Wayward Woman Stitching-Blogger Tempted Back By New Prairie Schooler Releases

Yup...It's me! You're well, I hope?

Somehow, I was doing well with stitching but not with blogging for a long time, but the past two months or so there has been not much stitching either.

BUT! Today I randomly fired up Google Reader--which is sunsetting in just days *pours one out for Reader*--only to see this item headlining my updates--New Prairie Schoolers! 

These may be the three sweetest words I know--New... Prairie... Schoolers...

And they are GREAT this time. Right? RIGHT? What do you think of them? You think they are great, right? ALL of them! Which has never really happened for me.

Somehow, I like New PS Release even better than Market. I know! Crazy! But, somehow it became that way.

Why are they great?

• Shocked moon AND cracked-open orangey-lit door on brick house in the Mini Card!

• Another Halloween Yearly Santa-sized card--with Prim Needle/BoAF-ish cats!

• Lg. Halloween pattern: contains a small with wonderful kiddie revelers.

• Christmas Ornaments: Wonderful Euro-Swedish theme--is that a Dala horse I see!?!?

• This year's Santa: Now with Jaunty Boots, and CLOCKS! Even a Cuckoo clock!! (I have a thing for clocks. And Candles. Taper candles. With the little ring to hold using your finger. I'm not, however, drawing a hard line on sentences with verbs today.)
I can't discern what those documents he is carrying are, though...

• Boo Moon: Okay, this MAY be the weak entry with some same-y items in comparison to past releases, but I think I'm digging the orange moon with Halloween Town skyline.

• Happy Christmas: The title. Also, "tiny long-coated Santa approaching house" ornament. :D


SO wanting these; but wondering if I have even remotely sufficient mojo!

Photos, Go!

I love baskets. And Roof-lurking cats. So, I added one. (I don't see this piece suffering that charted bird's loss...)

I made pincushion for use with my sewing machine/quilting during the Christmas season, while I was making gifts. The backing is a crisp blue seersucker. 

A friend's moving family suddenly had an extra swing machine. It's all mechanical and about 30x better than my 3 y.o. Kenmore. Now, if only I could coax it to wind thread!

I continued piecing that quilt top--rather home stretch.

I rather like my workspace; yay drape-y quilt top! The iron was a birthday gift (November) from a dear friend. It's one of Panasonic's cordless models. I love Panasonic home goods, but it could be hotter. I adore the maneuverability.

Growing...

Blue, blue tiles!

St. Valentine's Day

A house with vines

A cast-iron teapot souvenir/birthday gift from Mariage Frères. The cord was a christmas gift. It was intended as a bracelet, but I do enjoy it as display dressing here. :)

A wild hair seized me and I decided just before New Year that I needed to tackle the Everest that is the PS Alphabet. I still need 2 or 3 of these to start...I wanted to prepare a special modified layout, with custom edits, but I need them all first before I can even plan it. Complicated!

They do look nice there upon my Fig Tree table-topper, no?

If you recall my yearly ornament project, here is "dedictated to 2008" all finished. I once stitched this for an exchange, and here is another for me! Love this Mary Garry design. 

I was SO SATISFIED when I successfully added this fox. A very talented professional illustrator friend of mine saw this image and enthusiastically told me he'd use it for a color palette. I concur!

I love the crest-like nature of that center vine medallion/birds-in-flight.

Right-hand terminal reached!!

When These came out, I flipped my sh*t! So edgy! So awesome! So...so...so.

I finally treated myself to those braided kelmscotts I'd been coveting since their launch. Also, did you know that this blog's name is a reference to an old French version of LRRH? 

LOVE IT. 

I stitched it with the recommended PS Lambswool, which I almost never do. I Just wanted This. Piece. On. My. Wall. Now. Look at that corner-turning wolf! I may have shared some of my heart's fox-loving space with wolves due to this series. <3 p="">

Perching on my stitching shelf; I have it all finished and most of Three Pigs, too. And a few smalls. But, finishing? Hah!

La bougie

Do you still remember I said I love them?

Thank you to everyone who has cared for me upon hearing of my troubles this past autumn and winter. 

Things are better now, mostly. I'm sorry I wasn't able to let you know until now, and I think of you often and wish you are well. I do love my blogland friends.

Until Soon,

Berit

Autumn Comes Again

Yesterday I spent $5 at the local vegetable market to buy this little bevy of gourds. :)

This little green watermelon-y one with its over-long stem is my favorite.

Did I fool you with my laid out quilt block quarters? Only these three have now been sewn together--last time's "quilt" was just me deciding block placement by laying them out on top of my quilt-covered bed. My friend's mother let me use her Bernina--what an eye-opener that was. Want. 

I think I need to use a walking foot though, because of how varied and scrappy all these fabrics are. (They are getting quite "stretched by the process of being sewn together. Also, two were sewed together in the wrong placement. The foreground block is definitely coming apart. I need to decide which way to iron my seams. Heh.

I love wip pictures which elevate materials and textures. :) Last time's PS WIP with scissors Christina sent to me in an exchange. I've changed the fibers, most notably the ground below the Haunted House.

Please Advise: When I started, I thought of using just black for a pen-and-ink illustration look. I then decided to add browns, but am still not sure about adding in the orange. I've basically decided to orange the windows with an overdyed silk, but...should I do it anywhere else? If the keys aren't orange, should they be brown or black? Should the owl legs be brown or black? Should I just make the windows with their black backstitch only and no orange glow at all???

I AM disappointed that Marc is only afraid of the orange-eyed owls, but I do like the limited palette. I need elves to stitch this for me again as-charted, perhaps.

Didn't think I'd stitched much while away, but "found" this on "Aoutline"'s linen. I loved this motif I stitched for Faye a while back for an Autumn exchange, so here is one for me. But, what to put in the center? :) (I realize I did stitch, and quite a bit more than this...watch this space?)

I though Lovely Autumn'd just begun, I got the Christmas Stitch Itch. :) This is from a leaflet I bought because it had a Huntsman Santa with Fox. Do my threads drive you crazy? Me, too. 

But...

I loathe clipping them while/after stitching, but I ENJOY doing it at the beginning of a stitching session.  Thus, many "finished" pieces have little trail-y threads like this poking out of the front. Once or twice I've clipped them just for the purpose of shooting a blog photo for you (but not woven them in)--this is Not Allowed. :P

What else is on this "Linen No. 9"? Why, more PS! 

And Kindred Spirits by Prim Needle! Bad! How are things to keep clean with such an M.O.? I tell myself larger works (like a BAP Quaker) do, but my mind is not satisfied. 

I remember working hard to give this cat charming markings with the Belle Soie. Do you think I succeeded?

Another Away Stitch (with away waste knots, too!) This is a PS piece from the big Halloween book JCS put out last year, but I altered the colors and filled the background to match my favorite small (as seen in this post's first photo). So far, it is out all the time (though still unfinished!!) I need to stuff it (do I, though?) and finish the beaded edging. 

Thank you everyone, for your visits last time and kind comments. I am quite surprised and touched, and happy to be able to talk with you again. 

I am making a little extra time to integrate more visiting and commenting into my life, so I hope to see you at "your place" and talk with you again soon. 

Berit

October Happy Dance

Hello, Everyone! It's beyond time for an update on what I've been up to in stitchy land! Here follows the floss toss (which I meant to post a while ago) for the piece I've been working on:



I just fell right in love with this piece after seeing it on Nicole's blog around Memorial Day, so off I went looking and looking for it on the 'net. Now, at this time I didn't know a BBD from a pair of BVDs, and so of course had No Idea that it was a Loose Feathers Design and also OOP. OOps! Well, in the end I was really blessed because kind Nicole agreed to lend it to me! So, it arrived mid-July, and then the battle to acquire fibers and fabric began. It was long and arduous battle with many setbacks--the less said the better! Note: This fabric is Silkweaver's Purely Primitive (28ct. Cashel), which is the same colour if not count as the one Nicole used.

And Now, progress as of this Morning:



I realized after taking this that the floss is entirely in the dark.
All I can say is...
a.) lol
b.) Good thing I uploaded that floss toss!
c.) Photograpy is not one of the visual arts in which I excel. :P



The Heron-Crane (can never remember which the leaflet identifies it as. Can you tell I'm a naturalist :P) I've really been hauling to get this thing done, but it totally doesn't show! I STILL do love this design, though I must say I'm itching to stitch for Hallowe'en, and will likely do so all of November!! As for this piece, I would love to finish it, though I am all but out of GAST Parchment (off-white), yet not halfway through the charted stitching of it. Gargh!!



And here, because my love is fickle and has many objects of devotion, is a closer shot of these darling scissors. To see them is to love them (IMO), and I finally got my paws on a pair thanks to intel from Staci's blog on ebay seller rosa0537 (I had no luck at all in wading through her 700+ items to get to these darlings until I searched the french "ciseaux"; "scissors" returned exactly zero results.) I want to post more in-depth about these beauties in future!

Also needing mention is the fatally charming floss tag lurking in the above shots, which was an exchange I received from dear Ann, which came along with some darling accessories and is therefore part of a Sewing Set. (I capitalize it so that you will know that its wonderfulness is such that it has attained Proper Noun status--lol!!) This is yet another item in need of its own blog entry!
...
Now, I'd like to make a brief "Seasonal Landscape" intermission.
I present to you a stunning photographic landscape the likes of which would compel even Ansel Adams to gnash his teeth in envy:


(Just look at the pretty crimson tree.) :)

And, here is "My Tree" which is a tree (in point of fact, this tree) as seen by me as I gaze upon it as I enter and exit my little apartment. It's rather concrete-y in the corridors of our place, but this little peek is my natural oasis:


My tree dressed in Autumn.

With such weather as this, is it any wonder that I am Expiring With Desire to stitch:



Now, this is another piece whose acquiring was fraught with frustration--and I still have yet to put needle to fabric. It's a conversion which is not mine (yet I don't care to identify the source now; I'll see about that if there is any interest) from DMC to cotton overdyeds (Mostly Crescent Colours, but one WDW thrown in for good measure.) I am actually Still WAITING for one of the fibers, the black calls for two skeins. Le Sigh. The fabric is 28ct Pilgrim Brown from R&R. A week or so after I saw this one all stitched up at the LNS (Oh, how Glorious it was--I even dreamed about it after leaving the shop!), Vonna decided to unleash her own version on the Unsuspecting Public! I was able to prevent my own Deaty by Envy only by admonishing myself repeatedly that I "really do like the conversion/fabby I'm waiting on better." I will however admit that I only now closed the browser tab containing the link you can see by clicking "her own version". :P

As a reward for enduring to the end:



Charty stash: PS "Autumn Leaves" and JCS Jan/Feb 2009 (Yes, it's the issue featuring "This is the Day", to which Edgar turned me on.)

To round things off (since I haven't a cat and so can't pleasurably pad out the post with charming pictures of him) here is a vintage card:



If I don't post before the day, Happy Hallowe'en to you and yours...

In Stitching,
Berit