I had to wait.....

till I could show it FINISHED!! Yippee!! Doing a happy dance -- (be glad you can't see that)

I got the final stitches in late last night and looked it over this morning and I didn't find anything I wanted to add. I stitched mine and my sons' initials into the piece. I always try to do that but I do admit I don't enjoy stitching them over one thread but that what this piece took. This piece was a pleasure to stitch and will be a wonderful addition to my sampler collection. I dropped it off at the framers after dinner so I should be able to show it in all its framed glory in about 2 weeks - stay tuned!

So today I started a new sampler -- OMG - I know you are shocked!! I was going to start the new BBD chart that I just got from Myra but when I measured the piece of linen I wanted to use i discovered it is too small. My LNS is closed on Thursday during the summer so I'll have to wait till tomorrow. So I started the Magic Garden Sampler by Shakespeare Peddler.



I like the graphic qualities of this sampler but I've made some changes in the colors of floss that were chosen. I see the flowers down the left side of the piece as being day lilies and I'm not sure what the designer had in mind but the floss for these flowers is Sampler Thread Onyx which is black. Now maybe there are some purple undertones in this skein but I'm just not seeing it. So I changed the flowers to a beautiful skein of Sampler Threads called Orange Marmalade - it has shades of peach, yellow and orange, just like the day lilies in my garden. I'm liking it much better and then to balance out that I chose Fragrant Cloves for the alphabet that was also charted in Onyx. I love the cute snail and bug and the worm too. I don't' think I've ever stitched a worm before. I love the garden gate with the arbor and the vining flowers. I think all the flosses I've picked with look good on the evenweave that I dyed in yellow, gold, brown and orange. Its going to be sunny piece.

And because I'm real tired and not thinking real clearly I wanted to show this quirky guy. I find him quite interesting but my homeowners association would throw a fit I'd put this guy on my front lawn.



Doesn't everyone need a 6 foot blue rooster made from scrap metal? No,well I do!
Happy stitching -
carol fun

Sampler Sunday

Busy busy day - I went to see Dreamgirls this afternoon. Great vocals and costumes. I love a play with an interesting wardrobe. I've seen several plays this year and I think my favorite was Mary Poppins. The play took a different spin in some scenes than the classic movie and the actor who played Bert was phenomenal. I left thinking the play should have been called "Bert, the Chimneysweep" -- oh where was I? My mind wondered there a bit.



My offering for this Sampler Sunday is one I stitched back in 1998 called Heart that Gives. It is a design by Ewe and Eye and Friends. I loved these designs and have several of their samplers. When the Twisted Threads shop was still open in Madeira they used to carry all of this line and it was one of my favorite cross stitch designers. This piece is done on a soft turquoisy blue linen and it uses several decorative stitches. The lady's hair is done in french knots and is a lovely shade of auburn (similar to my own hair color but a better shade - IMHO) and there are satin stitch accents in the basket and in the flower centers. But what sets this sampler apart is the wonderful spiderweb roses in the border (click on the pic for a better look.) Now these roses took quite a while but oh I love the look -there are over a 100 of them and yes I am crazy. Now as much as I love this piece I felt it was lacking in the one thing I love on samplers - a house-- soooooo, I ended up sticking a little blue house down over the hill.



Perfect! This piece also includes my initials and the initials of my boys. I like including those details in my pieces.




And here is a pic of the quilt top I finished yesterday on my design floor. After putting on 3 borders (which took all day and I don't know why) it was too big to put back on the wall. I like how it turned out. Now it is off to the long arm quilter. The motivation for getting this quilt finished was so I could start another quilt. Big surprise, huh? I already cut out a lot of the pieces and I spent some time today washing a bunch of fat quarters so I can cut some more out tonight. Check back tomorrow and I'll show you some progress- it has great colors - red and yellow!

Happy stitching,
carol fun

Sampler Sunday

I've seen on lots of blogs that people have certain categories of postings for particular days of the week. Since I do cross stitch as one of my many crafty endeavors I thought I'd feature either a piece I'd finished or a work in progress on Sundays.



Here's my first offering. You'll see LOTS more since at last count I have stitched over 65 pieces, the majority of the being samplers with houses on them. Again, when I started doing samplers I thought that limiting myself to those that featured houses would keep me in check (see I realize I have a problem, I'm just not very successful in handling it - LOL)

I've been cross stitching for the last 25 years. I started this obssesion at the same time I took up quilting. I was pregnant with my first child and all those maternal hormones kicked in. I wanted to have a house full of quilts and samplers and I was going to bake my own bread and have chickens in the back yard. Hey, it isn't my fault that those prenatal hormones cloud your thinking. Now there was no reason to bake my own bread since we lived in walking distance of two great bakeries and as for the chickens, our back yard was the size of a postage stamp and we lived in the heart of the city. (Darn those zoning ordinances!!) So I channeled my energies into cross stich and quilting and taking care of my bouncing baby boy (who is now 25- where did the time go???)

Oh - sorry I got distracted there - (I told you I'm ADHD) -- This sampler is the first one I did with a house. I don't remember the name of the piece but the designer was Polly Carbonari (she designed needlepoint too). I personalized the piece by making the house look similar to the one we lived in then and there was suppose to be another child in the piece and I added a dog (we had an irish setter back then). I loved how it only used one color of thread but I learned as I did it that even DMC floss can be different from dye lot to dye lot.

Happy stitching,


carol fun