A Holiday Finish!

I was recently thinking about my friend Renee and how we used to go over the Just Cross Stitch Annual Christmas Ornament issue as she would choose designs to stitch for holiday gifts. I bought a copy of this year's issue and found a design to stitch in Renee's memory.  I'm not much of a cross stitcher, but I enjoyed this project

   The "one more stitch" motif seems appropriate.

While I had the brown linen handy, I began test stitching a design for Susan Johnson. I'm loving it. The circle will be about 6" when I'm done.  I'm using a 24 count linen with DMC coton a broider size 20. (Thanks to Jenny--it's wonderful to stitch with!)

I also got out the paints and painted the backgrounds for the Catherine Jordan trees through the Shining Needle Society.  I'm not terribly controlled about these things. Paint always gets away from me.  I was pleased to find that I could dip the undried fabric in water and the color would rinse out and I could start over.  The seasons I selected are: left side, bottom to top is summer, spring, autumn, and winter.  The right side is a second autumn. They're drying now. With everything, they got quite saturated.  Next I'll press them to set the colors and then I can begin stitching.

And here's my drip/blotting cloth. I always try to use fabric under my painting because I end up with an interesting piece of painted fabric. 

Don't forget to enter June giveaway

It's almost over! Don't forget to leave a comment here to be entered in the June blog giveaway. The THREE winners will be selected next Monday (June 29).

catching up

I spent much of last weekend outside. We've been cool and wet here and while I had the chance, I got some garden plants in. We had a mostly nice weekend. On Saturday we bought plants, always a fun excursion, and dirt and on Sunday I got busy and planted them.

We buy our plants at a local place, Field of Flowers (Joe Orr Road in Chicago Heights) and enjoy seeing their changes and additions each year. They do wonderful hanging basket and planters. I wish we had a place for a hanging basket, but I've never figured one out. (We have a very shaded house and yard, good for the electric bill, bad for pretty flowers.)

Most of our garden is perennials, I got a few photos this weekend of the roses and peonies. We also have lilies of the valley going strong and violets, the phlox, day- and tiger-lilies are on their way, the passion flower vines are poking up...

I have some huge pots around the yard and I planted some flowers in front (the same as last year, I still can't remember their name), dill, rosemary, parsley, and thyme in the back yard and cherry tomatoes in the new pot.

I did some stitching. I mostly worked on the Hardanger State Day project, hours spent, little to show for it, so I took time out to stitch Susan Johnson's new beaded design--a pretty and quick project. Here's the booklet with my stitched heart below. It was a fun project to do. (I kind of felt bad, but I walked into her studio and said "I WANT IT!" and then made her kit it up for me. I don't think I'm usually quite that pushy.) The kit is available to order from her website.

I stitched it on perforated paper like the model. I haven't worked on perforated paper for a long time and I enjoyed it. I've been contemplating finishing possibilities. Of course, I've thought of stitching it to a slightly larger wool felt heart, perhaps pink, and making a pin. Or backing it and making it a scissors fob. Or adding it to a collage of some sort. The design is charming and I can see it added easily to a lot of projects.

I need to get some more beads from Susan and then stitch a few more hearts on canvas or linen.

new giveaway

While I was visiting her on vacation, Susan Johnson of SJ Designs offered to provide a treat for this month's giveaway.

Gala is her new thread and she has offered to send THREE WINNERS! a twist of Gold and of Silver. I'm sure she'll also be happy to include her latest newsletter.

These luxurious metallic threads are structured like Jap gold but are a little shinier and thicker. I think they'd be perfect for longer stitches on canvas (not tent stitch). I plan to use mine to outline a crewel design (that I have yet to stitch), using outline stitches.

Please leave your name and contact information in a comment on this post by Monday June 29. I'll generate THREE random numbers then to pick the winners.