hearts and more hearts . . .

Backposted (because how ever many years from now I'd regret not having posted these pictures along with their stories)!

What's red and white and pink all over?

My living room! With a little purple thrown in for good measure.  ♥

Y'all know I enjoy decorating for the season.  Valentine's is no exception!  I'm even doing a little heart hand stitching . . .

Like, literally.  :)

And here's my little Valentine wearing his sweet onesie!

I did a little tail stitching (again, literally), too!

Because if you're dancing as a sheep, your tail needs to be secured to your ballet skirt. :)

Have a very Happy Valentine's Day!

:)

happy october . . .

Hello October, I'm so happy that you're here!  It's *birthday* month and it's blog hop month, too!  :)

I finished stitching up Mr. Jack O'Lantern!  

He's such fun.  But I felt he needed something a little more than a hoop or mug rug finish. I think I found (or rather, made) the perfect solution . . .

Yay!  It's a slipcover for a Christmas pillow I've had for ages. I may go back and quilt the face of it later.  Maybe.  Right now, I'm liking is just as it is, where it is!

I got some other stitching finished up and some started this week . . . 

The hexi pumpkin pins are always fun!

This Kathy Schmitz heart has been unfinished for a while ... since March, I think.  Which would be about right.  That's when the world went topsy-turvy, right?

Anyway, it's finished now and ready to display come February!

I stitched up the first of these in May (Mother's Day, to be precise), so it was about time that I worked on a second . . .

There are a total of six. At my current pace, I should have the complete set done by May 2022.  Hahahaha!!!  :)

Today I spent the majority of the day "falling" up the place . . .

While I watched a little SEC football.  There were (are) some good games on today!  Roll Tide!

I'll settle in tomorrow afternoon and pull out some "slow Sunday stitching" . . . 

I've got four of the nine floss colors needed for it.  I'll pick up the rest next week.  This will probably be my last autumn stitchery of the season.  I've got a wool project in the wings! Then I truly do want to get those mittens finished up for this Christmas.  LOL...really!

Linking up with Kathy's Quilts and her Slow Stitching post.  Y'all have a terrific rest of the weekend!! Oh, and you'll notice ... I'm being sweet ... no Christmas countdown reminder!! 

:)

eclectic collection . . .

It's been a busy week, which means I wasn't able to get in as much stitching as I would have liked, but I got some in nevertheless. I did make some progress on my heart:

But put it down to work on the Peppermint Purple SAL. 

Week 8 was made available on Wednesday, and I had it finished on Thursday, along with a good majority of the box outlines for the entire stitchery!

It's easy, soothing stitching and I'm enjoying it very much.  

Thursday was guild, and I struggled to go, because by the end of my work week--especially when it's been a busy one in the evenings--I just want to go home.  But I went and I'm so glad!  Our speaker was Diane Knott, who was just delightful!  I really enjoyed her program.  Then as a bonus, I won a $20 gift certificate to a local quilt shop!

Yay me!

Saturday I did some utility work on a sweet little bubble of Edith's . . .

This is the after pic. It's challenging, but you can just make it out in the center of the photo. It had a tiny tear so I used a square, white cotton patch and fused it.

This is the back side. If you've never used this fusing stuff, you should give it a try. 

Especially for applique and wool applique! But also for fabric tears. It is very pliable and soft when the fusing process is finished. Very nifty to have on hand!

I also prepped and stitched a block from the Grandmother's Choice BOW.  I actually did go to the last entry and finished up block 49.  

I think eight years ago I may have been afraid of the curved piecing. It didn't phase me in the least in 2020! LOL!

So progress is progress, right?! Still not quite to the halfway point.  The gap in row two is starting to bother me, but it *is* a block that's giving me pause. I may whittle this bad boy down to a six blocks by six blocks quilt and call it done.  If that's the case, I'm MORE than halfway through!  Ha!

While I was in the Nook, I came across a project I'd started late in November and because I'm a squirrel chaser . . . well, need I say more?  Heh.  Anyway, I decided I wanted to finish it up and get it to guild for show 'n tell next meeting.  

It really doesn't need much. I need to stitch the vines, then add the leaves, and then quilt it.  I'll spend my slow stitching today working on it.

After all the rain we've had in the last MONTH (!!!) I did take advantage of the sunny Saturday (brisk as it was) to take a slow stroll around the camp.  Things are starting to green up just the slightest and it makes me happy to see it.

The trees always make me smile.  This one in the center is just the perfect cone shape!  Enjoy!

Linking up today with Kathy's Quilts.  Have a super Sunday!

:)

bits and more bits . . .

It's been a lovely weekend so far.  Todd surprised me with a "gourmet dining experience" on Valentine's Day.  

It was a privately catered event and the food was excellent!  The chef classified his style as 'sophisticated southern.' We were served a four course meal which included a deconstructed Southern Greek salad, seared scallops, braised short ribs, and for dessert . . . 

Red velvet cake with a cheesecake center, topped with white chocolate ganache.  YUM!

Backing up a bit, I spent Thursday evening with the grandgirls and gifted them with their Valentines.

Edith was particularly enthralled with hers and went through her 'goodies' very carefully, several times!  ♥

I've gotten some stitching in, too. I worked up Block 40--Art Square--from Grandmother's Choice.

It went together fairly easily, and I should probably do more than one of these every couple of weeks if I want to actually finish it!  I've got SO much of the fabric.  I really need to do something with it!

I played around with the new Kathy Schmitz heart printed embroidery I got earlier this week, too . . .

This is really fun to stitch on!  For some reason I first thought there was just outline or straight stitching on it, but there are actually quite a few different types of stitches to work out, and I like that!

Finally, I've continued to work on the Peppermint Purple Blackwork SAL piece.  Since  I had finished week 7's block, I decided to go ahead and work out the block outlines for the rest of the year.

Nine rows down and four rows to go; then I need to decide on borders.  It's fun, easy stitching and probably what I'll work on this afternoon for my slow Sunday stitching!

Wrapping it up ... be sure to head over to Kathy's Quilts to check out what other slow stitching is happening today!

Happy Sunday ... I hope you get to enjoy a holiday Monday--I know I sure will!

:) 

always changing . . .

Not a whole lot going on to show here today. I managed to change up the design of my class quilt (again) . . . 

Here's my EQ layout. It's a respectable 60" by 60" now, so I think I'm done changing things!  I added the four corner blocks (which are just a tad different) and increased the width of the sashing and borders.

The blocks (laid out here in the order I planned to stitch them together) are now sashed and ready to have the borders stitched on.  I'd like to have that done before class on Tuesday!

I worked on it yesterday, until I had to leave to help with our guild's New Member Tea.

We had a pretty setup for our finger foods and tea station, and a great crowd, too!

It was a fun day!

I know what I said earlier in the week about what I might stitch next, but I got to looking through my rather extensive collection of files on my laptop (close to 4,000) and came across this heart . . . 

It's actually a coloring page I downloaded from Don't Eat the Paste.  Coloring pages really lend themselves to double as embroidery designs! I thought it might be fun set on point, in a crazy quilt-like patchwork block.  Plus, it looks easy to transfer. LOL! I'm thinking I'll use cotton perle and stitch out a pierced backstitch.  

That's enough from me this morning.  Linking up with Kathy's Quilts this morning; be sure to check out all the Slow Stitching that's happening this Sunday and have a terrific day!  Happy Groundhog Day!!  (I'm banking on an early Spring ... what about you?!?)

:)

french knots and hearts . . .

It's only appropriate that the embroidery that I put together for our road trip weekend . . .

Was finished just as we entered the last mile into the camp!

Full circle (full heart?), I'd call that!  Here it is in better lighting . . .

I still need to spray out my markings and decide what to do with it now that the stitching is finished.  Heh.

Several of you have asked about where I found my pattern.  It was a vintage freebie from French Knots.  If you've never visited their website and you're an embroidery enthusiast, oh yeah, you really need to!  They have tons of sweet vintage embroidery transfers for all occasions.  That being said, the one I just stitched (saved about six years ago), isn't on the site any longer, so the owner must rotate designs on and off the site. So if you see something you like, download it now!  Just click on the design you want to save, right click on it, and choose 'save image as'.  Presto!  Then all you have to do is print it off and transfer it to fabric!

This is the transfer from which I got my design.  If you'd like it (since it does say free on it), just let me know!

The owner also has a selection of vintage crochet, quilting patterns and applique patterns to peruse.  It's a fun page to wander around through, but the embroidery part is my favorite.  Hop over and find something sweet to stitch up!   

This is what I plan on putting needle and floss to next.  Yummy, right?! I love lazy daisy stitches and French knots! Plus the transfer process is so much simpler. Have I ever mentioned that transferring designs is my least favorite embroidery task?  LOL!

On a quick quilting note, I had my third quilting class last evening. We talked about the sashing, cornerstones, and borders. Here's a tentative of how mine will look (though I will probably rearrange blocks a bit) . . .

It's fun to have your class in a quilt shop where if you don't like the fabrics you have, you can just go pull something different and actually audition it before you buy it!  I did like the way mine looked, but I think (after seeing works from classes past) I'm going to add four more blocks -- with four patches in the corners instead of HSTs -- and put those in the four corners of the quilt.  Then add the sashing, cornerstones, and borders. Whew!

All rightie then . . . it's hump day (but it's really my Thursday).  So onward march towards the weekend!  Enjoy!

:)