Slow Sunday Stitching: Handwork in March

I can honestly say that the back bone of my crafty work in March has been handwork!  I've had two projects keeping me busy on that front and am pleased to say I made a lot of progress on both.  So I figured the end of the month was a good time to join everyone at Kathy's Quilts to show a little of my "Slow Sunday Stitching".

Cross Stitch

Back in January I decided to make another "Year Of The...." piece that celebrates the new spirit animal for the Chinese New Year.  I had started making these in 2023 after seeing that Pat Sloan was going to make one.  Each year I made them using the patterns designed by The Frosted Pumpkin ladies.  

Admittedly, I embarked on this year's piece to warm up to returning to another cross stitch project that I had stalled on back in November.  

Ironically the one I made for this year was also inspired by seeing one that Pat was going to do.   This time she had found a free pattern that Maja of The Snowflower Diaries had offered on her Patreon account.  I welcomed the opportunity to make another New Year celebration stitch but in a different style.  

Fortunately I had fabric suitable for the piece already in stash.  I also had most of the floss colors required for this one already on floss drops in other projects that are in progress.  So I borrowed those temporarily, pulled out one color from my floss stash and then only had to purchase one addtional color to finish kitting this up.  I started it towards the end of January.....

...and finished it up at the end of February.  I stitched on it before, during and on the drive home from our two week visit (and mini quilt retreat) with my MIL that month.  I also picked two fabrics (one for the front and one for the back) for the "fully finishing" step:

However,  once I was ready to finish it up this month,  I decided to only use one of them for both sides and to frame the center using reverse applique.  When I went to actually stitch it, I decided that it needed "a little something more" so decided to add beads around the frame.  

I took those from this old jewelry making kit I had on hand because I felt the beads would be easy to replace if need be.  

I long ago stopped getting kits from this monthly club as I never did as much jewelry making as I thought I would.  Considering how long I've had this kit,  I'm doubtful replacing them may ever actually happen, LOL!  But as with hand work,  I've learned to never say never!!

As with the others,  I did a pillow finish on this one.   Now I can call this one done and display it as we continue to watch the passage of this year!  

English Paper Piecing (EPP)

The other project I focused on was stitching down some "Hexie Snowflake" blocks to their backgrounds.  I had started this project back in 2021 as part of the "Blue & White" Christmas quilt decorating scheme I had decided to do that year.  

My plan was to do a four block version of Edyta Sitar's "Snowflake" EPP design.  It was also part of my continuing obsession with her Laundry Basket Quilts designs that started during the pandemic.

It took me until the start of 2022 to finish stitching all the hexies in each Snowflake together.  Since then they have sat waiting to be stitched down to their backgrounds.   I decided I wanted to finish this one up both as part of the "decluttering challenge" I did at the start of this year and because I realized this project now also worked for "Blue & White Winter/early Spring" quilt decorating.   

I was very surprised by how well it went as I thought all of that "stitching around the hexie edges" would be a real bear but it wasn't.  Turned out to be great for doing while watching TV!  So three are now completely done.

The papers have been removed from the fourth one:

And stitching is underway on it:

As I noted in a previous post two helpful tools for each of those processes was my "Sixth Finger Stilletto" for removing the papers and the "Under Thimble" for the stitching work.  Both are available from Colonial Needle.

Not to mention I think I've finally completely overcome the aversion I had to hand work that I had when I first started quilting 20+ years ago.  Now I heartily welcome opportunities to do some!

If you feel the same then you will love seeing all the projects being done by everyone that gathers at Kathy's Quilts each week when they share what's on their lap during their "Slow Sunday Stitching" sessions! 

Slow Sunday Stitching: September & October Cross Stitch Recap and November Planning

 As I've noted on my quilting-related posts this past week, it's been a while since I've reported on what I worked on over the last two months.  So I'm joining in at Kathy's Quilts for some "Slow Sunday Stitching" talk!

When I posted about cross-stitch back in early September, I was working on two projects.  The first was my "New York Skyline" piece by XstitchbyTA which I had started during this year's May-nia season:

Maynia Start

By the start of September, I had two pages of the pattern finished:

The plan was to have had the next page done by the end of that month, however Page 3 wasn't finished up until yesterday: 

There are now only two more pages of the pattern left to go.  My hope was to have finished through Page 4 by the end of October but now I am going to try to have this be a "monogamous stitch" for the rest of this month so I can meet my original goal of having it completely finished by the end of November.  I already have a frame for it and would like to be able to "fully finish" it and have it hung up by year's end.  

The other project I had just started in early September was this year's Fat Quarter Shop "Christmas In July SAL" project:  "Up On the Rooftop":

My September Start

Steady progress by the end of September

Technically finished by the end October!

I had finished stitching the sleigh and the border on Halloween.  However, during that process I realized that the two little white motifs above it on the right had been positioned incorrectly!  So last Monday my first task for November was ripping and re-stitching them.  So now it really is finished!

My plans for this is that I want to create a display for the holidays using this, last year's FQS CIJ piece "Letters To Santa" (which I finished stitching during this year's CIJ) and a "Patchwork Bow" that I made for the CIJ blog hop that Melva Loves Scraps hosted.

I have some ideas about how I want to do it so hope to flesh out those plans for "fully finishing" the two CIJ cross stitch pieces this month.     

That brings everything stitching-wise up to date.  Now I can go over to Kathy's Quilts and see what everyone else has in their lap for "Slow Sunday Stitching" as the cooler days of late Fall are now upon us!  

Slow Sunday Stitching: A May-nia Project Fully Finished!

Good morning on a sunny Sunday for a quick "Slow Sunday Stitching" check-in with the good crafty folks over at Kathy's Quilts!

Last night I finally "fully finished" my "Craft Supplies and Other Lies" piece!

I had started stitching this for "May-nia", continued it during "Red, White and June" and completed the tail end of it along with resuming work on another piece for "Christmas In July".   After that I found a frame that I liked and decided to go the route of mounting it on it rather than putting it in it.  

I debated a long time about how exactly to go about that.  In the end, I mounted the piece on some foamcore and batting and laced it in place.  It needed a little something around the edge so I made some cording from the flosses it is stitched with using the Clover tool purchased awhile back.  

Then I nailed it to the wooden patterned surround in the frame using brads.  The hope was that the nail heads would disappear between the fabric threads which went fine for all but one corner that took some tugging to cover.  I  know it's a little skewed on the surround but I think I can live with that --- well, I'll see if I still feel that way after a few days (or weeks) of looking at it displayed, LOL.   

So with that done, I am now ready to get back to some stitching!  I haven't stitched on anything since finishing the "CIJ" piece.  Now to fill my evenings,  I am going back to another "May-nia" start:  New York Skyline by XstitchByTA.

This is how far I've gotten on the next page of the pattern (it is a total of five pages).  I expect this to fill my days through the Fall and probably right through the start of the actual Christmas season --- not the shopping season which will probably begin in earnest in the next week or so, LOL!!

To see what other crafters have filled their stitchy days with (or to add yours!), head over to Kathy's Quilts for this week week's "Slow Sunday Stitching" link up to see what others are whipping up in their craft spaces! 

Slow Sunday Stitching: The End of "Christmas In July"

With July drawing to a close,  I managed to finish the "Christmas in July" cross stitching for this month just in time.  So I am joining in over at Kathy's Quilts for a little "Slow Sunday Stitching" show and tell!

First off a stitching finish:  the Fat Quarter Shop's "Letters To Santa" pattern is done!

Stitching on Aida and then being able to go back to "mongamous stitching" this past week helped get this done.  At this point, I don't know how I want to "fully finish" it.  I might take cues from how FQS did theirs:

I'm particularly eyeing the bow on it since I just did a project for a blog hop and made a Patchwork Bow using Liza Taylor's tutorial:

Although it is patterned using 2-1/2" cut squares, she says you could use any size squares.  So I could see using one or half inch finished squares to make another bow to use for finishing the cross stitch piece.  Once I decide where and how I want to display it for the holidays,  I can make more decisions about the "fully finishing" of it.

And speaking of "fully finishes":  My little "Christmas Log Carrier" ornament is now done!

I was supposed to stitch this as part of "CIJ" last year but didn't get to start it until the end of August.  During a few spaced out stitching sessions (probably between other projects), I finished it in October.

The pattern finishing just called for putting some seam sealant on the edges and turning under the handle loops and glueing them in place.  However I wanted to finish it just a little more so first cut some fusible interfacing to secure the back of the stitching:

Next I cut some coordinating holiday fabric so I could line it.  I really liked this fabric but it was directional so I seamed two pieces together so that I could make a lining piece where the print would run vertically on both sides.  

I stitched them together along what had been the cutting lines, leaving the handle ends open and an opening on one side so I could turn all the edges in and so no sealant was needed!  I edge stitched the opening closed and all around the edge and stitched the "handles" down to form loops.  

Last step was to find some wooden dowels for the handles.  I didn't have a dowel the size I needed on hand but did have something that worked perfectly in its place:

It pays to hold on to some of these chopsticks after all!  I cut a chopstick down into two pieces the size I needed.  Then it was finding some ribbon in my stash and Cinnamon sticks from the pantry and this little ornament is now done!

I look forward to seeing what everyone has for this last "Slow Sunday Stitching" for July over at Kathy's Quilts!   

Slow Sunday Stitching: "Christmas In July" Stitching Has Started!

I'm checking in for the first time this month over at Kathy's Quilts for "Slow Sunday Stitching"!

In my report for the end of June,  I talked about unfinished projects for that month and the plan to start on projects for "Christmas In July".  Since July 1st was on a Tuesday,  my hope was to use the last Sunday and Monday of June to finish up the stitching of at least two of those projects.  Good news, one of them -- Primrose Cottage's "Home of the Brave" -- did get done!

No plans as yet as to when I will "fully finish" this one.

Then we had a camping trip over the 4th of July weekend to Letchworth State Park here in New York which was great!  It is known as the "Grand Canyon of the East" for the large gorge that was cut through the area over time by the Genesee River that bisects the park.  

These are the "Middle Falls" and there are an Upper and Lower set as well.

A view of another part of the gorge from one of the outlooks.

On the trip we learned something new to us:  the Genesee actually flows north from Pennsylvania to Rochester in Northern New York State to empty out into Lake Ontario.  That makes it one of the 48 rivers in 16 different states that do that.  This happens because rivers flow downhill so they will flow towards the lowest elevation which can sometimes be north of the river's source or headwaters.  

The Appalachian Mountain range (the "Rocky Mountains of the East") extends from Alabama up to Canada and this part of New York State lies west of the range so the land in the Genesee Valley area slopes from there.  

Image courtesy of the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers Mount Morris Dam exhibit

On the trip I took my "camping project":  Emma Congdon's Stitchrovia "Open Your Heart To New Adventures".  I have been working on this one since 2023 and on our last trip for Memorial Day I had stitched half of a page of it (the fourth one I've worked on of this six page pattern) so had hoped to finish that page on this trip.

I did get the page done but only got to work on about half of that remaining half page during one campfire session and the drives up and back during the portions when I wasn't driving.  I finished the rest of the page once we were back home.

Now this project will be put away again until our next trip in late September.  My hope is to complete whatever is still unfinished after that during our annual Fall trip in October to visit my husband's mother in North Carolina.

With all that aside,  I was then ready to start back in on my "Christmas In July" stitching:  the Fat Quarter Shop's "Letters to Stanta"!  

I had expected to be "monogamous stitching" on it this month.  However,  I only had some filler stitching left to do to complete another June project.  So instead,  I worked on both in the hope of completing them both by the end of the month.  So there's more good news now because the "Craft Supplies Lies" project from June is also now done!

Although I have to say,  doing the filler stitching in that bottom box wasn't easy!  In a recent "Two Tall Stitchers" flosstube,  Carol and Jen's closing "Viewers Poll" question was:  "Do you love or hate stitching big blocks of the same color?".  In the past I would have said that while it can be a little boring, it is a necessary evil.  

However, for some reason (probably the "Are We There Yet?!? of it all),  this took so much longer and was harder to do than anticipated!  Not to mention, I kept getting off count on the Linen threads as I filled in the black stitches around the letters.  It got to a point where I only felt up to stitching on it for no more than 30 minutes at a time and often wanted to stop at fifteen!  It wasn't until I was down to the last word that it finally clicked in and I was able to get through it less painfully than the way it started!!  Now I'm glad that's over and I can go shop for a frame to finish this in.

As for the holiday project, after the last two months of stitching on Evenweave and Linen, the return to working primarily on Aida -- even if it is on a dark Charcoal fabric which usually has its own challenges -- is a pleasant and faster-to-stitch reprieve!  So as of today,  I've finished another page of it and now only have one more left to do:

So that's it for me this week!  My quilting plans for "Christmas In July" have taken a bit of a back seat to cross stitch as the hubby has been home on vacation this past week and will be so this week as well.  With only a little less than two more weeks of the month to go,  I hope I can squeeze in some time for that either in between or once this last bit of cross stitch is completed!    

Now to go check in on what goodies others are working on this week at Kathy's Quilts for "Slow Sunday Stitching"!

Slow Sunday Stitching: The Last Week of Red, White & June

 As I say good-bye to "Red, White & June",  I'll check in one last time this month over at Kathy's Quilts for "Slow Sunday Stitching"!

Some Are Almost Finished

After a focus on them this past week, I'm thisclose to finishing the stitching on "Home of the Brave" and "Craft Supplies and Other Lies I Tell Myself".

I will admit that stitching on these two have been the most fun of all the stitching I've done over the last two months.  In each case, it was seeing the design revealed as I went along combined with the ease of stitching them out.  I also had less issues stitching on the fabrics as well as following the patterns for these than I did with the other two projects I worked on.  Well, with the exception of the error in positioning I did when starting "Craft Lies"!  Yeah, I still have some ripping to do from that, LOL!

I will continue to focus on these to get them done even as I've already pulled the project bag out for one of the projects I'll be resuming for "Christmas in July "!  I had hoped to have had them finished because plans for "fullfully finishing" them are already in place.  "Craft Lies" is to be framed so I'll be shopping for that as soon as it's done.  For "Home" the plan is a pillow finish and I will probably just follow how the designers at Primrose Cottage did it.  It's noted in the pattern that they used prints from Minick & Simpson's "Belle Isle" line and I actually have some of that so will consult my stash to see if I can do the same.

United We Stand is Still Not "Fully Finished"

Last time, I had talked about having a scrap of piping that I could use for the edging I want to put on this project.  Well, it still hasn't turned up so now I'll definitely have to make more.  

I will try to do so over the next two months since for me the "patriotic period" is from Memorial Day to Labor Day so Red, White and Blue quilts and cross stitch will remain up in my spaces!  I'd also really still like to see if I can then do the same edge technique on a pillow I also still need to finish so I'll see what happens with all of that going forward.

Stitching Still In (Long-term) Progress

This means I also end the month with "Right To Vote" and "NY Skyline" still in progress:

The threads I needed for "NY Skyline" arrived!

I may or may not continue stitching on these over the next month.  As I said eariler,  for July I plan to work on projects for "Christmas In July".  For that I already have two cross stitch projects that need to be completed:  one to be "fully finished" and one that the stitching needs to be completed.  If anything, "NY Skyline" will probably stay in the current stitching rotation since it's the easier of the two to stitch and is the one I want finished so I can use it in a prominent display spot that's open.  

It's been another fun "Red, White & June" season to focus on patriotic (and other) stitching!  Now head over to Kathy's Quilts to see what others have been "Slow Sunday Stitching" to finish up the month!

Slow Sunday Stitching: Two Weeks of Red, White & June Stitching

Things have been progressing nicely as this month's "Red, White & June" stitching has continued.  So  I am linking up again at Kathy's Quilts along with the rest of the "Slow Sunday Stitching" cohort.

Stitching Has Gone Well Since My Last Report

So much so that cross stitching has been about all I've been doing on the crafting front.  Of course that has not been good for my quilt projects, LOL!  The very slow, fumbly start I had made resuming two projects started back in 2023 for "Red, White & June" has eased a bit and over the past two weeks,  I finally got into the groove of working on them.  So "Home of the Brave" (a Primrose Cottage design) stitched on an Evenweave fabric has progressed as shown:

After this, I repositioned the hoop so I can continue by filling in the stars and words to be stitched next to "Home".  After that all I need to do is fill in the bottom with one more word and a big house and then the stitching on this will be finished! 

For my Linen stitching project "Right To Vote",  I managed to almost finish the word "Votes",  add one more of the backstitched words and started on the word "for" in yellow.

I should be able to finish that word and then will need to move the hoop to stitch the "S" for "Votes" and the other backstitched words on the first line.  

I had talked before about how hard it is to stitch on this soft Linen as I am more used to stitching on stiffer Evenweaves and Aida.  Next time I use a Linen, if it is as soft as this one, I will starch it first to make it easier for me to work with.  

May-nia Projects Also Continue

I also continued with my two May-nia projects which helps explain why I've been cross stitch obsessed!  Those two have bounded ahead and "Craft Supplies Lies" is now here:

I had to "frog" some of the false start I made originally so I could put in the last motif on the bottom right.  All that's left after that is the line of yellow text that will be surrounded by a big black box underneath all the previous stitching.  The line of stitches under the center are the start of the top of the box.  Fingers crossed that the sitching on this too could actually be finished by the end of the month!  

My "New York Skyline" project has also hit a milestone: 

I've completed one page of this five page pattern, woo hoo!!  That said, this means this one will take a few more months complete.  

I also just realized that I don't have enough floss for this!  For some reason I had only stocked two skeins and now I can't find the second one and I see that it took almost a whole skein for this one page (I am using Classic Colorworks "Black Coffee").   So needless to say,  an order for more floss has also been put in.  

Well at least, all of this focus on stitching has been encouraging as well as enjoyable!  What didn't go as well as planned on the cross stitch front was a finish!  

"United We Stand" Finish Stalled!  

My plans had also been to "fully finish" my little "United We Stand" piece into a pillow.  

To do so, I was going to finally get a chance to do this edge finish I've wanted to try for forever.

I had noted it at the end of this quilt post I did back in 2021 on "Special Edge Finishes".

The pattern by Primrose Cottage had not included finishing instructions for their pictured pillow finish.  So as best as I could tell, their piece had about a 3/8 to 1/2 inch of open space around the stitching.  The instructions for the "Piped Scallop" edge finish called for 1/2" seam allowance so I trimmed my piece to one inch beyond the stitching figuring I could take off the extra 1/8" if I thought the larger allowance didn't work. 

The edge finish also requires having rounded not square corners.  Ironically the pillow pictured on the pattern seemed to have that too which I would bet would also make adding the pom-pom trim they used easier too.  Not a problem, I've added curned edges before.  My usual tool for this is my Creative Grids "Curved Corner Cutter Ruler".  But the smallest curve there is 1-1/2" inchces and I felt that was too big.  I tried the bottom of a two different sized thread spools -- nope still too big.  The perfect size to my eye was a bobbin!

The edging also calls for making piping.  Now despite the fact that I have read (and added in blog posts!) the name of this finish a bazillion times (okay, maybe a bit of an exaggeration) until now, I had been focused on the scalloped edge and had completely overlooked the "piped" part, LOL!  So reading the instructions in full for the first time, I was only now realizing that this called for piping.  However, I totally lucked up on this front.  

I actually have a tool for making piping purchased all the way back in 2008.  Back then I had belonged to the Empire Quilters Guild here in NYC and the tool and quilt designer Susan Cleveland had done a presentation at one of the meetings.  As a result, I had been impressed enough with the quilts she brought for her trunk show that I purchased this tool.  I will admit though that I've only used it once:  back in 2010 when I made this doll quilt for an Aunt of mine:

I had applied blue piping around the edge of that quilt instead of a traditional binding because I wanted the blue fabric for the binding edge but felt a traditional binding would be too strong on it.  The blue piping was just enough.  Ironically, when I pulled out the piping tool package, inside of it was a remnant of that same piping!  The fabric I had used had faded quite a bit but fortunately for me it was still blue enough and the piece long enough to be perfect for use in this project.  That meant I didn't even have to make more piping!

Unfortunately, at one point I did try to work on some quilt projects and that further filled my already cluttered cutting table (which I was supposed to clean off in prep of layering a quilt).  When I finally tried to go back to working on the cross stitch finish, I couldn't find my scrap of piping!  I can't figure out where it has gotten to.  I expect I might have picked it up along with some other fabric I was working with.  I've turned over a lot of piles and looked through things that had visited the table but still can't locate it.  Sigh!  

I'm really hoping it turns up but if not,  fortunately I have more of the cording that came with the tool so I can make more piping.  It also tells me that I have too much going on right now so need to focus more on just a few things!

To check out what everyone has been doing with their slow stitching projects, head back over to Kathy's Quilts to see what others have reported for this week's "Slow Sunday Stitching" share session!