Patchwork Sampler

I was feeling low last week, so spent a lot of time watching YouTube videos to pass the time. And because I can't seem to keep my hands still while watching, and I was tired of playing Spider Solitaire, I pulled out a project I started last year.

This is a sampler of odds and ends of threads. Over time, I've accumulated quite a lot of floss. Some of the bits and pieces are left over from kits. Others are specialty skeins I was given or that were used for a specific project and then never again. I also have quite an assortment of variegated flosses and overdyed threads that morph from one color to another.

I gave myself only a few parameters when beginning this stitching:

1. Each square is 10 stitches by 10 stitches
2. Every-other square is plain, then variegated
3. Try to keep like colors away from each other

With so few rules, it's the kind of stitching that's very easy to do while watching videos or listening to podcasts.

I'm not certain what I'll do with the finished product. Nor am I sure how big it will be. So far it's about 5 inches by 12 inches. The largest it can be, using the 14 count aida fabric I'm working on, is seventeen inches by 13 inches. I'm leaning toward making it into a pillow. Or perhaps I'll frame it.



Honestly, the end result doesn't matter. This time, it's a project I'm making for myself where the process is more important than the finished piece. It feels amazingly good to be cross-stitching again.

Sympathy Cards

I recently had a reason to send a couple sympathy cards. I tried some new techniques, so thought I'd share.

With both cards, I used images that I'd saved from picture frames that I'd purchased. The flowers are very pretty. I liked the idea of a single giant flower layered on beautiful paper.

With the first card, I learned to make a braided edge. From the front, it looks complicated, but by using the excellent instructions by Lisa Curcio, it was easy to do on this parchment cardstock.

This is what the braid looks like on the inside of the card, before I added further decoration and my personal message.

I made the second card bigger because the image was so large. I had it open along the top edge. I used a decorative square die to cut the image and the coordinating plain paper behind it.



For the inside, I fussy-cut the butterfly from another part of the original image. Before attaching the butterfly's body, I gently rolled the wings to give them some lift when the card was opened.

I'm sad, of course, for the reason I had to make these cards. But it was a wonderful way to think about the person who died for a few hours as I constructed the cards. She was an artist, too.

Drivin' Down a Country Road

A little passenger seat photography last week, just before sunset.

Father's Day Card

This is the card I made for Dale last week. Simple. Masculine. I'm quite pleased.



I used a brown paper cardstock for the base and a matching envelope. The top of the card has a dark brown leather-look scrap paper. For the bottom of the card, I used a lightweight polka dot print wrapping paper.

I used two sizes of an oval die cut for the layered sentiment pieces, first printing the "Happy Father's Day" on a coordinating piece of scrap paper. The horizontal stripe is a piece of dark brown grosgrain ribbon.

I wrote a personal note on the inside of the card. Then I decorated the front of the envelope flap with the same polka dot wrapping paper.

I wrapped his gift in the polka dot paper as well, and tied it with another piece of the brown grosgrain ribbon. Nice touch!

Oddball Minor Holiday

Earlier this week, I celebrated another minor holiday. National Parchment Cooking Day was on June 24. I have two excellent recipes that fit the bill. One is a delicious Dutch Apple Pie. But Dale and I are staying away from sweets right now. So I cooked the other, Salmon Baked in Parchment.

For this recipe, I first cut the parchment in the shape of a heart. Brush on some oil. Add the fish and spice it well with lemon pepper, Mrs Dash, and some dry mustard.

Then you enclose the fish by folding the heart like this.



Bake it for 15 minutes. Let it rest for 5 minutes. Then, yum!

I ate it with some spinach. A simple, nutritious dinner.

This was the 24th minor holiday I've celebrated so far this year.

Throwback Thursday - 2007 Part 09

This week the Wayback Machine takes us to September of 2007. I finished seven small projects. Here are the first four.

(I'm going into high-achiever mode with this post since I already completed my #throwbackthursday goal for 2020. Honestly, I can't help myself).

Blue Monkey

This is another square for a charity quilt. A sick little girl named Sunny wanted a quilt full of monkeys. Thought I'd do my part to make her wish come true.

This chart is from the leaflet Nursery Animals designed by Martha Schmidt. All the animals are in crazy colors. There's a pink kangaroo, a purple hippo and many other wild animals. My favorite is a blue giraffe with green spots. No surprise there.

Assisi Bird Bookmark
Here's another bookmark for the charity literacy project. This was a freebie pattern by Marlies Meyer of IHLE-Design. I enjoy single color stitching and Assisi work, so combined the two to create this piece.

Diamond Bookmark

This bookmark also was donated to a charity project. I adapted a freebie motif pattern by Editora Koala to create this quick stitch. For fun, I stitched with DMC "Color Variations," a new floss set in 2007. This is a mass-produced floss that attempted to mimic hand-dyed floss with subtle color changes. Quite pretty!

Music Notes Bookmark

This is the final bookmark stitched in September for the charity project. The design was a freebie from Charles Craft and was an extremely quick stitch.

On the next #throwbackthursday, I'll share my last three projects of September 2007. 

Tropical Greeting

I recently made a card for someone who lives in Hawaii. I chose a tropical theme.

For the front, I used a stained glass image that was salvaged from an old wall calendar. For the card base, I used cardstock that looks like watercolor or tie-dye.

I was pleased with the way the prints coordinated. The Tiffany birds are gorgeous.



The back side of the cardstock is white, so I added a coordinating paper on the inside of the card where I added a personal message.

Because the image is from a calendar, it was printed on slick paper and has a sheen. I paired the card with a blue parchment envelope, decorating the flap to match the card.



I enjoy making cards from upcycled objects already in my stash. The calendar was too gorgeous to throw away! Now I get to share the beauty by utilizing the monthly images.

Color Wheels

Coloring and putting jigsaw puzzles together seem to fill a similar spot in me. They are activities I can do with my hands while listening to a podcast or watching TV or videos. This weekend I did some coloring. My medium of choice is colored pencils.



I'm easily amused. That's handy during times of isolation.

The Final Four

These are the last faces in this batch of painted rocks. The blue is my favorite.

Hey there!



You startled me!

Can't we all just be happy?

Being a monster is my favorite thing about me!

Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to my Dale. The best man - and amateur astronomer - I know.

Meow, Whah, Eek & Chuckle

More from my most recent menagerie.

Meow

Whah

Eek

Chuckle

Colorful Buttons

I was itching for some puzzle time, so pulled out this 300 piecer.

It's a very cheery design.



But make that 299 pieces.



Sometimes, that's what you get for a dollar.

Throwback Thursday - 2007 Part 08

This week the Wayback Machine takes us to June and July of 2007. Here are my next five projects.

When I consider what was going on in my life during those months, I'm shocked to see that I did any stitching at all.


Little Jack Horner

In June, the charity stitching group started a quilt with a nursery rhyme theme. I decided to participate in this because I have a wonderful book of nursery rhyme designs that I'd never used before. I don't think I've used it since, either, which is a real shame.

I chose to stitch Little Jack Horner primarily because it was the right size for a quilt block. This was one of those charts that was just fun to stitch from beginning to end. Great shading. Not too much backstitch. Lovely details.

Joy Bear

Following that great project, was this sad ornament. It was one of those projects that I completely disliked. I rarely stitch these pesky projects, but this kit was tucked in with some fabric that I received from the charity stitching group. One of our members had a lot of extra Christmas charts and kits, so she divided them among group members. Normally, I enjoy doing ornaments. But there was something about this kit that was an extreme test to me.

"Clunky" is the word that comes to mind. The quality of the fabric was fine, but the floss was odd and felt strange in my hand. The shading in the design is too harsh. There's no subtlety whatsoever. Thankfully, it did make for a sweet ornament. The finished piece was returned to the charity group as part of the ongoing Christmas ornament project.

Bird Song

I totally love this pillow, designed by C M Designs.
As a vocalist, the sentiment is one I believe in:

The woods would be silent

if no birds sang except the best.

I made this bolster as a gift for a dear friend. I'd reconnected with my favorite college music professor. He and his wife celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 2007. Though I hadn't seen them in over 25 years, I was invited to attend their party.

I was required to complete the finishing on this bolster pillow by the seat of my pants since I didn't have any directions for how to do it. I used the knowledge I have about making a square pillow or wall hanging, and adapted it to make a tube.

The overall look of the pillow was inspired by a few of the needlework blogs I frequent. Some of the artists out there have a great ability of putting various fabrics together. I wanted to give that design aesthetic a try. I found three flannel prints that worked well together.

1. The border around the stitchery has little polka dots and ladybugs. The dots mimic the musical notes and the colors balance the birds.

2. The back of the pillow and the "jelly roll" ends are a blue fabric with white clouds. This way the birds have someplace to fly.

3. The inside of the "jelly roll" ends is a blue and white stripe. I've turned the end back a bit on the left side in this photo to show it off.

I sandwiched some small pompom trim between the layers of fabric on the ends. Again, the pompoms echo the shape of the musical notes and polka dots.

Finally, I tied bows to form the "jelly roll" with some narrow picot-edged satin ribbon.

I'm really pleased with the way this pillow turned out. It was very well received by my old professor.

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Sunflower Bookmark

This bookmark was so much fun to stitch that this was the second time I stitched it. I donated it to the charity bookmark project.

I like this bookmark from Designs For The Needle so much, that I finally stitched one for myself in May of 2019.

Zebra

The next group project by our charity stitching group was to make a black and white quilt. This zebra was my donation to it.

The zebra is part of a chart by Funk & Weber Designs called African Night. In the original chart, the fabric is black and the stitching is white. Our charity group usually stitched on 14ct white aida. So I reversed the stitched area, and with a few tweaks, I stitched the black zebra on white fabric.

Next time on #throwbackthursday, I'll share the seven small projects I completed in September 2007. 

With this post, I've completed one of my 20 Goals in 2020. This is the 20th #throwbackthursday blog post I've written this year. I'll likely continue these posts on Thursdays, but if I miss a week here and there, I won't feel like I've let myself down.

So Happy Together

These four friends. So colorful. So full of mischief!

The one with the wry jokes.

He'll laugh at anything, just to fit in.

Her charm is unmistakable.

Everything delights this kid.

Four more for the rock garden. So many more to paint before these get planted.

Fern Ridge Wildlife Area

Dale and I were feeling a little stir crazy over the weekend, so we decided to go for a drive. We had no particular destination in mind. I picked a direction ... how about southwest from home. As we drove along the country road, I watched the map. Something caught my eye. "Fern Ridge Wildlife Viewing" right next to a small lake.

That seemed like as good of a place to go as any, so I navigated Dale over the railroad and through the woods. We found the gravel road and took our chances.

At the end of the road, a parking lot and this sign.



When we got out of the car, I couldn't see the lake. So I started down a path. First I passed this flowering bush.



Then I climbed up a small ridge to this sign. This was a good omen.

On the other side of the ridge, the lake.

A short way down the trail was an observation deck. To the north, a large meadow. I paused to listen to the many songbirds. Turning around, I had this unobstructed view of the lake.

It's a very peaceful place.

click for larger image

While I was exploring, Dale checked out the Fern Ridge website. He learned there were many of these wildlife viewpoints to explore. All we need is to buy a parking pass. I think he and I may have a new favorite walking area.

As we drove back down the gravel road, we frightened a blue haron into flight. Wow. Just ... wow.



I love living in Oregon and am looking forward to the time Dale and I can explore the area more.