Scarlett's Finished -- Nana's Helper

Finally Scarlett is finished. I felt like I was stitching this piece for an eternity. Scarlett and Rhett will be shipped off tomorrow for finishing. I am not hopeful about getting them in time for Easter but at least they will be finished.

Jake decided to help me today with stitches. He was going through my Halloweenie notebook and telling me what to do. Jake loves books. He will sit for the longest time just reading his books. It is hard to believe that next week he will be one year old. He is starting to walk and is talking up a storm. Everyday we work together on flash cards and he is learning his colors. As you can tell, all the time I use to spend stitching is now spent on Jake.

I started the Fall tree by Eye Candy. It looks like a really fun stitch with great colors and stitches. I think it will be a very fast stitch but then I think that about everything.

Linda

Spring - Winter - Wonderful Surprises

As you all know from Denise's blog post on Sunday, I decided it was time to bring Spring into my home. I put out a few Easter decorations on Sunday and on Monday we got 6 inches of snow. I guess Mother Nature was trying to tell me something. This has been a very bad winter for us and I was really feeling hopeful that the snow was over when we had sixty degree weather last week but I was mistaken. I still have the feel of Spring in my heart and am very happy every time I look at my mantel.

Today I got a wonderful box from Amy's. The last lesson for the Haunted House arrived and I am sorry to say that now all the Characters and House are complete. I am even more upset that as of today I have only finished three Characters. Life has really gotten in the way of my stitching this year. Hopefully, I will be able to have more time to stitch soon. Also in my wonderful box is a picture frame canvas for Jake with a train and his name on it. I also found in my box the new book Shapes of Needlepoint by Sandra Arthur. This book is perfect for me to find stitches for Jake's frame. It is the perfect book for the train. Cannot wait to sit down and pick out stitches for this project. I also got the wonderful new book by Sharon G, Simply Essential Needlepoint Stitch Explanations. What fun I am going to have exploring this book. I also got my threads for my XOXO canvas and the most wonderful part of the box are the two stitch guides Amy did for Kelly Clark's Drizzled Witchy Hats and Hallowed Candy Corns. The stitch guides are amazing, but what else would you expect from Amy, the threads are great and Jill and Peggy did a spectacular job stitching the samples. What fun they are going to be to stitch. Now all I have to do is find the time.

I just have the basket to do on Scarlett and then Rhett and her will be mailed off to Ruth for finishing. I do not know if I will see them for Easter since it is so late but one can hope.

Tomorrow I will be going for my MRI for my shoulder. I was supposed to have it done on Monday but with the snow I rescheduled. I will be one happy person when this is over.

Linda

Linda has decided that It's Spring

And, therefore, the blog has been appropriately modified for the new season.

Let us just ignore the forecasted snow & wintry mix anticipated for my day off tomorrow. I decided to follow Linda's lead & get my car washed after the gym this morning. What a difference to be able to see out the side windows! That's as far as I'll go in optimistically anticipating better weather.

Linda, on the other hand, is happily decorating her home for Easter. The snow finally melted enough here (5 miles from Linda's house) last week for my husband to take down most of the Christmas decorations (there's still one decoration buried under a pile of snow that he can't get to). We did have a few more outside decorations up than Linda (despite his complaining endlessly about it, my husband loves how people comment about our Christmas lights), so I can let my husband off the hook about leaving them up until now. Linda took her wreath down the week after Christmas. I took mine down last Sunday--and only because it was dead.

Linda is busy working on Scarlett, when her shoulder allows. I am very nervous about her shoulder. I hope she gives it some rest during this week off from my Jake duty; we both love him to death, but he's a big boy, and carrying him around can't be good for her shoulder.

I have managed to finish another Christmas canvas. This is a Raymond Crawford canvas that was part of Fireside Stitchery's club last year; this was the first in the series. I was so excited to see how this turned out....I think it's very pretty and I am looking forward to the rest of these. Sequins & beads! Very different & elegant. I love the way the Frosty Rays looks like snow or fur on the ornament.

And I am now back to working on Positano. As you can see, I have the wall, the tree, the flowers on the tree all undone. I've decided this is coming to my office, as Positano is one of my favorite spots in Italy.

Cara & Mia felt they hadn't been adequately represented here on the blog & so I present them for your viewing. They are sisters, both Tonks, not Siamese. Cara is on the right, Mia on the left. They certainly are hoping Aunt Linda is right; this winter has been long enough!

Denise

UPDATE:

We got 7 inches of snow last night. So much for Spring.

Three Evenings

Three evenings. That's all it took to do this canvas. I started it Saturday night; worked on it Sunday evening, had no time last night, & finished it up tonight. Cute, right?

Well, it is for me. For those of you who don't know, I am an estate planning attorney. I plan on making this into a pillow for one of my office chairs. Sometimes, my clients spend too much time & energy worrying how to get their estates to their children, instead of enjoying the fruits of their labors a little bit. I try to help them find a balance if I can. This canvas fits my personal philosophy, and, frankly, the reality I see regularly in the children left behind. Sad, sometimes, how it all ends up being about the money. I have no surviving parents, and sometimes I wish those children clutching for their parents' money could realize what it means to never be able to call your mom or dad again.

Ok, enough of that. I found this canvas in the sale bin at our LNS, Stitch by Stitch. I had wanted to stitch this up in either the new High Cotton or in the Vineyard Silk Merino wool. But I couldn't find the cotton in the two stores I went to, and the Vineyard Merino did not come in the right shades. This canvas was not actually these colors, but instead was in a brighter red & green. The burgundy color matches the colors of my office chairs--& there's no green in my office. Basically, I changed the whole color scheme, and the shape of the borders, too. In any event I had a fun time stitching up this canvas, which was on 13 mesh--no magnifier needed! I will drop this at our LNS on Saturday to send off for finishing.

I have a business meeting tomorrow night so no stitching will occur. I will be going back to the Christmas ornament I started last week, planning on finishing that up as quickly as I can. My threads for the Positano canvas came on Friday, so I will finish that up next.

Plans, plans plans.

Denise

Linda Is Not An Only Child

Linda keeps reminding me that she is not an only child.

I present to you evidence that I exist, & I actually have been stitching.

I had wanted to finish the Sharon G Positano Door, which was the canvas that I did at Amy's last summer. Amy did a magnificent stitch guide, & that canvas was the second to last "large" canvas that I wanted to complete. I really wanted to get that posted up for you to see. Unfortunately, I ran out of two threads, and am waiting for them to come to me from Amy's. In the meanwhile, I jumped into my 2011 plan, which was to finish as many small pieces from my stash as I could.

So, I am presenting some of the canvases I've completed in the past two weeks.

Except for the last photo, these are all from the "Teeny Ornaments" club from Fireside Stitchery. I loved working on these, as they came with stitch guides, threads, beads & any other embellishments. Because they were so small, they generally worked up in a night or two. What instant gratification, especially since I've come off a year of canvases that generally have taken months to finish. I really enjoyed this club; it was reasonably priced & just made me happy. These ornaments do look adorable on my needlepoint tree.

The top canvas, still shown on bars, is almost done; I have about another 45 minutes of work left, but I think if I didn't post something soon I was going to be disowned by my Stitching Sister. I worked for the first time with DMC's memory wire on this canvas; it was used for the pom pom. What an innovative idea! You just coiled up the memory wire & couched it down with three different threads that you had used elsewhere on the canvas, & it looks like a pom pom.

The last canvas is something I grabbed for Ashley when Linda & I took a ride to Gone Stitching in New Jersey this summer. It's a pony tail holder. It's the first time I've worked a canvas "in hand" in years. This was also fun to do & putting it together to be used right away is even more fun than sending stuff in to the finisher!

I actually have a few more photos to show you, but I will save them for another post. Since there are no blizzards predicted for tomorrow, Linda & I are planning on going to the Super Bowl party at Edwardian Needle. My husband is confused by my attendance at a Super Bowl party where there will be no TV & I will be home before kickoff.

Men. What do they understand?

Denise

Dev L Mann and Surprises

Today I received my monthly and last Character for the Halloweenies along with some wonderful surprises. I had ordered a few new items that were at the TNNA show from Amy and did not know what if any would be in this box. I was thrilled that I received the three books I ordered along with the & More XOXO canvas and stitch guide by Julia Snyder. I also ordered the new hand lotion that was in Amy's newsletter. I just tried it and was very happy with it. I might order another one to keep in my sewing bag. I have a few more things coming and will be surprised every time the UPS man arrives since I do not know what will be in the box.
I have not had time to look through my new books yet but will tell you about them when I do.

It is hard to believe that a whole year has gone by since the first Halloweenie arrived. Each canvas that Amy did was more spectacular then the other. How one person can have so much talent is just mind blowing. I will be anxiously waiting for the first lesson of the Creche for the Nativity to arrive in April. In the meantime, I will try to catch up on the Halloweenies.

Linda