LATE INTERNATIONAL HERMITERS UPDATE

Its a mad house around here! In spite of that I manages to get some stitching in this past weekend. Made two snowflake biscornu. Even got them sewed into a finish.

Some of the pattern is parts of a freebie that was too big for a biscornu. Altered parts of pattern to fit what I needed and designed the small snow flakes to fill in the gaps. Used Kreinik metallic for the cross stitch.
Hope everyone is getting their holiday stitching done!
happy stitching
Deb

TURTLE TROT SAL FOR OCTOBER

Happy october! Hope everyone is well! Most of the stitching I have done was at the end of september. Our new grand daughter decided to make an early entrance! So it was a 1000 mile drive to see her.
Before I left for my long drive I saw these on a magazine cover. Bought some artificial pumpkins, cut some felt eyes, nosees, ears and voila! Pumpkin kitties!

Here are the projects I have been working on. Finished my page goals on this one.

 This is the precious moments butterfly fairy that is to be Penny's birth announcement which will have to be a christmas gift.

 One of Brooke's Books angels on 14 count perforated plastic canvas.

 And this... My TUSAL. I faithfully add my thread scraps and then forget to take pictures. Many pretty threads!

 My trip to TN had 2 highlights. One was seeing the kids and meeting our new grand daughter. I got to play grandma and had great fun! Please meet Penny Rose!

We also had a day at the park! Lily showed no fear and climbed the steps to the slide.

Another highlight was meeting designer Brooke Nolan of Brooke's Books. We met at the Chattanooga Choo Choo. Was wonderful meeting Brooke for lunch. In fact we spent the whole afternoon talking, laughing and having a great time. Brooke is so involved with her designing and it was fun to see her eyes light up when speaking about new patterns and great ideas for additions to her new lines. Thank you so much for lunch and an all too short of a visit. Think we could have talked for days.  I hope to be able to meet again.
Brooke has a number of downloadable charts,  on craftsy, for a very reasonable price. One is the Little Woman stitch a story line. Here is the link if you are interested!
Brooke Nolan's Pattern Store on Craftsy | Support Inspiration. Buy Indie.

I had a great time in TN. But, it was good to get home, clean house and get back to my daily routine. Thank you for stopping by and happy stitching!
Deb

October YOTA, not....

This has not been a good month for my SAL  's... Many unusual things have diverted my stitching time. Nothing done on Joan Elliott's Wizard. The one bright spot, this month, is a new grand daughter. Lily has a new sister.  I am visiting with the kids and, as all grandmas think, the cutest grand baby on the planet!
Hope to get caught up with all my SAL' s next month.
Hope you are getting more stitching done than I am!
Deb

SEPTEMBER HERMIT SAL and some gardening!

Hi everyone!
I haven't had time to stitch the last two weeks. Have missed a few SAL's. But, I did get time to participate in the Hermiter's SAL this weekend. Grab the Hermit button next to this post and join in!
The cat and I pretty much had the house to our selves this past weekend. Only two road repair calls. One each on saturday and sunday. Simple and didn't cut into my weekend too  much.
Here is my progress on my HAED Mystery piece
Before. a lot of confetti.

 After. Confetti finished and 3 bottom pages done. They are 1/2 pages. So the bulk of the design is yet to be stitched. I will not pick this one up until next year. As much holiday stitching and more page goals to accomplish.

 QS Chocolate, before

 QS Chocolate, after. Got the confetti stitching done on the middle cookie. Switched to less confetti stitching for a break. Will continue to work on this one until the last bottom page is completed.

 Brooke's Books Santa from the 2013 Just Cross Stitch Christmas Magazine issue. 14 count antique brown perforated plastic canvas.

 I finished beading a Mill Hill Halloween Heart ornament on black 14 count perforated plastic canvas. I found a pretty Halloween feather tree at Hobby Lobby. LOVE their 40% off coupons! Decided to add Belinda The Bat Witch for a tree topper.

 Because the tree is a cardboard shaped cone I used a decorative straight pin to attach the ornament. Have one more heart to finish beading.

 On the garden front, we received a shipment of Shriners iris roots out of Brooke's, Oregon. These are packed in organic shredded materials, for shipping, so no molding.  2 year old roots. Very large and already getting new growth. I like that they have plastic tags to identify plants. Turn them over to keep the sun from bleaching out colors.

 Some tags are a little wonky as I didn't want to disturb the plant for a good tag picture.

 Remember Mr Pineapple? Well, we had a minor set back... After a month I figured we were safe from anything digging up the plant. All the original fruit materials from mother pineapple was gone and roots had formed. We were wrong... The raccoons decided to dig through the barrel and laid Mr Pineapple over. Not once, but four times in consecutive nights. We don't know if the plant will have any fruit(maybe that should be Mrs Pineapple) due to being dug out, but it is a pretty plant and the spikes are nearly the expanse of the barrel.

That's our progress so far. I haven't done much blog reading the last few weeks. I promise I will get to reading your blogs and all the wonderful projects everyone is stitching.

Thanks for stopping by!

Deb

YOTA UFO update!

It's that time again! The first saturday of the month and time for a YOTA UFO (Un Finished Object) update. The weather is hot as ever, Even more so than in august. But, we have had a bit of rain which is keeping the garden alive and helping it through the heat. We have some new iris plants in fresh from Shriner's iris farms out of Brooks Oregon. They have the best iris roots. Very large and shipped in a wood shreds organic packing material that keeps them from becoming moldy or soft. We had the pleasure of visiting their vast gardens one spring. Truely magnificent with flowers of all kind, benches to sit and admire the blooms and mail box stations along the way to pick through brochures stating colors and breeds of flowers.
I tried to take pictures of the plastic tags attached to the roots. There is so much humidity in the air that my camera lense fogged up. Thought I was going blind until I looked at the lense! Maybe in a few weeks the humidity will cooperate.
On to the stitching!
This Joan Elliott Wizzard has been my focus piece all through this years YOTA SAL. The link, if you wish to join the sal, with any ole' work that has been sitting for awhile, is on my side bar with a few other SAL's.
The cross stitch was done last month and back stitching had been started. I really was not going to back stitch this whole piece. I have used 1/4 stitches to chisel the edges so they were not so "stair step" looking and would take the place of the back stitching outlines. THEN I started working with the Krienik #4 braided metallic's required for the castle and some of the gown. I was hooked. Started using the Kreinik for everything but the face. DMC #3799, which is almost a black, was required for much of the gown and it was just too dark. This is what put me off the back stitching to begin with.
Before

 After, with more Kreinik Metallic's back stitching.

 Made a nice and sparkly upgrade!

I still have quite a bit of detail back back stitching on the gown and cloak. Once that is done, there is a ton of beads. But, I am in the home stretch with this one and look forward to getting this finished by the end of the year. Have a frame ready to go!
Have finally finished my yearly page goals, and then some, on Mini Autumn Cat Magic. Think this one will be put away until I can get my other page goals finished. Still have the birth sampler and holiday gifts to finish. Having a difficult time with the holiday stitching. Every time I choose something to stitch for some one, I change my mind.... Although, once the article is started that is final and will be the chosen gift. Oooh! Maybe that is what I should do! Start everything and then work from there! No more indecision.

I started another piece this past spring. This will be called a Mystery Sampler. And will be so named for a while! Working on the bottom three pages. They are each 1/2 of a page and hope to have them done this next week so I can go on to my last three HAED and their yearly page goals. Getting close to the end of the year(E GADDS!) I really cringed when a TV commercial( DH missed the mute on the remote...) started screaming that there are only 101 days until christmas. That was last week and I didn't need to be reminded of that!

Another UFO SAL that has been making a little progress is the Pepper's Pillow. I really shirked my duty on this one this past month. Only a few stitches. But, I really like the coral colors and how they have brightened up the piece even more.

No small piece's this time. All those HAED page goals are coming back to haunt me. Oh well, what the hey, it's coming up on halloween anyway.

Hope you are having a wonderful weekend!

Thanks for stopping by!

Deb

AUGUST ISHW UPDATE

Time for the International Hermits Stitch Weekend update for August. Basically I worked on two projects. Both are HAED. In January, of every year, HAED has a yearly goals challenge. If one completes your page goal set for the year, one is entered into a random drawing for a free chart of stitchers choice,  for each month of the following year. Total of 12 charts. Quite a prize if the page goals can be finished. I have a problem with this. As a cross country stitcher, meaning that I take a color and run with it as long as I can and where my needle takes me, I have found it difficult to complete pages. I stitch way more than the original projected page finishes. But, still am not completing specific page numbers. I took this weekend as an opportunity to try and finish required pages. And am closer to my yearly goals on both Bubbles Telescope and Mini Autumn Cat Magic.
Autumn Cat before, 36 count linen, 2 over 2, full cross. For the first hour it seemed like 2 stitches forward and 1 frogged back. Don't know what I was thinking on the last stitch session with kitty. But, it certainly wasn't stitching..... After a rough start, I was on my way for the rest of the weekend.

 After. Estimate 1200 stitches, give or take. I really don't keep track much. As any stitch is a walk towards a finish. Amazing to me how so many stitches can be put in these HAED and it still looks like nothing much has been done!

 Bubble Telescope. 36 count linen. 2 over 2, full cross. Before.

 After. Really got a good amount of confetti stitches filled in this weekend!

Hope you had a great weekend!
Thanks for visiting and, as always, happy stitching to all!

TURTLE TROT SAL UPDATE.

Well. I have an excuse for a late post.... My camera battery has decided to hit the dust. It is still charging a little so it is slightly useable. Darn thing is only 8 1/2 years old. So, will be trying to hunt a replacement up. That's my story and I am sticking to it and not telling you that I also forgot it was the 13th ALREADY! Where has the month gone, who stole it and will they please give it back!
I had some finishes!

 This is my pride and joy for the month! Brooke's Books Belinda the Bat Witch from the 2013 Halloween Collectors issue of JCS magazine. I didn't have the #8 Kreinik. So I blended 2 strands. One strand of  #4 005 black Kreinik and one strand #4 Kreinik #3533 Purple Mambo for her cape. The DMC Memory thread was easy to work with. It is soft and easily shaped with fingers. Had an extra scroll rose and decided to use it for a purse.
This is a quilt square for a young lady who is to have back surgery next year. Done and mailed off.

 I made a mistake that turned into an ornament for someone in the hospital. I bought a package of 14 count aida. Package stated 12 inches by 18 inches. I had Gracie's quilt square nearly finished and decided to check in to verify the size of fabric needed. Well, the packaged fabric only measured 11 1/4 inches by 17 1/4 inches. I bought a larger package of fabric by a different manufacturer and restitched the proper size for Gracie. This is the first one made into an ornament.

 WIP's for the week include Mystic Garden HAED 2013 sal. Not a whole lot of stitches. About 100.

 New start. Precious Moments Butterfly Fairy for the new grand baby

 New start is a Jim Shore piece.

 Still having issues with the blocky Autumn Cat Magic.

I have many WIP's and there are 2 new links on the left side bar. They are my WIP's and Finished works. The links are at the top of the old numbered listings for the years work. So you can see what my WIP's are supposed to look like when finished!

Thank you for stopping by. Happy stitching!

Deb