Noel Stitching

Posted on October 23, 2009 by Heather

Before I get into sharing my latest finishes I just wanted to let you  know that I will be sharing short review of all the books I read for the 10 Book Reading Challenge.  I’ve had a few requests for my opinions on a couple of the books, so I figured I  might as well share how I feel about them all.  I should have the reviews up by the end of the weekend.

Now, the stitching!

Even though Halloween is just around the corner and it is most definitely Fall outside, I’ve been doing a lot of Christmas stitching.  Baby Man’s stocking is coming along great, and I will share pictures in a day or two.  I’m a bit behind on Sampler de Noel thanks to the distraction that was the Creativ Festival, but I’m just about done part 6 and Carole isn’t posting part 7 until next week.  (She just posted a cute Halloween chart though.  Take a look.)

I’ve also been stitching on two new projects, which I got at the Creativ Festival.  The first is Beaded  Noel Needleroll by Jennifer Aikman-Smith of Dragon Dreams.  It is DMC stitched on 28 count Jazlyn (I think), with pattern darning at the ends, and a lovely beaded blanket stitch to finish it off.

Beaded Noel Needleroll by Dragon Dreams

Beaded Noel Needleroll by Dragon Dreams

Pattern Darning and Beaded Blanket Stitch

Pattern Darning and Beaded Blanket Stitch

It was a lovely little design to stitch up, and went very quickly. Except for the blanket stitch, which I seem to be unable to do correctly with out looking at a diagram for every stitch!! Argh!

I don’t know if Jennifer will be offering this for sale through PatternsOnline or not.  She was leaning towards no the last time I spoke to her about it, which I think is a real shame.

My next finish is Noel Ornament by Laura Dickson of Enchanting Lair.  It is stitched on a Tokens and Trifles card using Treadworx and Krienik #4 braid.  I plan on making a couple more of these using different colours since the design lends itself so well to that.

Noel Ornament by Enchanting Lair

Noel Ornament by Enchanting Lair

It is  my understanding that Laura will be offering the chart for this, and possibly a kit too, on her website in the near future.  If you are interested in it (and it is so much lovelier than these awful, dull pictures show), pop over to her site and send her an email.

In other news, don’t forget that today is Day 5 of Missy Ann’s 13 Days of Halloween.  As always, pop over to her site to enter.  And, The Sampler Girl has almost all of her charts marked done to $5 for today only.  I am lusting after In the Garden with Jane, but I keep reminding myself I don’t need it.

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10 Book Reading Challenge – Done!

Posted on October 22, 2009 by Heather

I’ve mentioned in several blog posts that I’m taking part in the 10 Book Reading Challenge hosted by Vickie over at Reading and Stitching.  Well, last night I stayed up a little too late and finished my last book.

Here’s the list of books I said I was going to read:

  1. History of Hand Knitting by Richard Rutt
  2. Paul of Dune by Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson
  3. I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
  4. Empire by Orson Scott Card
  5. Way of the Green Witch by Arin Murphy-Hiscock
  6. Dark Mirror by Juliette Marillier
  7. Blade of Fortriu by Juliette Marillier
  8. Mircosurfs by Douglas Coupland
  9. Knitter’s Almanac by Elizabeth Zimmerman
  10. Dairy of Lady Mursaki by Murasaki Shikibu

And here is what I ended up reading:

  1. History of Hand Knitting by Richard Rutt
  2. The Shop on Blossom Street by Debbie Macomber
  3. I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
  4. A Good Yarn (Blossom Street, No. 2) by Debbie Macomber
  5. Empire by Orson Scott Card
  6. Norstrilia by Cordwainer Smith (aka Paul Linebarger)
  7. Mr. Darcy’s Diary by Amanda Grange
  8. Mirror Mirror by Gregory Maguire
  9. The Way Of The Green Witch by Arin Murphy-Hiscock
  10. A Woman’s Guide to a Simpler Life by Andrea Van Steenhouse and Doris A. Fuller

So, I read four of the ten books I set out to read.  It’s not so much that I am all that fickle, but rather that I read the books that I got in as reserves at the library.  Most of the books on my original list are from my personal library, so they will always be around.  Everything on the list of books I actually read were from the library.  With my local branch closing for 18 months at the end of the year, I figured it was better to save my books for later.

Some of the books I read were great (Norstrilia, I Capture the Castle, Mr. Darcy’s Diary and The Way of the Green Witch), some were good, and some were just awful.  But, I would have to say I’m glad read all of those books.  I learned something from every one of them.

Don’t forget, today is Day 4 of Missy Ann’s 13 Days of Halloween.  Stop by her blog to enter.

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Fall 2009 Creativ Festival – Part Two

Posted on October 21, 2009 by Heather

Yesterday I told you a bit about the classes at the Creativ Festival and showed some pictures of my class pieces. Today, I thought I would tell you a little bit about the shopping and the people.

First, shopping. The number of cross stitch related booths has dropped considerably over the past couple of years. I don’t know if this is because of the economy, or because Stitching Jubilee happens the same weekend down in the States or what. This year there were only six booths selling cross stitch including Enchanting Lair, X’s and Oh’s and a local shop (which only took cash, so I had to bypass them since I didn’t bring any.  Whaa!).  There were lots of other booths though, selling everything from quilting supplies to knitting things to beads and jewellery findings.  It is so great to have a show that gets all kinds of crafts in the same room.  It seems like inspiration is everywhere, and I am more inclined then ever to learn to quilt! (That will just leave jewellery making and scrapbooking left to conquer, I think. Oh, and tatting, but I have tried that.)

Overall, unfortunately, there were quite a few less vendors than in previous years.  And some large vendors had greatly reduced booth sizes; Mary Maxim and Herrschners come to mind here.  The isles also seemed narrower, making the show feel very crowded.  But, I had a great time anyway, and was still able to get some new stash.

Silk Yarn and Shawl Pin

Silk Yarn and Shawl Pin

Cross Stitch Stash and Fabric

Cross Stitch Stash and Fabric

As you can see, I did pretty well.  I got several things from Enchanting Lair, including the chart Blessed Be and the kits for Celtic Sewing Box and Enchanted Garden.  The later will be one of my first projects once my Christmas stitching is done since it is so pretty. I also snapped up X’s and Oh’s new chart Spooky House.

I think my favourite find was the pink breast cancer ribbon fabric at the back of the second picture.  I’ve been searching for breast cancer ribbon fabric to use with Lizzie*Kate’s Peace, Love and a Cure but I’ve had no luck.  Well, I found some great fabric in the Len’s Mills booth and bought a whole yard of it.  (I don’t know why they were selling by the yard rather than by the metre.)  When I got home, I discovered it is the same fabric used in the model on the chart.  What a find!  I really had no idea, and I am just tickled pink.

Besides shopping, I went to the “gala” dinner on Saturday night, and both the food and the company (Erica, Barb, and others) were wonderful.  Afterwards was a fashion show of items from Paula Lishman (famous for her knitting with fur), Jane Slicer-Smith, Sweaterkits (where I got that lovely silk yarn), and two men who do felted coats who’s names I have forgotten.  Some of the pieces were things I want to knit, some were just plain wonderful, and some were a little odd.  But isn’t that always the way with fashion shows?

It was nice to be able to spend the weekend with people who speak my language.  When I say I stitched The Wedding twice they know what I mean and understand why I don’t like to stitch large sections of white any more.  When I say I can’t knit with cashmere, they feel sorry for me.  When they tell me about their latest project or hand me some silk to fondle, we understand each other.  It makes we wish I had some crafty friends in everyday life.  (Here’s hoping Baby Man grows up to be a knitter!)

One thing I discovered at this year’s festival is that stitching and knitting in isolation may not be such a bad thing.  I’ve done a lot of different techniques with my stitching (cutwork, piles of speciality stitches, etc.) and with my knitting (cables, socks, entrelac, etc.) because I didn’t know they were hard or something I should be afraid of.  It seems to me that sometimes when people get together and over analyze their craft they can scare themselves out of trying more difficult techniques.  But by taking classes, like the Cutwork Compass Rose, they can learn that something they thought was hard really isn’t.  And, I hope, that this will encourage them to try other techniques fearlessly.

I also don’t understand why everyone was teasing me about  my speed.  I don’t think I am a fast stitcher, and it was a little embarrassing.  That’s just me though, being shy and nervous about people.

Enough about the show and my silly navel gazing!  Don’t forget that today is Day 3 of Missy Ann’s 13 Days of Halloween Giveaway!  Head on over to her blog to find out more.

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Fall 2009 Creativ Festival – Part One

Posted on October 20, 2009 by Heather

The Creativ Festival this year was great fun, even if it didn’t turn out exactly as planned.  Teresa Wentzler, one of my all time favourite cross stitch designers and a genuinely nice person, wasn’t able to make it because she came down the flu just before she was due to fly up.  Sadly, two of her classes were cancelled (crewel and bargello), but Erica of Erica’s Places and model stitch extraordinarie and Jennifer Aikman-Smith of Dragon Dreams were able to pull everything together and the rest of Teresa’s classes went off smoothly.  Erica taught TW’s Cutwork Compass Rose and Sparkling Hearts classes and helped Jennifer with the joint TW/Jennifer class Here Be Tiny Dragons.  Jennifer handled Summer Keep/Winter Keep on her own, and also presented the Sunday morning creativity lecture by herself.

Jennifer and Erica did a wonderful job of making sure that all of the rest of us had a great weekend.  They went above and beyond the call of duty in order to make sure that  fellow stitchers enjoyed themselves.  Thank you, ladies.  You did great!  And we all appreciated it more than we were able to express to you.

I understand that TW is doing much better, and was very disappointed she wasn’t able to make it.  I think I can safely say we were all sad she wasn’t there, but we are all glad she is recovering quickly.

So, on to the pictures of my classes pieces.  I don’t have much done yet, so use your imagination!  I will, of course, post pictures as I complete them, whenever that will be.

Laura Dickson's Framing Class

Laura Dickson's Framing Class

Laura Dickson of Enchanting Lair taught a framing class.  I took along my H fairy, and here she is hanging on my wall.  The class was great, and I feel confident enough to try framing some of my other pieces myself.

TW's Cutwork Compass Rose

TW's Cutwork Compass Rose

This was one of the classes Erica taught, and she did a super job tackling cutwork with students who had never done it before.  Rather than work on the teaching piece, I started the actual design.  (I’ve done a fair amount of cutwork.)  When done, this will have cutwork in the centre and the corners, and will have a bunch of speciality stitches in this over-dyed thread and two blue-green Dinky Dyes over-dyed cotton threads.

TW's Sparkling Hearts

TW's Sparkling Hearts

This design is mostly beads, and is so sparkly!  There is a bonus chart in the class kit for a back, which I may try to do, recharting it for braids or floss so I don’t need to go out and buy 10 packages of Mill Hill magnifica beads at US$4 a package.  (The kit has enough to do the front, but not the back sadly. But it is a bonus chart, so I’m not disappointed.)

J A-S's Water Dragon

J A-S's Water Dragon

This is Jennifer’s Water Dragon from the Here Be Tiny Dragons class.  It is so cute!  TW did a fire dragon as a companion, but I haven’t started it yet.

J A-S's Summer Keep

J A-S's Summer Keep

And this is part of the outer border of Jennifer’s Summer Keep design.  TW’s was the same keep in winter, which I haven’t started.  Both are lovely, and I’m stitching them on the same piece of fabric.

I also took Jennifer’s 3D Castle Ornament, and you can see a finished picture of it on her blog at the bottom of this post.

I will post some more tomorrow about my experiences at the festival.  Overall, though, I had a really great time.

Giveaways

Don’t forget Missy Ann’s 13 Days of Halloween giveaway!  Check out her blog for more information.

And another giveaway: Pumpkin Patch Primitives Quilt Shoppe is giving away a fabulous bundle of Halloween fabric. Stop by to check it out.

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TUSAL Update – October 2009

Posted on October 19, 2009 by Heather

Imagine that, I’m a day late again.  The new moon has come (and gone), so it is time for another update for the Totally Useless Stitch Along.  This time my jar includes yarn from dish cloths and floss from Baby Man’s stocking, Sampler de Noel and whatever else it was that I have worked on.  (Sorry, after the Creativ Festival this past weekend, my mind is gone!)

tusal-october2009-2

Don’t forget, Missy Ann’s 13 Days of Halloween giveaway has started.  Head over to her blog to learn all about it!

Tomorrow I will post my report on the Creativ Festival. (If you are on The Wagon yuku board, I’ve already posted a quick report there.) It was great fun, even though Teresa Wentzler wasn’t able to make it.  Jennifer Aikman-Smith (Dragon Dreams) and Erica did a super job of covering for her, and making sure everyone had a great time.  Thank you so very, very much ladies.

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Aren’t Those Fetching?

Posted on October 13, 2009 by Heather

Happy Thanksgiving!  Okay, I’m a day late and the turkey is almost gone, but I do hope all of my Canadian readers had a lovely Thanksgiving weekend.

When surfing the interwebs this weekend, I noticed a lot of people asking what Canadian Thanksgiving is about.  We don’t have pilgrims and Native Americans as part of our Thanksgiving “myth.”  Canadian Thanksgiving is simply about… wait for it… giving thanks for the fall harvest, our blessings, and whatever we happen to be thankful for.  Because we are, generally speaking, further north than our American cousins, our fall harvest starts and ends earlier, which is part of the reason for the earlier date. (I say generally more north, but Portland, ME, for example, is a fair little bit further north than I am here in Toronto.)  If you’d like to know more about Canadian Thanksgiving, check out this Wikipedia article.

Anyway, on to the knitting and cross stitch!

This weekend, not only did I cook a turkey dinner (with some help), I also knit a pair of Fetching.  I used the leftover Super Cable Aran (in colour 6434 Aubergine) from my Central Park Hoodie.  I did knit a pair, but I need one hand to hold the camera.  So, just image another hand, with the cables crossed the other way.  (Isn’t that a nice touch?)

Fetching by Cheryl Niamath (knitty.com)

Fetching by Cheryl Niamath (knitty.com)

I wore them out today, and I will admit I felt a bit like a Charles Dickens street urchin wearing fingerless gloves, but they did the job.  My hands stayed warm, and I was able to wipe Baby Man’s nose with a tissue without taking them off.  That is a total win in my book.

I also made some progress on Sampler de Noel 2009, and discovered why my stitching is so off centre.  It turns out I’m using fabric that isn’t the same count in both directions.  I used this fabric last year when I stitched Teresa Wentzler’s Father Winter Ornament, which is supposed to be square. Click that link and you will see that it is not even close to square.  And look at my Sampler de Noel 2009.  That empty oval is suppose to be a circle.  Yikes!

Sampler de Noel - Part 5+

Sampler de Noel - Part 5+

To make sure the whole piece will fit, I stitched the rest of the left border.  I still need to stitch the bottom border, but I can tell it will fit and leave me about 4cm (~1/5″) left.  I really need to find the larger piece I cut this from and remove it from my stash!

My first Creativ Festival class is Thursday evening, and I’m totally booked all day Friday and Saturday.  I’m also planning to attend the dinner on Saturday night since Erica talked me into it.  And Sunday morning I’m going to Jennifer Aikman-Smith (Dragon Dreams) and Teresa Wentzler’s talk about creativity.  I’m very excited, although I’m pretty sure that my I won’t get total shopping satisfaction since there will be so few cross stitch vendors.

Two more things to tell you about:

  • Dip Diddly Designs is having another draw.  Stop by to read all about it.  She also has a great freebie in the same post.
  • Anna from Stitch Bitch turned me on to Regretsy.  Check it out, but be prepared to a lot (and I mean A LOT) or not safe for work/little eyes stuff. Yikes!  The first image to load right now is off lady parts.  You’ve been warned.
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Halloween Pumpkin and Christmas Sampler

Posted on October 9, 2009 by Heather

I’m having another of my grand moments of indecision.  Today (this week?) it is about which projects I should be working on.   Notice I didn’t say which projects I want to work on.  It’s getting towards the end of the year, so that means gift stitching and knitting and ornament stitching should be dominating my rotation.  Instead, yesterday I worked on my Mermaid Socks (and screwed them up so bad somehow that I’m going to have to rip them out) and cast on for a pair of Pink Ribbon Socks (link to the pattern pdf).  I also got started stitching Take Time to Read from Jeanette Douglas Designs, which was a gift from Erica and which I have been dying to start but was supposed to be an after-all-the-gifts-are-done reward for myself. Notice that none of those are Christmas-related projects.

I should be working on the Christmas gift I have about 1/3 done, on Baby Man’s scarf, on Baby Man’s stocking, on Sampler de Noel 2009 (part 5 is out), and on another stitching gift.  I should also be knitting Baby Man the pumpkin hat for Halloween, and a pair of fingerless gloves for myself.  I’d also love to get some Halloween ornaments done too, but I think that is nothing more than wishful thinking.  Clearly, I need to review my October goals and seriously think about what I want to accomplish.

Halloween by La-D-Da is on my October goal list, and I finished stitching it just the other day.  I used Dinky Dyes silk Black Coral and DMC Colour Variations 4124 (Bonfire).  I think it turned out really nice, and I will be finishing it into a small pillow using some black faux velvet for the back.  The quilt shop down the street has some fabulous Halloween fabric that I would really like to use for this, but since this is supposed to by my SALsuffit project, I can’t buy anything new for it. *sigh*  Oh well.

Halloween by La-D-Da

Halloween by La-D-Da

I also found my Sampler de Noel, which Baby Man had stuffed beside my computer desk.  I’ve got started on Part 5, but still have a ways to go.  I’m certain I didn’t centre the project on the fabric correctly, but I should have about 4 cm (~1.5″) at the bottom.  Not great, but enough for finishing, I hope.

Sampler de Noel - Part 4

Sampler de Noel - Part 4

I’m also getting really excited about the Creativ Festival next week.  I’ve hunted down the cheap “daylight” lamp I take with me (a whole $10 at Wal-Mart, and it does a great job helping me see in those dim conference rooms).  I’ve made a small list of things to look for when I get a chance to shop, although with the lack of cross stitch vendors this year I’m not expecting to find much.  It’s the classes I’m most looking forward too, and to seeing people I only see once or twice a year.  I’m so shy they probably don’t know how much I enjoy seeing them, though. 🙂  Also, I wish I could remember if the conference rooms are hot or cold.  I always guess wrong and end up dressed wrong.

Anyway, back to the grindstone.  Today it will be Baby Man’s scarf, casting on my fingerless gloves (Fetching using the leftover yarn from my Central Park Hoodie), and Baby Man’s Christmas stocking.  If I’m lucky, I may get a little bit done on Sampler de Noel as well.  We shall see.

I’m also on book 8 of the 10 Book Reading Challenge: Mirror, Mirror by Gregory Maguire.  I’ve slowed down considerable because I’m not really enjoying this book, but I don’t dislike it enough to stop reading it.  I’m also reading book 9: Way of the Green Witch by Arin Murphy-Hiscock.  It is a really great book about, not surprisingly, green witchcraft.  I’m finding it really inspiring.

Don’t forget: the online Needlework Show is happening until October 12th.  There are lots of great designs to see (a couple I really would love to have), a few free charts, and some great door prize draws.

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