HOLIDAY TIME AND ORNIE'S!

Hello everyone. Hopfully everyone has most all their holiday stitching done. I have 2 more to sew together. Made good progress this year and have enjoyed all the stitching. This month has been a whirlwind of finishes, shipping packages out to familly, friends and exchanges. Cold weather set in about 0100 this morning. Soooo I figured it would be a good time for an update. Have my feet securely planted on the heater!
Here are the holiday ornaments for this year!

I had fun with these bears this year. They are about 4 1/2 inches by 6 inches. A little large for an ornie. Made 3. One for my bbinteractive Brooke's Books exchange for Marl. One for SIL and one for my ornie wall hanger. With each one I tried to improve the bow and make it look more like a candy cane stripe. So each one is a little different.

These little birds are from a larger Valerie Pfeiffer chart called corus line. Stitched this for my friend Michelle's mother.Wanted the lace to look as though one is looking through a curtained window and evesdropping on an important bit of gossip!

A few months ago I stitched the Margaret Sherry "Let Them Eat Cake" for a stitch a long. Michelle liked them so much, I just had to stitch one for her.

This cute kitty is what I sent out for my Margaret Sherry exchange. Making use of a minor card making skill, I used metalic powder and glue pad for the little hedgehog.

This is what I recieved from Marl for our bbinteractive Brooke's Books exchange. This will be the second year participating and has been great fun!

 Marls beautiful ornament has a permenant place on my holiday wall hanger!

 And Marl personalized the back for me.

Finished works for the month are some fun things! Especially the lemonade. Want to sew into a bell pull. But, am having problems finding the hardware. Checked the local Hobby Lobby and couldn't find one. Looks like I will have to cruise online to find a few. This is a Casy Buonaugurio design. One of bb interactives members brought this designer to my attension. Cruised her website and bought 3 patterns. Plus she has lots of cute freebies at www.caseybuonaugurio.com

 
This is a French Country Papillon JBW design. Stitched with pink DMC varigated threads. Will finish into an ornie.

And for my mom, a Just Nan butterfly. I changed all the colors excpt the ones for the roses. Added many beads and stitched on 32 count opalescent fabric. Will finish this one into a ornie, too.

Here are my WIP's

Have made more progress on Bubbles. Only one page is actually finished. Hope to finish another before the next shiney chart presents itself. Haveing too much fun on the HAED wbsite and waaayyy to many good sales!

I made it to the other side of the chart. Love the colors in the little plate in the corner. I am so happy that the colors in the dragon are not "cartoonish" They are very pretty greens.

Will be happy to have the leaves filled in more. Many holiday projects have been taking up my stitchy time!

This is my Fun Guys Snowballs Stocking. Will try to get him into overdrive for a finish. Have a HAED very pretty Merry Morgan stocking I would like to stitch.

This is DH birthday dragon that will most likely be a christmas dragon.... I can't seem to get enough "alone" time to get him finished. The dragon is from a Joan Elloitt's cross stitch cards book. There is also a very nice celtic wedding knot card that I would like to stitch for our aniversary. Here lately, we have had many night repair calls. So my evening stitching has been cut down quite a bit.

Was hoping that some would be interested in seeing some years past holiday finishes! Dug them out of the linen closet for decorating. These stockings and mittens needed some ribbons for hanging. Always intended to do that! So this past weekend was spent sewing ribbons with invisable thread.  Usually displayed them in a basket of ornies. They are Lori Birmingham designs from the leaflets Jingle Pals and Jingle Pals ll. 

This is snow familly and was a cottage kit from Bucilla.

Just Nan Snow Circle

DH loves Eeyore!

And this is a Cricket Collection design. I stitched this one and decided that the Just Nan snow circle would be a nice companion.

This is from a Leisure Arts leaflet. Old 80's or early 90's design and I can't remember the name of him. Used marroon corduroy for the pillow. Figured it went well with the flannel shirt.

While in Hobby Lobby, on a fruitless search for bell pull hardware, I found a card kit on sale for about 1/2 off. I figured why not. Has instructions and I am a very good copy cat if someone gives me pictures to follow! Well, my mistake. Only display pic's were 4 on the box and no aligning of what to use for which papers and cards. I ended up with about 10 cards out of 15. Mainly due to items not matching up into something I would consider pretty. But, here is the result of some quick work and glue.

In september, my friend Michelle(who knits aborable miniature mice) knitted some miniature christmas stockings. Michelle sent me some and they were taped to our refrigerator. Found a doll house fireplace to hang them on!

I took straight pins, K&Company layered pointsettia(for scrapbooking), Glisten thread for garland and put those jewlery making nippers to work.

Used a straight pin to makes holes, in each of 3, in the centers of the pointsettia flowers. Then cut the straight pins short and poked them back through the flowers.

Took a double sided sticky dot and attached it to the backside of the fireplace. The attached the "garland" Glisten thread.

Then poke the flower pin through the top of the miniature stocking and press into the wood of the fireplace mantle. The wood is actually pretty good quality and took a bit to get the straight pin to drill into it.

Then arrange the garland and wrap it around the backside of each flower to stabilze. Usead another sticky dot to secure the garland to the back.

Cut off the gold threan hangers from some miniature ornaments and decorated!

  Now my mice, from my friend Michelle,  have a nice warm fireplace!

Michelle and I exchange grand boxes for the holidays. It is great fun, as we try to find things fromTexas and the USA and Michelle sends food and candies from France. This year Michelle sent us nearly every mouse she knitted for the entire year. And I was truly amazed at the attension to detail with all the little mice. The slippers, tennis shoe and another stocking are completely adorable! My ltttle table tree is brimming with so many knitted mice and ornaments! Michelle even sent a smal wood tree with cute wood ornaments. It is 4 sided and on a small stand.  The pretty tins have hand made soaps with satin cloths. A snowglobe with Eiffel Tower and a beautiful cup with scenes of France. Many candies and cookie biscuits. DH and I were digging things out of the box and eating soft chewy nougat candies. Great fun!

 This tiny mouse is knitted in pieces, like the others, and sewn together. I think she is maybe 2 inches tall, at most. Happen to have some pretty candy stripped ribbon for hanging!

So tiny!

 Santa and Christmas mice!

So much is in the details. Christmas mouse even has tiny knitted holly on her hat.

Santa has tiny knitted and wraped packages.

Strawberry Shortcake has tiny strawberry beads, a green strip knitted in and a hand tied bow on her hat.

Even her strawberry bag has a tiny strawbery bead for a clasp.

Thank you so much for all the "petit souris"!

Michelle always emails pictures of her mice. But, until one see's them up close and "in person". One realizes how perfect and amazing these works of art really are. (I played with them for quite a while, organizing them under our little tree) Keep waiting for them to talk to me!

My appologies for the blurry picture. I am good with inanimate objects. But, I was laughing too hard to get a good pic. My big bear, DH's birthday is this week. His sister had a birthday party at her house. We decided to plaster the cake with all of 55 candles. The result was quite an inferno!
Well, thats it for now! Until next time, happy stitching and thanks for visiting, Deb