Time For Christmas Crafts

Some Christmas tree ornaments do more than glitter and glow, they represent a gift of love given a long time ago.
— Tom Baker

The best things in life are handmade.
— Unknown

Christmas magic is silent. You don't hear it — you feel it. You know it. You believe it.
— Kevin Alan Milne

Crafting is like meditation, it allows you to focus your mind and release your stress.
— Unknown

Yup. It’s that time of year again. Time to dive into the Christmas crafts. Every year, since the daughter was first able to hold a bottle of glue, we’ve had the tradition of making a new ornament for our Christmas tree. The tradition became a little sporadic once she grew up and got a life of her own, but I carried on, and now sometimes I get the granddaughter to join me.

This year, I finally stiffened the snowflakes I crocheted several years ago. Actually, I’ve crocheted hundreds of the snowflakes, and mostly gave them all away. These are all I had remaining:

I used a solution of half mod podge glue, and half water to dip them in, and then I pinned them to cardboard with waxed paper under them to keep them from sticking:

It worked pretty good, although I had to peel the snowflakes off of the waxed paper when I was done.

If you’re local, and you want to see them in person, a few of them will be included in the display my stitchery guild is putting up at the local library for Christmas. I still have lots of the crochet cotton left, so maybe I’ll be making some more.

And seeing as I gave all of my Christmas prints away to a good cause (I’d had the fabric for yeas and never did anything with it) I found myself going up to Fabricland on the weekend to get some more.

The prints I chose have the Khaos seal of approval. LOL I’m going to make some more of the folded stars for the Christmas tree this year.

The granddaughter likes to do origami, so I’m hoping to talk her into giving it a try herself. She was over on the weekend to work on a super secret Christmas present, and was doing great . . . until my sewing machine conked out on us. Grrr!

I had her do a sewing test – sewing along lines drawn on a piece of paper with the machine unthreaded – and she passed with flying colours. A couple of the lines were darn near perfect! And even the ones that weren’t perfect weren’t off by much.

She also used a rotary cutter for the first time, and I was really impressed with how safety cautious she was. Those things are really sharp, but without being told she figured out how to engage the safety shield when she wasn’t using it.

Looks like she’s a chip off the old sewing block. 😊

All Good Things . . .

But at the laste, as every thing hath ende, She took hir leve, and nedes wolde wende.
(source for All good things must come to an end)
— Geoffrey Chaucer, Troilus and Criseyde

It lasted for a long time, I believe.
A very long time. It was a great success, but even great successes come to a natural end.
― Isaac Asimov, Robots and Empire

All good things come to an end and the pain of some endings isn't worth the good things.
― Emilyann Allen

Well . . . I’m back. Albeit a little reluctantly. It was nice to have a bit of a break from blogging, but I figured if I took the month of August off as well I might never get back to it, so here I am. :-)

Unlike other times where I’ve needed a mental break, I’m happy to report I didn’t just dive into a reading binge. I did some reading, yes, but not constantly. And I was able to stay away from Nora Roberts. LOL

I managed to get out of the house a few times – lunch or coffee with friends, poetry gatherings, stitchery gatherings, early morning walks. And I’ve been spending time with my granddaughter while her parents are at work, which is always a good time. But the main way I found to relax was with my crafts, mostly stitchery/sewing.

As you know, I usually have several projects on the go. I picked the one that needed to be done the soonest, and worked steadily on it until it was done. In this case, it was the baby quilt for my great-niece (who’s due this month).

I like baby quilts because they’re something I can work on a bit at a time. I usually start with solid coloured squares, then trace pictures from colouring books onto them to embroider. When I’m done I find a print fabric to go in between the squares, then flannel to back it with. Then it’s just a matter of sewing it together. I don’t actually quilt my baby quilts, I use embroidery floss to tie them. It makes the quilt a little puffier, but I think it looks just as nice.

For this quilt, I’d chosen a medium violet colour and traced cartoon animals onto them. Then I used bright colours for the embroidery. Then, of course, I had to find material to go between the squares, which wasn’t as easy as it sounds. But I did find a print that was more green and white than purple, used light green flannelette for the back, and then couldn’t remember how I used to bind them – it’s been a long time since I’ve done a baby quilt.

I had a vague recollection of putting a ruffle on them, but I didn’t have enough material left for that and there was no time to go to a fabric store, which would mean a trip out of town. So I used satin blanket binding, which turned out well enough that I think that’s what I’ll be using from now on.

Anyway, here’s a picture of the finished quilt (click on it to see a bigger version):

Next week I’ll be talking about my second project, the ballgown I made my granddaughter for the Father/Daughter ball.

Life’s A Stitch

“Why are you so weird?”
“Because my weird has to be able to cancel out your weird, Lady Cross-stitch.”
“At least what I do is considered an art form.”
“Yes, in ye olde medieval Europe you would've been quite the catch.”
— Alexandra Bracken

A stitch in time saves uncontrollable blood loss.
— Simon Haynes

Take your needle, my child, and work at your pattern; it will come out a rose by and by. Life is like that - one stitch at a time taken patiently and the pattern will come out all right like the embroidery.
— Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr.

It took me almost as much time to do that tiny little, 2 ½ inch square cross stitch as it did all that embroidery work on my granddaughter’s Easter dress. Maybe more.

My sister, who does some pretty amazing cross stitch, and many ladies of the stitchery guild, all tell me that cross stitch is very relaxing.

It is not.

Okay, it may be for people with perfect vision who know what they’re doing, but that’s not me. I have three different pairs of glasses, and while my reading glasses work best for stitchery projects like cross stitch, I can still only use them for a couple of hours before my eyes need a break. Funny, they don’t need a break when I use them for reading.

Plus there’s the whole “know what they’re doing” thing, which I don’t. I’m not a big fan of cross stitch, so I haven’t done a whole lot of it. Embroidery is where my heart lies.

When I decided to do myself a needle book, I thought it would be a fun, easy project to do. And it might have been, but of course I ended up making it a bigger deal than it should be.

One of my stitchery magazines included a free needle book kit, but I didn’t like the little heart-shaped cross-stitch piece that was supposed to adorn the front. So I hunted around and came up with the pattern for the above piece. It originated online somewhere, and I’d printed it out in black and white so I got to pick my own colours.

The border was the easy part. Next came the pairs of pansies in the corners that had four different colours, not counting the French knots in the center. The hearts were next, followed by the spools of thread. So far so good, in an annoying sort of way.

When it came to the little thread making a decorative swirl through it, I thought I’d get fancy and use metallic thread. That was my first mistake. My second was not giving up on the idea. Metallic thread is not fun to work with. And it’s definitely NOT relaxing!

And it didn’t help that when doing the counting for the swirl I realized my stitches were off in a couple of places. A more conscientious stitcher would have corrected the mistakes. I, on the other hand, chose to work around it. And to be honest, though there are two places where my counting was off (because there were two places where the swirl didn’t align properly) I can only spot one.

Next was the saying, which should have been pretty easy to do, except it has all those curly cues on it and the “I”s were dotted with French knots. French knots are easy enough to do in embroidery, not so much in cross stitch. It took me a while (a long, frustrating while) to figure out how to do them and not have them slip through the holes in the aida cloth I was working with.

Finally, I added the beads to the swirl and I was done. All that was left was the simple matter of putting it all together. Which turned out to be not so simple after all. I’m going to have to check out some other patterns for a needle book.

But the bottom line is, tomorrow is the last meeting of the guild before we break for summer and not only do I not have my needle book finished, I never got to re-do my name tag (that’s to having to spend an entire day doing mending for my father-in-law). But I did borrow back the Easter dress I did for my granddaughter, so at least I’ll have that to show off.

Yes, life is indeed a stitch.

It’s Heating Up

It’s not enough to be busy, so are the ants. The question is: what are we busy about?
—Henry David Thoreau

I think summer is finally here. We may not be suffering from the extreme heat they’re still getting out west, but they’re not getting our humidity. The humidex means that when our temperature is 29 C (84 F), with the humidity it actually feels like 39 C (102 F).

Had a busy week (well, busy-er than we normally get) last week. Tuesday I spent the day getting some salads done for my sister’s visit, and I made her a scripture bread. Then Wednesday she came to visit with her oldest and youngest grandkids.

Thursday I had my annual mammogram, always a fun time (not!). I think the technician thought I was kidding when I told her she wasn’t allowed to find anything. One cancer is enough, thankyouverymuch.

Friday we had a nice, long visit with the grandbaby, a large portion of which was spent in the pool. A lot of this had to do with us surprising her with a floating unicorn. Previously she had a shark that was big enough to ride on, but the first time in the pool this year the seam on the bottom let go. The unicorn is actually a little bigger, and a lot more stable for riding.

Saturday the daughter and I went to Peterborough to the giant craft store Michael’s, who didn’t have the one thing I went all that way for. There had been some kind of accident on the highway we take to Peterborough, and we had a rather long, but thoroughly enjoyable (unmarked) detour through some woods and farmland, ending up at the Peterborough Airport. On the way home we chose the opposite side of the highway, which was also pretty scenic. I’d forgotten how much I enjoyed just driving in the countryside with no real idea of where I’m going.

The thing I was looking for at Michael’s was one of those large, magnifying glass things with a light for doing craft work. My stitchery group has been trying to meet once in awhile in the park, and it was pointed out that I’ve yet to make my name tag. It can be done on anything, as long as it’s hand stitched, but most of them have been done using cross stitch on aida cloth.

I’ve always found cross stitch hard on the eyes, so naturally I decided to design my name tag using red beadwork on black aida cloth. It’s going to look really sharp . . . if I can see well enough to do it. Hopefully I can find my magnifying thingie online. At the very least I’ll need bright light and my glasses.

But just in case, among other things I got at Michaels’s was some white aida cloth which I can see just fine. I suppose coloured beads on the white would look all right too, just not as sharp as the red on black.

We also went to Fabricland where I finally got the lining material for the stitchery bag I made. It’s going to be awesome too . . . if I can figure out how I’m going to put it together. I’d kind of like it to have a zippered compartment (yes, I remembered to buy a zipper) in the center, with open compartments on each side. Of course first I’ll have to clean off the dining room table before I can play around with it. LOL

But in any case, looks like I’ve got lots to do to keep me out of trouble this week.

And now, because my phone won’t let me transfer the picture of the grandbaby on her unicorn, here’s a picture of our resident pond frog.

Monitory Monday

monitory ~ letter containing a warning

Well, there’s still not much going on around here. Kitchen’s still not totally finished – we got a call from the company that delivers for the cupboard people and they’re going to drop something off this week. Could be the trim for above the cupboards, could be the replacement door for the cupboard beside the stove. Who knows?

I’ve been plugging away at getting the bins emptied and out of the office, and I even managed to unbury the couch and dining room table. My kitchen is about as organized as I can make it, which is pretty darned organized if I do say so myself.

One of the things I’m rather proud of … We have this small, free standing wet bar in the dining room that I’ve been using as a plant stand. It has a handy drawer up top and two shelves down below. The top one has slots in the top to hang wine glasses from, and below a wooden X divided the space, presumably to hold wine bottles.

The X wasn’t attached to anything inside, so I took the back off the stand and pulled the X out. My plastic bin full of flower pots fits perfectly in the bottom space, and the shelf above holds my bird seed and peanuts for my feathered friends, as well as a plastic container for the summer stuff that was in the drawer – sidewalk chalk, bubble stuff, sun tan lotions. The drawer now holds dining room stuff – hot plates, napkin rings, place mats.

So much organization!

Seeing as we’re not putting the carpet back down in the dining room, the hubby decided we needed to protect the floor from the table and chair legs. So I got little felt disks that self-stuck to the bottom of the legs. However, we still can’t really sit at the table because on one side we have the ever growing pile of donations, on the other (on the floor) is the old microwave that needs a new home, and behind it (against the wall) are the two rolled up carpets, the two previous (wrong) orders of trim, and the big mystery panel.

I can, however, use my office again. The pink wing chair that was taking up way too much space in my office has replaced the stack of bins in the hubby’s office. It’s still a little messy, but I can work at my desk and even sit in my reading chair if I want.

Now that I’m pretty much done with the kitchen I have some free time on my hands and I’ve been using it to work on an afghan. I’ve had the urge for a while now and finally gave in. But rather than dig through the craft closet to get to my yarn stash, I bought some fresh yarn at Walmart. Of course they didn’t have as much as I needed, but it was enough to get me started and I ended up ordering the rest that I needed online.

I was originally going to get at least one other colour to do a pin stripe every few rows, but this yarn, being variegated, makes its own stripes and I rather like it the way it is.

Guess I’ll just have to figure out something else to do with the purple yarn I added to my order.