FLASHBACK Friday !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Another week has flown by and it is Flashback Friday again!

By looking at the pieces that I have stitched you will definitely be able to tell that I am very much an eclectic stitcher. My likes are varied. Everything from the whimsical to the primative to Quaker. The pieces I am showing this time are both Halloween. About two years ago, I decided I had too many Halloween pieces in my collection. I pulled out three and let my 2 sisters and only niece take their choices. Now I realized that I have stitched these two pieces and have one WIP that is Halloween and another ready to go. I guess I just keep finding ones I like.

Trick or Treat Row

by Bent Creek

Stitched on a 28-ct mystery R&R fabric with the overdye colors called for on the pattern. LNS bought the fabric at market and then later after I stitched a couple of things on it we neither one can remember what the fabric is. We think it is something similar to Dark Cappucino. Frame is from local frame shop.

Peek-A-Boo

by Hinzeit

Stitched on 28-ct Heritage Cashel Linen from Picture This Plus using the overdyes that the pattern calls for. Frame is from East Side Moulding.

Still not enough progress on WIP for pictures. Maybe sometime next week.

Last night the LNS owner took myself and 3 others out for dinner to thank us for helping her during our recent Shop Hop. We had a great time. She gave each of us a hand painted Sunflower candy jar filled with Hershey's Kisses and a cross stitch pattern she designed exclusively for us with R&R linen to do it on. The name of the LNS is The Sunflower Seed, hence the sunflower on the candy jar. It took all the willpower I had not to start that design last night when I got home. It would just be another WIP. LOL!!!!!!

Off to get some more stitching done.

Have a great weekend!!!
Happy stitching!!

I'm Still Here

Just a quick update on what is happening. I don't have any pictures to include now. Since I do design stitching for The Sunflower Seed, I cannot show you the progress I have been making on a new design for her. Monday I went into the LNS, also called The Sunflower Seed to assist the owner/designer in assembling 200 patterns each of her two new baby sampler designs for shipment to Hoffman Distributing.

Tuesday was spent doing some errands including a stop at the frame shop to take in the completed baby sampler pictured in my last post and 2 mini flags that I plan to give to Aunts in South Dakota next month.

I am one of those stitchers that tends to jump around on projects depending on my mood that particular day. So the last couple of days I have stitched on my Best of Blessing piece and my Quaker Odds and Evens sampler. I have two of the motifs done on the Quaker Sampler. A picture of it was included a couple of posts back. Neither had enough progress to warrant a new picture. Most of my time has been devoted to The Sunflower Seed design.

Today (Wednesday) or yesterday depending on the time this gets posted, I spent the day with a friend doing something that I enjoy, but have not had a chance to do for a few months. We went to an Indian Casino to play bingo and do a few slot machines. There are several Indian Casinos neer where we live and until mid-March my friend and I went several times a month to play bingo. That bingo hall closed and the one that we went to today is about 35 miles further up the road and we had resisted temptation to go until today. We had a great time. Neither of us won anything at bingo, but she won $150 on the slots. I won about $25, but fed it back into the machine. LOL.

Before I started this post, I tried to make some changes in the appearance of my blog. Not sure I like it yet, so bear with me. This whole thing is so new and I am still learning. So many of you have nice and pretty blogs that I am trying to upgrade mine as I learn things. Most times I would rather be stitching than messing on the computer.

Happy Stitching!!!!!!!!!!!

Finishes and a Start

Finally I have DSL service. It has been in and out of service since Tuesday. AT&T has been here twice. The report yesterday was there was not any feed going into my line here at the house. There was a construction accident near here on Thursday that cut a fiber optic line. They did not seem to think that was part of the problem. I was on the phone with them every day from Tuesday on. Hope the problem is taken care of. Otherwise, they are going to be putting a bad label by my name and when my number comes up, no one will want to talk to me.

This is a finish that I completed for a birthday in mid-April. The stitching was done on time, but it still needed to be framed. It took me a long time to remember to get a picture of it. It was stitched for someone that I met through stitching and has become like a sister to me. The designer is Sweetheart Tree and was stitched on 28-ct Antique Tan Linen with Anchor floss. Custom framed by our local frame shop--Frame Warehouse. The pattern itself is dated 1991, so it is an oldie, but goodie.

Finished the baby sampler including name yesterday. Some of my local stitching friends were having a fit about the kids not having heads in the earlier posts. Now the kids have heads and it is done. Tuesday I will take it to the frame shop along with my mini flags, if I get the second one done. It is started and they only take 2-3 hours each. This is for my great-nephew. I have not seen him yet, but do have pictures. Of course, he is a cutie. He looks just like his father.
Well, I don't know whether I have discussed in previous posts, but I have a really bad case of Adult Attention Deficit. There is just something about starting a new project that just sends me into a new zone. A week or so I was working at the LNS and as I was preparing remnant pieces of fabric for sale, I found this wonderful piece of 28-ct Antique Cotton R&R linen. I thought that is about the right size to do this design that I had just been dying to do. Low and behold, it was the right size. So now, I have started Hands To Work-- Best of Blessings on that piece of fabric. Below is the progress so far. Design size is about 19x7. It is turning our real nice and I can hardly lay it down. Hopefully this will satisfy my attention deficit for a while. I have been seeing some other stitching on Village at Hawk Run Hollow and I have had an itch to stitch that too.

Also, I am working on a new design for The Sunflower Seed. It is maybe one-third done. No pictures until she is ready to release the design.

The weathere is starting to really feel like summer. I don't do the heat very well, so that makes for more stitching time. Going to help at the LNS on Monday to prepare patterns to send to Hoffman. Earlier in the week we picked our first tomato and first green pepper of the season. If thing continue the way they are, I will be either giving some away or making salsa.

Time to get back to stitching and watching the Royals lose. LOL!

Have a good week.!!!!!!

College Get Together and New Furniture

As I mentioned in my last post I was going to have a get together with several of my college friends on Saturday. Four of us did get together and had a great time. Made plans to do it again later in the summer and hope that more could join us. While in college all of us lived in a small scholarship house and became quite close during our college days. Sometimes as we go out into each of our own worlds we lose track of each other, but we never forget each other. I guess as we get older we want to rekindle those special friendships and make a greater effort to get together. I had not seen one of the gals for probably 20 years. It was a great time.


We got together in a small town of about 1500 about 30 miles from where we went to college. They were have what they call Wah-Shun-Ga Days. It is like a heritage festival celebrating the towns at stop on the Santa Fe Trail and they had a mission for the Kaw Indians and is named for an Indian Chief. As for all small towns they had a nice parade. Maybe not as big as in the past, but still very good. I have included some pictures that I took. Below is Old Glory carried on horseback.



These are the Women of the Wild West. They dress in period costumes and make lots of noise and act sort of crazy. I have seen them also do stage acts at various events. This time they were only riding horses.What is a parade without the Shriners? Here they are in their mini roadsters. There was also some on mini motorcycles. Each group does various formations and have lots of fun.

Here we have a classic car. I think this is a 1955 Chevrolet. There were several, plus there was also a classic car show as a part of the festivities
Found this to be a cute little horse drawn cart.

This looks like one of my dad's tractors. This community is surrounded by farmers and ranchers, so why wouldn't you want to include a tractor.
We also checked out a flea market that was held in conjunction with the event. There were carnival rides and the normal foods that would be at any festival. Turkey legs, funnel cakes, lemonade and BBQ sandwiches. It was fun to do all this and also get to visit with friends. We made plans to get together again and try to get more to come too.

Also last week, I had new furniture delivered. What a challenge that has been. It is replacing something that I have had more years than I would even want to admit. We had looked a long time to find something that both me and my significant other (SO) both liked. We finally found something and then it was not in the warehouse so we got to order it and pick colors. SO said you pick color, whatever you pick will be fine. Well, after it was delivered he decided it was too big and he was not sure about the color. After much consternation, etc. we have decided to keep it. I had to get help from the LNS, who has a good decorating eye, to tell SO that it was perfect. Below are pictures of the couch and loveseat. The loveseat has a console with cupholder and and place to stash things. Actually the LNS owner told me if her husband sat down in that she would never get him out. The color in the pictures is not exactly what it looks like in person. We have decided, depending on the dye lot you have it is somewhere between Nutmeg and Sarsparilla in Sampler Thread and Hazelnut in Weeks. That really tells you how addicted we are to cross stitch when we equate colors to the color of floss.

No stitching progress pictures. I am getting close to having the Now I Lay Me Down Baby sampler done. Probably by the end of the week. Also, stitching on a design model for The Sunflower Seed, so you will not see that until it is released as a pattern.

I have been having some computer issues so they are coming tomorrow to work on it. UGH!!! Hope it is nothing on my end. They have now said it is on the line outside the house. Now I am off to a small afternoon stitch group. Fun! Fun!

Later!!!

FLASHBACK Friday!!!

As you all know I am new to this blog thing, but one thing my coach (Julie) informed me of was that past completed projects can be posted on Flashback Friday. So here we go with a couple of finished pieces. I was going to put a couple of other on with this post as well, but today, when I was at the LNS where they are being used as models, I found that the memory card for my camera was still in my printer where I had downloaded pictures. These pictures I had taken last week.
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Stars and Stripes Forever

by Bent Creek

The design was stitched on 28-ct Mercedes Linen from Picture This Plus. The original design was done on some cream or tan like fabric. I thought the blue really did more for the design. No other changes were made in the stitching. The frame is from East Side Moulding.

Winter Snapperland

by Bent Creek

All 4 designs were stitched on the same piece of fabric. The fabric is 28-ct Vintage Country Mocha Cashel Linen. Nothing else was changed from the designer. It is double frame from East Side Moulding. This was really fun to stitch. If I did not already have so many WIPs, I would be starting the Spring one. One word about using the overdyes instead of DMC floss. I have a friend that started this same design after I had started mine, but she was using DMC. After she saw my piece mostly completed, she told me that now she wished she had done in the called for overdyes and guessed she would have to stitch it a second time to get the look of the overdyes. She had already stitched too much to frog and start over.

As I have mentioned before, I work a day here and there at my LNS - The Sunflower Seed. She also has a design business of the same name. Just a little heads-up. She just released 3 new designs within the last couple of days. One is a pet memorial sampler and then a boy and girl baby samplers. The designs can be viewed on her web site http://www.thesunflowerseed.com/. Copies are winging their way to the distributors, Hoffman and Norden and should be available in your LNS in a week or so. If you don't have access to a LNS, you can order them directly from The Sunflower Seed. All that information is on the web site. I stitch design models for her and I stitched both of the baby samplers. It is fun to be the first one to stitch a design. The biggest problem is that it takes away from the time I can stitch on my own projects. But I look at is as a job that I get to do at home, and I do take out time to stitch on my own projects so I don't get burned out on any one thing. I just started another design model for her on Tuesday, so my posted progress on my projects will be minimal.

Staying with the theme of Flashback Friday, I am spending the day on Saturday with 2 possibly 3 of my college friends. We will be going about an hour away from where I live to a festival in the town where one of live. We have been out of college more years than I want to admit, but there is a small core of friends that have maintained our closeness through the years. It will be a typical festival with a parade, arts and crafts, carnival rides and food among the activities available. It should be a great time. Probably not much stitching time on this day. Will try to make up for it on Sunday.

Everyone have a good weekend. Keep crossing those stitches.

Kathy

Cookbook, Aprons and Progress Report

In one of my previous posts, I was talking about making meatballs for a meeting at the church. I thought it was time to tell you about the meeting. It was a very interesting one, if you are into history and cookbooks. Our speaker gave us the history of a cookbook that was first published in 1931. Actually they did not call it a cookbook. It was called a Recipe Book. The book profiled was the Household Searchlight Recipe Book. I remember both my mother and grandmother each had one and used it a lot. When it was announced what the program was going to be for this meeting, I looked high and low for one of those cookbooks, but I could not find it. I know that one went to one of my sisters and one to me, but we neither one could find it. I guess that means we don't use it. Since I could not find my copy of the old one, I went looking for one. Found out the last publication was in 2000 and does not look anything like the old ones. Actually the last couple of reprints were made only because of many requests. However, it is a totally different publisher and they say that they will not do any more reprints. As of a couple of weeks ago, there were limited copies left.

This recipe book was first published in 1931 and and was reprinted a total of 33 times. The book had over 1200 recipes and was over 300 pages. It was developed by the publishers of a magazine named Household. The magazine started publication in about 1908 and at one time had a circulation of 2.5 million. It ceased publication in 1958. The Household Searchlight maintained a test facility for all kinds household products, including recipes from 1925 -1942, when it was shut down because of WWII. The test kitchen was continued for the recipes that were in the Recipe Book. All recipes were tested for accuracy, dependability, palatability and obtainable, economical ingredients. The person giving the presentation was the retired Rare Collections Librarian at the local public library. He had even been able to interview the last manager of the test facility many years ago. One of the most interesting part of this is the test facility was located about one block from the church when it was in existence. Later the house was razed and a grocery store built. One of the members of our church (she was at the meeting) was the last owner of the grocery store before it went out of business.

The first thing tested at the test house was Old Dutch Cleanser. Many manufacturers sent new products to be tested there. Two products that I remember from the list were Rice Krispies and Shredded Wheat. The recipes in the book were from both manufacturers and readers of the Household Magazine.

I am sure that you are wondering what this has to do with my meatballs. Well, my ladies group, is one of 3 in our church that go to this meeting and we were hostesses for the meeting. We decided to make things as refreshments from the Recipe Book. Our thought was to give everyone a taste of the recipes in the book. Some of the things that we had were: Coconut Strawberries(a fruit salad), open face cucumber sandwiches, Cottage Cheese Cookies, Prune Cookies and Pineapple Cookies, along with 2or 3 more kinds of cookies. Oh, I almost forgot and the meatballs. We had run our own test kitchen for our previous monthly meeting and weeded out some that were not very appealing. One of those was sardines on a type of deviled eggs. Not many were into sardines.

Following are a couple of pictures from the meeting. The first one is one of ladies doing our devotions. She used the theme of aprons, since the program was about a recipe book. One of her first comments was "do you think that aprons were around in biblical times?" Well, in the King James Version there is reference in Genesis that after Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit they used leaves, etc. to weave themselves aprons. She mentioned that aprons had been a big part of our lives and used for many things, but that now days were not used by very many people. On the table she had displayed one of her grandmother's aprons. It was a very interesting way to tie things together. I remember that my grandmother always wore an apron when she was at home. It was used for many things. Wipe away tears, carry tomatoes in from the garden, use as a substitute pot holder and I have seen her wrap it around her arms when we were sitting outside and it started to get cool.

Below is our refreshment table. The man in the back ground was the speaker. The open face cucumber sandwiches are in foreground. The lovely meatballs are in the crockpot.

Now that you are all bored by my stories about the recipe book, I will give you a stitching update. Here is my progress on Now I Lay Me Down Baby Sampler.

In my last post, I was looking for my little flag pattern. I found it and stitched this mini flag today. It was a little kit that I got back during the 1991 Iraq war. This is the 7th (I think) one of these I have stitched over the years. I have one more to stitch. Obviously they are a quick stitch. I pay more for the little frame, etc. than the fabric and floss.

Also show is the 4-in "Glory" scissors from Gingher. The LNS owner gave them to me last night as an early birthday present. She had ordered some for the shop and knew I had been coveting ever since I first saw them. She was afraid that I would buy them when I found out they were in the shop. I just love them. I love anything that is Red, White and Blue and Patriotic. For some reason this photo is not very good. Might be the photographer.

When I was at the LNS--The Sunflower Seed today, I picked up a new design to stitch for her, so my progress reports might show much progress on my own stitching. I am not at liberty to show of the new designs until they are published. I am not very artistically inclined so being about to stitch the design models, is my contribution to creativity.

Again, I have become long winded. I hope this all makes sense, because I have been IMing with someone while I have been writing this.

Happy stitching!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

WIPs

After a whirlwind week, things slowed down long enough today for me to get some pictures taken of my WIP. I am what many call, an eclectic stitcher. I have a variety of interests and have many projects going at one time. That way I never get bored or burned out. Many times my mood determines what I stitch on that day. Also deadlines for gifts or design models enters into the equation also. Some people might say I suffer from Adult Attention Deficit. The best part of having several projects going at one time is when you are able to finish a couple of them within days of each other. It really gives you a big sense of accomplishment.

Following are some of my current WIPs.

Now I Lay Me Down

This is a baby sampler for my new great nephew born May 16th. It is from a very old book with a 1983 copyright from The Stitching Post and named Country Samplers. I have done this design once before, but it has been a long time ago. It only has 3 colors in it. I have changed them to overdyes. In the middle will be a silhouette of two children kneeling in prayer. They were to be done in Sampler Thread - Tin Bucket, but that was not working out so I changed back to the DMC. Had to do some of the frog stitch, but am not back at it. This will be a priority to get done before some of the others. Almost forgot, the fabric is 25-ct Natural Pearl.

Christmas Stack by Waxing Moon

This is being done pretty much as called for in the pattern. The fabric is 28-ct babbling brook lugana, I think.

Quaker Square by The Workbasket

The Workbasket put out two leaflets, one being Quaker Odds, for the odd numbered months and Quaker Evens, for the even numbered months. After stitching my Quaker Santa and a couple of other small all one color designs, I have really gotten into doing this type of stitching. One day at the LNS, the owner Anita and I were talking. She said there ought to be a way that we could stitch several of the odds and even together in one piece. We figured out of the 12 there were 4 that were 65x65. So I decided to see what I could come up with. I had been looking at this fabric in the shop for a long time. It is 28-ct Mulberry cashel linen. ( I love anything purple or remotely purple). I have stitched a few things with Needle Necessities so decided to try to find a fiber in my stash. This is 170 Mauna Loa. The coloring does not come through in the photograph very well. Still need to work on my photography skills.

Little Witch by M Designs

This is one that I could not do exactly like the pattern. I am using 30-ct R&R Creme Brulee instead of 32-ct something. I also changed the Needlepoint Silk to Weeks and Sampler Threads. I pulled on the DMC equivalents for the NPS and then matched up to the overdyes. Then since Anita, at the LNS is a designer and wonderful with colors, I had her approve my selections. She only changed one. It also called for 3 different Thread Gatherer Silk 'n Colors. It is the black, the purple hair and lettering and the wild color one in the border and other places in the design. There are beads that trim the border of her hat.

Quaker Snowman by The Workbasket

This is the companion piece for my Quaker Santa (aka Santa Burl). Again I had to make some changes from the model. I am using 28-ct Dawn cashel from Picture This Plus overdyed fabric with Needle Necessities. I think the color is Thin Ice. Rather appropriate for a snowman.


Below is the finished stand-up of my Quaker Santa (aka Santa Burl) that I promised to post a picture. He stays on display at the LNS, The Sunflower Seed.

I have taken some more pictures of other things that I have finished over the last few months. Julie, who introduced me to blogging, mentioned that Fridays were traditionally used for posting finished projects. I will wait until then to do those. Besides this post is getting rather long anyway. I was going to include some pictures and let you know how things went at my Saturday morning church meeting that I was up late making meatballs for, but I decided that would be for another time.

Went back to Kansas City yesterday afternoon to see the Fargo cousins, then on to the KC Royals ballgame. They lost. We have not seen them win since we were there for opening day. Last night was a pitching duel and the game was over in a little over 2 hours with a 6:00PM start.. I was totally amazed that we were leaving the game and it was not even dark yet. Stopped in Lawrence and had drinks and dessert with friends there.

Today was a very lazy day after all of the things that went on this past week I needed to do that. Have a couple of things going on this week and then maybe a weekend with some college friends. We are trying to start a regularly scheduled get together once a year of a group of us that were always together in college.

I did spend some time today looking for a little flag pattern that I have done several times. I need to make a couple of more to give away when we make a trip to South Dakota to see relatives coming in from Oregon. I seldom stitch on aida anymore, but since these are giveaways, I will do them on aida. That was a trick trying to find some in my stash to stitch on. It takes only about 2 hours to stitch one of them. They are 28x19 stitches.

You know I have blabbed on long enough and you are all probably thing this woman is such a motor mouth. Off to stitch on the baby sampler for awhile

Keep crossing those stitches!!!!!!!!!!!

Too Busy to Blog

As I write this it is just after 2:00AM and I have just finished cooking the last of 5 pounds of meatballs for a meeting tomorrow morning (actually now it is today) at my church. The last few days have been a blur. Too many things to do and not enough time to get it all done. My plans were to take some more pictures on of my WIPs and some of my most recent completed projects. However, that has not happened.

Some cousins from Fargo, North Dakota have been in Kansas City for a Machine Quilting Showcase, so have driven over to see them twice, worked at LNS-The Sunflower Seed on Thursday along with making preparations for the meeting. I am guilting the cousins into sending me something from the Nordic Needle in Fargo when they return home. The first day they were apologizing to me for not asking if I NEEDED anything from the Nordic Needle. The really funny part is we talked on Sunday night for 45 minutes before they left and neither one of us once thought about the Nordic Needle. We will see how this story ends.

Tonight when we were down there we went to dinner on the Country Club Plaza at George Brett's, the restaurant and then walked around in the area. This is a high-end shopping, restaurant and entertainment district in Kansas City. Showed them several fountains in the area. Kansas City is called the "City of Fountains". You will also find out that I am a HUGE KC Royals baseball fan. George Brett has always been one of my favorites. Even though they are most of the time the worst team in baseball, I will always be a Royals fan.

Here is a picture of my Muffin in her new pink dress. One of my stitching friends, actually my adopted sister, bought this for her and gave it to me for Muffin on Thursday, so we had to try it on. It has a sequined pirate face on the back of it. She was not to crazy about it. After we got the pictures taken she wanted it off. Not much for wearing clothes. Her Aunt Mary loves buying things for her. Muffin says next time I see her I will give her an extra few wet kisses.

Oh, by the way, I finished stitching the new Kansas Christmas design for The Sunflower Seed. Those locally will be able to see it in the shop soon and the pattern should be available in the near future.

Well, off to bed with me. Early to rise to get to the church on time (LOL) to set up and do the meeting. Next blog should have some more stitching pictures.

Happy Stitching!!!!!!!!!!

Second Time Around

Taking a break from stitching. Been a fairly lazy end of the week and start of the weekend. After traveling over the Memorial Day holiday. As I said in my first post, this whole blogging thing is very new to me. I am including a couple of things that I have finished lately. Since I do a lot of design model stitching for my LNS (The Sunflower Seed), I am not able to post pictures of them here.

Below is Quaker Santa by The Workbasket. It was stitched on 28ct Lambswool Linen with Needle Necessities Razzle Dazzle Red and Waterlilies Opal. All of which is different than was indicated by the pattern. The pattern was 36ct. I don't do anything that small very often. Also call for Wisper for all the white. Wisper is not that fun to stitch with, so I changed to the silk. Since this picture was taken he has been finished into a stand-up. I will put a picture on later of the stand-up. As I was stitching this piece, I kept thinking the Santa looked like another Santa I had seen. After a while, I decided he looked like Burl Ives in the cartoon Rudolph. Now I have mentioned this to several other people and they agreed. My local shop owner even talked the designers at market and told them what we thought and they were amazed at the likeness. So now, we always refer to him as Santa Burl.



This next piece I stitched as a baby sampler for the first grandchild of my best friend from college. I was looking for somthing that was not too fancy because the baby's mother is just not into fancy and traditional type things. It is a La-D-Da design, Now I Lay Me... done on 28 ct Raw Natural Cashel Linen with the overdyes that it called for. I extended the dark line border below the sun to make room for the name and date. That was done in a purple since mom, dad, grandma, grandpa and myself are all Kansas State grads and we had to get the purple in there somewhere. Mom was very pleased when she opened it at the shower. She just kept looking at it and saying "It is awesome".


Now I am including a picture of my dog Muffin. She is an almost 10-year old Boston Terrier. This picture is a couple of years old because she is beginning to show her age by getting more white around her eyes. She loves to go for car rides, even if it is just to ride into the garage to park the car. I take her with me when the weather allows when I am out running errands. She also goes with me sometimes when I work at The Sunflower Seed. She loves people, maybe too much. Right now she is waiting for me to get of this dumb computer so I will go sit down and stitch so she can curl up in my lap or beside me.

Currently, I am working on a design model for The Sunflower Seed. She does an annual Kansas Christmas design and this is what I am working on. I hope to have it done by the first of the week.

As I said before I always have several things in progress. Right now they include a baby sampler for my nephew's second child, a Halloween witch, a Waxing Moon Christmas design, a retirement gift for a friend and another Workbasket Quaker design. Now that I know a little about putting pictures on, I will try to get some pictures posted for those.

Off to do more stitching. Hope you enjoy seeing things that I have made.

Happy stitching!!!!!!!!!!!!