Finally Framed

I finished the last bits of stitching on the Robin Pickens Winter Seasonal Courier project, pinned it to the foamcore, and popped it into the frame.

Today at stitching and after I got home, I did more work on the Summer one. It's on 40ct - one thread over 2 so a bit smaller than the one above. I may use the same frame but a fabric faux mat on this one. We'll see.

I really like the colours, although I should have used a darker yellow for the star on the bottom left.

When Poppy's granddaughter, Olivia, was visiting her recently, she saw Jim's Everett and really wanted him for herself. 

I mean, who could resist him?

She was really bummed out she couldn't have him so Poppy commissioned me to make one for her, but this time a girl. I made sure she had the same colour sweater as Everett when I knit her yesterday. They're not really fraternal twins because her 'fur' colour is a different yarn than what I used on Everett.

I kind of got carried away with her facial features and wasn't happy with her snout.

so today at stitching I performed some ursine rhinoplasty and gave her a more petite snout. It sets off here eyes better, don't you think?

When I delivered her, I got some brownies! The quality control manager deemed them to be delicious.

Here she is with her homies Daphne and Everett.

I can finally reveal the stealth project I was sewing a couple of weeks ago. While at the Ultimate Sewing Centre in Oshawa, I espied this lone charm pack. Of course, the poppies caught my eye.

This was the array of fabrics in the collection (except for the strip of butterflies):

I fashioned my usual checkerboard design but did it twice, so there's one on the inside AND back of the bag. I also made a thread bed (shown with pairs of snaps). Daphne and the stitch picker I made are tucked in there, too. I attached the binding to the front and folded it to the back, handstitching it in place.

I have several other sewing projects I'd like to do. Now to find the motivation to get started...

We're in a heat wave so I haven't been venturing outdoors much. Staying in air-conditioned comfort has been wonderful and a good excuse to do lots of crafting - not that I need an excuse...

24+ Hours of Fun

Poppy, Jen1, and I hit the road on Friday afternoon and headed up to Gravenhurst where we spent the night before the Muskoka Yarn and Fibre Festival.

I was very pleased to find us lodgings in an efficiency unit that could comfortably accommodate three people in three beds at the Pinedale Inn, on the shore of Gull Lake. 

The view from our balcony

For a Friday night in the cottaging season, it was very quiet. We chatted outside on the balcony until almost sundown. The temperature was perfect, the view stunning, and we reveled in the rustling sound of the poplar leaves in a nearby tree. One could almost feel one's blood pressure dropping and the stresses in our lives drifting away.

I took an array of bears to see if Jen1 was interested in having one come and live with her. She picked Lola.

We took a selfie with our little friends and had ChatGPT make it into a cartoon.

Jen1 with Lola, Geri with Thomas and Ernest, Poppy with Daphne

The next morning we had breakfast at Stacked in Bracebridge then headed to the Fairgrounds for the yarn fest.

We split up - each interested in different things - and determined a meet-up time. Jen1 had pre-ordered something she went to pick up. Several of the yarn merchants had models on display. We all were intrigued by the Mautinoa shawl designed by Malia Mae Joseph. The pattern is available on Ravelry. It would work very well with a couple of contrasting skeins of laceweight. I could see knitting wider bands and making it into a lap blanket.

I was intrigued by a Knitted Bliss Stitching kit which featured several specialty stitches to look like flowers and balls of yarn.

Other colourways were also available. The blue kit I purchased was complete with 2 needles, a threader, all the DMC flosses separated on a floss card, the printed fabric, and 6" hoop. I do plan to vary the flowers with other colours. There are instructional videos available for the various techniques required.

What first drew me to their booth was seeing a floral embroidery on a sweater on display.

Of course, I dragged Poppy over to their booth, too. The designer uses Sticky Fabri-Solvy and just washes the water-soluble interfacing away once the embroidery is completed. She also sells 'Stick and Stitch' packs with designs already printed onto the 'Solvy', ready to literally stick and stitch. My mind is now racing with ideas for this embroidery technique. 

Ernest had a few photo ops:

with a very cute, needle-felted Peter Rabbit.

with an intriguing book of fellow critters,

between a couple of felted sheep on display,

amid an assembled lot of needle-felted critters,

and with an emotional support chicken and a frog.

After the fibre fest we made a beeline for Thimbles & Things quilt shop near Orillia to see if there were any to-die-for fabrics or kits. Among our purchases, Poppy found a very cool panel of a poppy print that was ready to make into a tote bag. It was very cool that the ends were printed in two directions so it could just be folded and seamed without having to cut a front and back separately.

Jen1 found a pretty, floral printed panel and companion fabric that she though would make a nice table cloth. Close up, the flowers looked like they'd been appliquéd in place.

I picked up a couple of William Morris fat eighths.

Our final stop was Myrtle Station Wool which conveniently, was on our route home. We had a nice visit with Stephanie and ogled her lovely yarn.

Back at home, I pretty much baffed out after all the activity of the previous 24 hours. 

It was so good for the three of us to get away. 

I don't see enough of the two of them as they are still working and busy with family commitments so I really look forward to spending time with them. We got to indulge ourselves doing many of our favourite things: shopping, discussing crafts, eating at restaurants, staying in comfy lodgings, getting away from 'adulting' for a little while, and spending time together.

We really need to do things like this more.

Garage Sale

Barb and I attended the Bolts & Bobbins garage sale today at their location near Woodville. The shop is on a farm where Clydesdale horses are bred. There was a 60 day-old foal sticking very close to its mama. We chatted with the breeder as he was assisting with directing parking for the cars arriving for the sale.

I purchased a few deeply discounted things in the 'garage' and a few other items inside the shop (regular price).

I thought this precut metre of fabric was very cute - with some practical 'goals'. I didn't have a specific plan for it but since coming home, I have thought of something I'll use it for.

I found a neutral, lightly patterned fabric

and a dark blue blender fabric in the remnant area.

This fat quarter will coordinate with just about any solid fabric.

I also needed a homespun fabric to back my wool felt appliqué 'bowl fillers'.

Any fabrics on the bolt had a 1m minimum cut. This white on ecru fabric was already a precut metre so I didn't have to stand in line to get it cut.

I did, however, stand in line to have this cut. It is a companion fabric to a charm pack I already have.

Inside the shop, I picked up one quilt pattern (I have lots of random fabrics that would be suitable),

a fabric glue stick, and chalk to refill my chalking/marking tool.

There was only one of these zipper pulls left so I think I'll order some more online.

When I got home, I installed it on my now-favourite project bag (the one with hexies on the back). It looks gold in the photo but it really is silver.

After lunch in Port Perry, Barb, Ernest, and I stopped in to see Alda who is spending the week at a retirement home in north Oshawa. She is looking great. She'll be going home on the weekend.

While there, Ernest, and Alda's Rusty got together for a bit of conversation.

Judy also joined us so we had a nice gabfest for a couple of hours.

Once home, I got some fun mail. 4 patterned Japanese cotton fat quarters. I'm hoping to use a couple of them to back some project bags I made with the Yukata charm pack.

Tomorrow Jen1, Poppy, and I head north so we can attend the Muskoka Fibre Festival on Saturday. I'm really looking forward to our overnight getaway.

Good For Social Stitching

When I'm stitching with the Monday morning gang, there's a lot of chit chat and not a lot of concentration on what we're stitching. This week I worked on my sashiko piece because all I had to do is stitch on the lines.

I was running low on the thread but knew fairly soon my order for the rest of the threads I'd need would show up. They came today. I bought the necessary thread from an Etsy vendor - mostly because shipping from Hong Kong was less than $10 and from a Canadian or US vendor shipping would have been almost $30. The price of the thread was the same.

On Monday, I completed all the stitches in one direction (verticals in this photo) and started in the other direction. (seen at the top). The timing of the arrival of the new thread was very fortuitous because a couple more rows and the first reel of thread would have been finished.

I was going to fully finish the Robin Pickens 'Seasonal Courier: Cardinal's Winter' by mounting the piece on foam core then mounting it on a background of complimentary fabric. Like in this photo:

I even had the perfect fabric for the job in my stash but couldn't locate it last week. Instead, I purchased a fat quarter that could have fit the bill. Then I found a frame in my stash that would work without the faux fabric 'mat'.

I started mounting the stitching on foamcore I had cut to fit in the frame and had it pinned all around when I realized I hadn't finished stitching the bit on the left edge. See that open space on the edge across from the bird's beak? Of course I can't find the pattern (having cleverly filed it away somewhere when I emptied the project bag) so I've asked Barb for the thread colours as I can stitch from the photograph.

In the meantime, I started kitting up the 'Blue Jay's Summer'

 in the same series and popped into Michaels today to pick up the three  DMC floss colours I didn't have in my stash. I scrounged an appropriate piece of fabric from my stash (38ct linen) and went to work stitching with one thread over two. 

It'll be a pretty quick stitch. I may use the same frame for all in the series and just skip the fabric 'mat' altogether.

Inspired by MaryK's Lori Holt 'stitch picker', I thought I'd fashion some of my own using bakeable modeling clay (aka Fimo) and some #24 tapestry needles. The first batch of Fimo was all crumbly - understandably so as it had been in my 'stash' for probably 3 decades. The second batch was made using Premo Sculpey and was still pretty maleable. The clay is baked at about 230ºF for 30 or 40 minutes for it to cure/harden. I made enough pickers for everyone in my Monday morning group. And yes, I had the business cards, labels, and little plastic bags in my stash. If I were to make another batch, I'd make the 'handle' a little longer.

Today I even had occasion to use one on my stitching error. That little 'handle' makes is a bit more easy to 'unstitch' stitching boo boos.

Today for lunch I met my friends, David, Shelley, and Suzanne for lunch at the Greek pavilion - Acropolis - as this week is Oshawa's multicultural festival 'Fiesta'. It begins with a big parade through downtown Oshawa every year on Father's Day and continues until the following Saturday.

Thomas and Ernest were in attendance, too.

We sat and gabbed until almost 3.

On Thursday, Barb and I are going up to Woodville for the Bolts & Bobbins garage sale. Then on Friday afternoon, Poppy, Jen1, and I will head up to Gravenhurst for the Muskoka Yarn & Fibre Festival on Saturday - not that I need any yarn (cough) but it will be fun for an overnight getaway with a couple of my girlies.

Carol Feller just did a Facebook post about knitting a top using random yarns - leftovers from other projects or skeins combined with others. She's going to cover sizing, gauge, etc. It might be a good exercise for me to actually use some of my stashed yarn. I've indicated my interest in accessing this free information on her Stolen Stitches Facebook page and website.

What To Do With English Paper Piecing?

Three years ago (!) Jen1 and I ventured to Bolts and Bobbins near Woodville for their garage sale. While there, I found this amazing fabric on sale. I thought all the coordinating colours would be great for English Paper Piecing - 'Shimmer Eclipse Iceberg' fabric by Deborah Edwards for Northcott Fabrics.

A month later, I had created this 14" x 10" piece.

It sat for three years while I figured out what I would do with it. Then I realized it would make a great back to a project bag. I added another 2 rows of hexies to the bottom to enlarge it to the dimensions I prefer to work with.

Next came deciding what I'd use for the lining and binding. At the same sale, I had purchased a (0.6m) remnant of a blue fabric - perfect for the job.

For the binding, I cut three strips of one of the darker bits of the striped fabric. Two of them were beside the selvage and a bit wider after trimming the selvage off. The third strip I cut from the inside. Because it was narrower, I encroached the adjacent fabric to match the width of the other two pieces. I knew the other colour would be hidden when I sewed the folded binding onto the front of the bag.

I then did all the usual steps, attaching strips above and below the zipper, as well as inserting the vinyl between the double-folded strip below the zipper.

After sewing the folded binding to the front and hand-sewing it to the back, I was pretty pleased with the result.

I have been considering selling some of the ones I've made but this one involved a LOT of hand-sewing and I couldn't imagine parting with it.

I still have some of the fabric left so could also make some coordinating pieces.

Will be on the lookout for more striped fabric like this. It really saves a lot of agonizing about coordinating colours.

This year's Bolts and Bobbins Garage Sale is this week. Barb and I are heading up there on Thursday.