new stuff for ETSY

 Now I realize, it's just too dang early for christmas but well I have a few things finished and they just so happened to be themed that way.

the past few years I haven't been feeling all that chirstmassy at christmas time anyway.


 I tend to be one of those people who gets stuff done, when I get it done (unless it's FOR somebody)



to top it all off its 50* and raining in the great NW.

if the furnace was still on it would have run this morning.


as it is I had to put on my fuzzies and a sweater.  -.- hello juluvember.




anyway enough grousing about the wacky weather, the little christmas pouches are cute aren't they...


the first one is just big enough for a small set of keys and a cell phone



 the 3 girls is tiny 2"x2" so it can hold a small present &/or be hung on the tree.





the third one is another cell pouch that has room for keys and maybe one more item



I love the horse sleigh on this one.




though I will admit to going a little crazy with the snowflakes









the next piece is a ring pillow I only had half the lace heart motif so I had to stitch the rest of it.


I also put a bunch of beads on it.









the dragonfly's wings untie so the rings can be secured to the pillow








 and the last pouch is just too frilly and pink for words.




not my usual colorway but I need to stretch myself now and again and do the frilly pink thing


hey not everyone is good at cutesy foo-foo! I have to practice at it!


 this is what I have been up to so far, the blooms of summer

though there has been a lot of gardening as it has been unusually warm around here,

until yesterday that is

more on that later

pearblossom faerie

 I finished him finally!


 he sat in his tree and blew raspberries at my muse for months,


                                        the little stinker!

 It also helped to find a set of beads the exact colors of the block to finish the seam run at the bottom!

then there was this fellow who just happened to hop by!

BJP-May dancing with the volcano

Just when you thought I had fallen off the face of the earth, I appear!
bearing eyecandy! woo....ok, ok. so It's not that exciting.
I have been busy! 

 a little bit here and a little bit there, I have mostly been out in the garden this summer.

anyway I have finished another BJP piece

  as you probably know if you read the blog regularly (or irregularly as the posts go).

I got married this past december and we took our honeymoon in Hawaii.

this is my may bead journal piece I call her dancing with the volcano.
 she is the constant lava flow of the pu'u'o'o that has been erupting on big island for over 30 years!

she has reshaped the Island several times and removed whole towns from the map but she always adds a little more than she takes.

the last time we came to big island she was running out to sea, this time she is "adding land" inland so we couldn't go see her with out a 7 mile there day hike or a  chopper so we opted for exploring the rest of the island Wipao valley is stunning!

Gardens and flowers RR-Elizabeths blocks

 so we start with a spray in the bottom not quite corner with feather stitches, rose buds and mokuba ribbon flowers

then we go up to the upper right hand for the spiderweb and some beaded lace trim and green french knot berries



blue Sre flowers to bring out the blue design in the bottom fabric and yellow trumpet flower vine to hang the spiderweb from and a purple and green spider to dangle off the end all drips down the right side of the block

on the left side I ran a bunch of crimson SRE daisies on a field of lace and ribbon

then across the bottom I ran a wave of pearl daisies with green sprays topped off with green and purple beads

 I tried to balance my block with Barb and Shelly's blocks and added a little more lace

 I hope you like it!

Rotten Rabbit!


I see you!
Eating buttercups under that bush!
         SHoo!



sorry, Elizabeth!          I didn't see him till it was too late !

Garden and flowers RR-Barb's block

 I chose the Birdbath block from Barb's assortment and gave her blue birds for her garden




along with a butterfly, dragonflies and a snail.





as I wanted the birdbath to be the focus all the stitching is relatively subtle


I gave her lavender and yellow climbing roses  and a snail

I'm sending this off ASAP to Dana as I'm already late I hope it will not hold her up to badly

spring fling challenge the whole thing!

you've seen little parts of it but now here it is


 my finished piece for


Therica's spring fling challenge 



 I used every thing she sent me in the box,

except one of the birds, for some reason one more, was a bird too far!

I used this a an opportunity to try out some more SRE.

I don't use silk ribbon much but I am trying to break out of that habit and spread it around a bit more.



I was contemplating dying he mushrooms with red and white spots. I may still do it, it would make that little corner pop a bit better.

go over to Therica's store to see the competition and let me know how I did? OK?

Happy mothers day!

To my Mom, who raised me as best she could all by herself.

thank you momma for teaching me there is more out there to learn every day and better things to do than sit at home.

Happy mothers day!

spring fling challenge#3

Tantalizing, no?

here is another piece of Therica's spring fling puzzle

here's a spot using 2 of the lace motifs
I "colored" in the flower with blue  overlapping fly stitch.  also shown are
a cloisonné butterfly, the snail charm and ribbon roses. I used bullion stitch to "color in the roses on the lace motif and beads to accent the ribbon.
how am I doing so far?

uh-oh

My pile grew again

how does that happen?


looks like I'm going to be busy

I also have skellie to finish
(i have been negligent there)

and the fairies

and the heritage cq, the hankie project, another BJP.....crap * sigh*
it's a good thing I love this stuff  ;)

garden and flowers dyb

 I have finished Shelley's block and what a cutie it is!





 lots of pink



 I added flowers all over it







 and sprays and beads


hope you like it it's off to NZ and Dana next!

wrigley field 100 year anniversary

I lived here!

I grew up living 3 apartments down from wrigley in the 70's-80's.
back when it was little house in the barrio and we were practically the only Caucasians for miles who were crazy enough to live there.
that "c" shaped building with the arrow is where i grew up in a 3rd floor balcony apartment.

the apartment with the check mark is the one we young neighborhood punks used to climb up, to watch games from the roof. we had a perfect view over the left field bleachers.

the old manual score board

I once got knocked off my bike by a pop fly over the left field wall by Bobby Bonilla (I don't actually know for sure but it was a good enough story to get an autograph!)

that was back in the day, when the score board was still run by dan,dan the number man who changed all the scores by hand, on big wood boards. he'd let a few of us punks up to help him the day before  or the day after to make sure everything was organized for the next game.

he paid $2 + a coke and a hotdog and if you showed him your report card with good grades, he'd let you stay and watch the game from the board!






and being punk kids we would park cars in the unaffiliated lots at the end of the block before the "Official" parkers got there to and charged $5 to park 'em. we'd get 4-5 cars before we got run off the lot by the older kids.

that would give us enough readys to run to Yum-Yum Doughnuts (X marks that spot) and get a burger and fries, for each of us and $ left over to get candy later.

we'd go "car surfing" to get there so if any of you all parked behind wrigly on clark between wellington the Yum-yum ( because boy did they pack 'em in!) and came back to dents and scratches on your car, sorry ;) !
 oh! and if you were ever in the hood at night to see the bleachers lit you would know them as the ICAGO UBS cause no one ever fixed those lights in the 70's!

spring fling challenge#2

just another teaser for Therica's spring fling challenge.
I used a pearl and a bead for the spiders body and Krennik braid for the legs, the river silks that came in the package for the roses and the blue flowers. anchor #8 thread, lace motifs and lace, that also came in the package, for the seam treatments and DMC floss for the web

procrastination

Procrastination presents in strange ways in me.

like right now I should be sewing on my gardens and flowers RR, finishing a fairie block and working on skellie but I just can't seem to get motivated on any of it

some people shop, read novels back-to-back, go shopping do the movie/TV show couch potato marathon.

when I'm avoiding something I bake, cook elaborate meals, garden. oh I do the other things too but yesterday was too pretty to do them and today I had to finish.


 I saw one in my local farmers market but it was too expensive and a little small so I went to home desperate, collected my gear and built a potting bench.

no plans or directions just winged it. yes folks, I am an odd duck.

how hard could it be?


apparently, not so difficult.
once I found the measuring tape and the drill my DDH hid in the garage, it was off to the races!
and look for $60 bucks in materials, I have a potting bench to suit my needs!

I used 31 - 6'x4"x1 1/2" cedar fencing($1.89 per)
a box of 1" #8 screws ($5,?)
2 2" corner brackets for under the top shelf for bracing and squaring ($3.50 E)
 the rest of the stuff I had lying around
1 sterilight container for dirt
1 handle
4" screws for hanging
4 hooks
you also need a measuring tape, pencil
table saw and a drill with a 5/32 bit and phillips head screw attachment
and voilà!

Aprils BJP

 April's BJP is done

I've depicted our yearly dance between the sun
 and the rain during spring.


the blue our cloudy skies the clear beads are representative of the rain that drips, drizzles and randomly pours down on the great NW.

the sun in gold, peeks through the rain and the clouds giving us sun when it's pouring and intermittent double rainbows

out of whole cloth

I don't usually do whole cloth quilts, it seems like cheating.
this caught my eye at the quilt store last week, it has all my favorite colors in it and it's just so joyous, I couldn't resist it.
note the seal of feline approval, jubilee was the first to nap on it.

 ("whole cloth" in quilting, means just quilting on an unpieced, piece of fabric to "quilt in the ditch" or the design on a piece of fabric with no or not much piecing accompanying it )

spring fling challenge

I entered into Therica's spring fling challenge  I have finished the sewing of it though it is not due till may the 15th. I have not decided what to do with it yet. I was thinking a box top maybe. I have a month to think on it.
here's a sneak peek I won't show the whole piece until
the challenge is up.