Lizzie Kate time on Slow Stitching Sunday...

It has been a very good week for cross stitching... I attribute this to the fact that except for my PBS British shows - Call the Midwife and Mr. Selfridge - there hasn't been a thing on TV to watch.  I listened to some baseball this week... the way my beloved Cincinnati Reds are playing it is easier to just listen than to watch. And here are the fruits of my labor...

This is the May installment on the new Yearbook series from Lizzie Kate ... there is a cute little shovel charm to attach  too!  This finished about 2.5 X 4.25" on 32 count ...the linen has is a peachy color but I couldn't get it to show in the picture.   The chart is a two -fer ...

May and June come together. I'll be starting June later this week I think.

And I made a lot of progress on my  Lizzie Kate Summer Alphabet...

The little blocks don't look that wonky in real life... I think I skewed them a bit when I ironed this piece for its picture. I really enjoy doing the frames and the letters. What slows me down are the little pictorial blocks. They are cute but I don't like stitching them as much as the letters.

My favorite detail so far is the little bee on the letter C...

I gave it a little stinger too!

Well it has been a very productive weekend in the sewing department too... check back tomorrow... I have new blocks on my design wall and I got the 81 blocks of my Hi Again top for my son and daughter-in-law sewn together... yeah!  Now to get the borders on and get it off to Terry to quilt.

So the weekend is coming to a close... my son and DIL weren't available for dinner so my younger son and I did carry out Italian... yummy... now I'm full and I think I'll get comfy in my chair and stitch some more while I watch my British shows on PBS...life is good!

I'm linking up with Kathy's Quilts today and Super Mom - No Cape tomorrow.

happy stitching-
carol fun

Where does the week go????

I start every week thinking I've got so much time to get things done... and then whoosh... the week is over. I've worked a little on knitting, a little on cards, a little on sewing and a pretty good chunk of time on cross stitch which I'll show tomorrow...promise!

But right now I want to show my latest knitting finish... another pair of ragrug socks that has a definite Frankensock vibe... I'll explain what I mean after you look at them...

I knit these alternating Drops Fabel 162 and deep turquoise yarn with Wisdom Yarns Pix in Citrus Slide... you can see them here and here.  I love how the different stripe sequences played out and I got chunks of striped patterns which give these socks the look of scrappy Frankensocks.   I am currently totally besotted with knitting scrappy socks. I started a Pinterest board called Frankensocks which you can see here...  and lots of inspiration from Instagram which you can see here and here.  You don't have to be on Instagram to look at the pretty pictures... just type in a hashtag like #sockknitting and be prepared to lose an hour or two or three... LOL!

Now it is the middle of May and one would think that sock wearing weather is over but one would be wrong... very very wrong... it is only 48 degrees as I type this and I am cold...and to add to the ambience it is gray and rainy... ugh...


On the other hand yesterday was be-youuuu-ti-ful and I potted up a pyramid of petunias...

Six different varieties of Proven Winners petunias in 6 different ceramic pots... from the top we have Honey, on the middle shelf left to right we have Holy Moly and Violet Star Charm, and on the bottom shelf again left to right we have Picasso in  Blue, Lemon Slice and Pink Star Charm.  You can click on any of the names and see bigger pictures of these pretty posies. I LOVE petunias and this is a way I can indulge in lots of different varieties.  At the moment my favs are Lemon Slice and Holy Moly...what a great name for a petunia! These are all new to the big box kinda garden centers this year... last year I think all of these were only available at nurseries... do you remember driving all over hell's half acre looking for Lemon Slice petunias??? I got all of these at my local Meijer's  store in Loveland.  They had  more varieties and I might go back and get a few more. I find them as irresistible as a skein of sock yarn or a fat quarter.

Well I hope the weather is nicer in your neck of the woods... I'm staying indoors today... got some sewing to do... and some more knitting...

happy stitching-
carol fun

Happy Mother's Day on a Slow Stitching Sunday...

Happy Mother's Day to all of the wonderful women who work hard every day of the year... a day in your honor is well deserved!  And to celebrate this occasion I plan to indulge in a little stitching and knitting before I attend dinner at my older son's house... he's grilling steaks and I made pasta salad, marinated tomatoes and deviled eggs for accompaniment... I did that yesterday so I can take it easy today... and isn't the the essence of motherhood... we strive to make the world of our children a better place even on our day off!

And on the stitching front much has been accomplished... I finished Prairie Schooler's July...

I can't believe I have one of these done ahead of time...yeah!  I plan to finish it and display it like Priscilla did... you can see it here on her blog.  And I am continuing my personal Mother's Day tradition of starting a new piece of cross stitch... guilt free... no thoughts of all the other WIPs I have.

This year I chose Summer Alphabet by Lizzie Kate... I've already stitched Winter, Spring and Fall in this series ... I don't know why it took me this long to get around to Summer.

And here is my start... one block... I'm using DMC and the linen is a 32 ct. Wichelt called Sun Shower... a lovely yellow. I do enjoy Lizzie Kate pieces... easy to stitch and I particularly like the samplers in this series. Each letter is a different font and a different border ... certainly keeps my interest.

Also I got some happy mail this week... a sweet piece of cross stitch from Terry of Terry's Treasures...

Terry said her Mom did the cross stitch and Terry did the finishing... I will treasure this gift!  Thanks Terry and your Mom too!

So I have several hours to sit and stitch... if it warms up I'll go out and sit on the porch... hope you are having a lovely day!

I'll link up with Kathy's Quilts today and Super mom - No Cape on Monday.

happy stitching-
carol fun

Finally getting around to making a post...

So.... I went to my quilt guild meeting on Monday night and a couple of friends asked when I was going to update my blog... and then another friend called and asked the same thing... so I've been sufficiently poked and prodded and I'm putting up some a new post... hope you are proud of me... I certainly am...LOL!

I've made four more of the blocks from the pattern Flower Basket by Live.Love.Sew... you can find the pattern here.

I'm having fun with these as I've used several of these prints in quilts and waaay back when I sewed clothes I made dresses from some of these fabrics.  Here are some close ups...

Little lavender flowers...

Pansies...

Roses...

Geraniums... I made a dress with this fabric and I think it is still languishing
 in the back of my closet.

And here are this week's production with last week's production... halfway there!

Big Dude was carrying out his inspection duties and was not to be hurried... this is going to be a pretty quilt... I have to find another tone on tone white for the sashing strips and then I'm going to make the corner stones each from a different floral fabric.  That would put 41 different floral fabrics into this quilt...sweet!  So far all of these fabrics are Hoffman (at least I think they are)  but I may stray from this manufacturer as there are some other prints in my stash that I'd like to use too. And I have a Moda or two  that would be lovely additions... so much pretty fabric... I am blessed. The only issue I'm having with this quilt is that it does take a good size chunk of fabric, after all they are BIG blocks - 16" finished. At lot of my stash of these florals are bits and pieces and twice now I've cut out a block only to be short one 4.5" square... darn it!

Well it is already Wednesday and I don't know where the time goes to...I've gotten some outdoor jobs done. Cleaned off my patio and spray painted several flower boxes. I've planted 3 small flower boxes and I'm awaiting the arrival of  a large flower box to be installed below my living room window. My handyman suggested last Fall that flower boxes on the side of my house would be a nice addition to the one on  the front of my house. My house sits on a corner so I sort of have 2 front yards. I think the addition of 3 more window boxes will be dynamite. I'll take some before and after pictures. I'm hoping he can install them in about 2 weeks. I've already decided what to plant in them... pink and white wave petunias with either sweet potato vine or creeping jenny as accents...simple but I'm hoping it will look wonderful.

happy stitching-
carol fun

Every thing's coming up ...

Hit it Ethel.... every thing's coming up.... flowers!  Apologies to Miss Merman for changing the lyrics. With the warmer weather I have been itching to get some flowers planted... but then I remember that here in southwest Ohio the prevailing wisdom is don't put anything in the ground until after Mother's Day... so I've been waiting... not patiently.  And then this quilt caught my eye...

A new pattern from Live.Love.Sew called Flower Basket and you can see it here.  These blocks are BIG... I love big blocks and I can not lie... oh another song riff gone wrong... I wonder how many times Ethel Merman and Sir Mix-a-lot have been mentioned in the same post...strange.

And yes that is Big Dude's tail and a bit of his rather large butt in my picture... these blocks measure 16" finished... the rotary cutter is there for scale.  I really like the look of the background being the prints and the baskets being calmer.

Here are are some close ups...

Hydrangeas...

Pansies...

Sunflowers and little bees...

Sweet Peas...

Now all of these a florals are vintage Hoffman prints ... lots from the Le Jardin collection many years ago. I have a nice stash of these prints  as they always called my name. The white on white print is also vintage (vintage in my book is around 20 years old)... as I was cutting the white on white I was wracking my brain to remember what quilt I used this fabric in and for the life of me the only memory I have is that this fabric was the background for a raffle quilt I was co-chair of back in Modesto California in 1991 or 1992... now that is vintage...LOL! And since all of these fabrics were on my shelves this quilt is utterly FREE!!!!  Four blocks down and 12 to go... will make a nice size quilt for my bed.

And well... I just could not resist getting some real flowers...

I really like this combination... salmon geraniums paired with purple alyssum and some coleus tucked in on the sides. My pictures do no do these colors justice. I planted these up yesterday and put them on the steps of my front porch. Then the severe weather came in last night and I was out in the rain rescuing them. I pulled them up on the back of the porch and they survived. More heavy rain coming today so they may spend the day safely tucked away.

Off to check out the garden centers... so many pretty flowers!

happy stitching-
carol fun

My latest pair of Frankensocks...

Hello...just a quick post today... should get out of my pajamas and take my car to the tire store to find out what wrong with the right rear tire...ugh!

Here are my latest pair of Frankensocks...

The heels and toes are Drops Fabel and the rest of the socks is bits and pieces of Opal and Regia and more Drops Fabel. I love the places where the faux Fair Isle pattern appear. These kind of socks are both fun and frightful to knit... since I'm using bits and pieces of yarn from socks I've already knit I know I like the colors but many times I don't know exactly how it will knit up as I can't identify the sequence of the colors.

What lurks inside those little balls of wonderfulness???

I cast on another pair of socks as soon as I finished this one. I'm back to playing with 2 self striping yarns. The last one of those I tried about 2 weeks ago is still in time out and will be scrapped. I thought I could get them to play nicely together but I was wrong. Irreconcilable differences... This time I'm using Drops Fabel 162, a deep turquoise and Wisdom Yarns Pix in Citrus Slide... you can see them here and here. I've only got the cuff done, so the jury is still out on whether they are compatible.

I'm linking up with Patchwork Times today ... check it out here and see what other people have are knitting this week.

Okay... off to shower and get dressed and then to get my tire hopefully fixed and not replaced.

happy knitting-
carol fun

Looking for something to post...

Sooooo... my design wall hasn't changed significantly in over a week... and I don't have a sock finished... and I want to save pictures of my cross stitch till Sunday... so what can I post here?  Oh Oh  Oh... I can show you some of the cards I've made and mailed in the last couple of months.

I use to stamp a lot... I was even a demo for Stampin' Up for a while, but did it mainly for the discount. I amassed quite a stash of stamps and inks and papers and dies and embellishments of all sorts. When I moved I got rid of a lot of the stamps and the inks but I kept a lot of the paper... I love patterned paper... it reminds me of fabric!  Now when I first purchased a lot of the is stuff I found it hard to use... What if I used it all up?  What if they never made anything that pretty again? What can I make with this? So much dithering...

As  a result I still have  lots and lots and lots and lots and lots and lots of paper... bur I'm finally able to use it...hooray!  I do more papercrafting than stamping these days and playing with the papers and making cards to send here and there is a very satisfying way to spend an afternoon. Here are some of the cards I've made. In looking through my camera I realized there are a bunch more that I forgot to take pictures of...oh well... you can see these...

These cards use a lace doily kind paper laid over a base card made of Basic Grey Grunge paper... I love Grunge as paper or fabric!

Pretty paper cut with a wiggly die and embellished with a cute butterfly!

A birthday card with a flower made from cupcake liners!

Another cute die and the paper has a quilty pattern with buttons on it !                                                                             

Cards with a patchwork look and some stitching and a button!

I don't make elaborate  cards anymore... I really enjoy just playing with the pretty papers. I get a lot of the layout ideas from sketches others have used. You can see some of the ones I've pinned here on my Pinterest board.

In an age of digital messages I think everyone still enjoys finding a card in their mail so I continue to make them.  When I'm making cards I think about when I was a child playing with construction paper ... I enjoyed it then and I enjoy it now.

Do you like getting cards in the mail?  Do you send cards?  Store bought? or home made? Actually I prefer the term hand-crafted... makes me feel like an artist....LOL!

Hope your week is going well!

happy card making!
carol fun