A little bit of sunshine...

I had to share these cute frames with you. For those of you who shop at the store, you have probably already seen these on display. The patterns are each free patterns from the web page:

www.lizziekate.com/free.html

The frames are available at the shop while the supplies last...

Old Blue Eyes...

This came in for framing last week. Isn't it cool! Margaret likes to stitch while her husband fishes. We love to see all of her finished pieces. I guess we have framed at least 40 for her. She is always stitching for herself, her kids or friends. The name of the design is Blue Eyes by Kustom Krafts. We try to always keep this book in stock.

You snooze you lose...

Well all of the flowers frogs that I brought in last week are gone! To some wonderful loving homes.... This week I have two new ones, and we have not had a blue one in the past. Isn't it great!

Oh so tiny....

Our Wednesday group had a lot of fun this week. It rained all afternoon and we were warm and dry, stitching like crazy. Norma is working on a discontinued Mystic Stitch design called Summer Zinnias. We do have one of them left in stock though. She is stitching on 24 count congress cloth over one using 2 strands of floss and half crosses. The colors are so vivid and beautiful!Karen is stitching Cornflowers by Dimple Designs. She is stitching on 28 count over one with one strand of floss using full and half crosses. It was so fun to see them work on these tiny stitch counts. This is a picture of the design when complete. The pattern can be worked on any stitch count, but the smaller the count the more detail it has.

These will be gorgeous when they are finished. I will show you again then.......

I've been on a frog hunt...

Look at these beautiful clear glass holders. The tiny one is my favorite. It holds 7 scissors and is only a little larger than an egg cup... I thought that the color of this was cool. It is a wonderful shade, not really green, and not really blue. It really depends on the light.This little dish is pink depression glass embossed with cherries. Everyone loves the pink glass. I have enjoyed my pink Fire King sugar cup long enough. I am ready to see it go to a loving home... Can you ever have too many?

The Bride

I had to share with you a beautiful piece that our customer - Bernie - brought in for framing.....

Isn't it wonderful!

It is called "The Bride" by Graphworks International.

Now, this is the way it is supposed to be stitched.....

But Bernie embellished hers with so many wonderful flowers and extra beads and gem stones. She did a beautiful job and I wanted to share some close-ups of her changes.

The bodice is edged in silk flowers sewn on with a crystal bead.
The veil is also lined in silk flowers and crystals.
She even added a diamond ring!
We framed it in a shadow box type frame to give the flowers room and we didn't want to make this look crowded at all.

We think that it turned out wonderful!!!!

Thank you Bernie for letting us frame this for you.

Your granddaughter is very lucky.

Little Snowy Blue Church...

Don finished this gorgeous Mirabillia design, and we matted it to look like a snow globe...It is stitched in fun fibers and uses lots of beads and even a few specialty stitches.

Good job Don!

Don was kind enough to write up some information about this design and working with the fibers and beads. He e-mailed me his thoughts and I will post them here for you to read:

Jamie and I talked a while back about doing two or three paragraph reviews on newly released designs. She thought it was a great idea and here is the first. If you think this was of some value please tell Jamie

I recently finished the "Little Snowy Blue Church" by Nora Corbett. j This is the first in the "snow globe" series that she has just released. While I'm not a huge fan of her flower fairies and other releases this immediately appealed to me. I was attracted by the photo on the front but when I saw the colors of thread and beads she used I was hooked. A word of caution is in order though. It you don't like stitching with Kreinik threads and glass beads don't even start this one. While the pattern only uses three colors of DMC thread, it has four colors of Kreinik #4 braid and seven colors of beads including some size six and size eight. It also calls for Rainbow Gallery's Artic Rays. This was a bit more challenging to work with. Before attempting I recommend lots of patience, a large needle, short lengths, a stiff drink and for non drinkers reconsider your tea total ism! Another consideration is the fabric color. When we first thought about this, Betsy and I picked out a fairly light blue fabric that looked beautiful until I started to stitch. The Kreinik and most of the DMC looked fine but the DMC white didn't show up on the light blue fabric. I got a piece of the fabric Nora recommends (ocean Kiss), started again and it was a whole different story. When you pick out fabric consider the contrast between the threads and cloth especially the DMC white. Ocean Kiss is a medium blue to turquoise color.

A few quick reminders about using Kreinik braids, use short lengths, don't use good scissors (check out the less expensive brands that the Craft Center carries), and go slowly, let the braid move as it wants. As you pull, just guide it into place. Next, some thought about stitching with beads. I usually do all my beads last. The reason being is that the thread has a tendency to tangle and wrap itself around anything, and beads just make thinks worse. In this case, I did them as I went. There are so many and in some cases rows of beads separate rows of stitches and I was afraid of getting the piece all done and forgetting a row of something. So I would do a section and go back and do the beads. The instruction suggest using a matching thread color to the bead-I prefer using the YLI filament. In the case of this design it works really well because when using the YLI, changing threads with different bead colors isn't necessary just change beads and stitch away. Whatever your preference give careful thought to stitching the beads as you go.

Some last thoughts. The completed piece is beautiful and I'm really excited about the rest of the series. It was so much fun that I'm considering doing it again. Weird I know but that's me. If i were to do it again I would probably change the colors of the DMC 413 to 924 floss. These are used as "windows and doors" of the church. Instead of leaving them in dark blues I would change the colors to red, blues and other bright colors simulating stained glass windows and doors. The Kreinik and beads make it sparkle and was just fun to stitch. The stitching goes fast enough that it would make a nice gift for someone, including yourself.

Don