So Excited!

Tonight was date night with my hubby and we went to Barnes and Noble. I was so thrilled to see a group there wrapping gifts was the Southern Oregon Stitchers! The ladies were so nice, we talked about different classes they offer and where they meet. I plan on attending their next get together in January.

I also finally finished ONE tiny project and here it is. I found this at Joann's and it was so cute it had to come home with me.



Forgive the terrible photo, I took it with my phone just before bed and my eyes were going. We are putting up the tree this weekend and it'll join my other ornaments.

Antique beauties

This weekend my husband and I attended an event at Butte Creek Mill in Eagle Point, Oregon. The Mill has an authentic general store where they sell all kinds of goodies from wheat ground there to baking mixes and old fashioned candies. The store also contains antique store items among which I discovered these beautiful old thread displays. I thought I'd share them with you and all their thready goodness!

Amazing how the colors of the threads haven't faded much after all those years!

OOh heading into fall...

I haven't posted in a long time but I swear I have a great reason! My fiancé is finally returned from Australia and we're super busy. I swore to him I didn't have a Honey Do list but he's been keeping himself occupied by reorganizing the garage, hooking up the washer and dryer and generally being a super hero to me. We've also been hitting the garage sales and flea markets hard too and I found some beautiful old embroidered linens. One is a lovely old table cloth embroidered with an adorable house and flowers. I plan on posting pics of it soon and possibly a pattern as well. In the mean time here is a crafty tip that I like.

I keep all my embroidery supplies in a clear vinyl make up bag. Sounds easy enough I know but I have kitties and so it keeps the cat hair out, dust out and I can throw it in my bag or backpack when I leave the house. I keep thread lists, threads, samples of threads I need more of, needles, scissors, transfer pens and pencils, and a tiny dmc checklist in it. For me it makes it easier to take projects with me at any time, or remember what threads or projects bits and pieces I need to pick up while I'm out and about.

Sheesh I'm a slacker..

My one excuse has been it's been icky hot out lately and with no AC having an embroidery project on my lap hasn't seemed all that fun of an idea. I did however promise pics so here they are...mmm colors..

A trip to Joann's crafts and I came back with some color bundles of fat quarter to get my imagination working. I have also restarted with success the Dao board as well. Starting over with the black background was the way to go I think it looks a lot better. Changing the orange to yellow for the grid also helped...

It is a bit wonky in the frame but I think it'll straighten out once its done and I wash and iron it.

Creative block OVER..

I figured out that moving on to a new project is better, so I now have some juicy colored fat quarters and just as juicy colored thread to play with. I plan on making some bright, festive and summery little projects and I'll be posting pics this weekend. I also entered the Rainbow of Stitches Contest on Feeling Stitchy. Can't wait to see the winners, there were so many cool entries. Thats what inspired me to get these rainbow fabrics, fun stuff...

Creative block..

I worked more on the Dao board but came to realize I didn't like the orange I used for the grid pattern. Rather than take it out I'm going to start over again. My intention had been to use black fabric or blue, but at the time I didn't have a erasable white pencil, so I went with the white fabric. After a recent trip to the craft store I purchased one and so now I'm planning out the pattern and starting over on the black fabric. Everything happens for a reason. I'll post more photos when I get the pattern laid out...

New Project Game board...

I love games and I had planned on making a Dao board for a while, at first I was going to paint fabric and then decided it was to stiff. The idea is to have a board of fabric with little glass stones and the board either roll up and a bag for the stones or board itself turn into a bag. So far I've only gotten as far as the board..lol.
Sorry for the terrible pic I used my phone, I took much better ones today with my camera I'll post soon.
Here is a link to a standard set. Mine will have a celestial theme...
dao game

Finished Mehndi piece

I'm really happy how it came out. I washed it after the photo was taken to get the design pen ink to disappear and I think it shrunk a tiny bit. Other than it came out perfect. I am sending it as a gift to a dear Aunt. I am excited to see how she uses it..she followed the progress of it on my Facebook and didn't even know it was for her..

Progress on the Mehndi..

So far so good I like how its turning out. I'm mostly freehanding it and coming up with designs on the fly. I love how the hand is coming along..

Mehndi tattoo embroidery...

Well I can't find my good wool felt in autumn colors yet so I started something new. I love Mehndi henna tattoos and I have some patterns for the henna designs that I love. I'm a paisley nut, so I decided that instead of whipping up some henna I'd just make it on fabric...I can't wait till its done. I think it'll take a while I'm only halfway following patterns and some of it is freehand, where the thread takes me...

Needlebook WIP

As promised pics of my needlebook which is still in progress. I have to go search for my wool felt and autumn fabric in the garage this weekend.

I also need to make a run back to the cross stitch store for more overdyed threads in this color.
Today was great for threads though via the mail and Ebay. Lovely Carrie's Creations threads and some Valdani as well. Photos of those tomorrow..

New Project

Started a new project, this time a needlebook. I have wanted one for a long time and finally thought up one I like. I went to my local cross stitch store and found Weeks Dye Works overdyed thread and bought some. This color is called Tobacco Road. When I went to print  out the lettering I searched through my fonts and found one named Tobacco Road. Those two just had to go together I guess..It is a WIP and I'm having fun with it. I'll be posting photos of the work so far soon..

Also I got a copy of the book Stitch-opedia by Helen Winthorpe Kendrick in the mail Monday. I checked and it hasn't been released on Amazon  yet, I purchased mine through my online book club. I was so excited to get it and when it came and I went through it I was disappointed.

The focus of the book is embroidery in all its forms, stumpwork, hardinger, blackwork, etc. However as an embroidery book I had hoped it would have a stronger how to section and a deeper well of stitches to learn. The introduction section in the first part of the book was I felt sadly lacking, the thread information amounts to a paragragh or two, a tiny blurb on needles, and the illustrations while plentiful weren't all that helpful to show how to accomplish the stitches. I frequent the Hand Embroidery Network blog and their stitch examples far out do this book in clear, concise and easy to understand instruction. Finally the sample projects in the back of the book were uninspired and in some cases not very attractive. The book itself is filled with beautiful photographs of embroidery art from around the world, it would have been nice to see at least some of the sample projects at that level and more attractive in motif. The book title includes "The only embroidery reference you'll ever need" unfortunately I'm still on the hunt..I'll give it a C-...

Latest project..

Just finished my latest project and I really like how it came out. I designed it myself with the help of Microsoft Word, Word Art and printed it out, traced it on fabric with a transfer pen and voila! I used just some plain white cotton fabric and two DMC variagated threads in green and purple (two strands). I basically just played with different stitches and this is how it came out. I still need to get better pics these were off my phone..

First post on fullnovembermoon

This blog is a craft blog, and it's my first real blog so wish me luck!