A Finish! Winter Quakers

 I am so happy to be finshed with Winter Quakers by Rosewood Manor.  I started this piece in June of 2023 and finished it a few days ago.  

It is stitched on the called-for cashel linen.  The color of the linen is "dwarf".  

I enjoyed using the Valdani threads for this piece. I did, however, run out of certain colors. I ordered more of the green color.  Fortunately I had the primitive blue color left over from my long ago completed Quaker Diamonds piece as I also did not have enough of that color. I also ran out of the cream Subtle Elegance Valdani color, so I substituted WDW grits and also DMC 822 here and there. I am happy with how the blending of both called for and 'new' colors turned out, so to speak. 

The snowflakes were plentiful and I grew to enjoy stitching them. I will confess that at first they were tiresome for me, to say the very least. I did see that some stitchers used two threads for them, and I loved that look. I did not see those particular stitchers' pieces until I was too far into the snowflake stitching to redo with two threads. One strand provides a nice look, too. The snowflakes are just way more subtle. 

The large greenish motif in the left center of the piece took me way too long. I found the outside of it to be tedious and thus I set this piece aside for way too long. Once I resigned myself to simply working on it again, it went just fine. 

Here it is:

Some more views:

This is the final part I just completed. I swapped out the initial that would be stitched in the lower diamond creamy snowflake for a coordinating design: 

This past weekend we celebrated four birthdays here, so I didn't have much time to stitch at all in over a week.  It was fun to get this piece done on Sunday evening! 

This is one of the birthday cakes we served, and it's a triple chocolate bundt cake.  The vintage holiday picks were fun to throw onto this cake just for fun. 

Thanks for stopping by today.   

 

Progress on Winter Quakers

Life has been busy but still finding time to stitch.  

Since I last shared here much has happened. Eight of us in our family traveled together to Norway to see our (both mine and my husband's) ancestors’ home area. It was an amazing trip! I would happily return there on a regular basis if life allowed that sort of thing to happen.  

We rented two cars and explored the western part of Norway.  What a peaceful, clean country full of lovely people. I have always been drawn to crystal blue lakes next to tall mountains, and that is definitely how it was in Norway. Of course though there are fiords instead of lakes!  

There was an abundance of driving through long tunnels that cut under mountains, oceans, and fiords. What an experience! It was precious time spent with family, which is the best of all.  

Later in the summer we came upon a very flooded home (plumbing) after we were gone a few days. Our home sustained a lot of damage. At this point we are still out of our regular sleeping area, but at least the work is nearing completion. No complaints, just disruption. 

Even with our home upset at hand, I always seem to find cherished stitching time. I recently had a small finish which will be shared later.  I now have less than five WIPs!  I did start a new piece in October which I will show later. 

I have been enjoying time recently working on Winter Quakers from Rosewood Manor.  The thread is all the special Valdani pack for this piece, except where I have used some WDW and DMC. I was running low with certain Valdani threads, but that was easily solved with my "on hand" threads.

On the bottom right motif I changed it a bit from the pattern. Instead of inserting my initial in the middle of the "diamond" motif, I instead stitched a little design in the middle. I hope this coordinates well with the whole motif. 

At this point I just need to stitch part of another motif that is not shown here, two small motifs, a few more birds, and a few dozen (or more?) snowflakes. I actually haven't counted how many are left.  

I am certainly enjoying this piece! I have seen that some people stitch the snowflakes with two threads instead of one. By the time I saw that method, I had already stitched too many snowflakes to go that route.I did like the denser look of the snowflakes, indeed. At this point I can appreciate these lighter looking ones as well. 

Thanks for stopping by today! 

Lots of WIPs!

We have had several busy months and there hasn't been much time for stitching.  It is all great though, precious time with family and friends is always the best! 

I have worked a bit on The Night Before Christmas and also Yvonne Le Clerq 1905. Here are some progress pictures of those pieces:

The Night Before Christmas

Yvonne LeClerq 1905 (above and below)

I recently finshed 2024's Year of Stitches. It is slow going for me. I am not doing a stitch icon for each day, but rather one for every several days of each month.  This is a project I decided to do for fun, but for me it has not been much of a blast! I definitely will not do this again, but I am glad I was able to complete the year 2024. 

I  have also been working on some stamped pillowcases. I find this fun to do when I do not wish to look at a chart. Here are a few views: 

Finally, I have been able to work a bit on Winter Quakers by Rosewood Manor. (Karen Kluba) I love how this one is looking. 

Thanks for stopping by today! 

A Few WIPs

 

Happy 2025 to all! I hope the year ahead brings you joy and lots of  happy stitching time. 

Today I am sharing some recent WIPs.  This is "The Night Before Christmas" from theTiny Modernist. I sure am enjoying working on this bright, lively piece. It is being stitched on a 28 count evenweave dyed fabric from Live and Dye in LA fabrics. 

I have also been working on Winter Quakers by Rosewood Manor. I am stitching this with the called for Valdani threads on a 32 count fabric piece in the color of  Dwarf from Picture This Plus fabrics. 

Finally, I have spent some time with Yvonne Le Clerq 1905 from Reflets de Soie. This beautiful piece is coming to life on a piece of 28 count fabric in antique white. I love these colors so much. 

These are my three main counted cross stitch pieces this year, and I hope to have at least one of them done by the end of 2025. 

Thanks for stopping by today! 

A Small Update

Times have been busy, but time for a small update.  I recently stitched a towel for a family member. I love how this turned out!

I also want to share these stitched pieces that were made by others.  

These two crewel pieces were stitched by an unknown person.  I received them via a community giveaway page.  Aren't they fun and vintage?

A stitching friend of mine stitched these two Prairie Schooler designs and inserted them into some fun painted wood pieces.  I love getting them out each year for our display. 

I have been busy working on my Yvonne Le Clerq Sampler, as well as Winter Quakers. Life has been full of busy activities so I don't get as much done as I would like to, but that is how it goes. 

Thanks for stopping by today! 

An Update of Sorts

Oh my, so long since I have been here. I will share some of my finished pieces and WIPs at this time. Thanks for visiting me here despite my lack of posts. 

I started this blog in 2006 and moved to this address in 2011 after the old one was hacked. In the meantime, I have started sharing my stitching on Instagram and Facebook, thus the lack of visits to this blog. 

I do enjoy reading blogs, however, and I vow to return to that wonderful pasttime.

Here is one of my current WIPs.This is Yvonne LeClerq 1905 from Reflets de Soie.I am so enjoying this piece. It is being stitched on 32 count linen using DMC threads. 

Originally I had vowed to refrain from working on a labor intensive sampler  but I just could not resist this one.

This is my progress on Winter Quakers from Rosewood Manor. It is being stitched on 32 count fabric with the recommended fabric color called dwarf. I am using the called for Valdani threads. What a joy it is to work on this piece, and I do so as often as possible. 

This is Summer Breeze by Prairie Schooler that I worked on mostly at various stitching retreats and gatherings. I used DMC threads. I decided to finish it by using a simple poster hanger. I love seeing this in our home each day!  

It reminds me of my late mother as she loved summer. She also enjoyed reciting little poems about summer. 

This is Cottage from an older Cross Stitch and Country Crafts magazine. My husband and I framed it and gave it to one of my dearest cousins. She enjoys looking at it in her kitchen each day. 

Several years ago, I worked on many different weather projects. This is one I finished that represents 2020's weather in our city, starting with January 1st in the middle of the design. 

Here it is again, shown with another one I did that represents the same weather zone but starts with a summertime birthday. These projects were fun, and I ended up doing four of them in one year. The poster finish came in so handy, although I did have the other two framed as they were gifts. 

This was the first weather project I did, and it shows the weather here in 2019. It was designed by Stitchin' Mommy, purchased off of Etsy. 

Finally, this is a weather project I did that shows midwest weather for 2019.  On the bottom is Fractal Bookmark 705 from Cross Stitch Collectibles. I did shorten the length of the bookmark as I decided that would work for me. The bottom piece is stitched one over one on 28 count fabric. 

So there you have some of my recent WIPs and fully finished items. There are many more that will be shared down the road. 

Life has been busy & full of both happy moments and sad ones in the past few years. That is the nature of it, of course. 

Thanks for stopping by today. 

A Framed Finish!

 I thought I would be returning more faithfully to this blog, but alas I have failed.  

I wanted to share a piece I had framed at the end of 2022.  It is Seedy Pumpkin Cottage from Praiseworthy Stitches.  I  won the pattern, beads, charms, and fabric from Brian, who is also known as Blitstitch.  I picked it up at the end of November but still have it hanging in our home. 

Thanks for stopping by today!