Flossy Lady

October has arrived!

2011-10-01T12:46:00.001-05:00

I just love October! I love the way the air feels. I love the way the temperatures feel. I especially love the wind and the falling leaves. And, I love Halloween, too.

There's a tutorial for a Halloween wreath over on Dollar Store Crafts that I found back in late August. Though the post was from September 2010, I was still able to find the bath scrubbers at my local Dollar Tree. The rattan wreaths, though, were a bit smaller than the one used in the tutorial so it only took three scrubbers to cover the wreath instead of four.

Here's my wreath that came together in about half an hour using one wreath, three scrubbers, one ghoul and some purple curling ribbon from Dollar Tree, a bit of Fun Fur from my stash and a glue gun. Not bad for $6, huh?

Click the picture to enlarge

September TUSAL

2011-09-28T21:06:00.001-05:00

Greetings, folks. Here we are at another new moon. And, once again, I really don't have much to show for it in my TUSAL bottle.

Even Jack looks a bit perplexed that there's nothing new in there. Sorry, but knitting doesn't generate the amount of ortage that embroidery does.

Yes, I'm still knitting. And, yes, I'm still working on big squares. One day I hope to have them all done and then I can sew them all together and have a great lap rug to show for it. Perhaps my stitching mojo will return by then.

I've been telling an online friend about all the birds in my backyard. Here's a shot out my kitchen window of many of the feeders in the backyard and a good showing of the different birds that visit the feeders. We once tried to count up all the species of birds we've seen in the backyard and I believe we came up with 18.

And, then there are the squirrels. They enjoy the sunflower seeds and peanuts we put in the feeder box. Sometimes they hit the jackpot and get a stale bread bowl.

Click on any of the pictures for a bit larger view.

Doesn't hurt to ask

2011-09-25T23:50:00.001-05:00

So, I'm helping with a link to a blog written by someone I don't know.

Gullible, aren't I?

TUSAL: August 2011

2011-08-29T22:01:00.000-05:00

Here we are at the New Moon for August. I'm still not stitching so there's no new floss in the jar. There are a few yarn snippets, but not from anything specific. The blue blob is from a working swatch where I was trying to figure out the stockinette stitch.

Here's anothe view of the TUSAL bottle. The nosy kitty is Tabby; she's part of the local cat colony. It's not quite fair to call her feral as she clearly belonged to someone once upon a time. I have no idea who or why she's not with them now. Too bad the kittehs can't tell their stories to us.

My dear friend PP read my last post about stitching a scarf and a hat for the coming winter. PP is an accomplished knitter (and fiber woman in general) and she made me some truly awesome fingerless gloves from the same yarn I used. Aren't the gloves beautiful? Thank you so much, PP, for these awesome gloves. You rocked my world! When the cold weather hits, I'm going to be so ready for it!

Here's another shot of these oh so comfortable gloves!

What I've been knitting lately are squares. This is the pattern I used for the wash cloth that was my second (and third) projects. The yarn came from Mama's stash. Just your run of the mill cotton yarn. It may be Peaches 'n Cream, or it may be just something similar. I had the crazy idea to use this blocks like quilting blocks and use them to make a lap rug/throw/Afghan/whatever. I've got some ideas for constuction but will keep that to myself until I'm further along on the project.

When I ran out of Mama's yarn (after three squares) I bought a new cone of yarn. Wouldn't you know it they didn't have the same color, close but not the same. Oh, well, it's not like anyone else will see this. The smaller squares pictured above are 50 stitches wide at their widest. The big boy above is at 86.5 stitches when the picture was taken and will ultimately be 100. I want to knit at least four (or maybe six) of these jumbo squares for the center of the lap rug.

The odometer on the ol' Subaru is still spinning. And yes, it just took about 2.5 gallons of gas to get the 85 miles on the tripmeter. The old gal will be 17 years old in just a couple of weeks. We sure got our money's worth out of this car. Rock on, Suby!

TUSAL: July 2011, Second of Two

2011-07-31T22:24:00.000-05:00

Greetings, everyone, from the last day of July, 2011. My goodness, how time has flown by!

I did a bit of research and found that the second new moon in a given month is referred to as either a black moon (according to this article) or a dark moon. This list of moon folklore said that two new moons in one month predicted a month's bad weather. Taken along with another tidbit from the same list (a new moon on a Saturday (as it was yesterday) supposedly brings 20 days of wind and rain) and we should be in for some lousy weather. Believe if you wish, but I don't think that will be the case.

What are all the bits of colored fluffiness?

I've been a knittin' fool this month and the little bits of color are the trimming from the pom-pom that went on the hat I knitted. Yes, you read that right: I knitted a hat! And a scarf to go with it. I've learned to knit in the round on cables and also on double pointed needles. Both of those were an interesting experience. The double pointed needles were difficult to maneuver when completing the crown of the hat. I'm not sure I want to go through that again. Perhaps it would be easier with smaller needles. I used Size 10us.

The original pattern for the scarf called for three skeins and for it to be 65 inches long. Well, I used all three skeins and mine turned out to be 78 inches (2 m) long. It's alright, though, since I'm tall and like having extra length to wrap around the neck and over the face, if necessary.

The bright sunshine really brings out the beautiful colors in the yarn. (It's Lion Brand Amazing yarn in colorway Mauna Loa.) Hard to believe I'm taking pictures of knitwear when it's 100 degrees outside. Ugh. C'mon winter!

Ready for cold weather!

This is Ginger. She's been a member of my feral cat colony for three years now. Ginger showed up when she was just a tiny kitten, but already too wild to tame. She has been spayed, though, so she's not adding to the cat population. This was such a great picture of her, I just had to share it.

Here's Jack on the run. (He really does have all four legs.) And Bob looking a bit grumpy. Pardon his rumpled fur but he got a bath on Friday and can't do a thing with it.

Nikki and the Binder, and a New Kitty

2011-07-04T22:31:00.002-05:00

I got email from a nice lady named Nikki who actually made a binder from my tutorial. This gave me a big happy! And she sent pictures, too!

I gave this to my 14 year old son for his birthday. He is an aspiring writer, and puts all his works in the binder. He loves it.

I sew quite a bit, and I was asked to visit my daughter’s sewing class (high school) with some of my projects. I brought the cover, and the teacher liked it so much she asked me for the website, and of course I obliged her. She is considering using your tutorial for one of her class projects next fall, I believe.

Doesn't that look like a great fabric for a teenager? How nice to hear that a teacher thinks my tutorial is worth using! Hope I didn't do anything wrong in there. Please, Mrs. Davis, I'd love to see pictures when your class completes their projects!

In early to mid-June we noticed a very vocal, little black cat hanging around the house. He responded to "kitty, kitty, kitty" by meowing loud and often. He acted afraid and didn't want to come close, but would run up on the porch and furiously nom the kitten chow left there for the ferals. Eventually, he did warm up to us and started flopping over for belly rubs. Upon closer inspection it was apparent that this was a young cat (about 7 months) who still had all his equipment. He would often show up with cobwebs on his face so we figured he was living in the neighbor's crawlspace. After getting to know him for a week and earning his trust, we put him into a cat carrier and took him to the vet so they could run him up on the rack and give him a tune-up and all the shots and neuter him. We brought him back home to the house and he was happy as could be, even with the doxies and Bob. Bob, on the other hand wasn't too delighted with the little cat - Jack, as he is called - and stomped around the house complaining loudly to everyone and no one in particular. It took about a week, but Bob and Jack are now getting along together and Bob's got his sweet disposition back again.

TUSAL: July 2011 - First of two

2011-07-02T22:09:00.000-05:00

This month is rather unique in that we will have two new moons in the same month. When there are two full moons that second is refered to as a blue moon. Anyone know what you call the second new moon in the same calendar month? (Other than the obvious, "rare".)

Stitching with tiny needles and fibers still doesn't hold any appeal for me right now so there hasn't been much added to my ort jar. But, unlike the last two months (or so) there actually are some new orts in the jar; they are yarn orts, but orts they be!

I've managed to knit three things. The first started life as the second incarantion of my learning swatch. It turns out I was knitting with a twist. Wish I could remember the actual name of the stitch I was doing, but it wasn't the garter stitch. Once, that got sorted out, SH showed me how to do decreases and at a good enough time to turn the practice piece into a little buttoned pouch. The yarn reminded me of water and there was a cute fish button in my stash waiting to be used. This little pouch will be about the right size to use for credit card, ID and a bit of money to tuck into my pocket.

The next two projects (which were actually finished before I did the finishing on the pouch (confused yet?)) were the ubiquitous knitted wash cloth. It's a nice learning project for several reasons: (1) you learn yarn over and knit two together; (2) there are plenty of repetitions to reinforce the motor memory; and (3) you've actually got something useful at the end.

The first one had some problems. I tinked and reknit and tinked some more. In the end, it was a good learning experience. The second one had fewer problems and looks better than the first.

My current project is a scarf; it shouldn't be a big deal and will be completed unless I get bored. There's a pattern for a matching hat. I'll believe it when I see it. Actually, it's kind of exciting learning a new craft.

TUSAL for June

2011-06-02T22:41:00.000-05:00

Here it is, my friends, my TUSAL bottle for June. Not a lot, well, nothing actually, different from last month. Still in a stitching slump. :(

Lately, I've been trying knitting when I feel the need to do something with my hands. Back and forth on the same 20 stitches. The owner of the LNS showed me this could actually be turned into some thing useful: Stitch a long-ish narrow piece. Stitch two short ends together. Do a running stitch around the top and bottom of the tube. Gather and sew it shut on both sides. Ta-da! A dish scrubbie.

If I get around to makeing one of these I'll post some pictures and label it a tutorial.

Actually Finished Something

2011-05-29T22:17:00.001-05:00

This weekend I got to be a Parrotthead for the first time. One of the friends of my youth came to town and went to the show with me. A grand time and mucho tequilla was had by all.

This friend is one that I owed a handmade craft some time in 2011, so I fulfilled this promise with a book safe. This Spanish text book was rescued from a by-the-pound bin at a thrift store. The safe compartment was lined with maps taken from an atlas that was rescued from the same situation.

Still haven't gotten the stitching mojo back yet. But I have started something new: knitting. Dear friend SU is teaching me how to knit Continental. I'll pause a momment to let PP recover from this shock. ... So far, my knitting looks a lot like my crocheting: way too tight. Why is my tension so tight when working with yarn but I can do just fine with thread and floss and silk and tiny needles?

TUSAL: May 2011

2011-05-03T19:59:00.000-05:00

Here's my TUSAL bottle for May's new moon. If it look suspiciously like the shot from April, there's a reason. Due to being very busy at work and allergies and a sinus infect yada yada yada I've been in a crafting slump lately. Here's hoping this is just a temporary thing and I'll be feeling crafty and productive again in May.

TUSAL: April 2011

2011-04-04T17:59:00.001-05:00

A half-gallon size Ball jar stepped up to become the new TUSAL bottle after the minor disaster that claimed the original apothecary jar. This one should be a bit more forgiving if it slips from my hands, but I'd best be quick to get toes out of the way since this jar is rather hefty.

Friend SU had a birthday recently. I made a book safe and a tin and scissor fob set for her. The book safe, at first, didn't go over well; I believe she really would have rather had the single volume from the 1957 edition children's encyclopedia. When I explained the original condition of the book (dirty, sooty, broken spine, pages tearing from spine etc), I think she understood why I did what I did with it. I promise I do not destroy any books of value when I make book safes. SU really loved the repurposed Altoids tin with the cute sheep on the front. The tiny scissors made her happy too since they are too small to use for anything other than snipping yarn or embroidery threads. She said she's infamous for ruining scissors by using them as screwdrivers or cutting up paper or tough fabrics like denim.

TUSAL: March 2011

2011-03-04T18:28:00.001-06:00

Looking down on TUSAL for March's new moon.

Lots of orts of all sorts added during February.

Moments later... uh-oh. And, yes. The bottom part landed right side up.

The lid survived but the orts are currently in a one quart zippy bag.

More later. I've got a Randy Rogers Band concert to go to.

TUSAL: February 2011

2011-02-02T18:51:00.009-06:00

Greetings. Here we are Groundhog's Day as well as another new moon, which means it's time for another picture for the TUSAL hosted by It'sDaffycat. There is a lot more to show this time than last.

During the last month, I made nine scissor fobs, took a needle work class in Florida and worked on several smalls for a project that's still in the works. In addition to orts from stitching, there's also the label and empty spool from a ball of #12 black perle cotton, an empty spool of Krienik #4 very fine braid, scraps of handmade cording and various and sundry scraps of linens and felts and velvets from finishing projects. Yes, it's been a busy month!

The needlework class I attended is an annual event taught by Susan Greening Davis. The attendees lovingly refer to it as Pirate Camp since it is held in the St. Augustine area - and they've had more than their fair share of pirates in the day. The beaches are beautiful in this area.

I like to make favors for my table-mates and hosts of the class and, this year, decided to make scissor fobs.

A little piece of needle work from JE's late mother inspired the black-on-black stitching on the front. The fabric is 22 count Hardanger stitched with #12 perle cotton.

In keeping with the pirate theme, I found a cute Jolly Roger rubber stamp and used it to make emblossed velvet for the back of the fob.

Joining the two pieces was a bit of a challenge. The velvet was crawly and evil and didn't want to stay put to be sewn together with the stitched piece. There was a lot of cussing involved. I made the tassels from #12 perle cotton, and the cording was made with #5 perle cotton and red #4 Krienik braid.

I'd been to St. Augustine several times but had never visited the lighthouse. Right before taking our afternoon break, one of the ladies at the class asked who was going to be climbing to the top of the lighthouse. At the time I thought to myself, "Not me!" But a while latter, driving down A1A, there was the lighthouse.

I turned off the main road to get some pictures of it and one thing lead to another. Oh, did I mention my mom was with me? Yuppers, she'd come to the stitching class and here we were at the lighthouse.

Now, understand, I'm afraid of heights and Mama had a total hip replacement a year ago last Christmas. Neither of us were great candidates for doing this, but I knew we could. All 219 stairs up to the top.

I kept my eyes on the wall when going up the stairs; the holes made into the stairs offered too much of a view to look down. Mama, on the other hand, was watching the stairs to make sure she didn't make a misstep. We'd rest on the landings, and Mama wanted to quit a few times, but I kept egging her on.

And we made it to the top! It was a glorious view and I wish I'd been able to step away from the safety of the brick wall to look around more, but I was terrified. Going down was a lot faster than going up for Mama. It took me a bit longer because I had a death-grip on wall mounted handrail (with both hands) and had to hand-over-hand my way down - looking at the wall not the steps. I was very happy to reach the bottom but could now brag I'd actually made it to the top. Three cheers for me and Mama!

Pookie had also made the trip, but we left him in Jacksonville with our friends B and TM and their bird, Gus.

Here's a book safe I made for B for her hospitality:

It's the best book safe I've made to date and she appeared to be please by it.

While there, I saw the scissor fob I'd made for her last year. It's a Lori Birmingham design. Don't you love them? They're all so delicate and beautifully feminine

I'll leave you with a shot of the good ship Bob sailing along the carpet.

TUSAL: January 2011

2011-01-04T21:14:00.007-06:00

Happy 2011, everyone! Hope all got though it safe and sound and are back in the swing of things.

Along with the new year, we've got a New Moon and that means a TUSAL post. Being so early in the year, I haven't much in the way of orts to show off. The strange picture above is shooting down the apothecary jar that will be my TUSAL container for the year. Yes, that's three waste knots and three pieces of #12 perle cotton. Wooo! What a stitching session that was. :P

Here's a more recognizable shot of the jar.

And a close-up pointing out the tiny bits.

Here are the 2010 TUSAL that I continued to use, though I fell off on posting pictures toward the end of the summer. The 2009 bottle is also in the picture, but that only accounted for May through December, as I started late.

Many, many thanks to Daffycat for continuing the TUSAL project started by Yoyo (who I miss bunches). If you want to join in the 2011 TUSAL with Daffycat click here to sign up on her blog. It really is loads of fun!

I didn't do very much in the way of creations for Christmas this year, and some of what I did managed to get away from me without pictures. Oh, well. The covered matches (there were two additional boxes with different designs that got away sans picture) made a nice gift paired with nice candles.

Friend SU does tiny knitting and has had some problems keeping with her tiny needles, so I made a needle book for her so they wouldn't go astray so easily.

The interior was finished with leftovers from the fabric I used to cover her stitching basket. She really loved this and it made my heart happy to delight her so.

Happy stitching, everyone. I'll leave you with a picture of Bob sleeping. Notice all the paws curled up. Isn't he adorable? Ok, I'm biased.

It's Daffycat: A Totally Useless Stitch-A-Long

2011-01-01T20:41:00.000-06:00

Oh, boy! DaffyCat will be hosting TUSAL for 2011. :)
It's Daffycat: A Totally Useless Stitch-A-Long

What I Want for Christmas

2010-12-23T09:00:00.001-06:00

This song makes me happy. Hope it makes you happy, too! Enjoy!

Santa Paws

2010-12-12T12:14:00.006-06:00

Yesterday was an interesting experience. Stitching buddy AC is active in a greyhound rescue group that has Meet & Greets periodically at area PetSmart locations. During the holidays, PetSmart has weekend "Photo with Santa Paws" events worked by different animal charities who receive part of the procedes from photo sales.

Thursday evening, AC was bemoaning the fact that try as she might, she wasn't getting any volunteers to play Santa on Saturday when the greyhound group was to benefit from the photo sales. Without thinking it through, I volunteered for the task - having had no, zero, zilch experience playing Santa Claus, of course.

From Thursday evening to Saturday morning I had plenty of time to think about what I had gotten myself into. Visions of dog bites, cat scratches and blood and urine soaked Santa suits haunted me. Plus, who had had on that Santa suit last? Ewwww....

AC at Santa Paws event

The photo shoot was to go from 11am to 4pm. I arrived at the PetSmart location at about 10:45. I was shown to the employee break room and the Santa suit. Thankfully, the Santa suit was fresh in a dry cleaner's bag. I took the costume - pants, jacket, belt, wig, beard, hat, spats, glasses and gloves - to the ladies' room to change, praying no little kids wandered in and caught a cross-dressing Santa getting dressed.

The costume was heavy, hot and ill fitting. The belt was way too big, even on the last notch; I could have used a pillow. The beard and wig were scratchy. This was going to be a long five hours.

When I walked out to the photo area, there was a line of folks ready and excited for their photos. Everyone was in a great and festive mood. This really did a lot to boost my spirts and lose my jitters. I tried a deep, "Ho! Ho! Ho!" but soon gave up because I sounded more like the Jolly Green Giant than Santa. Beside, the dogs didn't care and the owners didn't either since they just wanted cute photos of their pets and couldn't care less about whether Santa was a man or a woman.

The first dog up was Lucy, a short haired dog of undetermined breed that was absolutely determined that she was going to lick me to death. She pulled down the beard by stepping (nay, dancing) in it, tried to eat my nose, licked my glasses and face and had me laughing in that way that only happens when a joyous dog attempts to love you to death. She finally calmed down, while I readjusted the beard, and we got a cute picture after all.

That pretty much set the tone for the day. We had French bulldogs, English bulldogs, a trio of HUGE basset hounds, boxers, boxer/Pit bull mixes, Shih Tsus, Lhasa Apsos, Yorkies, a Dorkie (a designer-dog mix Yorkie + Dachshund), poodles, a Weimaraner named Grover that had just won the doggie lottery and been rescued (that day) by a large and loving family. There was only one dog, a Shelty named Unitus, that was a flop. He just wasn't in the mood to have his picture made. His owner said she had shopping to do and would try later; we never saw her again.

I got tickled at one of the owners. She was a real take-charge sort of gal and her dog was a Lhasa Apso (whose name I don't recall). She put the dog up on the platform next to me and began fussily arranging the dog's holiday collar, the position of her paws. As soon as she was satisfied with the dog, she began on me: fluffing the beard just so, arranging the pom-pom on the hat, tucking in whisps of hair, even arranging how my hands were positioned. I had to fight laughing at this. It really was a hoot and was all I needed to see to know this gal got what she wanted. All. The. Time.

Santa Paws!

At the end of the session, we'd raised over $125 dollars for the greyhound charity. This was impressive since the weather went to hell shortly after we got started and it was cold and windy with a hard rain for most of the day. I got to meet a lot of great dogs and some great owners, too. When I was returning the Santa suit to the employee break room, there were some cashiers who said all the photos that came through their lines were cute. That made me feel good and that the discomfort of the beard and wig (the worst part of the costume) was worth it.

Pookie braved the weather to come see me. Said he wouldn't miss it for the world. :)

T-Day +1

2010-11-26T16:02:00.002-06:00

Hope everyone had a good holiday with family and/or friends. We had a nice quiet evening here at Casa d'Fidget and were thankful to be together with a warm meal, a roof over our heads and means to keep the wolves from the door. Life is pretty good.

Pookie and I just took a vacation in Florida. I haven't had a chance to go though all the photos yet so I'll save the narrative for later.

Enjoy your leftovers and good shopping bargains.

Late Summer/Early Fall Craftiness

2010-10-19T12:15:00.009-05:00

Ok, first things first. Here are the pictures of the TUSAL bottle for the last three months. August is on the left and October is on the right. I thought I'd taken a picture of September but I can't find it if I did. It looked a lot like August except there was a huge blob of blue floss added. More on that later.

The first crafty thing to share is one of the more recent, but it is also seasonal so I'd best get it in now.

A while back, I made a biscornu out of some great purple fabric that came in a kit. The fabric really was awesome and I couldn't bring myself to throw away the leftover scraps after assembling the biscornu. The scraps turned up just in time for a make-a-scissor-fob desire to hit me. (I can always use another scissor fob because I own too many scissors.)

Purple is my favorite Halloween color -- especially when paired with emerald green. Thinking cap engaged for a Halloween scissor fob, I quickly found a small bat motif, tweaked it just a bit and had a bat. Instead of stitching eyes, I applied two red glitter chips from some glitter glue in the stash.

I wanted to put some words on the back of the scissor fob, but couldn't come up with anything pithy off the top of my head, so I turned to the Internet and started looking for batty things there. A wonderful poem by Frank Jacobs called The Bat turned up:

The Bat
By Frank Jacobs

Bats are creepy; bats are scary;
Bats do not seem sanitary;
Bats in dismal caves keep cozy;
Bats remind us of Lugosi;
Bats have webby wings that fold up;
Bats from ceilings hang down rolled up;
Bats when flying undismayed are;
Bats are careful; bats use radar;
Bats at nighttime at their best are;
Bats by Batman unimpressed are!

I fell in love with the line "Bats remind us of Lugosi" and knew that was what the scissor fob needed. The lettering style came from taking batty = deranged.

The scissor fob was assembled using the tag string from a Vera Bradley bag (love that emerald green!) and a bead from my stash. I had some black matte scissors that were just begging for this scissor fob. But, they would need a scissor sheath, too.

Again turning to my stash for inspiration, I found some supple, old boot leather and some pleather that came from gawd-knows-where, and some scrap black velvet. Yes, there was a bat in my future. This seemed to be the perfect sheath for these scissors with that fob at this time of year.

This really wasn't hard to make. If anyone has a desire for a tutorial, or just some instructions for making one, let me know and I'll be happy to fill you in.

The big blue floss blob that was added to the September TUSAL bottle was the orts from the (finally) completed Smokey Mountain Cats that I've been working on for a long time. I believe I started it around 2000, but one of my friends thinks it was around 2002 or 2003. Either way, it's been in the WIP pile for a long time and it was time for the final push to get it done.

This project is 184 x 140 stitches - a small one for many of you - but for your humble author, the ADD Kid, this was a mammoth undertaking and I'm pretty damn proud of myself for getting it done. And the funny part of it all? It's going to be given away. It's always been destine for AH and I hope it is appreciated.

Fall is my favorite season. I love the mild temperatures, sleeping under quilts with the window open, the changing leaves and the winds. Going to the Farmers Market is also a treat. All the produce looks great and there are colorful pumpkins, gourds and mums all around.

This is my friend SU. She is very talented with tiny knitting needles and crochet hooks.

She had come across the first tiny needles she'd ever bought and was bringing them to our stitching group so we could admire the beautiful rose wood handles on them. When she arrived at the stitching group, she discovered one of the needles had been lost - probably when she dropped them into her project basket. I offered to make a lining for her basket so it wouldn't happen again.

The happy ending to the story is that SU found the missing needle not far from her stitching nest. It really had dropped through the open weave of the basket. But that will never happen again.

Lately, I've been playing with felting sweater in the washing machine. After a couple of near disasters and some reading on the Internet, I learned to put the sweaters in pillowcases prior to felting them in the machine.

I'm still in the thinking stage on what to do with most of the felted sweaters. I've made cat toys with the cuffs

and some house slippers for Mama

but I've got a lot more already felted and ready to go - as soon as the inspiration hits me.

Still alive and kicking

2010-10-12T07:09:00.002-05:00

Contrary to popular belief, I have not been kidnapped by a band of skunks hell-bent on revenge and demanding the return of their kin. It's been a busy time at work and, after a day of sitting in front of a computer for work I had little desire to sit and type on one at home. I've been doing crafty things and have taken pictures along the way. Pictures and descriptions will be coming soon.

Oh, fer Pete's sake!

2010-08-14T11:01:00.002-05:00

Caught another skunk last night. I asked Sunny if this one was an adult. He allowed as how it was another teen-aged skunk. This would make a litter of seven - eight skunks in all. I had no idea we were being over-run with skunks.

The big questions is how many more are out there?

Sunny didn't leave a trap today. Mostly so that he wouldn't have to come out on Sunday to collect whatever wildlife would surely stumble into the trap. He suggested moving the cat bowls to a higher location since skunks don't climb.

Now I'll have to come up with some contraption for moving the cat food higher. Thinking cap engaged.

Hope everyone's having an awesome, skunk-free weekend.

Busy Week

2010-08-13T15:49:00.002-05:00

It's been a hectic week. Mostly because of work, but other things have been going on too.

Had a great time at the class with Susan Greening Davis. Our project involved a Longaberger basket to use for a project basket and the accessories for it. It should be darling when it's done.

Sunday, another little skunk showed up and rattles the kitty food bowls. I called Sunny on Monday. He came out to place another trap and we caught the little stinker overnight. Tuesday, he came to get the skunk and replace the trap. We didn't catch anything on Tuesday night, but we caught a tabby cat Wednesday night.

This was a cat I hadn't seen around before so it was probably a neighbor's that got out and just had a misadventure. I've never seen anything move as fast as that tabby flying out of the trap when I opened the door. That kitty will probably never come anywhere close to my porch again.

Thursday night we caught a 'possum. I'd seen a mama possum and a couple of little ones around before so this wasn't a total surprise. Sunny came out today to take the possum to it's new home out in the wild and left us another trap. I'm really not sure how many more critters there are to catch.

The game seems to have changed so I'll change the scoring system to just a tabulation. Skunks: 7 (mama + 6 skunklets or kits if you wanna be technical about it). Opossums: 1. Cats: 1. Sunny's made seven trips to the wildlife refuge (one trip was a twofer) to relocate these critters to a place where they will be much happier.

Skunk Drama and Other Stuff

2010-08-06T21:52:00.008-05:00

For the past couple of nights, I'd been taking in the cat food bowls in hopes of getting Mama Skunk to go for the grape jelly in the trap.

Yesterday, the guy that mows the lawn managed to get grass clippings in the cat food bowls on the porch. Without thinking, I tossed the cat food out onto the lawn. Then, I refilled the bowls for the feral kitties.

After dark, I happened to look out and saw Mama Skunk eating the cat food off the lawn. I called Sunny and asked if I should move the trap from the porch (close to where the food bowls usually are but aren't since I took them in) down to the lawn where Mama Skunk was eating the discarded food. He said that sounded like a good idea. Mama Skunk ran away when I went outside to move the trap. I added a bit more food on the ground below the trap and waited.

It wasn't long until Mama Skunk came back and happily munched all around the trap -- but didn't go in. *sigh* I added a bit more food around the opening of the trap, covered it with black plastic, went to bed and hoped for the best.

I got up at 5:45am to check the trap and, if necessary, move it up to the porch to get it out of the direct sun. To my delight, the trap had been sprung! Yeah! Got a skunk! I called Sunny to come get Mama Skunk and carried the trap, still covered with plastic, up to the porch.

Sunny came on over. Imagine my surprise when he said, "You know there's two skunks in there?" Yes, we had Mama Skunk and skunklet #5. Holy moly! I had no idea there were so many! He said that five was an average sized litter and that this may be all of them. He didn't leave a trap this time, but said that if more show up, just give him a call.

On the assumption that this is all the skunks, the final score is Sunny 6, Skunks 1. Go Team Sunny & Trapper Jack!

There've been a lot of skunk drama lately, but I've been crafty, too.

A couple of weeks ago some of my stitching buddies got together for some noms, stitching and playing Stitchopoly (basicly Monopoly for stitcher).

While there, I gave AB a belated birthday present: a purse I'd made from thrifted Girls' size 10 Old Navy culottes and a L.L.Bean Ladies' size L sleeveless blouse and some purse handles bought from Jo Ann's. It was an interesting exercise trying to figure out a pattern and how to use the blouse the best ways to get the lining and pockets done. In the end, there were just a handful of small pieces left. AB really enjoyed the bag but wanted to add another pocket. So I gave her what scraps where left and she took care of adding that pocket on her own.

This cute notebook was a Make-it-and-take-it project from a Moonlight stitching get-together at the LNS last year (or was it two?). I'd never gotten around to finishing it but did so recently. A simple, yet charming, design stitched on banding and then closed with herringbone stitch on the inside - which doubles for a needlepark. Something like that would make a great little gift for a crafty buddy, or just for anyone actually. Who doesn't need a notebook from time to time? The kloster block are just perfect for a bit of fancy Hardanger work. Hmm, I may just do that. If so, I'll post pictures

I've really been busy finishing things I'd started and never completed. Lately, it's been a lot of projects from my favorite designer, Susan Greening Davis. I just adore this project. Isn't that a wonderful sentiment? I don't know about you, but I feel most complete when I'm creating and I love creating with a needle.

I finished the banding for the box that was created in the tutorial for the lined box with pincushion. The banding was from a Susan Greening Davis project that I tweaked a bit.

Saturday I'll be attending a class taught by Susan. I'm really looking forward to it as I learn wonderful techniques and stitches from her everytime I'm with her. If you ever get a chance to take one of her classes, go for it. She's such a wonderful, dear person and a great teacher.

This was the project for last year's class. Most of the actual needlework was done last year, but there were still a few small things to be stitched and the final finishing. I finished it this week -- just in time for the next class.

The needle book is my own design. The needle on the cover is secured by Jewel-It glue so it's not going anywhere.

Here's something you don't see every day:

This is the odometer from my 1995 Subaru Legacy Wagon on my way home from the office this past Thursday. With the exception of the 63 miles that were on there when Pookie and I bought it in September of 1994, and a couple of thousand miles Pookie's probably put on it over the years, I've driven most of that mileage. I'm on my way back from the Moon and still getting around 30 MPG. Not bad for a car that's almost 16 years old, no?

Updated Score

2010-08-03T12:28:00.003-05:00

The new score is Sunny 4, Skunks 1.

Last evening, upon hearing the outside food bowls rattling, I peeked out the window in the front door and saw Mama Skunk finishing off the last of the cat food. After getting a drink of water, she waddled past the trap -- not even giving it a glance -- and down the steps she went and off into the night. Score 1 for the Skunks.

I put out a bit more food and immediately Ginger came up on the porch to eat, so that was a good thing. A while later, though, I heard a cat commotion and found Tabby-with-the-white-feet (a cat that lives down the street but likes to eat our food) giving Ginger a hard time about the food, so I brought the bowl in.

This morning Patches and Ginger were both looking in the trap with guarded interest. Sho'nuff, there was yet another teenaged skunk in the trap. I had no idea there were this many! Sunny's escorting this little stinker to the wildlife refuge to join his/her brothers/sisters and start a family reunion in the woods.

Tonight, I'll try to bring the food in before Mama Skunk comes by and see if the grape jelly won't tempt her into the trap.

Stinker Update

2010-08-02T07:55:00.003-05:00

Well, the Cute Litte Stinker Roundup has begun. So far the score is Sunny 3, Skunks 0.

I contacted Trapper Jack wildlife removal service on Friday. Sunny Rippetoe came out and set up two humane live traps. Friday night/Saturday morning we caught one teenage skunk. Sunny came out, retreived the first skunk and reset another trap. Saturday night/Sunday morning we caught two teenage skunks. Sunny came out again to get the skunks and reset the trap hoping to catch Mama Skunk. Didn't catch Mama last night, didn't catch any thing, but I expected Mama Skunk to be a bit more wiley. We'll see how long she can resist the grape jelly that's being used as bait.

Sunny is taking the skunks far, far away from ~~their~~ my home and relocating them in an approved wildlife area close to a river. They should be much happier there than in my neighborhood where they can be run over by a car.

Cute Little Stinker

2010-07-17T21:54:00.002-05:00

There are several feral kitties that depend on me for food and water. Two main ones and some that come by occassionally. Therefore, there is usually kitten chow and water on my front porch. One of the drawbacks to this is that I end up feeding animals I did not intend to feed. Like possums. And skunks. Currently, a family of skunks.

A couple of weeks ago, there was a commontion (with lots of squeaking) on the front porch. I went to the door to see what was going on. There was mama skunk and two young skunks. The youngsters seemed to be bickering over the kitten chow.

If you turn on the porch light and open the door, the skunks (and possums) usually leave quickly with no problem. This night, however, mama and skunklet #1 left right away. Number 2 had a different idea and came over to me. Stopping about 18 inches away, just staring up at me. The cheeky little thing finallly left after a few Shoo!s and a couple of you-need-to-leave-nows.

I think tonight's visitor to the cat bowls was that little stinker. S/he showed very little fear when I came out on the porch and snapped a picture or two. It may become necessary to hire someone to relocate this brazen little fella since s/he is learning not to be afraid of humans.

And because s/he can wipe out two bowls of kitten chow in one sitting!

July's TUSAL and other things

2010-07-16T19:54:00.006-05:00

I'm less than a week late for posting the July TUSAL. Not bad for me. There's some new stuff in the bottle from recent projects, some more ort producing than others. Sure glad I'm using a bigger bottle. All of this wouldn't have fit so well into the small bottle I used last year.

For last year's July TUSAL, I took a picture of my orts bottle with a pair of scissors wearing this beautiful fob my friend SU had made for me. The frock is so complete there's even a petticoat under it!

At a recent stitching gathering I chanced to be sitting next to SU and I had the fob with me. S was very good natured about me wanting to get a picture of her with her creation. Thank you again, S! Love you, mean it!

I've been working on a lot a Susan Greening Davis projects lately. This one I really like and enjoyed making it. So many pretty stitches and beautiful beads!

This Purple Tuffet by Susan is my latest project. It took less than a day to complete. I so adore fast projects and the gratification that goes with them.

And speaking of biscornus, this one was a recent Make-It-And-Take-It project at the LNS. FC, one of the stitchers that attended, said she never does the projects and passed it on to me. It was a fun little project to stitch and originally was charted for only the little ABC pattern. The back is a freebie pattern I had printed from online some time in the past...from I don't remember where. If it's your's please leave me a message and I'll give you credit and link back to it. The pattern, with the addition of a few beads, was perfect for the tuffet. As a surprise, I gave the finished project back to FC. She was delighted and immediately started using it as a pin cushion. I love making useful things.

Lately, Pookie and I have been going to the local Farmers' Market to get yummy fresh vegetables. I don't have my late daddy's green thumb so I have to satisfy my yearning for home grown tomatoes at the Farmer's Market. It's a great little outing for a summer day and well worth the drive.

That squash was as delicious as it looks.

And, speaking of nature, here's a lovely web that I found the other morning as I was leaving for the office.

That's all for now. Happy stitching, y'all.

Tutorial: Lined box with compartment

2010-07-09T17:37:00.025-05:00

Please add a comment and let me know how you came to be at this tutorial and if it was helpful for you. Thanks!

I've recently been working on a kit from a favorite designer. I really liked the banding for the project, but the final finishing didn't make my heart sing. So, I poked around in the craft room and found what (with a bit of craftiness) will be a great alternative for finishing.

This little wooden crate is 3"h x 4.25"w X 3.5"d. Just a plain-jane little wooden crate. The banding was a near perfect fit, so it was time for some crafty goodness to dress it up a bit.

What you need:
wooden box
book board
rotary cutter/cutting mat/cutting guide or scissors
spray adhesive
quick dry tacky glue
felt
Sharpie or paint to match/contrast with felt
small scrap of fabric for pin cushion
sand or weights for pin cushion (optional)
poly fiber-fill

First, measure the inside dimensions of the crate. I measured in millimeters since it would be more precise. Measure the height, width and depth of the interior of the box. You will need one (1) piece for the bottom (width x depth), two (2) pieces for the sides (width X height) and three (3) pieces for the ends and center divider (depth x height).

Transfer your measurements to a piece of book board or heavy cardboard.

I used a rotary cutter and cutting mat and cutting guide to cut the pieces. It takes several passes with the rotary cutter to cut through the book board, but it make a very nice clean cut and it's worth the effort.

Test fit the pieces in your box. Put the bottom piece in first and then the two long sides. Make sure they are level with the top of the wooden box.

You will need to adjust the width of the three end pieces because of the width of the book board itself. Place the pieces on top of the box with the bottom and side pieces in place. Mark where the edges need to be trimmed and do so.

Test fit all the pieces now. The two end pieces and the middle piece should all fit within the two side pieces. If they are a little loose, that's good since the felt will make the side pieces a little thicker.

Take your Sharpie or paint and color the exposed edges of your pieces. This is just a matter of aesthetics and purely your choice. Do whatever makes your heart happy.

Now it's time to use the spray adhesive. I love this stuff but it can be evil if it ends up somewhere it shouldn't be. I like to put the pieces to be sprayed into a box to keep the spray from going everywhere. You can do this or take it outside (on a day with no or very little wind) or cover an area with paper or a drop cloth. Spray the adhesive on one side of the following five pieces: the bottom, the two side pieces and one of the end pieces and one side of the center piece.

Position the piece sticky side down on the felt. Press it in place so you get a good bond.

Neatly cut out each piece using the book board as the cutting guide.

If you used a little crate, you may want to make filler slats to give the box more solid sides.

Use the quick tack glue between the wooden slats and position the filler slats on top of the glue. Be sure the edges are flush with the box.

Put a bead of quick tack glue along the side and bottom edges of the book board center piece. Where you position it will determine the size of the compartment and the pin cushion.

Be very sure that the felt side faces the compartment side and the blank side faces the pin cushion side. The glue may get a bit messy when you position the piece. It will dry clear but you may dab at it with a damp cloth to clean it up a bit, if necessary.

If you want to give your box a bit of weight and make it more stable now is the time to put something in the bottom of the pin cushion compartment. I used about 1/3 cup of fine sand wrapped up in aluminium foil to add weight to my box.

I folded the foil into a packet and scrunched the ends up until it fits the compartment.

Push the packet around until it fills the bottom of the compartment. This isn't rocket science and doesn't need to be perfect; close is good enough.

Cut a piece of fabric for the top of the pin cushion. Make it at least twice as big as the pin cushion compartment. You'll need about half an inch on each side for gluing down and a bit in the middle to allow for poofiness. Put a line of glue on the inside far edge of the pin cushion compartment.

Press the right side of the long edge of the fabric onto the glue.

Put a line of glue on the near edge (the uncovered side of the center divider).

Use your fingers (or a pencil or other tool) to press the right side of the fabric into the glue. Using your fingers will help you leave a bit of room for the pin cushion to poof out.

Put glue on one of the short ends.

Poke your finger in the pin cushion tube (or a pencil or other tool) to press the right side of the fabric into the glue. Make any necessary adjustments to make it look nice.

Stuff small tufts of poly fiberfill into the open end of the pin cushion. Small tufts will keep the cushion from becoming lumpy. Be sure to poke it down into the corners. Fill it nice and full.

Filled and ready to close.

Use your fingers to push the fabric and stuffing away from the unglued edge and apply a line of glue.

Push the fabric into the glue, easing the fabric into place to make it look nice.

You're done! Now you've got a great little piece to keep your pins and needles under control while also having a place for your tools and what-nots.

Cover the box in whatever manner makes you happy. When I've finished stitching the banding, it's going around this box and I know I'll be delighted.

Have fun with this. I'd love to hear (and see results) from anyone that gives this tutorial a try.

June's TUSAL and other random stuff

2010-07-09T17:37:00.023-05:00

It's almost time to post the July TUSAL but I'm just getting round to posting the one for June. Such is life these days. I did take the picture around the correct time which should count for something. There are bits and pieces from all sort of stitching, both original projects and those I purchased, and scraps from finishing.

Lately, I've been stitching on Susan Greening Davis projects that I've gotten either at classes or at trunk shows. I really love her designs and I'm very grateful to her for all the wonderful stitching knowledge she's passed on.

Susan aways says to follow your heart and do what makes you happy..even if it is changing a design. This was one of the class pieces from the Souther Stitching class in St. Augustine last January. The original design had waves along the right and left edge, but I prefered to put fishes. The design came from the book A Rainbow of Stitches.

One stitch I came across while looking though stitching books (something I love to do) is the Hugarian stitch. I believe it is normally a needlepoint stitch but it works well with floss and linen, too. This little scissor fob was made with a scrap of linen and a lot of Hungarian stitches. A bit of cording and there it is.

I used a double running stitch and a surface stitch to create the little humbug. They are rather easy to make, actually, since it's just a matter of joining the top seam at a right angle to the bottom.

While I was in the mood to make scissor fobs, I braided this little guy using up some left over floss. As it turns out, I didn't have enough of the orange to make the cording and had to improvise with black. Meh, it is what it is.

A recent doodle using different stitches resulted in this little needle book. Notice the background is, again, the Hungarian stitch. I really like that stitch, it adds great texture.

Stitch Witchery was used to line the inside with fabric and a bit of wool felt created the needle park area.

Another recent stitching doodle became a little pin cushion...

...mounted on a small stuffed pillow.

The needle book and the pin cushion were given to stitching buddy LS as birthday gifts. She was delighted with them. Happy birthday, L!

The last bit of stitching was started on my way to Talladega back in April. It is a Ginnie Thompson Guild design that's Assissi work. I'm going to finish it into a pouch for my digital camera.

And, for the cat lovers out there, here are a couple of recent pictures of Bob.

He's actually bathing, but it looks like he's laughing into his paw.

Ok. That gets me up to day on posting. Y'all have fun.

Making some changes

2010-06-21T20:27:00.002-05:00

I'm working my way up to a post, but got distracted (what else is new?) by some new formatting toys. Still tweaking some settings...

Tutorial: Covered Binder with Needlework Insert

2010-05-25T17:49:00.048-05:00

(Click on any of the images to enlarge for a closer look.)

You need:
an ugly binder
fabric for outside cover
fabric for inside cover
inexpensive muslin fabric for pattern/lining
embroidery piece to use for insert
thin vinyl to cover embroidery (if desired)
1 package extra wide double fold bias tape (3 yds.)
fabric marking pen (or pencil or Sharpie, if you have to)
tracing paper & wheel
masking tape

Make a pattern from the binder by placing it flat on the muslin and tracing the outline directly onto the muslin. Mark 1/2" beyond the traced line on all sides. This is the cutline. Make two of these. One is for the outside cover, the other for the inside cover. On the one for the inside cover, mark the spine folds - top and bottom - and then use a straight edge to draw lines to connect these marks.
If your binder is like mine and the rings are mounted to the righthand cover, you will need to cut one more pattern for the spine. Mark at the top and bottom where the spine folds and use a straight edge to connect these marks. Add 1" on each side and 1/2" top and bottom for the cutline.

If you are going to add a piece of needlework to the front cover, now is the time to figure out where it goes. This tutorial shows the emboirdery centered on the front cover. Measure the height and width of the portion of the needlework that you want to show - don't forget to allow for a border (I used 1/4") - for example, 6 1/2" wide and 8" high. The front cover of this binder is 10 3/4" wide and 11 5/8" high. To center the piece horizontally, calculate the left and right margins for the front cover as coverWidth - needleworkWidth / 2, or

10 3/4 - 6 1/2 = 4 1/4 / 2 = 2 1/8" left & right margins

Calculate the top and bottom margins using the same formula.

11 5/8 - 8 = 3 5/8 / 2 = 1 13/16" top & bottom margins

Using the left/right and top/bottom margins, mark the rectangle for the needlework on the front cover muslin pattern only. Carefully cut away the rectangle. Save the piece you cut out. It will be used as a pattern for cutting the vinyl.

Pin the front cover muslin pattern to the front cover fabric being careful to keep the rectangular hole rectangular. If your fabric has a pattern, play with the placement of the hole until you are pleased with how it will frame your needlework.

Cut the front cover fabric. Do not cut out the rectangular hole in the cover fabric.

Using the cut-away rectangle pattern, position it on the vinyl so that there is at least 1" of bare vinyl beyond each edge. Tape the pattern to the vinyl, if necessary, but don't use pins since the holes they leave will be permanent. Cut the vinyl and set it aside.

Pin the second muslin pattern to the inside cover fabric and cut along the cutline. If your binder has the rings on the spine, cut up the middle of the spine section to give you the left and right inside covers plus seam allowance. (Note: if this is a narrow binder, go ahead and cut up the middle to divide the left and right halves, but know that your inside cover won't come all the way to the spine fold. If this bothers you, make separate patterns for the left and right inside covers.) If you made a third pattern for the spine, cut it now, too.

Using tracing paper and a tracing wheel mark the location of the spine folds on the wrong side of the left and right inside cover fabric and your spine piece, if you have one.

If you don't want an inside pocket, skip this part. I used a scrap of the outside cover fabric for the pocket. Cut the fabric so that the top edge is straight and it is as wide as the left inside cover plus its seam allowance.

If you are using a pre-quilted material, mark the spine fold edge and pick out the quilting to the right of the seam allowance. Cut away the batting and the bottom fabric to keep the folded seam from being too bulky.

Sew bias tape to the top edge of the extra pocket. Remember to sew on the short edge of the bias tape.

If possible, position your needle to the left when stitching this edge.

OK, pocketless people, welcome back. Now it's time to trim the embroidery down to size. If your work is on a woven fabric like aida, a tea towel or canvas, use a measuring tape or ruler to mark 1" beyond the visible edge of the embroidery (what you'll see in the window) and cut out along those marks. If the needlework is on an even weave fabric like linen or Lugana here's the easy way to cut even edges: Take your tape measure and find the spot 1" beyond the visible edge of the embroidery.

Take sharp scissors and lift a vertical thread if you're marking the right or left side, or a horizontal thread if you're marking the top or bottom side. Snip that thread.

Use a needle to unweave that thread until there is enough for you to grab it.

Pull it all the way out of the fabric.

Do the same with the other half of the cut thread.

Repeat on all four sides.

Now you have straight lines to cut; just cut where the thread used to be.

All the pieces have been cut out and we're ready to start sewing in earnest.

One nice thing about using muslin for the pattern is that you can also use it for a lining by just moving it from the right side of the fabric to the wrong side. The fabric I used for the inside cover was somewhat lightweight so the muslin gave it some extra body and made it more opaque. If that's the case with your inside fabric, you can do the same thing prior to sewing the seams.

If you made a pocket piece pin it to the front of the left inside cover and treat it as part of that piece when folding edges.

On the left and right inside cover pieces and the spine piece, if you have one, fold on the marked spine fold lines with wrong sides together.

Fold again so the raw edge is now at the spine fold.

Iron the seams so you'll have nice sharp edges on your seams.

Sew close to the edge but be sure you catch all three layers.

Put these pieces aside.

Take a straight edge and mark the diagonal from each corner of the rectangular needlework window on the front cover.

If you have a rotary blade, you can go ahead and cut the diagonal; otherwise, take your scissors and cut on the marked line. Either way, be very careful not to cut past the corners.

Unless you are very sure with a rotary cutter, it may be best to stop a little bit away from the corner and complete the cut with scissors.

Remove the muslin pattern from the front cover. Turn the front cover over, face down. Take each of the 4 triangular flaps and fold them over to the back, making a straight line at the base.

Pin in place.

Position the vinyl so that it covers the window and tape it in place. Guess-timate where the needlework should go and tape it in place. Now comes the fiddly part of adjusting the position of the needlework so it looks good in the window. Flip the cover to the front, check it out and make adjustments on the back. When you have it to your liking, tape the needlework down, all the way around to hold it securely in place.

From the front, sew around all four sides of the window, close to its edge.

You'll be sewing down the triangle flaps, the vinyl and the needlework. Take your time and try to keep the seams even on each edge.

Remove the tape from the needlework and the vinyl.

Remove the pins from the flaps. Trim the needlework, vinyl and flaps to about 1/2" from the window seam.

Turn the outside cover face down. Pin the left inside cover in place over the back side of the needlework with the finished edge to the right. (Don't pin through the window area or you'll ruin the needlework and the vinyl.)

Pin the right inside cover in place with the finished seam to the left.

If you've got a spine cover, pin it in place, too.

Flip the cover over to the front. Use the double fold bias tape to enclose all the raw edges.

Make sure the short side of the bias tape is on top. (If you look at the bias tape the edges aren't the same, one side is a bit shorter than the other; that's the side you sew on.) Place your pins so that you will be sewing the bias tape clockwise.

This will keep the bulk of the cover to the outside of the sewing machine while you are sewing. (I didn't do that way and regretted every moment because it was all bunched up to the right of the needle.) The picture has been flipped to show pinning in the correct direction.

Once all the bias tape has been pinned down, commence to sewing all the way around. Remove your pins, snip your loose threads and slide your new cover on to that formerly ugly binder and you're done!

Enjoy your fabulous new, covered binder!

I wrote this tutorial back in January 2010 and posted it over on Craftster. I'm posting it over here to reach more folks and hope this is helpful to someone.

May TUSAL and various other things

2010-05-23T16:17:00.021-05:00

Summer seems to have arrived this weekend. It's in the 90s and I hate it. Fall can't get here soon enough to suit me.

Again, I'm late. Here's my TUSAL progress shot for May. I'm worried about Yoyo, our gracious hostess for the Totally Useless Stitch-a-long. She hasn't posted since mid-April and I pray everything is ok for her.

My first feral kitty recently turned 3. She's the only one that I could tame because she came to us at two weeks old with wobbly legs and eyes barely open and a tilted head. She'd been abandoned by her mama. She went to the office with me so I could bottle feed her. With the help of the vet, she overcame her head tilt and grew into a very handsome kitty. She's a great pet and companion for Pookie. What became of Momcat? I was able to trap her and the two other kittens (a boy and a girl), got them spayed and neutered and they now live happily as barn cats in a rural town. Don't you love a tale with a happy ending?

This is my first attempt at framing. It turned out fairly well, at least on the front and for something I'm going to keep. If it were to be a gift, it would need somemore work on the back. If you're ever at my home, please don't peek behind it. Not pretty.

Here's a nature shot. I found Ms. Spider in the bushes and she agreed to having her picture taken. There was a red chevron on her back but it didn't show up in the photo. No, it wasn't a Black Widow, but I don't know what type it is.

I recently got a kumihimo kit from a mail order house. My ADD prevents me from telling you the name of the company. It has totally slipped my brain. This craft looks a lot like the friendship bracelets that kids used to wear. I can't say for sure because I was too old to be making them when they were in vogue. Now that I'm older and really don't care what anyone thinks, I'm trying this out as a new craft, mostly because I need some braid to go around the mushroom tin I made in Cincy with PP a while back.

This was a very relaxing craft once I got the hang of the pattern. This sample braid was made using cording that came with the kit. When I make braid for the mushroom tin I'll be using embroidery floss instead so it will be much smaller. The left side of the braid is the back, the right side, the front. For my money, I find the back side more pleasing and interesting than the front.

My lastest completed crafty endeavor was a purse/tote made from a very cool Tripp NYC mini skirt. This was a gift for someone I know. Most people at the party throught it was very cool, others had a more lukewarm resonse to it. Whatever, I thought it rocked pretty damn hard.

This is the interior pocket trimmed with aluminum dots. The pocket was lined but I forgot to get a picture of the lining.
All of the zipper pulls (two front pockets with zippers, and the zipper in the back) were these awesome skull & cross bones. I thought that the hot pink with skulls was a great, unexpected combination. The skirt was probably a once in a life time thrift find and I enjoyed making the bag.

Nashville

2010-05-05T13:43:00.004-05:00

The beautiful city of Nashville has been my home for over 44 years. This past weekend we, the citizens of Middle Tennessee, experienced the worst rain storms in our history. This wasn't connected to a hurricane, it was just supposed to be strong thunderstorms. No big deal for the Southeast, we get them all the time in the spring and summer. Heck, we even deal with tornados with little warning.

But the tornados are somewhat isolated, they don't effect a third of a state. The storms dumped more water on us in a 48 hour period than had ever happened before. And it caught everyone by surprise.

Billions of dollars of damage has been done. Nineteen lives were lost - at last count. There may be more once the waters recede. It will take months, perhaps years, for things to go back to normal. But they will.

My brother sent me a link to an essay by Patten Fuqua, on the blog Section 303, which is usually devoted to the Nashville Predators hockey news and commentary. This beautiful essay, We Are Nashville, sums up what happened to Nashville - and why you may or may not even be aware of the scope of this disaster - in the most eloquent way I've yet to read.

And a haunting video, documenting the situation as of May 2. It got worse.

Say it loud, say it proud: We Are Nashville!

Weather and purple hair

2010-05-01T22:31:00.006-05:00

So last weekend, I dodged tornados in northern Alabama to go to Redneck Mecca and watch the race at Talladega. We sat waaaay over toward Turn 1, just a bit past the start finish line. There is a tiny red arrow attempting to point to our general location.

We were way up in the nose bleed section - good seats actually. Great race, didn't care for the winner, but he did it the old fashion way and slingshotted himself into victory lane.

This weekend, just because I wanted to, I dyed part of my hair purple. I'm lovin' it. Thanks, PP, for the hair color! I'll probably do more went this fades a bit.

Last weekend it was tornados in Alabama, this weekend it's tornados and flooding at home. This is unlike anything I've seen here in I don't know when. The local news had pictures of dozens of cars and trucks submerged in water that covered one of the local interstates. Even from my front porch I've never seen water this high in the 26 years we'be been at this location.

Last time I saw the neighbor's trash can, it had sailed half a block away and then took a left down a flooded stream. They'll probably never see it again.

Everyone stay warm and safe and dry!

TUSAL for April

2010-04-18T15:26:00.012-05:00

It's new moon time again (plus a few days) and that means it's time to post my progress in Dragon My Needle's Totally Useless Stitch-A-Long. This month, instead of embroidery floss and a cheerful kitty I present cotton yarn and a sour puss. (Really, Bob, I'm sorry about that incident earlier in the day.)

The needles I usually work with are about 1 1/4 inches long. I like the petites since you can stitch longer without reloading.

The needle I've been working with lately, though, is 5 inches long. Some difference, huh?

A friend's late mama was a crafty woman and he let me go through her stash and take what I wanted. One of the items was an old Weave-It loom. I had never used one before but it looked like something fun to try. This loom was first invented in the early 1930's by Donald Simonds but this one is probably from the 1950's - around the time she would have been starting married life. [Note: The more modern (circa 1998) Weavette loom was produced by Licia Comforti's Buxton Brook store after she bought rights to manufacture it. There's an article in the March/April 2010 Piecework magazine featuring Weave-It work.] The box contained the 4"x4" loom and instruction sheet but did not have a weaving needle. The LNS had a 5 inch weaving needle that seems to work fine, though a 6 inch one would be better.

I purchase several balls of Sugar'n Cream cotton yarn for weaving. It works well and had a good hand when completed. The 120 yard balls are good for 13 squares and a bit left over. I used the leftovers to make a multicolored square. Looks nice but I didn't enjoy tying off the ends to change colors. Oh, well. Got'sta take the bad with the good. I'm half way through the second ball (the third one is pink) and realize that it will take a few more balls to make the afghan I'm shooting for. I'll post pictures when I've got something to show for it.

Oh, and one other thing about these little squares: they make a lovely 9 count even weave fabric. I see embroidering (or at least cross-stitching) on these in the future!

TUSAL for March and a Craft Weekend

2010-03-18T21:35:00.024-05:00

Whoops. I'm getting really bad at posting my TUSAL in a timely manner. My excuse this time is I was in Cincinnati over the weekend and went to bed early Monday trying to get over the triple whammy of time change for daylight saving time and Eastern time back to Central and not getting to bed before 4am all weekend. Yeah, lame, but that's what I've got to offer. The drab offerings in the TUSAL bottle are all dark brown and all from the "Get Over" piece I finished earlier this month. I need to do some more stitching to get some more goodies in my bottle. The TUSAL really is fun...and you can join in over at Yoyo's Dragon My Needle.

My trip to Cinci was to meet PP for the first time. We've been email buddies for over five years and we'd never spoken in all that time. On a whim, we decided to meet before the busy season for PP at work. We spent the weekend doing wonderful things like crafting, shopping for craft supplies and poking around in thrift stores. Weekends don't get much better than that!

PP is very good at paper crafts such as ATCs (Artist Trading Cards that are the size of baseball cards) and inchies (one inch squares.) She brought tons of paper crafting supplies to the weekend meet up and we had a blast using them.

Lucky for us, the tables in our hotel rooms were on casters. To make for a perfect crafting environment, some remodeling was called for. We rolled the table and chair from P's room down to mine and positioned them back to back. We then spread out and let the fun begin.

I hadn't done any modern paper crafting, ATCs and Inchies were new to me. P was very patient, showing me how to do things, how inks were used, and all the hows and whys of using the tools and supplies for paper crafting and stamping. This is my first ATC. The picture was one that I found at Foundmagazine.com (link to picture here) many moons ago. I love this picture and it was what first came to mind when thinking of making an ATC. I'm pleased with the outcome and may frame it. 8D

We also made some inchies. As the name indicates, they are one inch square little bits of art. As with ATCs, there are no rules - it's art and art should have no rules. In addition to all the goodies P brought for crafting, we had a bonanza of pictures and words from travel brochures we picked up in the hotel lobby and a few from a rest area I visited on the way to Cinci.

After a day of shopping and some lunch at a disappointing Chinese buffet, we went back to the hotel and I taught P how to do punchneedle embroidery. Most of the time P + sharp needles = blood and cussing (her words, not mine) but she and punchneedle got along well. I had kitted up a little punchneedle project for her with punchneedle tools, an embroidery hoop, fabrics, flosses and a Camel Snus tin. I free-handed a few mushrooms and used a transfer pencil to put them on weaver's cloth. After showing P the basics, she easily got the hang of punchneedle embroidery and created a sweet mushroom with a blue cap with green spots and brown gills. We finished the project ~~Saturday evening~~ Sunday morning and I gave her a quick little lesson in finishing it into a topper for the Camel Snus tin. P plans to add some cute little pom-pom trim and possibly some blue rickrack to her tin.

Here's my punchneedle project. It does need a bit of braid or cording around the edge, but it's still cute - even if I do say so myself.

After finishing the tin, we cleaned up and packed up all the supplies and rolled P's furniture back to her room. Housekeeping was none the wiser to our redecorating.

Oh, kudos to the Drury Inn where we stayed. Very nice hotel with a manager's reception and free mixed drinks (or wine or beer or soft drinks) and food (hot dogs, chili, chip & salsa, salad, baked potatoes and veggies) in the evening and free breakfast in the morning (not that we got up in time to eat breakfast.) All for a very reasonable price. Two thumbs up!

Awesome weekend with an awesome friend! Thanks, P!

Words to Live By

2010-03-03T20:59:00.004-06:00

I'm so happy February is over. I grieved for the passing of Captain Phil Harris, watched my guy (Ryan Newman) get taken out toward the end of the Daytona 500 (on TV not IRL) and watched as much of the Olympics as I could, including the USA losing to Canada in the gold medal hockey game.

On to better things in March.

While watching the Olympics I started and finished a project that I designed a while back. Friend DP had given me some great overdyed fabric as a gift and I'd misplaced it for a, erm, let's just say a while. I really wanted to use it on this project. It had the look of old, damaged parachment. That, and dark brown overdyed floss (with the look of old ink,) seemed to be just the thing for my latest project.

These words I first heard from my late friend, ES. They seemed like good ones to hold on to and to permanently enshrine in stitching.

So, now I'll just get over February and look forward to the rest of March.

TUSAL for February

2010-02-14T22:53:00.004-06:00

February is the armpit of the year. For some reason, February always ends up putting me in a foul mood. Can't really say why since this year because nothing really has gone wrong or happened that was bad. I'm just cranky.

But I have been stitching, mostly working on an original pattern. I'll post the finished piece when I'm done since I don't really like posting progress pictures. Though I did take one the other day because it was somewhat amusing. You'll see later. Appropriately, most of the stitching I've been doing is with a dark brown so that's what's new in the TUSAL jar.

Fiftieth post

2010-01-24T21:28:00.005-06:00

Just returned from a needlework class/retreat in St. Augustine, Florida. Have I mentioned that's one of the places I want to live when I win the lottery? The class was a lot of fun and we worked on some fun projects. The camera didn't make the trip with me, so no photos. Too bad. The surf, rolling in from the Atlantic, was rather awesome. Pookie went with me. He spent most of the time palling around with B & T and had a great time while I was in class.

On Saturday afternoon a handful of us when to the Lightner Museum, close to the Bride of Lions in St. Augustine. Otto Lightner was a tycoon from Chicago that made money during the Depression. He published a magazine titled Hobbies and it seems one of his was collecting. For his health, his doctor thought getting out of Chicato would be a good thing. While in St. Augustine, he noticed that there was a larger, empty hotel across from the hotel where he was staying. He thought it would be a perfect place to store/hold/show his many and varied collections. So, he bought it around 1948. Unfortunately, he died in 1950, but he left his collections and the building to the city of St. Augustine. What we went specifically to see were some beautiful antique needlework pieces, a fabulous button collection, and lovely antique laces. There was also a wealth of antique furniture and stunning glass and mineral displays. There was a LOT of stuff we didn't get around to seeing. I tried to talk Pookie into going back to day to do more looking, but he was having none of that.

Hmmm. Just notice this is the 50th post of the blog. Ay, ay, ay. They grow up so fast. That's at least 40 posts more than I ever thought would be in here. Big hug to Yoyo and all the TUSAL folks for getting me back to blogging.

Enjoy your week and keep warm and dry.

January TUSAL

2010-01-19T22:13:00.003-06:00

I blew it. The first TUSAL for the new year and I missed the date. Phbbbbt. Well, better late than never. I could cop out to excuses of being busy at work and writing a tutorial (I'll post here soon) but, gee whiz, I just plain forgot. Most of the orts were generated by the Pat Rogers sampler. There are also some finishing snips from creating the covered binder.

Like the new quart size jar? Since last year's bottle was so full after just seven months, I figured the bigger size would be a good change when shooting for a full year of clippings.

Idea Binder

2010-01-12T21:54:00.004-06:00

I have a binder that started its life ten years ago holding seminar materials for a software development conference. Not a very pretty thing to hold ideas and charts for future (and past) needlework ideas, but it was still in good working order. Besides, it couldn't help it if it had non-inspiring printing on it. So, I decided to doll it up a bit.

Presenting the new and improved Idea Binder!

I spent the weekend working on this idea and bringing it to life. Do you know how scary it is to take a nice sampler and start pinning, sewing and cutting on it? I learned that it is better to tape down the vinyl and needlework and then sew the opening than it is to trying pinning it all down. Trust me on this one. The tape worked so much better!

All the work was documented in pictures, I may do a tutorial on it in the future, but now, I just want to enjoy it and reload all the ideas.

First finish for 2010

2010-01-09T14:48:00.003-06:00

Here 'tis: my first finish for 2010. This is Pat Rogers' Counted Collection A Lady's Alphabet, mentioned a couple of posts ago. This sampler gave my TUSAL bottle a nice start for the new year.

The designer's notes on the pattern mentioned that the omission of the letter V was intentional. Samplers were used as teaching vehicles in earlier times and since fabric and thread were precious, one would try to conserve and not duplicate lessons. Since the V is incorporated in the W, the V was some times omitted. Ms. Rogers did provide a chart that included the letter V, but I chose to go with the original design.

I've got an interesting finishing idea for this piece and I'll post it when it is completed.

Insomnia post

2010-01-09T00:53:00.014-06:00

I almost always have trouble going to sleep at a decent hour, but diphenhydramine an hour before bedtime helps. Only problem is I have to remember to take it. On those occassions when I forget, I'm up until an hour after I do remember. Meh. Thank you, A&E, for Criminal Minds reruns.

The last of the handcrafted Christmas gifts has been delivered. It was a Lori Birmingham design for a scissor case and fob. The actual needlework had been finished for a while and dear friend PP even gave me some fabric perfect for the lining. What was missing was the actual finishing work and I admit I was scared of it. On second thought, scared for it would better describe my feelings. It was such a pretty thing, I was sure that badness would occur and it would be ruined while I was finishing it.

As it was, my fears were unfounded and it turned out pretty well. Oddly, the lining fabric - which is actually a lavendar color - looks way too blue in the pictures. All the rest of the colors appear true, so I'm not sure what's up with the color difference on just the lining.

I love to learn new stitches and techniques when working on projects and this project did not let me down. Interlocked slanted queen stiches were used to make a lovely lacey pattern on the scissor case. Click on the pictures to get a better look. I also loved the double running stitch laced with gold blending filament. Those can be found beneath the point on the front and in a square around the heart motif on the back.

Ok, I've got to ask: do you strip the white part away from the blending filament before you use it? I do and dont' seem to have much problem getting the filament to behave. I've had folks tell me I'm doing it wrong but, hey, if it works don't fix it! That being said, I'd still love to hear other opinions about working with blending filament and what works for you.

I really like the way the closure was worked: satin stitches were used to outline two adjacent rectangles. The interior was cut away and ribbon threaded through. A heart-shaped Swarovski AB crystal was hung from the point of the cover flap and the ribbons are tied over it. Very pretty and clever.

The fob was a bit of a challenge. I'm used to finishing fobs using the same evenweave material front and back. That makes them easier to join together. This time, though, I used the lining fabric as the backing for the fob and had to break out the sewing machine. That almost felt like cheating, but it was the only way I could see to join the two different fabrics neatly together.

Ok, the diphenhydramine has kicked in; bedtime has arrived!

Happy New Year!

2010-01-01T09:40:00.005-06:00

It's hard to believe it's 2010. Isn't that the title of a science fiction novel? Let's hope it doesn't turn into a horror show.

I spent a quiet evening at home stitching on a new project: "A Lady's Alphabet" by Pat Rogers. Several years ago I bought the pattern - already kitted up with fabric and floss - at the estate sale of a lady from Knoxville. The design is copyright 1992, not current but not old enough to be called retro or vintage, either. It was just something in my stash and I needed a new project.

Many years ago, I made a resolution to not make resolutions and it's the only one I ever kept. So, no resolutions to not buy stash or only to stitch from my stash - that's unrealistic for me - but I will make an effort to cut down on purchasing new projects and work the ones I already have.

So, enjoy a nap, a football game or stitching time. Happy new year to all!

Gifts for stitchy people and a tutorial

2009-12-25T21:49:00.034-06:00

Hope everyone had a Merry Christmas - or at least a good day.

This year I made Christmas gifts for my stitching buddies: fabric covered tape measures with matching bottle cap pincushions (thank you to VeryBigJen for her Flickr tutorial on bottle cap pincushions) and personalized magnetic needle books for most everyone. (One gal mostly knits, the other already received a different personalized needle book on an earlier occasion.)

It was a lot of fun to select fabrics, color combinations and buttons that I thought the recipient would find pleasing. It was also fun engineering the magnetic needle books. There were a few false starts on those but I finally worked it out. Would you like to see the process? Here's a tutorial on making the needle books:

Fidget's Magnetic Needlebook

What you'll need:
fabric for exterior
fabric for interior
iron-on interfacing
flat flexible magnets
sharp scissors
tweezers
iron
a sewing machine or hand needle and thread
Aleene's Jewel-It glue or a multi-purpose glue that works with fabric

Getting ready:

Cut two pieces of fabric 2 5/8" by 3 1/2". One piece is for the exterior where the stitching will be done - if you want stitching. The second piece is the interior and will be mostly covered by the magnets. Use the same material for both or don't. Do what makes you happy!

Cut four pieces of iron-on interfacing about 1" by 1 1/4". This is roughly the size of each face of the needlebook less the top-stitched edge. Adjust the size so that there is about a 1/4" open border around the edges of the material and about a 1/4" in the middle for folding.

Cut two magnetic strips 1" wide by 1 3/4" long. I bought a roll of magnetic tape that was 1" wide, so that part was easy. Unless you're making many needlebooks or have a use for the excess magnetic tape, buying a roll may not make sense. You could use the flat magnets that you find with advertising and/or calendars on them but because these are thinner you'll need to either adjust the size of the magnet (make it a bit wider) or the size of the needle book faces (make them narrower.)

If you want to add stitching to your needlebook, now's the time to do it. I centered the stitching on the bottom half of the exterior fabric so that it would be on the front cover once assembled.

Putting it all together:

Flip the interior and exterior pieces over and position the interfacing in the four quadrants of the fabric. Be sure the interfacing is bumpy side down so that it fuses with the fabric, not your iron. Iron the interfacing according to the manufacturer's instructions.

Match the interior and exterior fabrics right sides together and pin in place. Sew completely around all four edges.

Trim the seams and angle the corners. Flip the piece over so you're looking at the interior side. Take your sharp scissors and cut a slit in the center of the interfacing on one side. Make the slit large enough to turn the piece but don't go all the way to the edges. Don't worry, we'll cover the hole later.

Use your tweezers to reach into the slit and grab a corner. Gently pull the fabric and turn it right side out. Use the tweezers to poke the corners out, but be careful not to poke through the seam.

Press the piece flat.

Top stitch about 1/8" from the edge of the needlebook on all four sides. I found it easiest to set the needle position to the left and stitch counter-clockwise (or to the right and stitch clockwise) instead of at center. This allows both feeddogs to move the fabric instead of just one if you tried to stitch that close to the edge from the center needle position. Trim any loose threads.

Put the magnet faces together. If you're using a tape or flat magnet that has sticky sides, put the sticky sides to the outside - but don't peel off the backing yet. If you're using an advertisement or calender magnet, put the printed side out. Test fit the magnets to the inside of the needlebook and make any necessary adjustments to the size of the magnets. Remember to try closing the needlebook. Once you're happy with how they will sit, peel off the backing on one of the magnets and put a drop of glue on the sticky side...

and use your finger to spread it around to all the edges.

Turn the magnet sandwich over and position the gluey side inside the needlebook. I usually do the side with the slit first.

Peel off the second backing paper and apply the glue in a similar manner.

Press closed and wait for it to dry.

Taa-daa! You're done!

Add needles and repeat as necessary.

Kitty Pillow

2009-12-22T22:02:00.008-06:00

(Click the pictures to see larger versions.)

Stitching buddy BS had a birthday on Monday. In addition to loving to stitch, B loves cats. This pillow made her happy. It's the first crewel I've done in years, no, probably decades - yup, just like riding a bicycle - and it was a nice change of pace from flossy embroidery. The orginal backing material was a lime linen, but I like the floral canvas from Jo Ann's better. Happy birthday, B!

Final TUSAL for 2009

2009-12-17T20:25:00.004-06:00

Oh, no! Just realized that yesterday was the New Moon, and that means it's time for the Totally Useless Stitch-a-long hosted by the lovely Yoyo at Dragon My Needle. And it wasn't just any old new moon: it was the final one for 2009 - time to start a new ort bottle. And just in time as the one I'd selected for this year is about full. I'm planning on going to the hardware store and buying a cork for it. It will look great sitting on a shelf in my craftroom. Along with TUSAL bottle is the wee little Waste-Knot-Whatnot. There are a lot of black knots from AC's 15-sided biscornu and plenty of white ones from as yet disclosed gifts.

Yoyo has graciously agreed to host the 2010 TUSAL - thank you! To join in the fun, you have to go HERE to sign up. C'mon! Join the fun!

All she wanted for Christmas was a new right hip

2009-12-15T19:58:00.002-06:00

Today, Mama got what she's needed for a long time: a new right hip. The doctor said the surgery went well and all the new parts were a good fit. She's in good spirits and feeling pretty good, considering. Here's to Mama and her new hip and pain-free days ahead in 2010!

Baby's Better and Birthday Crafting

2009-12-10T23:22:00.023-06:00

The baby netbook is all better now - and it didn't cost a fortune. Luckily, there wasn't anything on the netbook that wasn't on another computer or storage device somewhere else, so it didn't matter if I had to start from zero. My netbook had a recovery disk that allowed me to reset the netbook back to factory specs, as if it had just came out of the box. So that's what I did. And you can bet your boots that the first thing loaded onto the virginal netbook was anti-virus software!

Some of the December birthdays have happened so I can show off what I made for AC and DP, who happen to share a birthday. These were the items I was wanting to crow about in the November 30 post.

. . . . . . . .
AC is a lover of bright green and tchotchkes and I wanted to try my hand at blackwork and making a 15-sided biscornu. Anita, at Stitch Creations, had created beautiful patterns for blackwork squares and instructions for making a 15-sided biscornu. The pictures for assembling the biscornu were so perfect that it didn't matter I don't speak or read a word of Dutch - stitching is a universal language! So, I started the blackwork on the trip to Alaska and finished it last month. Thanks, Anita! AC loved it and I loved making it for her.

DP is fond of frogs and I'm fond of making quirky things out of the mundane. This cute little frog caught my eye last spring and I knew I had to make something out of it for DP. It was hollow and had a hole in the base so it just about screamed Orts! to me. I took a paper mache box, stained it with a food coloring wash, rubbed it with gold paint to pick up the texture on the box, varnished it, applied some rub-on transfers and lined it with cloth. A hole was carved into the lid and Mr. Froggie glued onto it. The lid lining was extended up into the cavity so it all flowed together. It looked good on paper, looked good put together, but I haven't heard from DP yet if it actually works as designed. Sure hope so but if not, it's still cute.

Grumble, grumble

2009-12-08T13:45:00.001-06:00

I'm running behind on postings because my new baby netbook caught a virus - all because I was stupid and didn't load anti-virus software on it. Grrrrrr Totally my bad. I hope to get something posted from my laptop soon.

Finishing Up

2009-11-30T22:38:00.004-06:00

All of my stitching/crafting efforts of late have been directed to finishing gifts (birthday and Christmas) for friends and relatives. The final touches were added to the _____ for ______ and the ______ for _______. Sorry, can't blow the surprise. I'm happy I remembered to take pictures of the finishes so I can post them (later) here on the blog. For right now, all you get is this:

Back in the Real World

2009-11-28T10:39:00.010-06:00

Pookie and I had a marvelous mid-November vacation in Florida. First stop was a weekend at Treasure Island. We watched a beautiful sunset on the Gulf of Mexico...

...crashed a wedding on the beach (along with a few other beach bums)...

...and I had a great time at a needlework class taught by Susan Greening Davis while Pookie relaxed.

Then we went to the Atlantic coast and watched the launch of Space Shuttle Atlantis from the Kennedy Space Flight Visitor Center. It was so much brighter than it appears on TV. The only thing I could compare it to would be burning magnesium. It was a bit disappointing that it wasn't louder, but we were 7 miles from the launch pad so it's understandable.

Next, we spent a few days in Orlando, mostly at Seaworld. I'd been to the one in San Antonio, but this was a first for Pookie. We saw all the shows (some twice), fed shrimp to some rays and generally had a good time. One unexpected and fun show featured dogs and cats adopted from shelters and rescue operations. They were very highly trained and their show was like watching a living Rube Goldberg machine in action.

Heading south, we visited with some of Pookie's relative and overnighted in Ft. Lauderdale. The next morning, with a kiss and a wave good-bye, I put Pookie on a plane and sent him home. BFF CD was driving down for the races and picked me up the airport (probably before Pookie was even through the security check point) and we headed for the NASCAR season finale at Homestead-Miami Speedway. Jimmie Johnson (CD's guy) won the championship for a unprecedented fourth time. She was happy about that but would have prefered the champion had been Mark Martin. One of my guys, Denny Hamlin, won the Cup race for the weekend and I was happy about that. So we both got to have a happy.

CD then put me on a plane to return to the real world and the job that goes with it. sigh I really, really need to win that lottery so it can be vacation time all the time!

TUSAL for November

2009-11-16T08:00:00.004-06:00

Yoyo over at Dragon My Needle pulled a nifty trick on her blog recently: she wrote a blog entry and posted it later at a predetermined time without being online. *gasp!* I was amazed since I didn't know that was possible. So, being the inquisitive type, I did a bit of poking around, found the Post Options link and am making use of this feature at this time - I hope. There's every possibility I goofed and this post will happen in mid-February. Pookie and I are on the road right now (the now for when this post should be posted as opposed to the now when I'm typing this), and looking into my crystal ball, I see we are having an awesome time and are on our way to watch the launch of space shuttle Atlantis.

It's the new moon and time for the TUSAL for November. The bottle is getting rather full, no? The little bitty bottle is the current Waste Knot Whatnot. I've been doing crewel embroidery lately and that accounts for most of the orts and the waste knots growth over the last month. Sorry, can't show the project at this time as it is a birthday gift for a friend, though I will post pictures of the finished product after it's been delivered. And don't forget, it's never too late to join the fun and sign on for the Totally Useless Stitch-a-long.

Bob is just so photogenic, I can't resist posting this recent picture of him. Enjoy that which is the Bob.

In the air and on the road

2009-11-12T13:14:00.002-06:00

The new and improved mobile version of Pookie and I are traveling again as of tomorrow. This time we're headed in the opposite direction - Florida! I'll be learning great new stitching techniques from Susan Greening Davis while Pookie amuses himself in (or at least near) the Gulf of Mexico. We're planning on watching the launch of STS-129 (it's Atlantis this time)at the Kennedy Space Center on the 16th and after that we're foot loose and fancy free. Don't know what we'll do or where we'll end up but we'll be having fun in the sun!

Finished Stitch Book

2009-10-31T16:46:00.006-05:00

Boo, y'all!

For the past week, all my crafting energies have been directed to making Christmas gifts. Since I'm not sure who looks at my blog, this is all that gets shown at this time. I'll post real pictures after the holidays.

I did finish the Susan Greening Davis design Susan's Needlebook of Stitches. Here's a picture of the assembled book. All fourteen pages are bound with ribbon. Even though no stitches have been documented, I'm very pleased with the results. I've designed what I want for the back cover, but it will have to wait until I'm finished with all my holiday/birthday crafting.

When I was stitching the cover, there was a point when I was reloading the needle and took a look - a real look - at what I had sitting in my lap. "My stitches are filled with me" Ain't that the truth? It was just a fluke that I needed to reload at that point, but I'm glad I saw it and captured the image.

Here's a detail shot of the ribbon rose and "doo-dah" from the cover. When you attend a class with Susan Greening Davis, you're given a charm at the end of each class. In addition to the charm she selects for a class, the little scissors are the customary charm for first time students. Susan has taught me so much about stitching and the history associated with it, and I'm so grateful for it. For this reason, I put my first class charm on this project and it makes the project that much more special. I hope that some day this book teaches someone else.

In addition to being Halloween, today is Caturday! So, I'll leave you with a picture of the ever charming and loving Bob.

TUSAL for October and something new

2009-10-18T22:31:00.005-05:00

The New Moon is upon us and it's time to post a progress picture of my TUSAL orts bottle. The orts that have been added come from the SGD project I've been working on diligently. There's a new #8 perle cotton #738 ball label in the jar. For those of you at home keeping count, that's the second one. It's getting really full and should be overflowing by the end of the year.

See the little bottle sitting next to the TUSAL bottle? That's something new I've started: a waste knot whatnot. The vial is about 2 inches tall and 7/8 inch wide. I tend to use waste knots to start my stitching and just stitch over the thread/floss to secure it. The waste knot whatnot has only been in action for a few days but I'm liking it so far and look forward to a little bottle full of colorful knots. Too bad I didn't think of saving them earlier. Ok, they were saved - in the TUSAL bottle - just not separately.

Today's stitching was on the cover for Susan's Needlebook of Stitches and that added some color to the orts bottle. There are a few more specialty stitches to be done, and seven pages need some eyelets and then it's time to assemble it. Pictures will follow when it's all together. I like posting pictures of things that are done; progress pictures, enh, not so much.

With the holiday season fast approaching, Susan's Needlebook of Stitches stitch documention may have to wait a while. It's getting really close to time to start the ol' creative juices flowing for gift ideas.

Cat walking

2009-10-15T08:16:00.011-05:00

Buying a cat walking jacket from MetPet was probably the best thing I've ever done for Bob. He loves it! And it took surprisingly little time for him to learn that if he tolerates getting the jacket on that he gets to go outside and sniff, sniff, sniff. Our walks haven't gone far - just around the yard - but for Bob it's all about smelling what's been going on.

"Does this jacket make my butt look big?"

Sniffing the bushes, reading the p-mail.

"Who's been here?"

"What do you mean 'time to go in?'"

Rainy Tuesday

2009-10-13T21:43:00.004-05:00

I got a nice surprise in the mail: a $10 check from the State Fair Creative Arts department. That's $6 for the second place sampler and $4 for the one that placed third. I think that's rather quaint. Bet those prize moneys haven't been updated in a coon's age.

In the not so nice department, the city of Nashville no longer wants to foot the bill for the State Fair so this last one really may be The. Last. One. It was nice to have the experience of participating in it.

No stitching since the weekend. I've been mulling over the placement of the eyelets and haven't reached a firm conclusion. The original design called for two eyelets on each page and a ribbon run through both, tied on the front. That's great if you've just got a few or even several pages, but I'm dealing with 14 of those boogers. I'm thinking I need three to four eyelets for a more stable stitching book.

Mull, mull, mull.

Oh, Mr. Stinky II is browsing at the feral cat bowls. The first Mr. Stinky met his demise crossing the street last year, so I know this isn't the same one. Seems like I'm running a soup kitchen for animals these days: Patches, Ginger, Big Yellow Cat, Tabby with White Feet (who I now know is named Ziggy), Patches's Evil Twin, and Tippy, the chubby gray and white cat with the white tip on his tail that lives across the street but always likes to grab a bite or two on my front porch. And sometimes this huge white German sheperd comes by really, really early in the morning and cleans out what little is left in the bowl overnight.

Still here...

2009-10-12T07:26:00.003-05:00

It's been way too long since I last posted. My free evening time has been devoted to stitching on a Susan Greening Davis project Susan's Needlebook of Stitches, a handmade expanable notebook of stitches. I chose to make 14 pages for the notebook and have been working on them since the Alaskan cruise. The end is finally in sight, though, as I put in the final four-sided stitch on page 14 last evening. Now, it's on to the eyelets!

Alaska

2009-09-18T20:40:00.013-05:00

We had a great flight up to Seattle on Southwest. We told the flight attendents we were celebrating our anniversary and wanted everyone else to join in. We had a handful of drink coupons and bought drinks for all who wanted one. The flight attendents made us crowns from drink stir sticks and bags of peanuts and pretzels and a "cake" from a roll of toilet paper.

I love the vacation frame of mind!

We saw mountains...
and glaciers...

and more glaciers.

And all sorts of wild life...

TUSAL for September and Tennessee State Fair

2009-09-18T19:34:00.013-05:00

While cruising in Alaska, I was working on a Susan Greening Davis design on mushroom Lugana with 738 #8 perle cotton - just about the same color as the fabric. The stitching involved pulling threads from the fabric for hem stitching. This meant lots of orts were generated and they were saved in this bag.

I managed to moosh the orts into the small bottle I'm using for Yoyo's TUSAL by compacting it all with the eraser end of a pencil. The label from the ball of perle cotton can be seen in the upper right side of the bottle.

Well, would you look at that? My sampler won second prize at the state fair! I think that's the second ribbon I've ever won. (The first was a blue for a poster in 9th grade - and that ribbon was stolen from the teacher's desk. phbbbt!)
Annnd...I entered a second, smaller piece that also won a ribbon - white for third place. If you'd asked me before this what color was used for third place I couldn't have told you, but now I know.

On the Road, er Sea, Again

2009-08-28T10:01:00.002-05:00

The Wonderful Mr. Fidget, aka Pookie, is taking me on an Alaskan cruise for our bazillionth anniversary. I'm taking several stitching projects with me for working on while flying across this great land and while sitting on our balcony cruising up the Inside Passage. The TUSAL bottle can't/shouldn't go with me so I'm taking a backup travel TUSAL container: a lowly plastic zippy bag. The accumulated orts can be documented and then poked into the official TUSAL bottle.

My new baby netbook is travelling with me so perhaps a post or two may happen while I'm visiting the 49th state. We'll see.

TUSAL for August

2009-08-22T08:20:00.008-05:00

Today is the new moon for August, and just to prove I'm not just a creature of the night, here's a day light shot of my TUSAL bottle. Newly added are a band from DMC #5 perle cotton 4060 (used to make the scissor fob and needlebook), clippings, odd threads, and blue felt from said fob and needlebook, a bit of gold blending filament and some white linen thread used to complete the piece below, and some DMC #8 perle cotton 957 that I was going to use on a new project but have since rejected that choice. To join the fun on Yoyo's Dragon My Needle blog click here or on the TUSAL button on the right.

This is a piece from The Victoria Sampler one of their Beyond Cross Stitch Learning Collection. This one is Level Six #8 -Curled V in a Fan. I love all of Thea Dueck's designs, she's so talented!

This kit was purchased back in 2005 or 2006 so you may have trouble finding it. Most of it was stitched last year; I just recently got around to putting the beads on it. "I've got plans for how to finish it but it will have to get in line," said the Queen of Unfinished Projects.

Here's my beloved Bob, looking all sauve and debonair. Is it any wonder he talked his way into the house a year ago? Can't imagine life without him now.

Weekend crafting

2009-08-16T15:39:00.006-05:00

When I made the fob for my new scissors it took two tries to get the Hardanger how I wanted it. The first attempt was abandoned because, in the zeal to try out the new scissors, I cut all the threads inside the blocks. Rut-row. No wrapped bars for me. At least on that one. Made another, bars were wrapped, beads were added; you know the story. The other one seemed too cute to waste so I made it into a needlebook. Right now it just has one lowly little sewing needle (which is also useable as a beading needle), but now, I've got a set. Ain't that cute?

To celebrate our bazillionth anniversary, Pookie is taking me up to Alaska. I wanted to make a new something to take with me on the trip and for once didn't wait until the night before we were to leave. This time I made a travel wallet to hold all the confirmation papers, my passport and driver's license. I didn't have a pattern or much of a plan, just kinda cobbled it together as ideas came to me. It's not what I'd imagined when I started, but I'm happy with it. The original idea involved a lot more sewing, the finished product involves a lot of Stitch Witchery and glue.

The wallet includes a bit of recycling. The green snaps were from the 1970's stitching stash of a friend's late mother; RIP Mrs. E. And the form of the wallet was achieved by cutting and using bookboard from an old children's book. PP had thrifted many children's books and used the innards for paper crafting. She sent me a nice lot of book covers to use. The original purpose was for covered boxes, but the travel wallet was their first use. Boxes will come later, PP, I promise.

New Scissors, New Fob

2009-08-12T21:32:00.009-05:00

My sweet sister gave me a gift certificate to the LNS for my birthday. I've had it a while and was waiting to use it for some really, really nice Hardanger scissors. They said they had some nice ones coming in early August and, sho'nuff, they did!

Anyone who's read this blog knows I love my Dovos and these are no exception. Their finely honed tip snips right down to the point making cutting the holes in the fabric a breeze. Stitchin' buddy DP doesn't understand how I can take scissors to something I just worked so hard on, but I don't think she gets Hardanger. Or, perhaps she's just afraid of making a bad cut.

New scissors calls for a new fob. The LNS had some pretty yellow 22 ct Hardanger fabric that I picked up on the same shopping trip. The pattern is my own original design, doodled from my imagination. On one side, there are clear Mill Hill Petites nestled between the Scottish stitch/Reverse Scottish stitch blocks; in real life, they look like drops of dew. Once that side was embellished, the other side was calling out for some beads, too. It began with clear AB seed bead inside the Algerian eyelets and inside the Dove's Eyes. While digging in my beads I saw some pretty bugle beads that looked like just the thing to drop next to the wrapped bars. The fob was finished off with a Swarovski AB tear drop and some Delica beads.

I'm pleased with the fob and tickled pink with the new scissors. It's good to create something. I've been in a bit of a crafting funk so this makes my soul happy, making something - actually finishing something - again.

New Finishing Skill

2009-07-25T23:56:00.021-05:00

Last year, I completed this sampler, shown here freshly ironed and taking up most of the ironing board. The sampler, it's a big 'un - 18" x 30" - and there's a lot of stitching in it. And not just cross stitch. All the grass is long and short satin stitch, the center flower is Turkey work and the vines are crewel, the top and bottom bands are rice stitch, the other dividing bands are various other stitches, and I finished it with an antique hem stitch around the whole magilla. It's on 32 ct Glenshee linen and stitched with Rainbow silks (except for the Turkey work and crewel which were done in wool.)

Since the piece was hemmed, it would have to be sewn to a mat board, instead of stretched, to be framed. I decided to try to tackle this myself and Cathy, the framing artist at the LNS, gave me a quick lesson in sewing on to mat board. A couple of weekends ago I started the (seemingly endless) measuring and pinning (and measuring and pinning) of this booger to the mat. (Note: this makes for some sore thumbs.) This morning, I decided to quit piddling around and finish the job.

It soon became apparent that the most important tool of this job was the handy-dandy paper piercer that I found in the scrapbooking section at JoAnn's. See it? It's at the bottom of the picture, between the pin cushion and the mat board and next to the glaring metal ruler. It made poking all those bleepin' holes a much nicer task than using a pushpin or a T-pin. So, with #22 needle and Gennie Thompson Ivory Linen Thread in one hand and the paper piecer in the other, I commenced to marrying sampler to mat.

Here we see one side (and a bit around the corner) done.

Yippe! Twenty inches down and only 76 to go!

And four hours later...taa-dah!

I meant to take the sampler to the LNS tonight to have Cathy the Great complete the framing, but the sampler failed to make it to the car. Rut-row. So now it will have to wait until Monday. Stay tuned to see the final pictures!

TUSAL for July

2009-07-22T18:48:00.007-05:00

Tonight's the new moon and time to post my progress picture for the Totally Useless (but very artful) Stitch-A-Long hosted by Yoyo at DragonMyNeedle. Not a huge amount added this month. I've been stitching mostly with Caron Waterlilies (Jade) and stitching over one on 28 ct (or perhaps 32 ct - I haven't stopped to count it) even-weave. So one ply goes a long way; hence, not a lot of ortage.

I want to show off a beautiful scissor fob my dear friend SU made for me. Isn't it just darling? I'm in total awe of anyone that crochets or knits at all, but start doing the tiny stuff with thread and the little hooks and needle with multiple 0's I just swoon. For Christmas, SU had knitted a mini sweater scissor fob for me. When summer rolled around I took that fob off -- not the season, you know. The next time I saw SU I apologized for not having it on the scissors, it being summer and all. The next week, when I saw SU again, she surprized me with this lovely summer frock with pettycoat and matching hat with flowers. How dear a friend is that??

I call this "Still Life with Orts". *snicker* I crack myself up some times. Remember, all the pictures are clickable if you want to get an up-close look at something.

Kitteh break

2009-07-09T10:04:00.002-05:00

After all the heartbreak in the last week or so, it's time for a kitteh break. Sweet ol' Bob doesn't meow a lot, mostly he trills. It's adorable, but it would be nice if he'd talk like Cosmo in this video I found at ICanHasCheezburger

Khen Moore

2009-07-04T11:45:00.003-05:00

The world lost a great guy this week: Khen Moore passed away. Start the swill, big guy, and one day we'll all join you in the ConSuite in the Sky.

2009-07-04T09:24:00.003-05:00

Happy birthday, America.

TUSAL for June

2009-06-22T21:11:00.006-05:00

Tonight is the New Moon so that means it's time to post my June Totally Useless SAL photo. Come join the fun over at Yoyo's Dragon My Needle! The floss ball from last month has been flattened (via tamping down with the eraser end of a pencil) and more orts, a bit of belending filament, one DMC band and a broken finishing needle have been added to the stash. The needle met its demise while I was finishing the peacock chair. The scissors are my pride-and-joy Dovo's with the blue blades. I love my Dovos!

First day of Summer

2009-06-21T22:41:00.004-05:00

...and boy, was it a hot one: 97 and muggy. Yuck. I take comfort in knowing this, too, shall pass and fall will come again in due time.

Don't have any finishes to share today. I've been piddling around on a couple of minor projects but nothing to show for it.

So instead of finished projects, here are a couple of pictures of Bob from this weekend. Two of his favorite places: in the bath tub and snoozed out on my bed. I just adore the way he sleeps with his feeties all curled up. :o)

44 Cent Swap, part II

2009-06-19T17:02:00.012-05:00

Mama made a contribution to the envelope going to my swap partner: three chicks in sunglasses and calico cloaks. She did not stitch this; it was in a container of stuff she got for $2 at a garage sale. The original piece was a bit larger and would not fit in the envelope, so I thought to cut it down into a bookmark. A bit of Stitch Witchery later and it was done. The backing fabric also came from Mama's stash.

I'm planning on including several skeins of overdyed floss, some trim, a tiny pastel striped binder clip, some beads and a beading needle, and a magnetic smiley face. Some of this may come out if the weight is over 1 ounce.

[Note: The tiny binder clip had to come out. :o( The envelope was just a smidge over weight. How much is a smidge? The weight of a tiny binder clip. The envelope and contents, sans binder clip, was 1.0 ounces.]

[Note II: Partner received her envelope - with postage due! :o( Seems the contents shifted during the mailing process and it no longer met the 1/4" thickness requirement. Just like cereal, some settling ocurred during shipment. Guess I need to remember to tape everything to the inside of the envelope next time.]

44 Cent Swap

2009-06-18T23:31:00.007-05:00

I've signed up for the 44 Cent Swap over on Craftster. The idea is to put as much as you can into an envelope to send to a partner and still stay within the limits of a single 44¢ first class stamp. One of the goodies that I'll be sending to my partner is a needlebook I made this evening. It's about 2.5" x 2.25". I designed the chart for the owl this afternoon at the office while I was waiting for a test to complete. (Busy hands are happy hands!) I'll also be including some over-dyed floss, some ribbon and some hand-tatted trim. No, my hands didn't do the tatting.

This is the inside of the needlebook. Have I said how much I love Stitch Witchery? It really saves a lot of time putting a backing on a piece. It doesn't take a real long time to do a nun stitch or a buttonhole/blanket stitch around a needlebook, but the Stitch Witchery is fast. And the fused fabric really does look good.

Wine and Hearts

2009-06-14T22:44:00.010-05:00

Yesterday was a milestone birthday for my dear friend RL. I got her a nice bottle of wine but was unable to find a suitable wine gift bag, so I made one for her from some ultra-suede I had in my stash. The gift was well received and R had a very happy birthday and a great party. It was good to see many members of her extended family that I hadn't seen in many years. You wear it well, R! Many happy returns.

Today I finished stitching on a piece called Heart Quartet. It came from a 1997 kit designed by Studio B with Nancy Whitley and put out by Anchor. This has been my recent take along project when having to sit and wait at doctors' offices and/or hospitals. Once it is framed, it will probably go to my sister since she admired it while I was working on it. The original design did not call for widgets in the cutwork kloster blocks, but I thought they looked nekkid and in need of some widgetry. You can click on this picture (and others on this blog) to get a closer look at the details. C'mon...go ahead and click it! You know you want to. *wink*

Make it and take it

2009-06-07T19:32:00.003-05:00

This is the make it and take it project from the Moonlight Stitching event at the LNS from two weeks ago. It's a needle park that can be draped over a couch or chair arm. The original design didn't come with a backing fabric but I could not resist this batik print.

Some catching up

2009-06-07T09:12:00.011-05:00

Here are some smalls I've completed within the last month or so.

First, this initial M was stitched on perforated paper for M (a stitching buddy and scrapbooker) for her birthday. The pattern was taken from a kit, whose name I forgot to note, and the initial was stitched using Kreinik #16 Cable and Silk Mori from my stash so I was able to give her the whole kit for use as she pleases. She also received the whole pack of perforated paper as I stitched the M in the lower left hand corner on one sheet and did not cut it out. This seemed to be the best way to let her scrapbook with it.

Oh,and this needlebook was also gifted to M. The chart came from one of the many cross stitch books in my library and was stitched over one on a scrap of linen using flosses from my stash. Don't you love Stitch Witchery? I find it is invaluable when finishing things like this where you don't want the back of the stitching exposed.

Next, this is my first attempt at making a floss tag. This project was inspired by all the cute ones out there on the web - a great source for inspiration. The patterns were taken from Debbie Draper Designs "A Cat's Life" - with the exception of the mouse I added and a bit of modification to the yarn ball from the original chart. This was stitched on linen with an over-dyed from my stash.

This needlebook was made on a whim because I came across some colorful stash floss that made me happy. It just moved me to do something with it so I went along for the ride. A bit of Hardanger and some buttonhole stitching later (and some finishing) and this was the results. The material that was used for the lining is about 40 years old. It was a remnant from a piece of material Mama used in making a dress for me back when I was in grade school! It's amazing she has hung on to that material for so long and it looks like it just came off the bolt.

This scissor fob was stitched over one using DMC on linen from a design charted by Jean Smith. Look familiar? Yes, it's the flower basket from the Whitman's Sampler box. This will go with another project that I've got waiting in queue for finishing, one that involves a Whitman box.

Finally, here is a lining I made for a little basket that I have. The bottom staves were just a little wide-spaced and needed some help keeping things from leaking out. The fabrics were cotton scraps from Mama's fabric stash.

Peacock chair and a new tape measure

2009-06-07T00:17:00.016-05:00

Well, I missed posting on Saturday by a few minutes. So shoot me. :P

It's been a busy day. I finally finished the finishing on The Cat's Whiskers Peacock Chair that I had begun back in October, 2008. *happy dance all around the house* Wanna see? Of course you do!

So many folks are making cute decorated tape measures I felt like hopping on the band wagon, too. Here is the one I put together today. In the future, I may do some embroidery with perle cotton on the button (plain felt) side.

I'm still working on the make-it-and-take-it project from last weekend's Moonlight Stitching at the LNS I shop. It should be finished by tomorrow and then I'll post pictures;it just lacks nun stitching and fringing. That should be easy to complete while watching the race on TV, or I should say listening to the race. Please tell me I'm not the only one who mostly just listens to the television.

Time to say good night, Gracey. "Good night, Gracey!"

Where have you been?

2009-06-05T23:12:00.006-05:00

It would take a very long time to explain the lack of posts for the last *cough* six months. To quote a friend, "I could complain but it wouldn't do any good." So, let's pick up like nothing happened.

I've joined the Totally Useless SAL hosted by Yoyo at Dragon My Needle. This is a first for me but she's been so sweet and kind, it should be a lot a fun. The idea is to keep all your stitching orts in a clear glass container and post pictures of it on the new moon of every month. Since Flossy Lady (the blog, not me) was inactive last month, she posted my entry for May's new moon. Now that FL's going again, I felt it was only fair to post May's picture, too. Thanks for the help, Yoyo!

The huge ball of orts came from the massive frogging that took place with the SGD practice piece. A lot of perle cotton and Watercolours went into that ball. And then it was just the usual orts from stitching using the Jade Watercolours. Lots of scraps for a lot of stitching. When the finishing is finished I'll put up a picture.

What else has been going on? Well, stitching buddy AS was in dire need of a needlebook, so I made one for her using her favorite colors. I'm happy to report she was delighted with it.

NA in Germany was a Craftster swap buddy back in the winter. She was a sweetie and sent along some extra goodies so I made another little pin cushion/box to send along to her. This was one of those unfinished blond pine boxes from the craft store. I stained it using green neon food coloring, added rub-on transfers and then varnished it. Then I stitched up a circular poof and ta-da! pin cushion/box. She should be receiving it tomorrow; the post office said it would take about a week. Hope she likes it!

'Nuff for tonight; I'll post more pictures tomorrow.

Are you a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or someone else?

2008-12-15T08:27:00.002-06:00

Your result for Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz...

You Are an Ingrid!

You are an Ingrid -- "I am unique"

Ingrids have sensitive feelings and are warm and perceptive.

How to Get Along with Me

* Give me plenty of compliments. They mean a lot to me.
* Be a supportive friend or partner. Help me to learn to love and value myself.
* Respect me for my special gifts of intuition and vision.
* Though I don't always want to be cheered up when I'm feeling melancholy, I sometimes like to have someone lighten me up a little.
* Don't tell me I'm too sensitive or that I'm overreacting!

What I Like About Being an Ingrid

* my ability to find meaning in life and to experience feeling at a deep level
* my ability to establish warm connections with people
* admiring what is noble, truthful, and beautiful in life
* my creativity, intuition, and sense of humor
* being unique and being seen as unique by others
* having aesthetic sensibilities
* being able to easily pick up the feelings of people around me

What's Hard About Being an Ingrid

* experiencing dark moods of emptiness and despair
* feelings of self-hatred and shame; believing I don't deserve to be loved
* feeling guilty when I disappoint people
* feeling hurt or attacked when someone misundertands me
* expecting too much from myself and life
* fearing being abandoned
* obsessing over resentments
* longing for what I don't have

Ingrids as Children Often

* have active imaginations: play creatively alone or organize playmates in original games
* are very sensitive
* feel that they don't fit in
* believe they are missing something that other people have
* attach themselves to idealized teachers, heroes, artists, etc.
* become antiauthoritarian or rebellious when criticized or not understood
* feel lonely or abandoned (perhaps as a result of a death or their parents' divorce)

Ingrids as Parents

* help their children become who they really are
* support their children's creativity and originality
* are good at helping their children get in touch with their feelings
* are sometimes overly critical or overly protective
* are usually very good with children if not too self-absorbed

Take Are You a Jackie or a Marilyn? Or Someone Else? at Mad Men-era Female Icon Quiz

Love those captains!!

2008-11-25T23:05:00.003-06:00

I love the Deadliest Catch and would have Capt'n Phil's babies - well, if I could have babies I'd do it. But let's just keep that our secret for a while.

I need a laugh

2008-11-05T08:41:00.003-06:00

My spirit is tired and weary today. Laughter is supposed to be the best medicine so here's a dose for today. Repeat as necessary.

Eebil fings

2008-10-30T07:33:00.004-05:00

Things have been rough at Casa d'Fidget. Bob and Sadie haven't fallen madly in love. At first I thought Sadie was the problem and she wasn't giving Bob a chance. Now, I think Bob is the problem, and the agressor. Or, Sadie was the problem and Bob's fed up with it and has changed roles with her. GAH! It's making me nuts.

So here's a lolcat that explains my life right now. Please note this kitteh is colored much like Bob.

more animals

Guess Who's Coming to Dinner?

2008-10-17T11:23:00.004-05:00

Patches and Ginger have their bowls out front. Often, Patches is usually waiting close by at mealtime; Ginger shows up when she wants to. (I think she's still a bit bent about having been spayed.) I put out food for them twice a day and the bowls are usually empty when it's time to fill them again.

During the day, I know the birds will come by and steal a few pieces of food. I've suspect that more than Patches and Ginger were sampling the buffet at night. Looking out the front door glass I've seen unknown cats and dogs and possums eating at Patches' and Ginger's bowls. Last night, though, I got a surprise.

The latest diner at Casa d'Fidget is a skunk. Yes, Pepe La Pew (or Fifi, I didn't check) was busy eating and drinking on the front porch. The porch light didn't phase him a bit. He actually was kinda cute. The white stripeage didn't extend to the tail, though. There were two white stripes, beginning at the top of the head, that went down the neck, over the shoulders and joined at the middle of the back. Once he'd eaten all the food and drank his fill, he waddled off the porch and into the night.

I think I'll be a bit less generous with the evening meal. He may have been cute, but I'd rather he stayed away.

T.G.I.F.

2008-10-17T09:19:00.006-05:00

Dang! Where did the week go?

Taking care of Bob and Sadie has really taken more of a toll than I thought it would. The hard part is having to keep them separated so that Sadie doesn't infect Bob.

Ooops, forgot to mention I took Sadie to the vet Monday so they could have a look at her and be sure she's healthy enough to mingle with Bob. Turns out she wasn't; poor old dear had a respiratory infection and an ear infection. She has to have antibiotics and ear drops twice a day and stay away from Bob.

Mourning Sadie Jones has been living in the bathroom the whole time she's been here and she's becoming put out with it all. Only a few more days until she gets to join the rest of the household. I'm hoping she will fit right in and not be too grumpy with Bob, who is already fascinated with her.

I've been skipping my stitching nights to tend to the kitties and have been too tired to stitch at home this week so not much to share or talk about on finished crafts. There are two projects in the near-finished stages, though. I'm putting together a Peacock Stitching chair from The Cats Whiskers and a drop-side sewing box designed by some folks from Whitehorse, Yukon, Cananda, that I can't find a link to right now. And working on a real pretty item from Lori Birmingham Designs, it may be a gift for someone so that's all I'll say about that now.

On a gloomy fall day like today, it's hard to decide whether to do something productive or just nap...

New Family Members

2008-10-12T11:40:00.009-05:00

People who know me know I've got a soft heart (and some would say a soft head to go with it.) There are two feral cats (Patches and Ginger) that have adopted me. They each have their own story but that's for another day. Bob, pictured here, adopted me after he some how became separated from his people. Not sure if he got lost or if he was abandoned but the important part is he once again has a home.

Isn't he a handsome fellow? He's somewhere between 3 and 5 years old and had been neutered by his pevious people. Bob came to me with perfect indoor manners and is a delight to have as my buddy.

Like many kitties, Bob likes to sit in the window and look outside. Often, Patches and/or Ginger are out there and Bob makes little chittering noises at them. Thinking he may be lonely, I decided to adopt another cat as a companion for him.

Mourning "Sadie" Jones was adopted from Nashville Cat Rescue. She's a little over 6 years old, spayed, declawed and has weight issues. She's talkative and very loving - at least to me. Since yesterday, she's residing in the guest bathroom until she becomes acclimated to her new home. When I opened the door just enough for she and Bob to get a look at each other, she hissed; Bob fell in love. He rolled on the floor outside the bathroom and mewed to her while trying to reach for her under the door. I hope the adoration will continue when they do finally meet face to face, and that Sadie will realize what a sweetie Bob is.

The Time Felt Right

2008-10-09T22:36:00.000-05:00

The blogging bug has been nibbling at me for a while. Not that I thought I had great and pithy ideas to share with the world, it was just a desire to see what it would be like.

My dear online friend, PP, suggested starting a blog to save pictures of the needlework I've made and will make in the future. That way I can share these pictures with friends and relatives and not have to worry about navigating them through whatever other picture hosting site I may be using. OK, makes sense to me.

Here's hoping the blog lasts longer than my past attempts at journaling. :P