A HOT July Recap!

Another busy month not as focused as planned.  It was sooo brutally hot this month that it was often hard to feel motivated to work on things!  At the same time, staying in under the air conditioning was also good for when I was able to try to put in some time on some projects.  So here are all the scatter shot doings from the soon to be past month:

UFOs

At the beginning of the month, the hope was to use the inspiration of "UFO Day" to do some work on UFOs.  The grand plans to work on multiple ones devolved into just catching up on two.  The good news was that one of them was a finish!

Back in October, I had done the "All Carolinas Shop Hop" with my MIL for the second year in a row while we visited her in North Carolina.  The Hop issues a magazine that has projects in it utilizing fabrics designed for the Hop.  One of the patterns in last year's magazine was the By Annie "Piecekeeper" bag which is also offered as a free pattern on the By Annie website.  

Prior to us traveling to NC,  I had purchased the magazine along with some of the HOP fabrics.  I didn't want to take a chance that they might be sold out by the time we would be shopping towards the end of the Shop Hop period. 

During the Hop, I was lucky enough to find one of the prior year tone-on-tone prints that coordinated well with the current year Hop prints I had chosen to use.  In the course of making our shop rounds, I also picked up all the additional finishing supplies to make the bag up.  I had started on the cutting and made some applique additions to the focus print while at my MIL's but once we got back home, I went into "holiday projects mode" so never got around to finishing the bag up. 

Fortunately for me, Annie Unrein announced a sew along in July to make the "Piecekeeper" bag and I took that as a sign that the Quilt Muses wanted me to "get 'er done" and so I did!

Front and back of the bag

Mine finished a little different than patterned as I used a portion of a border print from the Hop fabric line for the bottom part of the front of the bag.  The section of the print I used is taller in height than the strip of fabric called for in the pattern.  Annie talked about making adjustments to the design at the end of the sew along video but unfortunately, I didn't see that until after I had already cut all the parts for the bag per the pattern instructions!   I'm happy with it though and am now debating between two zipper charms to add to it.  

When I had received the Shop Hop fabrics, I also picked out two of the prints to use to finally try making the "A Tisket, A Tasket: 2 Fat Quarter Basket" pattern by Me And My Sister Designs.  Since I finished the Piecekeeper bag, I decided to get that done too!  

This was actually pretty quick and fun to make up! 

While I'm happy to get these done, I still have another of these Shop Hop themed bags still to finish.

In other UFO news, I finally put my Roll, Roll, Cotton Boll blocks up on the design wall.

The wall is now full and on the corner of the sewing table is the additional row of the blocks bordered with the red and white HSTs and the bottom row of string pieced setting triangles that also have to be added to the layout.  I thought I'd get the whole top assembled this month but rather than starting to sew the blocks together, I wanted to work on the pieced outer borders so I could lay them out as well.

The borders are made up of the pink and green pieced strip set units that were made in the first part of the mystery and now need brown triangles attached to their ends.  As you can see from the pieced strips on the left, there is still a whole lot more that need triangles attached!  After that I have to sew the strips together to make up the outer borders.  

Okay, looks like this WISP* is going to continue to cook for a lot longer!  The good news was I had already had the quilting of RRCB on my "To Do" list for August so I will stick with advancing toward that plan by continuing to work on the top construction next month (aka starting tomorrow).

*WISP = Work In Slow Progress

Edited To Add:  You can see the finished quilt here.

Continuing the Cross Stitch Journey

The hot weather and A/C combo made me far more interested in working on Cross Stitch --- well that and frequent doses of Flosstubes, LOL!  I did make some progress on the two projects that were in progress at the end of June:  

"Home of the Free" started for "Stitch June"

One page done on "Open Your Heart" and starting on the next one.

Working on the Evenweave fabric for the little patriotic stitch is still very slow going.  It's easier to stitch when I have to do "fill in" work and harder when establishing a new line of stitching.  "Open Your Heart" is relatively easy to stitch overall but counting correctly for the color changes does keep me on my toes.  As a result, the Frog Prince has visited a few times (rip it, rip it)!

The founders of my community garden are a very artsy bunch and are always looking for classes we can offer for free to our members and the general public.  This year they got a grant to do art/craft classes and I was asked if I had anything I might want to do.  Previously I had led a class on EPP that went well despite my limited knowledge of EPP at the time.  

In thinking of a class to do, I am always constrained by the need to offer something that can be completely made by hand.  Then I saw this free pattern and loved the idea of being able to offer something in the cross stitch vein that was related to something we actually grow in our garden:

I will be using an easier Aida base fabric than patterned.

At this point I'm still working on my samples and sourcing supplies to make up kits for it.  I'm hoping to offer this in August although I'm a little crunched for time at this point.  Thankfully we could hold this in our gazebo which would provide a cool shady spot to stitch should the weather continue as it has.

So that's it for July!  As usual, I'll be hoping for a little more focus (and a lot less heat) for August!

World UFO Day

Before I get to outlining the rest of my plans for this month, I have to acknowledge what today is:

For the rest of the world, this is a day to indulge in your inner "Fox Mulder" from the X-Files.  According to Wikipedia, the reason it falls on today is July 2 is the date of the supposed UFO crash in Roswell in 1947.    

However, as a quilter, you KNOW what that really means to me:

It's time to make some plans for working on some of the quilty UFOs sitting around my work space!  

I haven't done much with the projects on my UFO list this year for the numbers picked by American Patchwork & Quilting magazine for their monthly UFO Challenge.  So for me, today is a day to make some plans to try to correct that this month!  

It would be nice to get some of these moving and maybe even get some finished and out into the universe by year's end!  

June Recap: More Events Than Stitching!!

Well, the second half of June was far busier than expected!  Starting with the Canadian Wildfires bringing smoke to New York State:

This was not only spooky and caused potential health hazards but it meant the cancellation of the last two weeks of my volunteering in our community garden with students from the Garden Club of a local charter school.  This actually worked out well as it meant it gave us more time to review our activity plans and pack for our upcoming trip.

And There Was Some Travel....

Next up, we got to run away from the smoke conditions (despite traveling towards Canada!!) for our planned vacation camping trip back to Acadia National Park in Maine!  We got to do all of things that we didn't get to last year like hike the Bubble Mountains:

This is the view of the North and South Bubble Mountains from the entrance to Jordan Pond.

The elevation at the top of the South Bubble.

The view of the pond from the summit!

After which we made our now obligatory stop at the Jordon Pond House for popovers and lunch!  

We spent another day in Bar harbor where we also got to finally walk the Bar Island Sand Bar and hike that island.

When the tide is high, Bar Island is a boat ride away...

However, when the tide is low, it is a simple walk to the island!

The view of the "path" from the Bar Island side.

Another day we visited the "quiet side" of the island and one of the things we did there was check out the Seal Cove Auto Museum.  For those that know about Acadia and its famous Cadillac Mountain, did you know it had a connection to the Cadillac car brand?!?  I didn't!!

Click the picture to read the history of the connection between the two.

This information is from when we visited Cadillac Mountain last year.

By the way, if you're like me and thought that electric cars are a new invention, think again!

As members of a community garden, we also looked forward to visiting two gardens in the area: Outside of the park, we checked out the Asticou Azalea Garden (and unfortunately at the time of our trip, the Thuya Garden wasn't open yet for the season).   Inside of the park, we visited the Wildflower Garden and hiked the Jessup Path at the Sieur Du Mont Nature Center.  Needless to say, over all it was a really great trip and there is still more we'd like to see if we ever get back to this park! 

Now Back to the Stitching! 

All of that meant that a whole lot less quilting and cross stitch than planned got done!  For starters, June was supposed to be about "Stitch June", the patriotic themed stitching prompt from the Fat Quarter Shop.  As noted in my June Plans post , I had picked out three patriotic themed projects to work on.  I also wanted to finally start my first "full coverage" piece called "Open Your Heart" during our trip.  The stitching plan for June had been to stitch the patriotic pieces on a three day rotation over the course of the month and work on "Heart" during the week we would be away.

What actually happened was that I started with "United We Stand", a small pin keep designed by Primrose Cottage Stitches.  I thought this would be the easiest of the projects to do considering that all three were delving into stitching on tighter weave fabrics than what I have used to date.  

I stitched "United" on 18 count Vintage Country Mocha Aida, a fabric coloring I've heard referred to on many a Floss Tube video.  Well this presented the first problem in that after getting the first two lines of stitching done, I realized that I had stitched on the "wrong side" of the fabric.  

The wrong side is on the left, the "right side" is on the right.

Vintage Country Mocha is a mottled fabric but it turns out the mottling is only "printed" on one side!  Since I wanted the mottled look in the piece, I had to rip the stitching I had done and re-do it on the "right" side of the fabric!

Up to now, I had mostly stitched on 14 count Aida and one project stitched on 10 count.  I had previously started a project on 18 Count but that used silk floss so didn't stitch any different than when I used cotton floss on 14 count.  The 18 count fabrics are a much tighter weave than 14 count, meaning it has much smaller holes.  Using cotton floss, I found it really hard to get into and keep track of the holes when using the two strands of thread and size 26 needle (stitched over one) that I have traditionally used up to now.  

It wasn't too long before I did some research and found that for 18 count using cotton floss, it was suggested to stitch with only one thread and a size 28 needle.  So I ripped and restarted again!  The change did make the stitching go sooo much easier although I was not always sure that I liked the coverage that a single strand of floss gave.  

I will also say that when I continued working after changing the thread and needle, while the stitching was now smooth, the counting was not!  Over the course of it, I had to rip and restitch to make "adjustments" on many parts of the piece as I stitched.  Count twice, stitch once!!

Needless to say that all the issues I had stitching on this meant that I in no way wanted to rotate off to another piece!  I continued stitching "United" right up until our trip to Acadia so wound up taking it and "Heart" on the trip.  Although our stay in Acadia was longer this year, because of all of things we wanted to see and do, I did not do a whole lot of stitching while in camp.  

However, I did manage to finish all the words before we headed back home and completed the outer blue border once we got back.  Additionally, contrary to the "Stitch June" plans, I didn't manage to get to the "fully finishing" of it yet. 

In other cross stitch news:  Since what little stitching I did in camp was on "United",  I wasn't able to finally start on "Heart" until the drive home.  "Heart" is a six page (!) pattern and I had gridded my fabric before the trip.  

I had decided to start stitching the part of the design on page 5 since it had both a lot of filler that needed to be done in a single color but also picked up enough of the color changes in the design to give me some opportunities to work through that.  However, in the car I was only able to start on some of the filler.  

This project is going back to the easy stitching of working on 14 count Aida but with a "full coverage" design it means there is A LOT of stitches to lay down!  Even working with just one color, you have to count carefully to leave space for the color change areas.  Once back home, I started on the color changes and this is as far as I've gotten:

With the stitching on "United" finished, it also meant I could start on the second of the planned "Stitch June" projects. 

  

This is another Primrose Cottage design called "Home of the Free".  Much like "United", this one is also proving challenging, once again, because of the base fabric used.  

This is my first foray into stitching on Evenweave (25 count also in Vintage Country Mocha).  While I can stitch this with two threads, I am "stitching over two".  Unlike the easily visible holes of Aida (which are stitched "over one" meaning from one hole to the next),  I have to count the threads in the weave of the fabric and stitch over what is effectively a 3 x 3 area for each stitch (stitch in one hole, skip a hole then stitch in the next hole).  I love the look of the tighter weave of the fabric but this will be a very slow stitch until I get used to working with it.  

As for my quilt projects, I thought about them (particularly all of those that need to be quilted) but none got worked on at all this month.  I do have big quilty plans for July so I'll see what I can get done for that!

Cross Stitch Plans for June

Now that Cross-Stitch May-nia is over, it's time to "Stitch June"!  Back when I laid out my May-nia plans, I had noted that originally I planned to work on some "patriotic" pieces for that event.  However, then I decided to instead move those to June and it turns out that was a good decision.  About mid-May I learned that Kimberly Jolly, now also a big influencer in the Cross Stitch world, had decided to lead a new June stitch along with the same theme!

Watch her Floss Tube announcement video here. 

In June, the Fat Quarter Shop will be stitching daily on cross stitch projects with a Red, White and Blue theme.  If you are interested but don't have any patterns or kits along those lines, the Fat Quarter shop can help you with that!  They have compiled a page of patterns and supplies perfect for the SAL.

Another opportunity to stitch along with other cross stitchers on patriotic themed projects is being offered by Nicole Sphor who is doing a Summer Stitch Along (SAL) for her "flossiversary".   Nicole is a Papercrafter, Quilter and Cross Stitcher who I was introduced to when I decided to make the FQS "Jelly Snowflake" quilt as part of my Red & White Christmas quilting last year.  

As I said, I had already made similar plans and already have the ones I want to work on in house.  The projects I'll focus on for the month are:

When I wrote about these in May, I also said I had another piece coming in and it was this one:

Okay that one's not strictly Red, White and Blue but I plan to display it where I will display the rest of them so into the mix it goes!  It will also be my first foray into stitching on a high count linen and adding a button embellishment designed for the project.  

The plan for the month is a three day rotation of the three projects.  None of them are very big so it may not take the whole month to get them done.  I am hoping to include the "fully finishing" part in the rotations as well.

Since we will also be traveling during June, I had another project I wanted to start on the trip:

I had prepped the floss while waiting during May's refrigerator repair debacle and had chose and cut the fabric back when I kitted the threads.  During the next two weeks, I need to make sure I have all the needed notions gathered for when we are ready to go.  

More Summer Stitching Fun

I've said it before:  cross stitchers know how to keep themselves busy and motivated!  I also just learned about another Summer stitch challenge from a Flosstube video:  Sheri, the Colorado Cross Stitcher, has led a virtual "Cross Stitch Camp" since 2021 and has held them in the Summer, Fall and Winter.   

This one is not for working on a specific project but "theme prompts" are given for the type of project or challenge to work on for each month in June, July and August.  She has already given the prompts in this video.  The challenges are free to join and there are chances for prizes and there is a free pattern for stitching up a "camp badge".  

The only rules are that you "check-in" on Instagram at the start of the month with a new project using the appropriate hashtags (which she shares in the video) and then finish (but NOT necessarily "fully finish") your project by month's end and check-in again to share it.  Although she also says that you can qualify for a few more prize entries if you do "fully finish" your project.

The other good thing is that you don't have to participate for all three months, just jump in where you wish.  That's good for me as I don't already have a project that fulfills the June prompt and already have plans for focusing on my quilting during July.  However, I might be able to come up with something for the August challenge which is (always) "Try Something New".   Heck that describes my whole cross stitch journey so far!!  So I'll see if I decide to do something and participate for that month.

If things keep up like this, cross stitch will really start to challenge quilting as my primary interest.  It's not quite there yet, though!!  

May is Done and so is Cross Stitch May-nia!

The last day of May means my May-nia journey has come to a close!  Participating in this really helped focus my work and resulted in getting a lot done.  This was my May-nia list and what I got accomplished on it.

The New Start

The month started off with a new start.  I had two incentives for making this one:  it not only represented a May-nia start but it commemorated a historic event.

It was a small piece so was easy to get done during the week before the coronation.   I also employed and got to practice a new technique for me:  "gridding" my fabric with a blue water soluble ink marker to aid in placing the design elements correctly.   I stitched on a WIP during the next week so didn't get to the finishing of this and the little mug rug I made until this week.  

Front

Back

I originally had an idea to try to finish it as a sort of thick tuffet with gold tassel trim.  However, when that didn't work out, I finished it as a simple pin keep/pillow.  It is backed with a purple panne velvet that I stabilized with t-shirt quilt interfacing and I embellished the edge with a gold rope trim.  It's a little rough but it is also my very first pillow finish.  In this case, I definitely feel that finished is better than perfect!

Oh, and I also bound the little crown mug rug that I made along with it!

The WIP

I had started this project last Fall as a companion to an earlier finish.  This is the first project I've done that required extensive color changes within a single motif and for this newbie CS-er it was definitely a real challenge!  There were many rip outs and re-starts and the finish as stitched is definitely off from the pattern in a few places.  This time, I was only semi-successful at using the gridding method again.  I guess I need more practice but at least it's also now done!

I managed to find the perfect fabric to finish the backing in the hoop frame I had purchased to display it in.  Having done this kind of finish before, it was fairly easy to complete. 

Now it hangs with its companion, ready to be enjoyed!

The "Fully Finished(s)"

The stitching for the next two projects had been finished prior to May-nia and now just needed to be "Fully Finished".  The first is another piece honoring a highlight of 2023:  this celebrates the "Year of the Rabbit" on the Chinese New Year calendar.

Front

Back

I have a stash of Asian-style prints so I was able to "shop the stash" for finishing this one.  Originally, I had in mind that I wanted to finish this like a Hands On Design pillow finish I saw at the start of the Spring.  However, the two prints that I picked to use didn't work so well combined together on the front.  So once again, I went simple and just used one print on the front and one on the back.  

I then decided to add some additional embellishment using tassels to sort of replicate a similar motif stitched into the piece.  Of course it was only after buying them that I remembered that I had looked up tutorials for making my own.  Oh well, next time!!

The last "fully finish" on the list was my "Memento of Maine" aka Helen D.'s freebie "Blueberries and Black Bears".  I'm still working on the finishing for this one:

The animals print will be the backing.

A lot of changes went into this project:  It was patterned to be stitched on 14 count Aida but I chose to use some Lori Holt 10 count Aida I had on hand because the color of it went better with the finishing fabrics I eventually found for it.  I picked up those fabrics at Fabricate during our trip last year so didn't make the final CS fabric choice until that happened.  

Although I kitted up the "called for" threads, when shopping for them I fell in love with a variegated DMC green (#4045) that I decided to add to the mix.  Then I changed where the patterned colors were used in the stitching which brought a better balance to my eye on the darker background fabric I was using.  

Also while in Maine, I had purchased the little buoy ornament with plans to use it to embellish the final piece.  I had also planned to copy an image of a lobster from a lobster bib from a restaurant we ate at, print it onto fabric and then applique it onto the piece.  

However, as I become more CS obsessed,  I am often looking around for designs of interest and happened on a cute little lobster CS piece that I figured might be an even better embellishment!  THEN I saw a little miniature lobster trap and thought "oh how cool to combine the two?!?".  This meant figuring out how to render the trap in fabrics.  So far it has proved to be a bit more challenging than expected so I am still trying to see if I can make that work.

So all in all, not bad for my first stab at May-nia!  Then tomorrow starts a new month that is bringing even more stitchy fun....

Moving It Forward Monday: Cross stitch May-nia leads to some finishes

 The WIP that was on this month's May-nia project list is now (finally) complete!

As I said in my last post about this, the color change placements challenged me right up to the end!  So if mine looks different from the pattern I purchased from the lovely Peacock & Fig chalk it up to the fact that I am still fairly new to CS (and that's my story and I'm sticking to it!!).  

However, I am thrilled I got it done!  I even tested it in the hoop frame that I will be using to display it.

Next step is rinsing out the grid markings and then completing the finishing.  Perfect since the plan for the rest of my May-nia month is to focus on "fully finishing" projects.  So now this one, the new project finished at the start of this month and two other prior finishes can all get the finishing treatment.   

What also challenged me this week was my refrigerator!  The repair technicians had been here the week before last to diagnose the problem (the compressor had died) and order new parts which came in Friday.   When I logged onto my service account,  it said an appointment for installing the new parts had been set up for Saturday.  

Well, my DH and I waited around during the two hour arrival window but they were a no show!  I tried calling the service vendor but was only able to leave a message.  Yeesh!  Another call this morning confirmed that the reason they were a no show was that they don't work on the weekends!!  Why the system scheduled an appointment for then I don't know.   Now it will be another two days of living in the 1920's hauling in ice to keep things cold until our (confirmed) appointment on Wednesday.   Maybe I should be stitching this one next.....

Pattern available at 123Stitch.com

On the plus side, having finished the WIP and while waiting for the appointment I didn't know wasn't going to happen, I worked on further setting up a project I want to start on in June.  

I had purchased this pattern and kitted up the threads and fabric last summer. It will be the biggest CS project I've attempted to date as well as one with the most colors I have ever used at one time and my first "full coverage" piece.  I had waited to organize the threads until I was ready to work on it.  I only expected to get some of the threads onto drops but it turns out that waiting on technicians who will never show is good for floss preparation:

They are now all set up on a ring --- another CS tool that I now have a new appreciation for.  For a project that uses a lot of floss like this, a ring of drops is definitely the way to go!  When I started stitching, I thought I really liked floss cards, especially when designers included one in the pattern:

I even considered purchasing one of the fancy heirloom ones.

Made by WonderlandUkraine on Etsy

However, I decided I wanted a system where I could prep the floss once and then be able to move it from project to project as needed.  

As I checked that I had all the floss for the project, I thought I was missing one.  It turns out I had actually put the missing skein with another "smalls" project I had planned to stitch as an embellishment for another finish.  

I think I put that floss with that other project because at the time it was close to the "called for" color for it.  However, since then, I had kitted another project that had the actual color I needed!  So I decided to put that floss on a drop and stitch up the small project real quick so I could return the rest of the floss to the kitted project.

As noted, you can find this pattern on Etsy.

Ironically, the other two colors of floss for this little stitch were also in kitted projects so it was helpful that this little thing could be finished up quickly and all the flosses could be returned to where they will be needed in the future.

The plan for this little piece is for it to be added to the embellishments for this project finished last year:

This little piece will be a memento of our trip to Maine last summer and is one of the projects on the May-nia list for finishing.  We will be returning there in a couple of weeks and I had hoped to have this finished to take with us.  

For it I have an ambitious plan:  I saw a cute miniature lobster trap on Etsy and I'd like to figure out if I can translate it into fabric and combine it with the lobster stitchery as an embellishment.

Unfortunately, this item is no longer listed.

I don't know if I will be successful but I hope to have some May-nia finishing fun while trying!