We have a winner!

Bent Creek Freebie-swirlygig
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

But it is not me...I did win the runner up spot though the Queen of the Fluffies award for Stitch Bitch contest. Bonus, as a prize I am receiving a frame from Elizabeth Newlin of Bent Creek to finish this little guy. Thanks to everyone who voted! and congrats to Kristen for her fabulous finish...she won first place.

Swirlygig freebie by Bent Creek, done on 28 count green Linen, I used Dye Is Cast's Pansy for the letters, Waterlilies in Lilac and Krenick 032 with white for the swirls

Side note, I swung by the Bent Creek site since i had not been there in a while...MISTAKE! the photobooth series is adorable and I love this and this but my absolute favorite is this...Must buy yesterday!

Christmas Puppy

Christmas Puppy
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

Another ornament! Here is 2006's Brittercup's Christmas ornament, over one with the called for threads. While I was doing this one my new 2009 JCS ornament mag arrived. and while I do not have the time or patience to do a full review of the mag like the Stitch Bitch , I do have a few thoughts:

• Over all I like this year better than last, there were very few phoned in designs this time.
• Lots of folks are complaining about the new layout...for me, meh, I could care less either way.
• I am happy to see Cindy and David Morrill from The Stitchworks back in the mag. They were my first real local LNS when I lived in Tulsa. While they often get out shined by The Silver Needle and resident artist Just Nan who are across the street, Cindy is one of the sweetest ladies in the industry and I always think of her fondly.
• I do wish they told the designers about moving the recipes. I feel bad everytime I read "I hope you enjoy this recipe!" and it's not there. I would of thought that could of been a quick editorial fix.
• Is it just me or the longer you look at them the more you want to stitch? I bet if I could see them in person I would want to do even more. (My In-laws LNS up in Hyde Park, NY, Deer Hill Farm, usually has most of the ornaments stitched up by some of her customers and on display in the store. My goose would be cooked- and broke- if I lived there).
• First run thru I see 5 I will definitely want to stitch,

1. Angel Stitchen Santa's Buddies...even though there is only one buddy..but he is cute!)
   
2. It's Fine-ally Finished's Mistletoad, which is confusing since it isn't explained.. but I'll just leave off the charm.
   
3. Thistle Thread's Snowglobe...although I have no idea how I will ever justify buying those over priced Tokens and Trifles perforated paper Trinkets thingies
   
4. Courtney Collection's Twitter Blue...which means I'll have to do the red one from last year.
   
5. Cherished stitches' Christmas Joy Needlebook.

Waiting for my mag too...

Brittercup's 2008 Xmas ornament
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

I think that it is unfair that subsribers to the JCS magazine get their issue AFTER the stores do. Does not make me want to renew my subsription. To keep myself happy I have been working on some ornies from the past. This one is last years, Brittercup's Christmas Centerpiece (over one ugh) but it is pretty all done and nice and small.

Journaling done

Yeah believe it or not I finished my journals last night...I tell ya when I want something done, it gets done! One problem i ran into though, as I was listing christmas ornaments i had done and flipping thru my old JCS mags to find the names and designers, I found more that I want to do. How many more you ask? 9. ugh. and this I decide 1 month before the new one is about to come out. HA!

But to tell you the truth I discovered a few things doing my photo journal...one of those things is that i really love doing ornaments and littles much more than the bigger projects. My favorite stitching group ever was when I joined and participated in the Ornament Round Robin back in 2005, where you bought enough fabric and floss for one ornament for your entire group and passed that around with each person stitching their own ornament. I loved that, I got to stitch ones i would of never done on my own due to cost or appearance..but you know what? I love each one of those 6 ornaments. and the 2004 issue is one of my favorites because of it. The group is now defunct (at least no one has posted there to start a group in years!, i was the last to ask about one in '07) , and I regret only being able to do it that one time. I remember Dani was in my group that year. If anyone knows of another group that does this style of round robin let me know.

I think I will be kitting and stitching a few ornaments in the next week or so, maybe even try my hand at a halloween one or two.

Stitching journal

stitching journal
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

This is the fire under my butt right now. I have been rifling thru my flickr account and my blog and getting people to take pictures of stuff I gave them YEARS ago. I found some clearance albums at Borders headed to Ritz photos and BAM stitching journal. Right now I am going on memory and written info from my blog. So I just have the pattern name and when it was done/finished written under the photos. and in gift or exchanges who it was given to. In the future I may include more detail...fabric choices, changes etc. I am up to 2006/7 and am on my 2nd journal.

As it was in the beginning......

DSCN2427[1]
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

This summer as I was going thru all the stuff during the attic move, I found what I think is my first (printed)cross stitch (I had believed it long gone). It was done around the time of the cat, and my mom and i disagree as to which was my first, but at the least this was the first to be mounted (on foam sticky board oh the HORROR) and framed. I was somewhere in the 10-12 age range, and It was shortly after this that I switched to counted cross stitch which I deemed much more sophisticated...you had to count!

with this, the near destruction of one of my first counted cross stitch, and an article in the latest Sampler and Antique Needlework Quarterly about women journaling their needlework, I have decided to put together a stitching journal. I am going to print up all the photos I have of stitched and crafty stuff i have done over the years and what its history has been. Does anyone out there in bloggity land have one like this... if so, is it fancy? or just a binder?

In stitching news I am working on Anna's stitching challenge...its is stitched but not finished...

Is it Live? or Memorex?

Ned Kelly Kitty front
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

I am so proud of this scissor fob, I got it to look just like the model (which I loved). I used the called for silks and sacrificed the rest of the skein for the tassle (honestly it would just sit around for months later). My skillz are finally showin themselves.
And the back

Ned Kelly kitty back
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

Margaret Sherry's N

Margaret Sherry's N
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

A bit of stitching? yep. this is a small piece I did for a friends birthday before I left on my trip. Th true colors called for the N to be the hot orange color you see on the lizards scales, but I adjusted it to blues instead. this was inserted in a coaster I had sitting around.

I tried to photograph it, but then tried my NEW scanner that i got for my birthday, and it came out great! Yay! (so good in fact it helped me catch the missing backstitching, which i then promptly fixed).

As for the work my husband did while I was gone, he actually did less than planned cause his furlough got called off...so less time at home but...yes he painted and ripped up carpet and polyed the hardwood floor, we are now moving stuff back in and I need to purchase rugs. I will post a pic when it looks done.

I'mmmmm Backkkkkk

Purchase at Cvered Bridge Needlearts
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

From Pittsburgh! I went up with just my daughter to stay at my mom's house for 2 weeks and I had a really good time. I was able to see old friends, hang with my sister and bro inlaw, and visit old haunts. It was unseasonably cold and rainy so not as much swimming as planned, but A got to hang outside alot with out getting bit by insects like she does down here.

I am heading into work next week, my contract has been renewed but they haven't told me my classes yet (it is always last minute), so I figure I better show up and clean up. and with the beginning of the school year that usually means more stitching and blogging too...so good news for you dear reader!

I never stitch much on vacation but I did get to go to Covered Bridge Needlearts in Bridgeton, PA. They have moved next store in to roomier space since i was there 2 years ago. I did not buy much but it was the most i have ever spent in one LNS. (I got alot of fabric)).
I did buy 2 patterns, Ned Kelly Kitty by the Cat's Whiskers (wouldn't you know they have a whole series!) and Maidens of the Sea by With My Needle. I know I have not progressed alot on the Quaker Turtles but this one was on my list. Add in some $7 silks (ugh) and you have a pricy purchase.

Oh I also got a clear ruler for a stitched insert. I was thinking of doing the "ABC Stitch with me" pattern found in the JCS mag last year, but am thinking their may be something better to do for it ...any one have any ruler patterns they really like?

Is it another blog post??? Already?

Book Stack I
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

Yes folks, when it rains it pours. Seriously, In about 4 days I am heading up to PA to visit family with A. and I may not get time to blog soo I am getting it all out now.

Ian is not heading up with us cause he has to work, if there is work, and has plans to redo our center room which we call the Drunken Library, and the hallway. Including pulling up the nasty ancient carpet and redoing the wood floors. It would be difficult to do this room with the family at home cause it is the room everyone goes thru to access the rest of the house. So before I leave I have been helping clear the room, Here are most of the books we own, stacked in another room of the house (I say most cause there is a contingent in the craft/guest room, bins full of paperbacks in the attic, and a horde of kids books in A. room.) we are book people.

In baby news Annabeth has begun standing and walking on her own with no assistance, she still will not go far, but we see small progress everyday. In addition she is starting to say words we can't understand..for example today she kept saying "amno" which we could not understand, animal? Then tonight when she pointed a picture of Elmo and said this again...OHHH. Why do you as the parent feel like the idiot?

Keeping with the theme...

Front wall---Before
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

Of old projects finally done....

We painted the front/living room of the house about 5 years ago, it is a long room and instead of a large TV my husband bought and installed a projector , so we watch movies at about full size (ok not that big but bigger than your largest TV screen ). The cost of a screen, or projector screen paint ( yes they make that stuff) was prohibitive...so we just left one of the smaller walls white, The other 3 are dark green. Yes we had a home theatre before it was the IN thing to do. At that point I had the idea of putting a fabric "curtain" up on that wall so it would not be so stark...and having it run on a rail like a hospital curtian so it could easily be pulled aside.

I found the sheer fabric I wanted at Joann's fairly quickly, but life got in the way and I didn't actually buy it for another 2 years (it was about $50-60). Then came the search for the right rail...millions of hospitals use them...but good luck finding a source for them if you're a civilian. I finally found something acceptable at IKEA. it was a strung wire with hanging clips. (got that in '07) but when Ian put it up, It mounted low and the hangers would mean the top 2-3 inches of wall exposed. I finally figured done was better than perfect...and I finished stitching up the curtain a few days ago and just strung it on the wire. I liked it laying flat but then my seams were very obvious, so I wrinkled it up and I think it looks ok for 5 years in the making:

Front wall--After
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

old dress

old dress
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

OK before you go any further on this post....no derogatory comments about my frumpiness.
This dress was once a bridesmaid dress that i wore for a friends wedding in august of 96. It is a full length pepto pink color that is more like tapestry/upholstery fabric and originally had this weird backward bolero jacket thing that buttoned up the back...that piece is long gone. This dress has been in my closet lo these last 13 years...I have always intended on dying it black and hemming it up to cocktail length or something...so i finally did:

Finiahed dress
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

The black dye turned the dress an interesting mulberry/purple color. An it was my first hem attempt (which is difficult by yourself...that's why i look a bit frazzled..I had tried the thing on like 10 times that day) I still need to change out the zipper which did not dye but with a nice black sweater (and some makeup) I think it will look pretty good.

Heaven and nature sing

Heaven and nature sing
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

I told you I needed to stitch something new....Heaven and Nature sing by Stitched from the Heartland

New Desk

New Desk
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

I have a few crafts I have been doing lately to tell you all about,..the first is this desk. Ian's parents brought down a disassembled toddler desk (and a chair that was already redone). So we had to strip, sand, poly, and assemble it. As you can see here A. took right to it when we put it in her room. She went to go get each book that you see and brought it back to the desk to read.

More tomorrow...

I'll be honest...

DSCN2330[1]
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

I have not been crafting AT ALL these past couple of weeks.

There has been this house project... Our house is very non-circulatory. Often it is cooler than the daytime temperature, but then in the evening our house is very warm and the outside air is cooled off and we waste AC cause we cannot get the outside air in...Well we decided we need a whole house fan. one of those in the ceiling jobbers that sucks all the air into the attic . So the project involved creating a new attic above the garage and moving the attic stairs and moving EVERYTHING in the attic across the entire house and into the new attic. This involved alot of sorting, reorganizing etc. which took up all my time...and now i am finding it difficult to get back into stitching.
Currently in progress is a series of Alphabet blocks (pictured above) that I was working on for A, but I haven't put a stitch in in 2 weeks. BUT tomorrow (my birthday by the way) I am cleaning my craft room and may find a new profect to stitch on...that always gets me going again....

Hobbies come and hobbies go..

I am one of those folks that gets obsessed with something for a week or two and then my interest quickly fizzles out or into a very slow burn. It can be books, usually a series like Twilight...(yes they are pretty shallow but damned if I wasn't at that bookstore for 4 nights in a row buying them mybrain screaming *MUST READ NOW!*). It can be a movie or a TV show, most recently Star Trek-I saw it 3 times in just a few weeks. It can be something new on the internet, like Facebook or a new game from Bigfish. And of course the hobbies. I always save the goods for when the need (flare up) to jewelry/knit/make candles/scrapbook comes around again. These last few weeks it has been quilting, so much so that i have not had a sec to blog about it till it was done:

I have dabbled a bit in this before, but not for long and something always frustrated me. For this story we must go back to about a year ago in NH......( insert ripply time effect here). I went to Keepsake Needlearts (disappointing) and next store to it is the Holy Grail of Quilt stores: Keepsake Quilting. There I had purchased a nice little pile of fat eights that were in shades of my my favorite color: purple. I also saw some fabulous Trip Around the World quilts...those looked very simple.... just squares right?.

So around the 3rd week of May this year I decide just to fiddle with these a bit, cut out the max # of little squares from each fabric and laid them out:



DSCN2319[1]
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

It wasn't very big, but I didn't care at that point a big quilt was not going to happen for me any way. I went and bought a special 1/4 foot for my sewing machine (I cannot drop the feed dogs on the old thing and it pulls to the left) I sewed each square to the next in little strips then stitched the strips together. (of course as soon as I was done i found a way to strip piece one...next one sigh) had to run out and find a border/backgound fabric...once I did that someone crawled right over to sit on it and decided it was definitely made for her.


DSCN2320[1]
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

One assembled I attempted to quilt it (by hand...my machine can't handle that yet) and that definitely needs work/practice. but i quilted (in the ditch) for a week straight till it was done...now though I think i am burned out on quilting...off to find my next fire.

It is about the size of a wall hanging for a wall that does not exist for it, or a doll blanket for the child that does not yet like dolls, or a table topper for a table that also does not exist. But I saw it though till the end, so it is my first, and I'll consider it practice...for the next quilting binge (in about 4 years)


DSCN2328[1]
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

TaaaDaaaa!

Observe the first steps of our 2 year old!


This was wednesday, and it is honestly some of the first unassisted steps A has taken...Can you not tell by my reaction? Priceless.

2 years old

2 years old
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

Hard to believe that almost 2 years ago today I gave birth to a squishy faced baraccuda...and now she is the cutest thing ever.

Her little quirks are numerous and fun to note but what I find astounding everday is how much she feels like an extension of me, I am requently shocked at how looking at her is like looking back in time at myself as I never knew me. Hmm that makes little sense. But I bet the parents out there understand it.

She is still not walking independantly and after a couple of PT visits and another Neurologist visit the consensus is....she can/could walk...she just doesn't want to/is scared to try. Basically the current consensus and hypothesis is that her cognitive awareness of the world and herself as a person who could fall and hurt occured before she could physically walk...now she is all but terrified to fall and clings to you for dear life. Let go and she drops to a crawl. So what we need is an injection of bravery...I know some of you with little boys probably have some to spare.

Before I left the neurologist i wanted to ask him when he thought she would walk...but instead I asked when I should start to worry..."call me in 3 months if she isn't walking " was his reply.

The other little quirks include calling everything "ba" (we have a definitive vocab of only about 10-15 words...which worries me ...me alone apparently) AND we are going through huge amounts of stranger anxiety (not seperation anxiety though interestingly enough). So much so that her visiting grand parents (my parents last week, Ians this week) have had to reintroduce themselves for 10 minutes after every sleep including naps. It makes me very anxious to try to have her pictures taken for this year...It could end in disaster.

that is the update

Funny thing happened on the way to the craft room.....

Heart in Hand -Birds
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

So I am stitching along on Quaker turtles one color over one Right? and my mind keeps wandering to a pattern I bought about a year ago, nothing special about it, not on my yearly list so I push it out of my head. But it would not go away kept butting its head in mine saying "I'm small" "Won't take long, I bet im cute when all finished", "I'm colorful, stitch me!". So after 2 days of harrassment I yell " Fine! I'll stitch you already!" much to the dismay of my husband who-already-knows-I-am-crazy-but-is-wondering-how-long-till-he-has-to-check-me-in-to-a mental-hospital-and-raise-a-non-walking-toddler-all-by-himself.

So I go get the pattern and thread (DMC of course, cause I did not have all the called for overdyed and this thing was not waiting!) and stitch it up in 2 nights.
Heart in Hand 's Wee one Birds...I made the worm crawl up the B...not sure what it is doing in the model.

But all done, cute? yes, easy ? yes, now....it will sit in a drawer untill a suitable frame can be found . I hope it is happy.

Quaker turtles 2 of 8

Quaker turtles 2 of 8
Originally uploaded by Stitching scientist

Here is the back of the scissor fob, I am about halfway through the next one, (pinkeep top?) but I haven't really been stitching lately. So therefore I haven't been blogging much.

School is slowing down, Ian and I are busy in the evenings doing house projects (finished painting the doors in the kitchen, building borders in the yard, installing a new set of attic stairs. OK the last two are mostly him, but i do assist and hand ou my opinion liberally.
I got a pay cut from the state for the rest of the fiscal year (read 2 months) and my lecture class that I was scheduled to teach has been cancelled. Not really that big a deal (I still have a job) it just will not be as challenging only teaching labs i have taught a lot.

In Annabeth news, I called the neurologist last week to confirm that I was being a ninny about her not walking yet...an lo and behold the doctor was NOT happy about that news...and wants to see her as soon as possible. This being the modern medical world that will be the 22nd of May, and you all know this means i have confirmed my daughters walking date as MAY 21st. Meanwhile he signed off on physical therapy for her, but i have yet to hear about scheduling that.