Slow Sunday Stitching

The Waiting for Santa stocking has been really easy stitching lately. The little boy is finished except for his hand and I have almost finished the rug below his feet. Once that is done, I am going to stitch the pretty toe pattern. As I move back up the stocking, I am planning on completing the backstitching as I go so that it is done before I turn the scroll and I don't have to go back to it.

I have another finish....almost. Many years ago I bought my daughter a Tweety latch hook rug kit. She worked on it a while and then put it aside. It was just about halfway finished. Well I don't like unfinished projects. With her permission, I started working on it and I finished the hooking on Friday. 

I am happily finishing some of the UFOs that have been hanging around for too long. I have already ordered Tweety fabric to make this into a pillow. I will leave it in my daughter's old room for now. If she or my granddaughter want it, they can take it.

I have finished knitting the sleeves for my grandson's jacket. I have sewn the shoulder seams.

I have also attached the first sleeve. The blue above is closer to the actual color of the lighter blue.

Unfortunately, the directions never state when to sew up the side seams. I think I will do that after I attach the second sleeve. Then all that is left to do is knit the hood and add the buttons. I need to shop for those and the directions do not state the size needed. I haven't decided whether the hood will be all the darker blue yarn or if I will knit a couple of inches in the lighter blue yarn and then change to the darker. I don't have enough of the lighter blue for the entire hood. 

Yesterday was such a beautiful sunny, warm day that Hubby and I decided to take a walk in the local preserve. 

Although it looks like Fall, it didn't feel like it. It was actually hot.....80 degrees. There were geese in the lake.

A few ducks also. These two were not at all afraid of us. They were only a few feet away.

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. 

Thanks for stopping by! 

Second October Morning Stitch Along update of October

Hubby and I took a trip to California last weekend and I have been concentrating on my grandson's stocking, so my stitching progress on October Morning over the last three weeks has been less than usual. You can see the post for that trip and the other crafts that I have been working on here.

This is where I was on October Morning three weeks ago. 

 I have been working on filling in the upper right corner. 

I have added a few colors of leaves and will continue filling in from right to left. The open spaces are the sky peeking through and are not stitched.

Thank you to Avis at Sewing Beside the Sea for hosting this Stitch Along every three weeks and sending us the needed posting reminders. 

Grab yourself a cup of coffee or tea and take some time to visit the other bloggers below who are part of this stitch-along. There is a wide variety of stitching projects. These talented stitchers are from all over the world, so please allow for the time differences and check back for each post.

Avis, Claire, Gun, Christina, Kathy, Margaret,

Heidi, Jackie, Sunny, Megan, Deborah, Sharon, Daisy, 

Cathie, Linda, Helen, MaryMargaret

Thanks for stopping by! 

Two finishes and a trip!

 Hubby and I took another trip to CA to visit our son, daughter-in-law and grandson last weekend. I decided I needed something to craft on the plane. My neighbor's daughter is expecting her second little boy, so I decided to crochet two little pups for both boys to add to the small gift that I had purchased for her. These are small made with scraps which wouldn't take up too much room in my underseat carryon. I finished the second pup today. Aren't they cute?

We had a great time reconnecting with our 4 month old grandson. 

Isn't he adorable?

While we were there we visited Batiquitos Lagoon. This is the first sign that greeted us.

Thankfully we didn't encounter any. Whew! The lagoon is near a busy highway, but was quiet and peaceful.

These beautiful painted chairs were at the entrance.

We also took a walk along the beach in Carlsbad. The ocean was quite rough and there were a lot of surfers.

We came home on Tuesday. I took some photos from the plane on the way home.

I have added several stitches to Waiting for Santa. You can see the heel shape of the stocking now. 

I am working on the red of the pointsettias and the legs of the boy's pajamas. I am loving working on this now.

I will be joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Stitching Progress

My stitching lately has been anything but slow. I am totally enjoying adding stitches to the Waiting for Santa stocking. Most of the stitching is large swaths of one color which means I can take a length of 6 ply floss, separate it into 3 2-ply lengths and sit and stitch those 3 lengths at one go. An hour later and many stitches have happily been added. The little boy is almost done already.

Of course, now that we are halfway through October (OMG, really?!), I finally bought my pumpkins and mums and made the front of my house look festive.

I have been steadily adding rows to the sleeves of the little boy jacket. They look a little wide to me, but hopefully they will be fine when seamed. They are stitching up close to gauge.

I have finished stitching 5 of those 10 Log Cabin Star blocks that I have been working on. 

The last log and the y-seam are giving me fits again. The five on the left are done. The next to last log went on so nicely too. Sigh.....

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. 

Thanks for stopping by! 

Another finish!

I finished Father Frost! He is already to be given to my grandson to hang on the tree! 

Now each grandchild will have a Mill Hill Charmed Santa Face ornament with their name and the year on it. 

I am pretty impressed with myself that I got these done so early. I have two more that I could make. At least one will be for me.  

I have been steadily stitching the Waiting for Santa stocking for my grandson. I am sure you can see my progress. The upper body of the little boy is almost complete.

I have my living room stitching spot back as our reupholstered chairs and ottoman have finally arrived. 

That means a lot of early morning stitching before Hubby awakens. These pieces used to be covered with a red and cream buffalo check. Unfortunately, the upholstered didn't have enough of that same fabric and it had been discontinued. I like the windowpane check that we substituted. 

Now that the ornament is finished, I have spent some time at the sewing machine the past few days to work on the Log Cabin Star quilt (Judy Martin's Timberline) for my daughter. I am adding logs to the next 10 blocks.

 Once these are complete I will be more than halfway done with making these particular blocks. I will have 101 of the 196 blocks completed. 

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Make yourself a cup of tea or coffee and pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. You know that I will be settled in stitching the stocking.

Thanks for stopping by!

 

October Morning Stitch Along Update

Sadly October Morning hasn't been getting much attention lately. This is where it was 3 weeks ago. I had happily gotten to the top of the right hand corner. 

I added a few more stitches just this past week to that corner. 

You can see that I have stitched two branches of the tree trunk all the way to the top of the picture and filled in along the right hand side. Next I want to fill in some more of the colorful leaves between the trunk pieces. 

I have been spending most of my time working on the Christmas stocking and ornament for my grandson, so October Morning won't be progressing as quickly for a while. I may even put it in time out so I can concentrate on the stocking. You will see what I decide to do in 3 weeks. You can find the update on all of my other projects here.

Thank you to Avis at Sewing Beside the Sea for hosting this Stitch Along every three weeks and sending us the needed posting reminders. 

Grab yourself a cup of coffee or tea and take some time to visit the other bloggers below who are part of this stitch-along. There is a wide variety of stitching projects. These talented stitchers are from all over the world, so please allow for the time differences and check back for each post.

Avis, Claire, Gun, Christina, Kathy, Margaret,

Heidi, Jackie, Sunny, Megan, Deborah, Sharon, Daisy, 

Cathie, Linda, Helen, MaryMargaret, Cindy

Thanks for stopping by! 

 

Rain Rain Go Away

Last weekend Hubby and I were on babysitting duty while our daughter and her husband took a short vacation to celebrate their anniversary. It rained almost all day Saturday and Sunday. We had to be creative to keep our 1 year old granddaughter and the dog busy and use up their energy. We drove all the way home in rain also. Ugh!

The rain was awful this Friday. There was so very much rain that the subways and roads in NYC flooded. Some of that rain found its way into our basement. We were checking every 20 minutes or so as we sometimes get a little leakage. I went in the basement 10 minutes after the last check to get something out of the big freezer and saw all the water. It came in so fast.  Below is the small storage area near our burner. Thankfully, most of the boxes are stored on plastic shelving that lifts them a few inches above the floor. Only one cardboard box that was on the floor was damaged. 

The water seeped in by the back door that is at the bottom of an outdoor staircase. Hubby was picking up sopping wet towels. We used all of our scrap towels and all of our beach towels to sop up the water. It took just under an hour. Thankfully the heavy rain slowed while we were working.  Our washer and dryer were working overtime so that we would have dry towels if the heavy rain returned. 

The basement is dry now and the towels have been cleaned and put away. 

So today I spent a little more time on crafting. The Santa ornament is all stitched and beaded. I finished the hat yesterday.

Next I have to cut the pieces out and put them together.

 I will back this with embroidered felt as I did on the last one.

I have added a bunch of stitches to my grandson's Christmas stocking. I am working on the little boy's pajamas.

I have added several rows to the sleeves for my grandson's hooded jacket.

Finally, my son picked up the birth announcement that is now framed.

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. I need to decide what I want to work on today. Maybe a few minutes of each craft.

Thanks for stopping by!