May Flowers

Happy Memorial Day!

Memorial Day, in addition to being a day to honor those who gave their lives in defense of our country, is the official start of summer.  If you live in Florida, summer started long long ago!  Here is a photo of my latest flower canvas - sweet!  Those bullions were a challenge towards the end.  You need a lot of patience and preferably a padded room when pulling the thread through the needle.  And I do recommend a bullion needle for the long ones.

June first is the start of hurricane season so we will be "watching the tropics" as they say from now until November first.  There is always a long list of items we have to have - why are there no needlepoint supplies on the Channel 7 list :)

Emily and I have been doing our gardening....

Look what we found

It's a harmless scarlet snake, not a coral snake as I first feared.  There is a poem we learned in elementary school...Red touches yellow, dangerous fellow.   Red touches black, friend to Jack.  Do you think I remembered that as I was screaming "DROP IT" in the backyard?  No, I came in the kitchen and immediately googled it!

Emily and I have lost one of our 9 lives over this baby.  And not to be outdone by Vickie's cat photos, here is Emily in her element...she went swimming right after this...

Yes, I have an active puppy :)

Have a great day with the BBQ!

Linda

Boston Strong

Hi everyone,

Sorry I have been away so long....

Here is our third ANG ornament demonstrating the "diaper pattern".  I have tried to do each one in a different color theme and I chose green and gold on white canvas for no other reason than I didn't have any St. Patrick's Day decorations.  Then came the Boston Marathon bombing and I thought how appropriate to name it Boston Strong.

With the deadlines for finishing coming ever earlier each year one needs to look far far ahead and stitch out of the season so to speak.  Sort of like buying bathing suits in January :)

I have two more St. Patrick's day decorations.  This one is from the Happy Heart series - there are 12 hearts, one for each month and some of my friends had them made into a calendar/bulletin board with all 12 hearts, but I'm opting for individual ornaments.

And the best for last, my March angel

with her pot of gold

check out the cool fringe - each one tied separately

I'm on to working on May flowers so off these go to the finisher!

See you soon,

Linda

Mind Games

Hi everyone,

It's been busy around here and time flies between posts.  I finished the second ornament from our ANG Chapter Book - I think it turned out great.

Then, while I was trying to decide what to do next I picked up the Seminar magazine with all those great classes in it.  I don't think I can actually go to seminar, but I did sign up for a Correspondence class...blackwork peonies.  This is also referred to as Elizabethan Blackwork because it was introduced to England by Catherine of Aragon and was popular during the time of Henry VIII and Queen Elizabeth.  I love the fact that you can take a very simple pattern and manipulate it into an elegant design.

I just started the blackwork HOMEWORK which has to be done before you jump in to the real piece so here are my first photos of my practice blackwork.  You have to have a plan (and actually think) when you stitch so you drag as little thread as possible on the back as you work the design.   I am moving from dark on the left to light on the right just by adding or subtracting design elements.  It's all done with 2 ply of black floss.

And here is a photo of the "person" who thinks I am nuts and wants to go outside!

See you soon,

Linda

The Dog Ate My Homework

What's left of my stitch guide

Hi,

I was just sitting outside stitching and minding my own business when a GUST of wind blew my stitch guide off the table and before I could yell "Emily!" she had grabbed it and run off, all the while trying to EAT it!  (Wow that's a run on sentence)  So when some child in your family comes up with the excuse "the dog ate my homework" it might just be true!!

But she did give me my next blog post idea :)

Here is the next ANG ornament that we are working on at our chapter meeting...

It's pattern couching (that's the section in the middle).  You lay down one thread - here the gold kreinik and couch down a pattern with the other thread - here the red floss.  I have named this my Pope ornament since it's red and white and gold.

My other example of pattern couching is on my Panda Santa canvas which is a big WIP.  The pattern couching is on the coat - it looks like brocade when you're done.

And here's a little WIP that's almost done- love the background.

Have a happy weekend,

Linda

Thank Your Hairdresser

Hi everyone,

Here is our first lady sporting the world's most famous bangs.  Does this look easy to achieve?  Well, it's not!  I have been working on my March angel and she has bangs too...Fortunately for the little angel when hers don't work out I can cut them out and start over.

In my first pass I used 6 strands of floss for the turkey work - which meant 12 with the loop and they stood STRAIGHT UP - not the look I wanted :(

So I cut the thread down to 4 strands and her bangs lay flatter- they may not be even but they're flatter.

At least Michelle Obama doesn't wear a headband- that's so Hillary...

Happy Stitching,

Linda

Better Late Than Never

Hi everyone,

Here's my first finish of the Kelly Clark Angels of the month.  Can you guess which month??  These are so incredibly cute!!!

I learned two new techniques with this one canvas...

The first is Closed Raised Herringbone which is used on the pumpkin leaves.

The second is the Casalguidi stitch - can you say that 3 times fast?  Casalguidi is an Italian embroidery stitch and is used here on the broom handle.  She needs to swat that spider!

I have also started using the tutorials on Mary Corbet's site Needle n Thread which are super helpful especially when you are trying a stitch for the first time.

Happy Stitching,


Linda

Best in Show

Hi everyone,

Here's my choice for Best in Show.  I love a real dog!  Although the Sporting Group may not be politically correct right now ....especially GUN dogs.  But Emily is a gun dog through and through!

I recently broke my foot following that little gun dog around the backyard so I have had a lot of time to stitch and watch tv. And Emily is practicing extended downs. :)  My latest finish is yet another cracker.  This project is a BEAD FIX.  If you like to bead these are for you!

Now that the bead fix is over I have moved on to the next Melissa Shirley 12 days of Christmas (#5).
I hope to finish 4 of these this year so that's through 8 Lords a Leaping!

Here's the first pass of the turkey work- do you see a heart under there?

Cut loops

Looks like a bad haircut...

Side view

Here's the cleaned up heart - still needs a little more TLC.  I think I'll take it outside into the natural light!

Happy Valentines Day,

Linda