Happy Halloween!

Hello, Stitching Friends!

Just doing a quick post to wish all of you a Happy Halloween!

We have been enjoying some vacation time.  We took a quick trip to visit our family in Minnesota, but we are back home now.  Mike went back to work today, but I still have this week off.  I am hoping to get some small things done at home...  We will have to see if that happens or not.  I would like to do some closet cleaning...

I have been doing some stitching, I will take the time to get a picture of the WIP and share it with you later this week.  It was an old  wip that I discovered when doing some organizing...  So, since it was seasonal, thought I would spend some time working on it.  I have made some real progress, so guess I will stick with it for awhile... ha! 

Hope all of you that were in the storm's path are faring ok.  Take care friends.

 

Autumn days...

Hello stitching friends!

I always have the best intentions to post more frequently...but everything else gets in the way. I have been stitching tho! I also recently caught up on reading blogs, at least as of yesterday....

I have enjoyed doing some smaller stitching projects. I tend to have a larger project underway instead of doing small ones.

But I have loved working on these two ornaments this week.




I really liked doing this new ornament from Little House Needleworks. I may have to do it again for a gift. I haven't decided if I will finish it as a small pillow ornament or do a flat finish.




This is my current project. It's also by Little House Needleworks. From an ornament magazine from a previous year. My friend Jane was kind enough to lend me her issue. I also really like the sparkly linen I'm using. I bought a remnant piece of it from a stitching store I visited a couple of weeks ago with my niece, Barb. She had discovered a stitching store in Elkader, Iowa, called Backstitch. So we took a road trip to check it out. The variegated green floss was something I had in my stash, that I thought worked well for this.




This s another smallish project I completed recently. I found the chart in an old cross stitch magazine. The chart was designed by Kathy Barrick. I changed it up some. I charted my Great-Great Grandmothers name and inserted it along with the year of her birth in Sweden. She was an emigrant to a small town called Bishop Hill very near where we live. I have always been intrigued by these hardy emigrants in my family tree. Some of them traveled on foot from Chicago to Bishop Hill (about 150 miles)! Pretty hardy pioneer stock... I do think I am going to stitch a small crown in the open area above Elizabeth's name.




I have been busy putting up some halloween decorations over the weekend. i recently got Trick or Treat sewed into a long skinny pillow thanks to the help of my sister. The cute Halloween runner on the coffee table is also more evidence of my sister's sewing talent.




This is a corner of our living room...Jolly Jack was sewed into a long skinny pillow with my sisters help also...

Mike and I have some vacation time scheduled to start at the end of this work week. We are both counting down the days.... It will be great to have some time off!!

I hope all of you are enjoying these beautiful Autumn colors. I think this is my favorite season.




This is a favorite Fall book of mine. I've been busy reading also. I just started the new J.K. Rowling book Casual Vacancy. I hope it will be good.

Happy Stitching Everyone!

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Happy Fall Everyone!  I think this is one of my favorite seasons!  Hope you are all finding lots of time for stitching.  I have been busy working on some small pieces.  I hope to have pictures to share soon.  I am so glad the weather is behaving more like Fall. 

Framed finishes and balloons....

Hello Stitching Friends!

It's been awhile since my last post, but things have been busy around here...  First off, I went to my LNS and picked up some framing I had done.  I'm pretty pleased with the results!

This one I did some time ago, it's Library by Little House Needleworks.  I am glad to finally get it framed.

Next up, is my BAP of this year, finished and believe it or not, framed in the same year! That is an accomplishment for me.  I am very happy with the way it turned out.  Holly helped me hang it when I brought it home on Saturday.  We took down some pieces I had hanging on this wall and made a new arrangement with these three.  Shores of Hawks Run Hollow, then Long May it Wave by Carriage House Designs as well.  And last Simple Joy Simple Life by Little House Needlework.

Then, these two small ones, I finally decided to frame. I had stitched them up years ago, and they were hanging out in my drawer of finished but unframed stitching when I decided it was time.  I hung them up in the kitchen under the upper cabinets.  They are by Bent Creek I believe. 

This is the piece I posted a progress picture of in my last post.  It's the Halloween Prairie Schooler pattern from this year's batch of new releases.  I am thinking I want to finish this as a flat fold.  I have some other Fall pieces I want to finish as flat folds as well.  Now, just to make the time to sit and do that....

I am currently working on Autumn by Little House Needleworks.  I should have it finished in a few days.  But, I already have the frame for that one...  So, that is a good thing.

Mike and I went to a hot air balloon festival this past Saturday.  It was a first for both of us.  It was a gorgeous day.  Finally, some beautiful Fall temperatures arrived.  So, I will share a couple of pictures.  The balloons were so pretty.  It was on the campus of Western Illinois University in Macomb.

It was a beautiful day and evening for this event.  At dusk, all the participating balloons were on the field in front of us, and the balloonists would light up their balloons with their burners.  Such a pretty sight.  There was also a live band playing, so it was a fun afternoon and evening. 

I better wrap this post up.  I am hosting Stitcher's Night at our house tonight.  I still have to put the kitchen back together, and do some finish work on our dessert for tonight.  We're eating healthy tonight, I'm serving angelfood cake with fresh strawberries.

Happy Stitching everyone!

Beautiful Sunday

Hello stitching friends!

What a beautiful day here in central Illinois today! What a welcome change from those awfully hot days in July.

I've spent some time on and off stitching on 'all hallows eve' by prairie schooler. I think I will like this one when finished. Not very many color changes tho, lots of 3371...






Forgive the wrinkles please. I just took a quick picture with my iPad.

Mike and I went for a ride to some marsh land south of where we live, near the Illinois river today. You can really notice the drought, the water levels are way down. However I think Mike got some good pictures of some Heron Cranes. It was a beautiful day for a ride.

On Saturday we drove along on a Memorial ride in honor of one of our son's high school classmates that died during their senior year of high school. Our son organized the event and had tshirts designed for purchase with the proceeds going to a suicide prevention organization. We were proud of our son for putting this all together.

The weekends always seem to fly past so quickly!

Hope all of you had fun and were able to spend some time stitching!

Happy Stitching!


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Vacation weekend

Hello stitchy friends!

Mike and I are back to work today after a nice long relaxing weekend visiting my sister, BIL, and family in Minnesota.

The heat wave finally broke before we left bringing much nicer, cooler weather to us here in central Illinois. We are still very dry with just slight rain from time to time, but the departure of the hot temps has made everyone feel better.

As I have mentioned in previous posts, my sister is an amazing seamstress. She had some wonderful surprises waiting for me...





She sewed this super cute purse for me, one of the coolest things about it is that the bottom part is removable, so she sewed a fall cover for the purse as well....




How cool is this...it's the fall cover to button on, then she made this one reversible to this cute Halloween print.


So, as if this wasn't enough she also stitched up a beautiful tote bag for my cross stitch.




She made a matching chart pouch, which I neglected to take a picture of...
If you look closely, you can see she embroidered my name on the front.

We had a fun weekend with them, a little swimming, a parade and community dinner, as well as hanging out with nieces, nephews and their children. So, all-in-all, we had a great time. It felt so good to get in their pool and swim! Plus it was great to do some knee exercises in the water.

Our daughter was glad to have us out of the house for the weekend as well...she had some friends over for her birthday celebration. She turned 21, so it was a big milestone for her.

I finished up stitching 'Summer' by cross-eyed Cricket- I don't have a picture of that, I will save that for another post. I have been stitching on the new Halloween piece by Prairie Schooler. It took awhile to adjust my eyes to stitching on 32 count linen, most of my recent projects have been on 28 count linen.

I took some stitched but not 'finished' pieces to Minnesota with me, so Karen and I did some finishing together.



I am really pleased with how Ida and Ira came out. I have to stuff them and hand sew the seams yet, but I'm happy to have them done.




Jolly jack came back almost done, I just have to tweak the stuffing add a bow and hand sew the opening shut.




Then this one got sewed into a long skinny pillow that I will put on a shelf. It too just needs the stuffing smoothed out and hand sew the seam shut.




Finally last picture for this looong post, a freebie I stitched up which we sewed into a small pillow. I found some cool old hand crocheted lace to add to it.

Thanks for sticking thru to the end of this long post.
Happy stitching friends!

Too funny

I've been having fun today on pinterest....I had to share this one. They were making me laugh. I also found some good librarian ones. I will save those for another time.


Stay cool and keep stitching friends!

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