Two framed finishes and stitching pouches

 I did a little framing over the weekend.  I had these two Blackbird Designs pieces stitched and I needed to get them framed.  Of course I first tried to find some frames in my stash but no luck.  I had a coupon for 50% off plus another $25 off so it was a trip to JoAnn's.

 This piece is from BBD Loose Feathers Spring 2012 book Mary Ann Blackburn.  As I mentioned in a previous post I put my paternal grandmother's name and date of when she would have been 8 years old as that was the age of Mary Ann herself when she stitched this sampler.  I think this will be a very nice heirloom of my grandmother.  It makes the sampler just that much more special to personalize it with my grandmothers birth date.  I was happy to spend the money on this frame as I think the sampler deserves it:) besides I did use that coupon!!!

 

 This piece is from BBD A Schoolgirl's Work book.  It is Ann's Sewing Tray.  Again I could not find the right frame in my stash so I ordered this frame from JoAnn's.  I so love the saying on this piece. 

 

  And lastly I ordered this Blackbird Designs quilt fabric last winter and finally got around to making some pouches with it.  I really like having my projects in these stitching pouches.  And of course I really enjoyed sewing them with my new sewing machine!!!

I hope everyone is enjoying the weather and having a great week.

 

 

I LOVE my new sewing machine.....

I was out today garage saling with my daughter and while we were out we stopped at a quilt shop.

I spotted this very cute fabric and knew I needed to make myself a set of stitching pouches.

Here is my set of stitching pouches.  Since getting my new sewing machine I have been trying out all of it's stitches. I have made these pouches before and would sew snaps on them well since I have a really nice automatic buttonhole maker with my new machine I decided I would put buttonhole's in these pouches. 

.  Boy let me tell you the buttonhole worked excellently.  I am so excited.  

Here is a view of the inside.  I just love this fabric.  Nice sewing theme. 

A close up of the inside fabric.

Here I am with my new sewing machine.  It is a Husqvarna Viking Sapphire 875.  It has been worth every penny I spent on it!!!!

I made an extra set of pouches to put up for sale.  If you are interested please email me.  I will sell this set for $45 plus shipping.  If you would like just the larger pouch it would be $30 plus shipping and the smaller version is $20 plus shipping.  These pouches are made with quality quilt fabric and have a button hole--not snaps.

 I only have one set of these pouches right now but if you would like to order either size or a set just let me know and I will make them for you.

 

  Here is a picture with to show that the larger pouch is big enough for a regular size pattern.

 

The smaller version will hold this type of pattern.  

 I bought this cute reusable craft bag from JoAnn's the other day.  Now I really like the bag, it is very cute but can you spot the problem????

Someone must have been asleep when checking the spelling---Caft???? 

I hope you have a wonderful weekend.  

 

I love dying on a sunny day

Jill (Purple Peacock) and I decided to do some thread dying.  Now we did do some thread dying about a month or so ago but wanted to do it again with another method Jill had found on Calico Rabbits blog.

Here are some of our threads pre-dying. 

Here of course are some of our dyes.

Need those pans.  Also had some cups but I didn't get any pictures of them.

 

Here is our drying process.  Gotta love the sun:)

I am going to be doing BBD Mother's Gardens so I bought all of the DMC's and dyed them. I bought 3 skeins of each color--maybe a little over kill but then I know I will have enough.  I am so excited in how they turned out and can't wait to stitch with them.  Also notice our wonderful tags.  Thanks to Jill, she did all the work on them.  They are a very nice touch.  

Thanks Jill:)

 These are some other threads I dyed.  I really tried to get some variation in the threads.  It is a guessing game, but the more you dye the more you learn. 

 The next few photo's are some close ups of the threads.  I am hoping that you will be able to see some of the variations in the dying.  I am not to good at photography.

 DMC 666

 DMC 3012

 DMC 3052

 

DMC 3053

Here are some threads that I want to redo.  I would like them to have some more variance in them.  As I said before it's a guessing game.  So I will try some different dyes.  

I also think that when I do my dying from now on I will choose my projects and then dye the threads.  Although you do need to practice so sometimes doing random threads is good. 

Well I had a great day with Jill and I love the results!!!

Friendship Exchange and two shop model finishes

Today Jill and Jackie came over for a day of stitching.  We usually would gather on Friday's but some of the girls have been busy.  As a result those of us that can gather during the day will try to get together sometime during the week.  Well I was pleasantly surprised by Jill with my Friends Through Threads Friendship exchange piece.  Since Jill had m name she hand delivered my piece.

 Jill stitched this Blackbird Designs piece.  I am not sure of the name of the pattern but she changed up the colors of the piece with some threads she dyed.  I think it turned out pretty cool.

Thanks Jill, I love it:)

I have been busy stitching for The Country Sampler again.  I stitched up this piece which is a Willow Hill Samplings design called--Eleanor Jaegler Sampler. 

This is another piece for the shop by Primitive Things, the design is called--Lucy Adams.  These were both fun stitches. 

I almost forgot about this sampler.  I finished is on Sunday.  This is Blackbird Designs--Mary Ann Blackburn.  I put my paternal grandmothers name at the bottom and the year that she would have been 8 years old.  I stitched it on some 32 count coffee dyed linen with DMC threads. 

Started on 4-25-2012

Finished on 4-29-2012

Again I really enjoyed stitching this and putting my grandmothers name on this sampler.  I plan on doing more samplers and putting family names on them. 

Well folks that's about all for now hope your having a great week.

Shop Model Happy Dance

I just finished this Stacy Nash Sampler called Grace Bridges.  It is a model I stitched for The Country Sampler Shop in Spring Green, WI.

I will have to say I enjoyed this stitch.  I was fun doing a spot type sampler.  This sampler took me exactly  a month to stitch.  I started it on March 21 and finished today--April 21.

Now I am going to do a bit of stitching for me.  Between this sampler and my Stitchville/Thea Dueck retreat stitching I have been doing some type of commitment stitching for the last two months.

 Here is a picture of the whole sampler.  It is about 15 X 19 inches.

I took a couple more pictures of the sampler so you could see some of the motifs up close. 

Just a little stitching update.  Hope everyone is having a great weekend.  Weather here is

kind of crappy but it makes for good stitching:)

Spring Fling Retreat 2012 and Happy Dance

I just arrived back home from this year's Spring Fling Retreat.  The teacher at this retreat was Thea Dueck from The Victoria Sampler. 

Here she is either on Friday night or Saturday morning.  I just can't remember which day--bad memory caused by a retreat and food hangover I'm sure:) 

This is the group of girls that were at my stitching table.  Chris, Joyce, Vicki and Cathy B.  It was a good group of girls. 

These are some of the goodies we received from Stitchville, our LNS and sponsor of this retreat.

 

Here is a little giftie Cathy B made for all us girls.  A very cute needle holder. 

Thanks again Cathy.

On Friday night we received a kit from Thea to make our own name tags.  Thea designed these for our Spring Fling Retreat.  We had a basic design and then could "freelance" some of our own ideas on our name tag.  Here are some of the name tags that were finished. 

This is my project all stitched up pre-finishing. 

Another view of my project.

This is where the Happy Dance part comes in.  My finished project.  I must tell you I stitched and finished this project kicking and screaming!!!!  More on the stitching part as I felt this was a very putzy stitch for me.  But I am so glad I stuck with it and finished it because it is just lovely.  I even had some wooden spools of thread from my grandma's stitching basket to put on the base.  Doing this project opened up some new stitches and ribbon embroidery for me.  It broadened my horizons--which is a good thing.   

Thea and I.

 She came around to each of us and visited with us and even asked us questions on this project.  It was nice to have her tell us how well we did on our projects. 

 Thea took time to sign our books which was very nice.  It was great to get to meet and talk with Thea.  I felt like I have made a new friend:)

 

These are all of the projects that were finished this weekend.  We had about 53 people at this retreat.  People were at different stages in their stitching and finishing. 

 One last view of our stitching room.  

I had a very good time at retreat.  It seems like the time went so fast.  

Can't wait until next year's Spring Fling.