New Lovelies to Stitch

 I would be a bit embarrassed to share my collection of charts waiting to be stitched. But as others have said, half the hobby is stitching and the other half (or more) is collecting things to be stitched. 

My collection includes dozens of leaflets as well as full collections of three no longer printed magazine series. Everything is stored in plastic totes on bookshelves.  It brings me joy to look through these once in a great while, and choose a new project. 

In 2025 I started just one new counted project, and that was Pretty Little Los Angeles from Satsuma Street. I did not purchase one chart in 2025, in fact. 

Unlike many stitchers, I do not enjoy starting new projects much at all. I don't like kitting them up, either. I realize that makes me quite odd!  I just enjoy stitching, and many of mine seem to take a long time to complete.  I wish I had more of a spirit to quickly start a new project, but I instead plod along on my established ones. 

I also did several stamped projects in 2025, and they have been a nice thing to do rather than counting. I turn to those when I want to stitch but I don't want to count or look at a chart. 

At one time I had about eight to ten WIPs. Some of them were close to twenty years old, but now I am down to just three of them. My oldest one was started in 2023, I think. 

With that being said, I received a gift certificate for Christmas for a designer I enjoy, but her company only sells needlework charts.  I thus had to buy some charts, and it was a great activity for me! 

On a side note, I used to call them patterns, but someone complained vehemently online in a stitching group about this "error"  that so many of us seem to make. I am now trying to call them charts. But really, does it matter? Not to me.  I feel that communication is the part that matters, and we all know what is meant by calling it a pattern. 

So out of curiosity, do you call it a pattern or a chart in regards to counted cross stitch. I truly don't judge either way, just wondered! 

The gift certificate was for TinyModernist, and I ordered these beautiful charts. 

This is "Woodland Christmas Cross Stitch". I am not sure if I will do the whole piece, or break it into ornaments. Knowing my stitching habits, I will probably stitch the whole piece.  I love the look of this one.

I also purchased this beautiful "Mini Christmas Banner". I love the colors in the design, as well as the fabric. 

Another purchase was "The Magic of Christmas". I will most likely change it to a lighter fabric due to my eyesight. I do adore this color, however. 

Just for fun, here they are in a beautiful arrangement of color and design. 

I hope to stitch one of these in the upcoming months. 

If you have time, please let me know if you call it a "pattern"or a "chart".  I also would appreciate suggestions for fabric colors for the Magic of Christmas, since this one is so dark for my eyesight. '

Thanks for stopping by today. 

Purchases, Finishes, and Progress!

I am so happy to have some time off. In fact, I have already been off one month. Time is passing quickly.

The last several months have been busy and full of happy events, with some stitching thrown in from time to time.

Some time in spring I was fortunate to be able to attend a Lizzie Kate Trunk Show at our local LNS. My dear friend and I had lots of fun oohing and drooling over all the fabulous patterns and models.

I had to purchase something, right?

Here is what I selected:

While in the shop, I saw this one stitched up as a model and just had to purchase this Plum Street Sampler pattern. It is gorgeous in person! 

Back to Lizzie Kate, I started stitching up one of the ornaments right away.  Despite having collected scores of ornament patterns, I do believe this is the first one I have ever stitched!   

I usually stick to large projects that take me forever, but I finally decided to do some smaller projects so that I get a sense of completion. 

Here is Jingle, which was a nice, fun quick stitch: 

I am not sure how I will finish this one.  I have been watching Flosstube videos for quite some time now, and love one gal's (Yvonne- Dough Bowl - Night Owl Stitcher Yvonne) dough bowl idea of displaying various seasonal smalls in a beautiful antique dough bowl. This is something I might pursue down the line.  I found one dough bowl while on vacation recently, but it was too rustic for my taste.  The hunt continues...and I must stitch items for this bowl. The finishing is the tough part for me, and I may have to call upon my finishing friends for help in this project.  I move slowly, so who knows when an actual dough bowl will be ready for display.


In June I purchased some plain tea towels at a discount chain store.  They were just crying out to be stamped and embroidered.  I thus went ahead and stamped one to stitch.  Much to my dismay, I found that the weave was way too loose to be of much quality for stitching.  Just the same, I had already stamped the towel so I decided to go ahead and stitch on it.  The weave was SO LOOSE that I couldn't do french knots but instead had to improvise a funky sort of stitch for the center.

I have collected way too many iron-on patterns for years, and I decided upon Aunt Martha's Colonial Girls and Puppies.  My stitches are very poor, but I did finish it. The towel is of such poor quality that this one will simply be a decorative towel. The good thing was it was done in just a very short time.

Besides working on Jingle and the tea towel, I have been working on Houses of Hawk Run Hollow.  Progress IS being made, ever so slowly.  Here are a few photos:

           Photo from April 

June and July Photos: 

I am enjoying this piece, but it is slow going. There are twelve total blocks, and I am on just the third one after over a year of stitching.  Perhaps I will just stitch four squares? We will see. 

We recently returned from a road trip that took us to beautiful places around the USA.  In our travels were able to visit a fantastic needlework store.  Oh, to live close to that mecca!  I will share more information on that journey in an upcoming post.

Thanks for stopping by today.

Some New Stash , etc.

I hope you had a great 4th of July, for those of you who celebrate it.  It's a fun holiday. I stitched this piece for my son long ago, and it hung in his room for years. Recently it has been displayed in my classroom.  It was a fun stitch from the now long gone CrossQuick magazine.  It's called simply "Patriotic Sampler".

I recall I was working on it in a public place way back when, which is something I don't do anymore. I require too many pairs of glasses to stitch away in a public place! I was working on this piece in a haircut place, in fact,  in our town whilst my son was getting his haircut. He was about seven at the time. There was a group home in the same haircut place, and I recall one of the young boys from the home watching me as I stitched. He was probably only about 12 or 13.  He was mesmerized by what I was doing, and he was so happy to know I was making it for my little son, who is now 28 years old.  He seemed so touched that anyone would take the time to do this. It makes me wonder how little love or attention he probably ever received from anyone, and I will never forget his face as he watched me work on this little sampler.  I could be wrong, but knowing he lived in a group home setting made me think that perhaps he'd received little attention from his family. I could have been completely wrong, of course, in my assuming such a thing about him.  It was the way he went on about me making this for my son that made me think just that thought.

And now shifting gears completely....

I also recently acquired a new pattern.  I certainly didn't 'need' it, but it sure is fun to think about what one can stitch in the future. It is from Bygone Stitches, and it is Quaker Christmas II- Songs of the Season. Here's a link to the pattern, and it's shown on the page of a great company from which to purchase items online.  

I have been working on Quaker Diamonds a bit more each day. An  update will be posted soon!

I hope you are enjoying this beautiful summer day.