Summer

Summer is just flying by and I see that I haven't posted in two months. But I have been doing some stitching so have a little bit to show for the amount of time that has gone by!

As I am not a "Divine Disciplined Diva" or a girl who stitches only one project at a time, I have been working on several things over the summer. Sadly, I think I only have one finish, but I'm also a BAP girl (Big A** Projects) and have been making decent progress on several. I'm not going to share everything in this post, so maybe that will give me more incentive to post sooner and show you more of what I've been working on - and maybe even have another finish or two!

As I mentioned in my last post, Sampler Guild of the Rockies (www.samplerguildoftherockies.com), at our annual Summer Retreat in June, the lovely Paulette Stewart of Plum Street Samplers was our guest. She provided two very cute projects for us and I've finished one of them! She called it the Mini Sewing Tray and provided us with all the materials. Here it is stitched and finished!

There is glass on this piece which caused a bit of glare making it look a little "washed out". It was a very fun stitch.

I purchased a reproduction sampler from the Haselmere Museum in England a few years ago. It's called the James Wilson Sampler and while I love the sampler and some of it's quirky motifs, I also love the fact that it was stitched by a boy! James was 12 when he stitched this sampler. At first, I was only stitching on it with a group I stitch with that meets 2 times a month. There were months where I either went once or not at all and so the sampler was moving along very slowly! It's a nice piece and I knew I had to change that, so starting 3 or 4 months ago, I added Sunday - so now most Sunday afternoons will find me with James in hand!

I started this in the middle so have roughly 1/3 of the piece done across the center. I'm using Picture This Plus Ancient in 36 count. The overall picture below shows the color of the fabric fairly true to its color - it's an awesome color. I also decided to try Sullivan's floss and so far am liking working with Sullivan's. I can't tell a huge difference between it and DMC, but I do like it.

To me, two of the quirkiest motifs are on either side of this house above the tree on the right and the whatever that is on the left. The colors are very light and therefore kind of hard to see - had I been aware of that, I might have changed the colors a bit, but I wasn't and I didn't and now it's going to be a piece that people will need to see "up close and personal" once it's complete!!! Anyway, these motifs look like weird fish to me! Not sure if that's what they are supposed to be, but they sure are unique. Here are close ups of each one!

I apologize for the "lightness" of the one above with the tree, I just couldn't get that one to come out quite right making this fish even harder to see than he already is!

In the picture above with the tree, there is a little "fence" next to the house. James stitched a dog on this fence on each side of the house - I have a cat, so changed these to kitties! There are little dogs in the very upper right and left corners of this sampler, on top of some of the border. I may go ahead and leave the dogs as stitched there as I also love dogs - just don't have one right now!

I also have another Sampler Guild project that I'm getting closer to finish work time on and I'm still working away on Quaker Christmas II. Hopefully, I'll get pictures of those for my next post - and also, hopefully, I'll post sooner than another two months!

We've had a nice, then hot, then rainy, then back to hot summer here in the Denver metro area and are in the middle of another heat wave this week. I don't like the heat and so, don't particularly care for summer! Wherever you are, I hope you are finding ways to keep cool or maybe keep warm; but most of all, I hope you're finding time to stitch and enjoy life!

Remember to hug family and friends today and have a wonderful week!

Debby