2020 Collector's Heart Cross Stitch

 I found another stitch finish that I have forgotten to share here.  

This is the Heart in Hand 2020 Collector's Heart pattern (there seem to be different heart patterns for different years).  It's quite small, maybe 2.5" x 7.5" in total if I remember correctly.  I think I will finish this on a little board or a mini cushion for displaying.  It's joining the finishing pile!

Spelling Bee - Progress 6

 

I have a car and an F now for my Spelling Bee quilt.  Was hoping to stitch up the Bee too, but I didn't get as much time as I thought I would at the machine.  Next time ...

Lori Holt's Sew By Row Cross Stitch

 Lori Holt's Sew By Row cross stitch is finished!!

I tried really hard to catch up and keep up with the Fat Quarter Shop's SAL for this pattern, and almost did except for those might sewing machines.  Boy, there is a lot of stitching in those!!  Actually, deceptively there was quite a bit of stitching in a number of the rows of this design, but definitely all worth it in the end.

I've been protecting this little spot on my wall since we redecorated in the autumn and am so chuffed to hang Sew By Row right beside my Stitching Nook where I can see it often beside these other two pretties too!

Mother's Day in honour

You might remember that I had started stitching Jacob de Graaf's (Modern Folk Embroidery) free Mother's Day Pattern in honour of my lovely mum who left us too soon.

Here it is all finished and looking beautiful, if I do say so myself.  Thank you Jacob for the generosity of this free pattern.  I'm hoping that I will make it into a little cushion to fully finish, but am mulling that over for now.

Stitched on: Vintage Blue dyed, mystery 20 count even weave

Thread: DMC 48

'Tucked Away' Pouch

 

Last month I had the privilege of pattern testing Just Jude Designs 'Tucked Away' Pouch.  

This is a beautiful versatile pattern for two sizes of pouch with those gorgeous twisted tucks. I made the smaller one, which was still a fairly generous 8" x 6".  You will certainly have fun playing with your fabric choices for these pouches.  The whole time I was stitching I thought this would be a perfect project to preserve the very last little scraps of your most treasured collections - maybe a Denyse Schmidt line, or Heather Ross, or Bonnie and Camille?  Or, imagine the little tucks in an ombre gradation ... so many possibilities!  As you can see, I went with a little rainbow of scrappy leftovers from my Kindred Spirits Quilt and a little piece of natural Essex Linen.

As always with a Just Jude pattern you can expect beautifully clear written, step by step instruction supported by plenty of photographs to keep you on track.  Fancy a little post-Easter sewing treat? Then hop on over to the website to purchase your own copy.

Spelling Bee - Progress 5

 

I managed a few more blocks for my Spelling Bee quilt in March.  

And these ones too.  

I have a few of the little picture blocks cut out for my next stitching session - very cute!

March 2021 WIPGO Goals Review

Little bit late sharing March's WIPGO review with you but I did meet my goals in the month so another big smile on my face for that!  My WIPGO focus projects were numbers were my Bee Happy Needlepoint and the Shine On Sampler cross stitch.

I'm pleased to show you the before and after of my 10hrs progress on Bee Happy (a needlepoint kit from Historical Sampler Company).

   

Before March I hadn't quite finished the border.

Ten hours of WIPGO goal focus later and the border is filled out and I've made a good start on the central background stitches.  It's lovely to see this progress and in order to keep seeing progress, I've decided to make Bee Happy my Daily Thread project for April.  (My Daily Thread is a new to me motivating initiative whereby I will try to stitch at least one thread length into a given project every day of a month.)

The Shine On cross stitch sampler from Bonnie & Camille's Quilt Bee book was a completely new start for me since my book hadn't arrived at the beginning of the month.  It showed up a few days into March and I was able to make good progress in my 10 hour time goal, even catching up to the third week of the Fat Quarter Shop SAL.  I'm still up to date with that but just haven't managed any more recent pics.

WIPGO might seem rather arbitrary, but there are no WIPGO police and I have set the "rules" of my board, so I can change them if needs be.  So far, so good though.  I am managing the 10 hours goals on two projects a month and am still finding ways to stitch other things besides.

This weekend will be the first of my 10 hour focus sessions for April's numbers.  I'll share that with you soon.

Spring Baby Quilts

Last month I got to play with a pretty spring fabric palette to stitch up two baby quilts for imminent arrivals.

For my cousin's baby I cut some charm squares from my stash and whipped up a Charm Pack Quilt.  You can find the details for this quilt here on an earlier post.  This is a great stash buster and given that I've not been doing much fabric shopping it was great to be able to use three different white on white prints from my stash for all the various borders because I didn't have a big enough piece in just a single print or solid.  I do love being able to raid my stash and still coming up with something pretty.

Believe it or not, I still haven't finished this one yet.  It's currently taken up residence on the back of a dining chair waiting for me to finish hand-stitching the last section of the binding.  So close!  I'll pop up a pic when I finally do get it over the line.

The other baby quilt is for someone who has made a BIG difference in Miss CT's little life.  Susan, CT's habilitation worker from Guide Dogs, is expecting (may even have had) her own first little bundle of joy.  I think everybody needs a Susan in their lives.  She is such a ray of sunshine and just what any family adapting to life with their child's visual impairment needs.  We have been so blessed to have her support for four years now, so I really wanted to make a special quilt as a way of thanking her at least a little for all she has done.  

Given that Susan is a complete ray of sunshine, what better quilt to make her new arrival than Lori Holt's 'You Are My Sunshine' quilt?  This is a pattern in Lori's Spelling Bee quilt and I'm delighted to have had a very lovely excuse to stitch it.  You can see it got some wavy line quilting treatment.  I'm not sure who was smiling more when I handed it over, me or Susan!!

So you see, it's not all cross-stitching around these parts.  It just looks that way ;-)