Merry Christmas 2010

For the past 5 days I've been busy cleaning and decorating the house, sewing up 1 pillow and the final 5 needlepoint stockings for customers, and swedish weaving 4 Christmas Tablerunners.  I had stitched one for myself for the beginner Huck weaving workshop I held on November 27th.  Since then my tablerunner has been on the front counter in the store as part of a Christmas display.  Every day as my mom would walk past it she would say "What a nice tablerunner, that would look great on my coffee table, but only if it's not too much trouble".   Wanting something more to get my mom for Christmas, and seeing that one end of the tablerunner only took me 1 1/2 hours to stitch, I thought no problem - I'll manage to get it done.  And then I thought, my mother-in-laws and sister would really like this as well.  So for the last week, I've been stitching on the tablerunners every evening.  By the time I got to the fourth one, I was glad it was the LAST one.  

The pattern is from a Zweigart leaflet, and the fabric is 11count Stockholm, very much like Huck fabric, but available in a wonderful selection of colours.  For the center tree I used  Anchor perle cotton #5  7683, a dark green with blended gold.  For the next two layers I used DMC perle cotton #5 367 and 368 respectively.  For the last (outer) layer of the tree and the bottom 2 rows I used Cresta d'Oro, a metallic gold by Rainbow Gallery.

I'm ready for Christmas so early this year, as we're celebrating Christmas with David's mom, his sister and her kids today.  They're visiting from Ottawa until Friday, and we'll celebrate with my family on Christmas Eve.

Merry Christmas to all of you.  

I wish you all a wonderful celebration, enjoyable times with family and friends, 

and some much cherished stitching time. 

Stitching at Second Cup

I spent my morning stitching in the Second Cup at York University, and had a wonderful time.  It was 2 hours of uninterrupted stitching!!
My daughter had an exam - apparently weekend exams are not uncommon  now - and a few weeks ago I had volunteered to drive her.  At first I thought I'll do a bit of shopping, but as this day approached the idea of searching for a parking spot and then fighting the crowds, made me cringe at the thought. So what else to do?  I have been wanting to continue  my "Cottage Garden" sampler by Thea Dueck for quite a while, but never found the time.  So I packed my portable light, bought myself a coffee, and stitched - thoroughly enjoying myself.  Along with an electric fireplace, the Second Cup also had some wonderful music selections.  One set was a Caribbean mix, making me think back to a wonderful vacation we spent in the Dominican Republic.
I never manage this at home, and maybe the "at home" is my mistake.  So this is my advice for today - grab your stitching and leave home.  Find yourself a nice spot  in the local Second Cup, Starbucks, or McCafe and stitch.  You may even meet other stitchers.

This is how far I got.  I managed to finish the cottage roof, and another 3 and a bit rows.  The hardanger I'm going to finish when I take my linen off the frame.  I needle weave nicer when I'm holding it in hand.

Stitch Night

Another full house for our last stitch night of the year.  Everyone was busy with their stitching and sharing some of the great things they picked up at the Christmas Open House this past Saturday.  One of the most popular patterns on Saturday was " Snow White" by Little House Needleworks.  Someone started the craze by showing it at the fabric counter and stating that they are going to stitch it on a Victorian Red Lugana with Ecru DMC  thread.  I had to put in my two scents - "I love the fabric but stitch it with  DMC variations 4160 ".  That sold out the last few patterns and the last skeins of 4160 DMC.  I 'll  be ordering more patterns and threads.

Another item I had to show off tonight was my Petit Point pendant, before I send it off to A Needle Pulling Thread Magazine tomorrow.
It will appear in the "In the Loop" section of their Spring Issue, to be released  January 2011, along with an article reviewing our first Getaway Retreat this past April (2010).
The pendant frames are hinged and you simply insert a photo or what ever you like.  When I saw the frames I already know that my petit point flowers would look fabulous in the frame.  I inserted a paper behind the floral, but you could also omit the backing so the petit point  appears as if it's floating.
The frames are available in different sizes and I already have them in the shop.

Christmas Open House 2010

Gitta's Annual Christmas Open House was this past Saturday, (always held on the 1st Saturday in December).  It was lots of fun and busy from morning until closing.  I generally take photos throughout the day, but it wasn't until around 12:30 that I remembered.  And this was only because Carol, a long time family friend and fellow petit pointer, was taking her own photos.  So I gave Carol my camera and asked her to snap some with my camera as well.  Before she was off with my camera I had to snap a photo of Santas little reindeer, now Gitta's official photographer for the day.  

Here are some photos from our day.  My dad hung around for the whole day, mingling with everyone, he was the perfect host.  Lady and her mom are a regular visitor every year.

 

Margaret was busy helping customers and Monika never managed to step away from the front counter.  My mom, always making sure everyone is well take care of, kept on bringing her munchies all day.

The busiest place in the house was the fabric table.  Or at least I thought so, because I never managed to get away from it for too long.  Two of us were always cutting, my mom, Ietje and /or myself, all day, and Mary managed to serge every piece.

 On every Saturday in December you'll see Santa strolling through Port Credit, and as Santa loves the ladies, he visits Gitta's every time he's in town.  This particular Saturday he partied with the ladies at the fabric table for a while.  And I heard him exclaim as he strode out of sight  " Forget milk and cookies, Santa loves a Brandy on a cold winter's night "

This is my first post to my blogspot.  Before this, I posted every once in a while to Kathrin's Blog page on the Gitta's website   To read these please Click here.