Posie Gets Cozy

Wild Violet

I made a Farmer's Daughter apron for my mother-in-law Sue's birthday last week. She loves purple with a dedication and consistency that is inspiring. This seems true for almost everyone I've ever known who loves purple. Purple people are unwavering in their purple love. And when you meet them, and you see them with purple things or wearing purple, you think, "My gosh, I totally get it. Purple was invented for this!!!"

Sue wears purple so well it seems invented for her and her alone, especially the dusky, mauve-y, silvery shades that feel like the flower borders in the backgrounds of Merchant-Ivory films, and the insides of oyster shells, and sunrises at the lake. Heathercolors. Ollalieberry ice-cream colors. I love these mellow shades paired with pale browns and driftwood colors, like wild violets speckle-ing the pine-needled forest floor. There's an unfortunate moire pattern in this photo that's distracting, but the color of this linen was so pretty — kind of a warm, pinky beige. For the embroidery, I used DMC six-strand cotton floss but also some of DMC's linen floss in the palest silvery lavender. There isn't an appreciable difference, to be honest, but it does give areas of satin stitch a subtle, matte-y finish that  I like sometimes, especially when it's playing off of the more shimmery, glossy surfaces created using the mercerized cotton.

Just sayin.

Walk in the Woods (and Ice Skating Afternoon) Ornament Kits Now on Sale

Good morning, crafters! Please allow me to introduce this year's handmade felt ornament-making kit, Walk in the Woods, available for pre-order now!

It includes the Cozy Cottage, with the wood fires burning:

The Snowy Tree, sparkling with ice crystals:

And my favorite, the Little Deer, who watches shyly from the trees:

Each Walk in the Woods Felt Holiday Ornament Craft Kit includes:

9 pieces of wool/rayon blend felt in assorted colors
9 skeins coordinating DMC cotton embroidery floss
3/4 yd French rick-rack (for hangers)
Sequins and beads
Wool fluff (from a local Oregon sheep farm :-) for the chimney smoke
Stitching instructions
Pattern templates
Illustrated embroidery tutorial

You will need to have your own:

Wool batting or Polyester Fiber-fill
Sharp embroidery needle
Dressmaker's chalk pencil or fabric marker
Dressmaker's chalk carbon paper
Iron-on transfer pencil
Sharp fabric scissors and paper scissors
Fabric glue

This year's ornaments were inspired by our walks in the Oregon woods, and designed to compliment the ornament set I designed last year:

There's the Hot Cocoa Cup, to warm you up:

The Ice Skate, with pom-pon for good measure:

And the Gingerbread Girl, the sweetest of all:

Ice Skating Afternoon kits are once again available now for a limited time as well! All ornament kits cost $25 each, and if you purchase both of them together you will save $5 (yay). Please use the special Paypal button on each page to get the discount (you'll see it). We'll leave the pre-orders open for the next couple of weeks, and make some extras if you miss that window, but if you are interested in these, it's best to order now and make sure we have one for you.

My dynamic duo (and if them working together last year wasn't one of the cutest things I've ever seen in my life) are once again helping me in a major way (thanks again, honey, seriously) to put all of these kits together, and we are planning to ship them all to you around mid-October. That will give you plenty of time to finish them for the holidays. I do ship overseas — just click on the "Buy Now" button and enter your country as the destination to see how much the postage is before completing the order. Please also check your addresses in Paypal before completing the orders, as well. Thanks!!!

About the skill level needed to complete these: Last year I said that, while I don't think of these kits necessarily as a children's or a beginner's project, if you have some experience working some basic stitches, these ornaments take more time and patience than skill. I will include directions on transferring the designs to the felt, and basic diagrams for completing the types of classic embroidery stitches you will need to know — backstitch, lazy-daisy stitch, satin stitch, French knot, and blanket stitch — but once you are comfortable working those stitches, if you just take your time and settle in, you will be fine. These ornaments are about 6" or 7" big — so, they take a bit of precision and attention to detail, but, you know, that's a handmade felt ornament for ya!

I think that's it. Any questions, let me know, and thank you again for your enthusiasm for these! I really appreciate that so much. Thank you!

New Ornament Kits Coming

I spent the weekend tracing, cutting, and stitching tiny pieces of wool felt into another set of Christmas ornaments for this year. This is my Walk in the Woods ornament set, which includes the Snowy Tree, Little Deer, and Cozy Cottage. (Can you see the "smoke" coming out of the chimneys on the cottage?) I am really happy with how they turned out! I really get into these. You get obsessed with blanket stitch (one of the coolest stitches, don't you think?). I think they are such a fun project to work on in the fall, especially if you give yourself enough time so that you don't have to rush.

If you were hanging around these parts last year, you'll remember the Ice Skating Afternoon ornament kits that Andy and I put together last September. I designed these new ones to be companions to those, and I am going to try to do a new set of three every year, I think. This year, we are putting together kits for the new, Walk in the Woods set as well as a whole new batch Ice Skating Afternoon kits as well, if you missed out on those. I know it seems early for Christmas, but rushing around during the holidays and trying to squeeze everything in just takes the fun out of all of it, for me; I want all of these kits off to you by mid-October or so.

To that end, we'll start taking pre-orders for both of the kits tomorrow, and leave the orders open for a week or so. I'll show you close-ups of each of them tomorrow and give you all the details then, too. This is just a sneak peek 'cause I was excited and couldn't wait! And Andy has been begging me for three days to please post again already.

Farmer's Daughter Apron

Remember the apron I was making a few weeks ago?

I finished it!

I am so happy with it. It's exactly what I was going for (rare). It's generous and sort of . . . serious. Pretty but serious. Makes you feel like you can bake a ribbon-winning pie. I love long aprons — baker's aprons — the ones that really cover you, with long, generous ties (ahem).

The apron is made of linen, and trimmed with binding tape (not bias cut, just straight). It's about eight yards of binding! I don't like full aprons that just have a neck loop and then tie separately at the waist. The neck loop is never in the right place for me. These ties attach at the top of the bib, cross in back, go through loops at the waistline, cross again, and come to the front to be tied in a bow. Doing them this way makes the apron really adjustable, so it fits better.

The embroidery is a couple of Swedish floral designs I put together, done entirely in satin stitch (with two strands of cotton embroidery floss) and outlined with dark brown back stitch. I picked up some of the flower colors that were in that dark brown calico (from JoAnn's, many years ago now).

My friend Sarah and I finally saw Julie & Julia a couple of days ago and we loved it, especially the Julia parts. The clothes. The kitchens. The . . . everything. Her aprons — long, straight, serious. French. It was all so beautiful. I've got to see the movie again and just watch the sets and costumes this time. I went right home and cleaned the kitchen. And stared happily at my apron. I'm going to do the ties and binding a bit differently on the next one (have the side-bodice binding turn into the ties, and also, bind it completely by machine). (To be honest, and fully disclose my lunacy, I did the binding on this one by machine and hand.) There are plans for a next one — next four ones. (Three are already in progress. All different colors. I told you, I'm crazed.) There is a special someone's birthday coming up, and I am going to make three more for my mom and sweet sissies for Christmas. My sister Susie is an actual pastry chef, too — how cool is that.

This one is for me, though. My uniform for fall baking. Hmmm, what should I make . . . something French? Not a tarte tatin, though. I made one of those last year and I didn't really like it (quel dommage!). Something from Baking with Julia, maybe, because it's now (naturally) in my TiVo queue. Or maybe these chocolate souffles.

Wasn't Meryl Streep so amazing as Julia? Magical.

Free Embroidery Pattern at Sew, Mama, Sew!

In the throes of Ollalieberry Overdrive, I was looking at these dark, mossy-green sheets and thought I should take a few minutes to embroider a little flower on the pillowcases, and have an ensemble. For the design I took one of my inspirations for the quilt, the delicate blossoms of Queen Anne's Lace.

To create the template, I literally took a sprig of real Queen Anne's Lace and placed it on the copier. I made a copy and then traced (using a lightbox) the major details of the copied flower onto another piece of paper. It's helpful, when you're tracing, to think about what stitches you're going to use to stitch it, because that helps you decide how to trace. Then I reduced it so that it would fit comfortably on the hem. The embroidery uses three simple, basic embroidery stitches — back stitch, stem stitch, and the French knot — and is done entirely in one color.

People frequently ask me how to "finish" the back of the stitching when doing pillowcases. My answer is, "You don't. Don't worry about it." Wash them, dry them, they'll be fine. Stitch through both layers of the hem, do the best you can, secure your threads, and don't worry too much about the back of your work — it gets better as you get better, so just keep stitching. I promise.

To celebrate the month of hand sewing being hosted by the lovely ladies at Sew, Mama, Sew!, I've put together a free Queen Anne's Lace Pillowcases pattern for you to download there! And please check out all of the other gorgeous projects, inspirations, and tutorials they've put together for us this month — yay hand sewing! If you've been wanting to slow down the end of summer with a quiet afternoon spent stitching on the porch, I know you'll find something wonderful there. I'm going to go over and look right now, and am putting together a bundle for Iraqi Bundles of Love today, too.

Late-Summer Garland

I've been trying to break out of my usual color palette lately, first with the hot pinks and lime greens of Arden's quilt (which is so cute, and finished, and I'm planning to give it to her next week and get a photo) and this past week with an idea for an autumn apron in linen with some jewel-toned satin stitch. I didn't really set up this photo, just snapped it as it lay when I put it down so it's not a great pic, but the colors really grew on me, I must confess. I show you the finished 'pron when it's, (er), finished.

Thank you for all of the potluck suggestions! Yippee! Now I'll have to choose! I'll let you know what we come up with. I think I need to branch out with my cooking a little more lately, too. I did wind up printing out all of my internet recipes and putting them in a binder. That took a whole four years and . . . ten minutes. So, I am now ready for more. Thank you!

Andy's two-week vacation starts today! Awesome. We're having a staycation this year, but those are nice; the county and state fairs are coming up (oh joy!), the U.S. Open (on TV, of course), I bought a new puzzle to work on (the ultimate in vacation recreation), have one (measly) night booked at a campground, our block party (fun), an afternoon at the pool with niece and nephew (double-fun), I can't remember what else. I plan to make homemade ravioli. I want to work on the Blueberry Buckle quilt. But I think that's it. That's enough.

As I write, Clover Meadow is rolling around on the floor, moaning pathetically and trying to look as adorable as possible (on back, with paws dangling like a sea otter; on side, batting eyelashes) so that Andy will be convinced to get up and take her to the park. He just looked at her and said, "If you get it cute enough, we'll go."

Dispatch from Sew Expo

It was cool. It had been about five years, I think, since I'd been to it, but the Sewing and Stitchey Expo my mom and I went to yesterday was a really fun place to find out about some new stuff, and pick up some things I haven't seen anywhere else. You know how I was kind of bummed to be finishing my book soon? WHAT WAS MY PROBLEM. Seriously. I picked up stuff to start about four more projects, some of which I have never done before, and now I am so ready to be done so that I can start on them. (BTW, these photos and illustrations are all from the artist's web sites, not mine.)

My favorite, and something I've been wanting to learn forever, is this little Sheperdess rug punch pillow pattern  from Reets' Rags to Stitches. My mom bought this pattern for me and a beautiful Oxford punch needle, and the burlap. Such a nice mommy. I have wanted to make a rug for so long, but I didn't know anyone who did it to show me how. I bought supplies and a book from the fabric store one time but I got overwhelmed by the idea of cutting all those strips of fabric, and because I had no idea what I was doing. I didn't realize that you could use worsted weight wool, which I have bucketfuls of, more than I know what to do with. And you know what I don't have? RUGS. I desperately need rugs in my house. And chair cushions. Perfect. I need four chair cushions for my dining room. My new thing was going to be making a braided rug out of my fabric stash, but I wasn't looking forward to cutting and folding and stitching all those strips, etc. Though I do want to do that someday. But this rug punch is SO EASY. The lady showed me how to do it. And it's so fast. And you can use up your yarn stash = good. I can't wait. Can't wait can't wait. The only thing is, to make a rug, I think you have to have a big frame to hold it while you're working? Not sure if you can use a big but hand-held hoop and move it around. Anyone know?

Okay, next. Folkwear. Do you know about Folkwear? I don't even know where to start talking about Folkwear. The coolest pattern company ever. They've carried these patterns at Fabric Depot for a long time and I have looked at them a million times but never bought one (just got the Roumanian Blouse), mostly because I can never decide which one to get because they are all so beautiful. Yesterday at the show there was an entire wall of them, offered by Birch Street Clothing.

I have never seen the actual pattern packages and illustrations (by artist and jewelry designer Gretchen Schields, which are utterly amazing — I could just look at the illustrations for everything all day, actually) so big and up close like that. They're gorgeous. And the clothes are so unique and fantastic. I'm thinking either the Roumanian Blouse, the Afghan Nomad Dress, the Russian Settlers' Dress, or, naturally, the English Smock.

See, I can't decide. But something. I will order something because I love them and had kind of forgotten about them. And they have a TON of different styles, you just have to look.

What else. Okay, another pattern. The Birdie Big Blocks quilt pattern by Barbara Brandeburg. A 56" square easy applique quilt. They had a turquoise, brown, and melon-orange one made up and it was absolutely adorable. I am going to make this out of my stash, as well. This looks like a perfect stash quilt. I've never made a little quilt like this, or done anything fancier than tie a quilt. This had cool stitching all over it. I think it would be cute to just do simple running stitches by hand around the circles, too. But anyway, sweet. Mom got this one, too.

Next: pincushion. I love pincushions. I need one in every room of the house, hopefully to assuage my tendencies to leave needles in pillows in the bed. One of my special talents. But cute pincushions really do call to me. I thought this one, the English Garden Pin Cushion by Bird Brain Designs, was really cute. I got the kit for this. You can do the flowers however you want. They had beautiful dyed wools, too. The lady was making the most incredible needle-felted animals. I am a little bit afraid of that needle. But I think this pin cushion has just enough needle-felted (the centers of the flowers, and you can make stems and stuff, too) parts for me. This I'll do right away, and keep it on my nightstand.

Look at these incredible miniature cross-stitch historical gardens by Liz Turner Diehl. I got the Ruby Jeweled Garden pattern. I couldn't resist. So cool. I'm thinking of doing my own, of whatever garden we put together this year in our planned raised beds. Aren't those neat? You have to click on the links because the photos are really small.

Anyway, I think that's it. I am really excited about the rug punch. I just had to say that again. I gotta go so I can finish my book and start this, stat. Bye.

A is for Another

As I've hinted, behind the colds, curries, and coconut custards, I am working on another book! This one is a collection of thirty embroidery projects that incorporate cross-stitch, crewel, and regular floss embroidery. It will be published, again by Potter Craft, in the spring or summer of 2010.

I have never worked as happily on anything as I am on this book. Everything — manuscript,illustrations, charts, and photos — is due on my editor's desk on April 15th. I started developing the projects earlier this fall, and every day of creating them has been so satisfying and enjoyable. I honestly think I will be sad to be finished with this one, which (for lots of reasons) I couldn't have said about Stitched in Time. For one thing, I have had a lot more time to work on this new book (as of yet untitled), compared with the wild-eyed and desperate dash-to-the-finish-line that was Stitched in Time, and that has made so much difference.

Last spring, soon after Stitched in Time was totally out of my hands and off to the printer, I started thinking about what I wanted to work on next. An article I'd written for Hallmark magazine had come out just a couple of months before; in it I told the story of my accident and talked about how important embroidery was to my recovery during that bewildering, terrible time. I hadn't really thought about embroidery, let alone done any really big embroidery projects, in a long time, but writing about it reminded me of how intensely connected I feel to this amazing medium. After the article came out, I received so many letters and emails from people who told me of their equally therapuetic experiences doing embroidery, and other kinds of detail-oriented, contemplative handwork. The letters really moved me. When my editor called and asked me what I was thinking about, I knew exactly what I wanted to do.

This book is a collection of my dream projects, really. I've interpreted so many of the things I love here — intricate cross-stitch motifs, vintage monograms, tolework borders, folky hearts and flowers, naturalistic botanicals, delicate alphabets. Some of the designs are old, treated in new ways. Some of the designs are new, incorporating traditional techniques and stitches. All of them, first and foremost,are things I just love. I'm so grateful to be able to contribute something to this medium that has given me so much.

I can't wait for you to see it!!! Now it's taking too long! :-)

Red-and-White Holiday

I started holiday baking over the weekend. This year I am going to make fudge for my friends and neighbors. We have a pretty close-knit group of neighbors, about seven families, and we all exchange little gifts every year. My mom has a great recipe for fudge that I am going to use — I will post that, and photos, when I do it, probably sometime this week. It's so nice and easy, and really, who doesn't like lovely, smooth, chocolately fudge? Even I do, and I am not a huge chocolate fan. But fudge I love.

These little berry-buttons, above, are my mom's raspberry thumbprint cookies, making their national debut in this month's Hallmark magazine (and that link will take you to the recipe). They are a standard part of my mom's awesome Christmas-cookie plate. She makes plates for all of us kids and her local friends, and even ships lots of cookies to peeps back home. Though we drizzle these thumbprints with icing, the editors didn't like the way the iced cookies were photographing, but unless your cookies are going to be in a magazine, I would highly suggest adding the frosty drizzle. Deliciousness! And so perfectly red and white.

In other red-and-white news, I have an embroidery project out right now in the current issue of Holiday Decorating Ideas by CraftStylish. This is a version of a traditional Hungarian folk-art design and I think it is so simple and sweet. Done entirely in three strands of dark red embroidery floss, this design can be completed with only two stitches — backstitch, and lazy daisy (both are explained in the article). If you are a beginning embroiderer, I highly recommend starting with a project like this! It is so, so much fun, and will give you lots of confidence to tackle more complicated color-and-stitch combinations. You can find the magazine at most craft and fabric stores, or just click on the link above. It will include the template and an illustrated tutorial for this project, along with many other wonderful wintry things to make.

Like the crocheted pillowcase edging here, which was created by my amazing friend Linda Permann! Look at some of these other recent sewing and crochet projects she has out there in magazines right now, too. That cupcake teapot cozy? Genius! And the darling gingerbread mobile is by the incredibly talented Kayte Terry, whose book, Complete Embellishing, will give you countless ideas and very thorough technique tutorials for embellishing all sorts of clothes and accessories — Kayte is a former visual manager for Anthropologie, and her aesthetic is so lovely and sophisticated in that perfectly rustic way I love. Isn't this cardigan from the book just gorgeous? I love the woolly ruffle. Yummy.

Isn't it a great time to be a crafter? There is so much out there for us to make. I LOVE IT.

Now. The auction! I am loving this auction stuff!!! Thank you so much to everyone who bid yesterday — you are awesome! But I want to update you on some stuff and answer some questions that came in yesterday.

Firstly, in order to go to the eBay auctions for each doll, just click on her name in yesterday's post. All of them together are here. :-)

Secondly, about international shipping for the auction: So, I wasn't going to do this, because I was worried about the time crunch before Christmas, and not being able to get to the P.O. to ship overseas, but I got a lot of email about it yesterday so I'm reversing this decision. Although I ship all of my domestic packages on-line (where you print out the labels from the computer and the postperson comes directly to the house to pick the package up), I never ship international on-line because, although it is much more convenient, it is more expensive than taking it directly to the P.O. I ship enough overseas packages every week that this just doesn't make sense for me, so I take them all in myself. BUT, if you are overseas, and you would like to bid on the dolls, and either pay a higher shipping fee to get it quickly or wait until our weather makes it safe to drive, that is totally cool with me! Please bid! Thank you!!!

And thirdly, I was talking to my friend Shelly on the phone last night and she said that she didn't realize, from looking at the photos of the dolls, that they all have braided hair twisted up on top of their heads. So I thought I would mention that the hair on all of them is the same, but you just can't really tell that from the photos of the brunettes, because their hair is so dark. But they all actually have the same twisty-braid hairdos as Ingrid and Devon. Don't you wish you could do your hair like that? You CAN??? You lucky!!!!!

Ice-Skating Afternoon Felt Ornament-Making Kits Now On Sale!

Good morning! Please allow me to officially introduce the Ice-Skating Afternoon Craft Kit, my limited-edition kit to help you create these three hand-stitched, hand-embroidered felt ornaments, now on sale in my web shop!

Included are the Ice Skate, with a pom-pon for good measure:

The Hot Cocoa Cup, to warm you up:

And the Gingerbread Girl, the sweetest of all:

Each Ice-Skating Afternoon Ornament Craft Kit includes:

9 pieces of wool/rayon blend felt in assorted colors
12 skeins coordinating DMC cotton embroidery floss
3/4 yd rick-rack (for hangers)
2 yd wool yarn (for pom-pon)
Stitching instructions
Pattern templates
Illustrated embroidery tutorial

You will need to have your own:

Wool batting or Polyester Fiber-fill
Sharp embroidery needle
Dressmaker's chalk pencil or fabric marker
Dressmaker's chalk carbon paper
Iron-on transfer pencil
Sharp fabric scissors, paper scissors, and scallop scissors
1/16" diameter hole punch (for apron)
Small pom-pon maker, or small pieces of cardboard

My sincere goal is to be able to offer as many kits as I can possibly make and still get them to you by the end of October. Please order now to insure that you will receive one! If you're just arriving here, please see this post and this one for more general information about these ornaments.

A couple of things to keep in mind:

• As noted, we are in the process of putting these kits together, and they will be shipped to you sometime in October, depending on how quickly we can get everything together.
• More information about how things work in the web shop, including answers to shipping and payment questions, can be found on my FAQ page.
• A downloadable PDF pattern will be available soon for those of you who already have all the supplies you need. Please stay tuned for that — I'm working on it now!

Thank you!!!