February Stitch Along Post #2

The three weeks between Stitch Along posts seem to happen faster and faster. This year seems to be going by quickly also. Can you believe that we are already near the end of February? Three weeks ago, I showed you my restart of Three Boats on a Tropical Beach by Artecy Cross Stitch.

I have been spending a lot of time working on this now. I have no idea when it will be finished as I am working the third of 24 pages, but I am making progress.

Below, you can see that I have almost finished my third page and I have started adding some stitches on the next page below as some of the floss colors are on both pages.

  I am almost done with the tip of the second boat and then there is just a whole lot of sand on the next page. The next page is not a full page, so hopefully I will have it finished by the end of March though probably not by the next check in. 

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! 

Slow Sunday Stitching

Last weekend we visited our daughter and her family in Boston. We finally got to celebrate her 30th birthday....three years late. Hubby and I had always planned to take her to dinner and a Broadway show in NYC. The pandemic obviously changed our plans. So this year we celebrated in Boston. We ate dinner at a fabulous restaurant, Estella, that was just around the corner from the Boston Opera House where we saw "The Book of Mormon". It was irreverent, but hilarious. We absolutely loved it. 

Of course we also were able to visit with our son-in-law and granddaughter the rest of the weekend. We even went to our granddaughter's gym class before leaving on Monday. 

There was a beautiful sunset over Manhattan as we crossed the bridge on our way home to Long Island. Please excuse the blurred black suspension cable.

I have been trying to finish more of the UFOs that are hanging around. I did add a piece of fabric to the back of the stitching on the wooden box that I showed you here. I had a scrap of coral colored fabric and I just used some spray fabric adhesive to secure it. Now I won't worry about any of the stitches coming loose. That is all done now. Yay!

I am trying now to finish the embroidery on this apron. I still have to finish the cream colored cross-stitching. I also have to use the stem stitch to finish the words. I like the cross-stitching, but I just don't enjoy stitching the letters of the words. I am trying to go back and forth and do two or three lengths of floss of the stem stitch and then do one length of cross-stitch. I have finished the "D" and am currently working on the "r".  

I have made this apron once before for and I no longer remember why I decided to buy the kit and make it again. I think I will finish it and keep it for a future hostess gift. I have plenty of aprons of my own and really don't need another.

I completed another puzzle. This one is of the White House in Washington, DC. It had all of its pieces, but some of the tabs were starting to lift up. I tried to glue them down somewhat before I sealed this puzzle up for donation. 

I worked on some of the Log Cabin Star blocks, but didn't yet finish the next 10. 

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!

Another UFO finish

I have finally finished the cross-stitch box that was a birthday gift 4 years ago. It is a wooden box with a perforated top. 

It used a whole lot of floss to stitch as the top is about 1/4 inch thick. I also broke 2 needles in the process. I found this pattern online. I may still glue a piece of fabric or felt to the back of the motif as it was difficult to secure some of the ends. 

Speaking of birthdays, Hubby's was the day before Valentine's Day. We had snow that day so he met with his university students via Zoom. This was the view from our front window. It was a heavy wet snow that clung to the tree branches.

I bought Hubby's favorite Entenmann's Chocolate Fudge cake and lit some candles.

I spent part of the snowy day adding logs to the next 10 blocks of the Log Cabin Star quilt.

I have one more plain log to add before getting to the two frustrating logs and y-seam. I hope to have these blocks finished by the end of the week. 

 Snowy days are good for reading also. I recently read "Slow Waltz in Cedar Bend" by Robert James Waller.

 This was another of my mother's books. I have two more of hers yet to read. I would not recommend this book. It wasn't really bad, just not very interesting or compelling. I could put it down and not really care to find out what the next chapter was about. 

I am now reading "A Miracle for St. Cecelia's" by Karen Valentine. 

So far it is fairly interesting and I am looking forward to reading each chapter. This is one of the books that I picked up for free at the Traveler's Restaurant in Union, CT. So far, I have chosen well when we dine there.

I also decided to work on one of the puzzles that I took from my mom's house when she passed. I would like to donate some of them, but I want to know that each one has all of its pieces. This puzzle went together fairly quickly and even had an extra piece. 

I am not sure if that piece goes to one of the other puzzles or was always an extra so I have put it aside. I will seal this puzzle box and make a note on the bottom of the day that it was recently completed and that it is not missing any pieces as of that day. 

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching.  I will be working on Three Boats....update next week.

Thanks for stopping by!

Valentine's Day Crafting

Hubby and I don't do much to celebrate Valentine's Day. We get each other cards. I get him a box of chocolate and he gets me a bouquet of flowers. I usually try to make a special dinner. Hubby's birthday is the day before and mine is the end of the month so Valentine's Day is low-key. I don't have many Valentine themed crafts around. I designed and stitched the pillow that is currently in the header photo. The little pillow from Little House Needleworks below hangs on a cupboard door all year long, but it goes with the holiday theme.

This fabric heart wreath I made many, many years ago when I used to sell at craft shows.

This small ribbon wreath was made for shows also.

I think my daughter may have helped me make this little hanger when I was trying to get her interested in quilting. Again, many years ago.

 This year I decided I needed a couple more Valentine themed craft items around. You may remember last month when I made the phone jack cover. Well I had bought two different wooden houses at Dollar Tree. I decorated the second house for Valentine's Day.

I used felt, puff paint, scrap ribbons and some pompoms. All of which were in my crafting stash. Again, the black plaid wooden house only cost $1.

As you know, I have been doing some organizing in my basement, which entails going through years and years worth of craft magazines. I am keeping some, recyling some (that I have cut out the few craft instructions that I want) and donating some. As I was perusing one issue of Crafting Traditions I found this little heart and decided to stitch up my own version. Again, I used scraps that I have.

It was quick and easy to make. Just the kind of craft I was looking for. Here it is hanging on the corner cabinet in my kitchen.

I went back to working on my daughter's quilt and was able to finish the 5 blocks that were giving me fits. I have 121 of 196 completed. I also started on the next 10 blocks.

I have actually already added two more logs to these since I took the photo. 

I have been in a baking mode. Don't ask me why as I usually give half of my baking to my mother-in-law and freeze most of the other half. Hubby doesn't have a sweet tooth (except for chocolate) and I really don't need all the calories. I do have tons and tons of clipped recipes though that I want to try so I have been baking.

The first was a Cranberry Orange cake. Although it was made using cake flour and baked in a tube pan, it was really more like a quick bread.

Next I made Oatmeal Raisin Breads. These were yeast breads that came out quite dense.

They were tasty, but nothing special. I also made a new corn bread recipe to go with chicken barley soup. No photos of these. The soup recipe turned out great and is a keeper. The corn bread was tasty, but also nothing special. I guess you could say that I purged two recipes and found two that we like a lot.

It seems that I have been pretty busy this month.  

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching. Grab yourself a cup of tea or coffee and pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are stitching. 

Happy Valentine's Day!

Thanks for stopping by! 

February Stitch Along post #1

October Morning is done! Happy Dance!!!

 Followed by extreme disappointment. After working on this for many years, it was dirty so I hand washed it following all the instructions and using a bunch of Color Catchers in the water. It looked great when I was done, but as it dried the maroon floss bled. 

I have spent the last week working to remove all of the pink spots. So far, the internet recommendations to use ice is working, but it is a slow process. 

I also have to buy some Goo Gone as I originally had this piece attached to a scroll frame using peel and stick velcro and there is a gummy residue along two edges. I was able to trim off some of it, but not all as there would not be enough fabric for framing. 

After all of my cross-stitching work, I will get this sorted out. I am not willing to give up on this piece. 

On the brighter side, I have resumed working on Three Boats. 

This is where I left off in April of 2021. 

Oh my, has it really been that long since I worked on this?

I sat down with it this week and managed to determine where I had left off on the current page of the chart. I am working on page number 13 which is the 3rd page I am stitching out of 24 pages. I am working down the left side rather than across so the page numbers do not go in order. I have managed to add a bunch of confetti stitches this week. This is where I am now.

You can see that I am filling in the first of the three boats. I have a feeling you will be seeing this piece for quite some time. I hope you don't get bored.

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! 

Organizing?

Typically, January is the month for organizing your home. Many magazines, blogs and instagram posts are currently touting how to purge and organize. Since my basement currently looks like a storage facility and is making it difficult to comfortably craft, I decided that I had to start making a dent somewhere. I am taking the approach that if we were to sell our house and move, what would I really want to pack. 

I started with my clothes closet. I share a walkin in closet with Hubby and we keep it very neat, but there were items in there that I no longer wore or used. I got rid of a few tops that I can't remember wearing in the last 5 or so years. I put aside for donation a few purses that I no longer use (although I have tried to in the past year) as they no longer fit my needs. I threw out a set of queen sized flannel sheets that we haven't used since we remodeled our home 20 years ago. Yes, 20 years. One of the pillowcases had been tossed long ago and the sheets had yellowed badly. I should probably throw out the other set I have, but I remember Hurricane Sandy when we lost power for over a week and needed those sheets and many blankets at night when it was 45 degrees outside. There really wasn't a whole lot more that I got rid of, but there is a little more room on the shelves now and they look neater.

I have been looking around my house at my collections and knick-knacks and realizing that I just don't love some of them anymore. When we were first married, I loved the color lavender and collected lavender Wedgewood pieces. The only lavender room in our house now is our first floor powder room and I would like to change that sometime. The Wedgewood stands out like a sore thumb no matter where I put it. 

The pitcher on the right was a gift from my son when he visited Croatia. I will keep that out somewhere. I am thinking of storing the Wedgewood away for a while just to be sure that I no longer want it.

I moved on to the guest bathroom on our second floor and found several expired items in the vanity and medicine cabinet. There were 3 cans of shaving cream that my son used to use when he lived at home over 10 years ago. I will restock with the essentials the next time I go grocery shopping, but this is now up to date.

My kitchen is in pretty good shape, but there are items that I have forgotten about and/or no longer use or care to use. I have set a few aside for donation. I was also unhappy with the way the open shelf on my corner cabinet was looking. I borrowed a few items from elsewhere in my kitchen and added a candle and I like the look of it now. The little sparrow was one of several ornamental birds that my mom collected.

I mentioned my basement/craft area. This is its current state. 

Yes, that is my sewing machine table at the bottom of the photo below.

These are the shelves holding my craft books and some craft supplies. I have been going through some of the really old magazines. Several of them only have one or two items that I think I might want to try so I am clipping them and putting the rest of the magazine in recycling. Many of the magazines are from the 1990s. I am making room. Any project book that I no longer want is being donated.

There is a wonderful sectional and an old TV with a gaming console that is sometimes still used. It is hiding behind my sewing table in the second photo. We have file cabinets, an old computer desk, my husband's childhood desk, and a keyboard as well as a whole lot of items that were in storage at my mom's house and a bunch of items we inherited from relatives. The number of photo albums that we have is sinful, but it is hard to let them go. I also have photo slides from my mom, but I think there are physical photos of all of them. My job today will be to see if I can match each slide to a photo and cull what I can.  

One thing that I removed from my basement were my cookie cutters. 

Don't ask me why I stored them there, I couldn't tell you. I took my mom's cookie jar that I have always loved with the plan to use it when I made cookies. It is a classic 1950/60s cookie jar. 

Unfortunately, the inside looks like this.

I really don't want to store cookies in it. The light bulb went off and I decided to store my cookie cutters in it. I sorted them all and put aside some for donation that I will never use. All my cookie cutters except for 4 gingerbread people cutters fit in the jar. I put those in a Christmas Cookie tin. Now my cookie cutters are conveniently stored in the kitchen and I can still enjoy the cookie jar.

I have already filled the empty small plastic bin with thread spools that came from my mom and MIL. It is filled to the brim with mostly polyester thread. Not sure I will ever use it so some of them may be donated also. 

As you can tell, my organizing will probably last most of the year, though I would like to have a garage sale in the Spring.....I think. It is a lot of work and I am not sure I really want to do it. Alternatively, everything that is in good condition will be donated to a local thrift store.

Thanks for stopping by!

 

Variety

Embroidery, crochet, cross-stitch and quilting. Those are the crafts that I have been working on lately.

First, I finally added the missing stitches to this embroidery I inherited from an aunt years ago.

 

 I'm not sure why she did most of the stitching in green ...even the flowers..., but I found a floss that I had also inherited from her and finished the stitching.

 I have four of these muslin pieces. I don't know if they were supposed to be dish towels or what. Some of them are quite stained.

 I will save them for now and hopefully cut out the motifs and sew them into a wall hanging quilt some day. 

I am have ditched the secret crocheting. It was supposed to be a crocheted chick in a decorated Easter egg. Let's just say that I was highly disappointed with the chick when all the pieces were completed. The proportions were wrong and it was sort of ugly even after I sewed some of the pieces together and added the embroidery.

I didn't even bother to unravel it. It went straight into the garbage as did the pattern. 

I am trying very hard to finish these blocks. There is one block of these 10 that is giving me fits and I currently just can't face trying to make it right.

I need 196 and I now have 111 completed. I can't begin to tell you how frustrating these blocks can be sometimes. I really hope that, in the end, I can manage to get them to go together so that they lay flat. 

I am working on filling in the background of this cross-stitched box lid. 

This is one of those UFOs that have been hanging around too long. It was a birthday gift 4 years ago. Since it is a wooden lid it is thicker than working on cloth and uses a whole lot of floss. I had to dig around in my stash to find another skein of the white Coats & Clark floss that I inherited several years ago that I am using. Thankfully there was one more full skein. It should be enough to finish.

I moved Three Boats back to my 2nd floor stitching area. Do you remember it?

This is where I left off quite some time ago. Not very much has been completed.

I sat with it yesterday to figure out where I am on the chart. It was way too dark and cloudy outside for me to get enough light (even with the lights on) to start stitching it again. 

Recently, after having trouble with our landline telephone due to the copper wiring, we are using home phones that are internet based. (We each have cell phones, but we have had the landline number for over 30 years and it is bundled with our internet service). Getting rid of the copper component meant that the phone hanging in our kitchen no longer worked. We took it down, but were left with the phone plate.

Hubby suggested that a craft could cover it. Of course I had to try. I stopped at Dollar Tree and found this cute little wooden house.

Other than the $1 house, I decided to use only items that I already had in my craft stash. Yesterday, I added some scrap fabric to the interior. 

I found some plastic stencils and used one of them to add the word home to another scrap of fabric using an archival ink pen. I tea dyed a piece of lace. I decided to use rustic ribbons for bows. I found the cute little wooden bird (that I didn't know I had) in a small miscellaneous bin and painted it maroon. I have a bin of paints that I rarely use any more. The mossy straw at the bottom was in yet another rarely used bin. I am pretty happy with how it turned out.

That is what I have been up to lately craftwise.

Last week both of our children and their families visited. We had 5 days with 8 people in our home. It is very busy here with a 16 month old and 7 month old and bitter cold weather outside. We celebrated Christmas with our son and also his January birthday. I did not get any crafting done during that time, but I enjoyed their visit immensely.

I did finish reading See Me by Nicolas Sparks soon after everyone left last Sunday. It is a hefty book and took a while to read. It is somewhat of a departure from his usual type of novel and I really enjoyed it.  I have two more of my mother's novels that I want to read before donating them. 

I am also trying to read my very large backlog of magazines. I tend to read these with breakfast/lunch each day. Not sure why I got so behind (some are 4 years old), but I have been going through them very quickly now. 

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

Thanks for stopping by!