my lizard who will sit on the center square. I am also thinking of adding my son's name and birthday as it is "his square." I enjoyed stitching and beading the square, but I am afraid that it has too many mistakes. Hopefully I will be able to "fudge" it when I finally put my squares together.

Thanks for looking. I hope to figure out how to put a slide show on here and share some great ATC's I just received.

A daisy to brighten your day

I was spending some time looking at other blogs when I stopped by Laura J. Perin's and saw her new design "Don't Eat These Daisy's!" Or at least I think that is what she is calling it. We are having rainy cool days here and those daisies really brightened up the room. I will have to do some stash enhancement soon. Here is the link to her blog so you can see it too.

http//two-handedstitcher.blogspot.com/

I will try to post my crazy quilt square tomorrow as I have almost finished beading it. Sorry there are no pictures to share today!

Barbara's Garden on black canvas

The Mississippi River Valley Chapter of EGA is doing this project as a year long project. I have completed three! We are getting boxes to put them in a box when I do that I will repost.

Hope everyone is having a good Labor Day Weekend! Prayers go to all who are in the hurricane's way.

A few finished projects

Although I am not allowed to sit for long, I finished a few things. First is a picture of my crazy quilt square that I am doing for the 2008 Beaded Journal Project. I will look up the blog for my next post.

I managed to finish the last of the 3 Barbara's Patchwork Garden that I started. I just realized this is the red one! I finished it a while ago. I will try to clear my brain and post my black one tomorrow! The design is on the ANG website, if you are interested.

Another thing is my biscornu. It is a Cindy Valentine design that was made for the Mississippi River Valley Chapter of EGA. Her email is cindy@cindyvalentine.com if you are curious about her designs.

Stripes?

In this image, I have added the #8 Krenik in purple and then the purple Impressions. I still have not decided about that green floss. Is it overwhelming? Is the piece going to look like it has stripes?

I did add the blue metallic to the middle of the diamonds. I considered using the green, but decided it needed that blue to keep some unity. Next is another band of #8 Krenik purple and then pearle cotton with an overdye layer on top. When I get part I finished, I will post a picture. But since I will be having some surgery, it may be September before I can work on this again.

A little more done on Mystery

I managed to get a little more done on MIAC. I added the purple Impressions overlay, which I like, but I'm just not sure about the green metallic center and the green floss basketweave. I think I will continue stitching and decide a little later if I need to rip out the green.

Christmas Stocking

My finisher called and I was able to pick up my daughter's Christmas Stocking. It was a Dimensions kit and although I loved the colors, I didn't like the floss in the kit or the canvas it was stitched on! Now I know why people pay more for handpainted canvas.

The finisher did I a nice job and my dd wanted to know if we could hang the stocking now. Nope. She will have to wait a few months for that.

Now off to my frame to see if I can get some stitching done on my Mystery. After all, Gay Ann told us to stitch for 1/2 hour on these Dog Days of Summer. I will take any excuse I can get!

Home from Vacation

I haven't been able to write for a bit because I went to visit my mom. The only real stitching I did was pull apart a bead project that I did not like. Hopefully I will be able to post more on that later. When I returned home, I was faced with a mountain of laundry so couldn't stitch for a while. But I finally sat down and managed to do a little more on my Mystery.

I decided the piece looked too boring, so I ripped the watercolors out and used a more variegated piece. I also added the green metallic to the center and green floss (DMC 911) to the one corner doing basketweave. I still need to add the Impressions over the top of the center square once I finish the rest of the center. I am way behind everyone in Gay Ann's classroom, but I am learning so much as I stitch.

It is interesting how choosing a certain piece of the variegated watercolours changes the whole piece. By adding the green floss, I have pulled in a little more of the green in the watercolours. It is fun to watch the piece develop.

More Mystery

I took my Mystery to several groups of friends and got two conflicting points of view. One group thought the green metallic would look the best using blue pearle cotton(798) and the blue Impressions(7041). The other group thought the blue metallic was better, using the purple pearle cotton (327) and purple Impressions(6010). So my guess is that I will be able to do some mixing and matching as I stitch this piece. I think my preference is for the blue metallic. I think in person, the green is too green. I am not sure if I will use the blue or the purple as the dominate color, but right now it looks like green will be an accent color.

I have been working on Mystery in a Corner and have run into a dilema. What color do I want to dominate?

Let me see if I can explain... If you look at the photo above, you will see both green and blue used in the same row. I am trying to decide which color I want to dominate. I love the purple and the varigated, so I will keep stitching and decide where to go from here.

Hi! This is my first attempt at blogging. I want to document my progress of my needlework projects and see if I can make a dent in my stash. I also hope to post a few altered art projects, especially as they relate to color and needlework.

Speaking of color, I have choosen my fibers for Gay Ann Roger's Mystery in a Corner.

Here are my color choices:

Watercolours-Appalachia, DMC #5-798 & 327, Kreinik # 8-008 & 006, Gold Rush 14-216C, and Gold Rush 18-GD33C

I am stitching on 18 count mono pale blue canvas. Because my LNS didn't have the exact fibers needed, I will have to do some improvising. I have found that Gay Ann's patterns lend themselves to this.

To see more of Gay Ann's beautiful designs, go to www.GayAnnRogers.com