Weekends and finishes ...

4 days off ... what a great 4 days off, even with all the rain we had. Miserable weather and all the outdoor plans turned into indoor plans ... so we stayed up late and sleep in ... watched movies and Nascar racing and just played around ... and of course I stitched. But I also did some finishing and some sewing! Yep sewing. I borrowed Monica's sewing machine and had a lot of fun sewing. Sewing and I don't always get along, but this weekend everything went fairly well.

One of the first things I wanted to attempt was a needlebook. I'm doing a personal exchange with Kathy. We chose to exchange needlebooks ... since this is a new finishing technique for me I knew I'd want to make one or two before making the one for Kathy. Here's my first attempt ... of course the one for Kathy will have a stitched front and back ... here's the front ...

and here's the inside ...

and the back ... I have a few tweaks to work out, but all in all I think it turned out pretty good. I used white thread so I could see the stitches and what needed to be reworked.

I decided to do some finishes since I was in the mood for sewing ... even though Spring is almost over I can enjoy these for a couple more weeks ...

Here's another new to me finish ... a pillow ... and I just love it! I will definitely be making more pillows ...

and another pillow ... how sweet is this *smile*

And here's my last two finishes ... both are BBD's Bluebird, one stitched 1 or 1 and boy is it tiny! lol .. I stitched them both with Belle Soie's Poison Apple. The tiny one is my first ever floss tag ... and the bigger one is filled with crushed walnuts to use as a pin cushion ...

here's the backing fabric ...

I sure had fun this weekend playing around with new finishing techniques. Thanks for stopping by for a visit. Hope everyone had a great weekend.

I hope you find your Joy in your stitches ...

I'm grateful for new things ...

A new start and a winner ...

I'd like to introduce you all to Tuesday's new rotation design ... Sampler Sisters of the Thread by Primitive Needle. I'm using the recommended fabric (Picture This Plus Mello) but I'm stitching it on 36 ct instead of 40 ct, 1 over 2 and a combination of GAST and WDW threads. I'm soooooo in love with this design. The Mello fabric is lovely to stitch on and the colors of the threads are just so nice and calming. Karen and I are doing an SAL on Tuesday nights ... want to join us?? You'll love the design!

My giveaway for Autumn Song was supposed to be on Tuesday but I forgot! So I came home from work today and listed out everyone that had posted that they wanted in on the giveaway, then into my wide mouth coffee cup they went ...

when Terry got home I asked him to pick a name out of the coffee cup ...

and the winner is ... April ... it's really hard to read her name on the paper ... I didn't write the names dark enough for my camera ... Congrats April! I'll be emailing you this evening. Thanks everyone for entering my giveaway ... it was fun!

In between my stitching rotation, I get some exchange stitching done too *smile* I stitched this Lizzie*Kate design for Karen (for the Lizzie*Kate Exchange Blog) and finished it into a pinkeep. I'm really glad you liked it Karen! shhhhhh I wasn't supposed to include any extras, but I couldn't resist making a scissor fob for Karen, especially after I found the perfect charm for it.

I'll leave you with a couple more pictures from Mother's Day ... here one of my favorites ... me and my boys ...

and here's all of us ... on the rocks ...

I hope you find your Joy in your stitches ...

I'm grateful for Thursday ...

Wips and a finish ...

Time for an update on my rotation and an another finish! First up are the rotation pieces ...

Peppermint Twist ... stupid tree was pretty boring to stitch, but I love how it looks!


Earth laughs is coming along nicely ... even with all the color changes for each flower, I still can stitch more in an evening ... feeling sooo accomplished! lol


and last is L*K's Christmas Flip-its ... I'm a bit bummed because I dont' think I have enough fabric left to finish the last of the designs ... I might rip out the top of the border and see if one would fit on top of holly ... I really need to sit down and count it out ... yuck!


My finish for the week is Autumn Song by Blackbird Design. I was doing a SAL with Natasha. She got a little side tracked by other stitching that had to get done, but she's really close to finishing it :) I really enjoyed this ... loved the colors!


I know I won't be stitching this again and would like to offer it up as a giveaway. The giveaway will include the chart, leftover Weeks floss (probably not enough to stitch it, but a good start) and the scissor fob, but not the scissors, in the picture. Just leave me a comment with your email address and I'll draw a name next Tuesday, May 18th. You don't have to have a blog to enter, but please make sure you include your email address ... also, I'll email international too!


I've picked by project to put in rotation now that Autumn Song is done. I'm finally going to start something new! I'll post pictures as soon as I have it all together *smile*

I hope all you mom's out there had a wonderful day! Mother's Day was also Chris' 28th birthday, he was really a Mother's Day baby too :) We started the day at Starbucks (surprise surprise! lol) and then headed to the waterfront for the day ... later in we ended up seeing Iron Man 2, ending with a nice dinner at Red Robin ... it was a very full day but so much fun! I'll leave you with one of my favorite pictures from Mother's Day ... more to follow in another post ...

I hope you find your Joy in your stitches ...

I'm grateful for the my sons and daughter-in-law ...

Happy Mother's Day

I found this poem on Carolyn's blog. I thought it was lovely and spoke to my heart ...

"If roses grow in Heaven Lord, please pick a bunch for me. Place them in my Mother's arms and tell her they're from me. Tell her that I love and miss her, and when she turns to smile, place a kiss upon her cheek and hold her for awhile. Because remembering her is easy, I do it every day, but there is an ache within my heart that will never go away."

Miss you Mom. It's Chris' 28th birthday today. You'd be very proud of the man he has become.

I hope you all have a wonderful Mother's Day

I hope you find your Joy in your stitches ...

I'm grateful for the the years I had with my Mom ...

Spring and Exchanges ...

Happy May to you all! Did anyone get flowers on their doorsteps on May Day? I remember making paper cones our of colored paper, picking flowers out of the back yard, putting them in the paper cones and hanging them on the door knobs of some of my favorite neighbors ... sometimes they were filled with grass and dandelions lol .. what fond memories I have of the 1st of May :)

Last week I didn't stitch on my rotation pieces ... instead I finished up an exchange and then stitched a couple of fun quick spring stitches ... now to get them finish finished! First one is Fresh Spring by Homespun Samplar. The bunny is stitched with GAST Maple Sugar and the rest of it is stitched with an unknown GAST color. Quite a while ago I bought some of GAST's special edition sets. Unfortunately I didn't know that the floss tags for each color, didn't have the color name on them, and I threw out the list before realizing it ... owell, they are still pretty colors and nice to stitch with ...

Next up is a freebie by The Stitcherhood ... the fabric looks purple'y in this picture, but it's just a nice neutral ... I do love the DMC purple and green for this one ...


I have two exchanges to show off to you too ... I received this lovely floss tag from KarenSC for the Lizzie Kate exchange I'm in ... I love this spring design! Sooo colorful and Karen did a great job on the floss tag ... this was her first one! I hope it isn't her last :)

here's the back fabric on the tag ...

and over on the Pals message board I participated on a Spring Stash Exchange ... here's what I received from Meg (I don't think she has a blog) ... didn't she send some great things! It was really fun to do an exchange that wasn't about stitching something, but about ending along new stash ... I hope we do another one like this soon ...

Friday afternoon I took off to the ocean for the weekend with my dear friends Yvonne and Lisa ... this was our 3rd annual trip and we had a blast as always ... walks on the beach, yummy hors d'oeuvres, pomegranate margaritas, lots of laughs, hot tubbing, an evening at the casino (we were all winners thanks to Yvonne ... she won big on the penny slots!) and of course great shopping ... good times with good friends ...

Here's the 3 of us in front of a sign of one the shops we visited ... had to get a picture! Yvonne is the one on the left, Lisa is the one on the right ... little old me in the middle ... definitely 3 wacky women! lol

I'm back to my stitching rotation this week ... Peppermint Twist is up for this evening ... can't wait!

I hope you find your Joy in your stitches ...

I'm grateful for the ocean and good friends ...