Something's burnin', na na na na....

and I think it's meeeee! Quick, what song does that sound like? Well, except the meeee part ;)

Boy, has it been hot here in these parts! 101 couple Sundays ago,105 the day after and it has not been below 95 since! In my area, the 105 was the hottest ever recorded. Down in Phoenix, 105 is rather cool! Today though, it's cloudy and it feels a tad humid. Yay, maybe our Monsoon season is gearing up. Hope so. I love thunderstorms but my cats do not.

I don't stitch much when it's hot. My home does not have AC or even an evaporative cooler. We make do with fans and lots of ice water! The cats sleep on the fireplace hearth because it's tile or the kitchen floor. So I got caught up with some reading.

But! My long awaited package from Needlecraft Corner arrived the other day and my stitching mojo sat up and took notice! That's kind of creepy..stitching mojo sat up!

Yup, the Spooked Mystery Sampler from LizzieKate! I jumped right on it and I just have two sides of border so really no picture. This Mystery sampler I ordered the whole shebang because last time they put out a mystery series, I thought I could be thrifty and buy my own piece of fabric. Well, I ran out of fabric and had to tweak the design some. So this time I said What the Heck. I also bought these..

Aren't these the cutest?! And this is just Part 1, eek! Since my Merry Berry finish inside the hoop, I've fallen in love with these chalkboard patterns. This came with 3 cuts of the gunmetal linen, the floss and embellishments. All from Needlecraft Corner. Drema, the owner, does a great job over there. So no more stashing for me. Well, until Part 2 of the chalkboard ornaments come out:)

I have a couple finishes, small ones..First up is Potted Poinsettia by LHN..

So pretty. I had to sub DMC for the light brown but it came out great anyway. Stitched up in a couple days.

 And my next finish tugs at the heart a bit..

This pattern is in the Fall 2015 issue of Punch Needle and Primitive Stitcher magazine. Stitched in a day and a half with domestic duties getting in the way a little. When you are an empty nester, there's not much to take care of besides these cats whom I might add are shedding ferociously! Anyway, this little cutie is designed by the Snowflower Diaries designer. You can recognize her style in this. It's nice to use up some of those small pieces of leftover fabric.

Lately, I've been using (or wasting!) time at Pinterest and I came across a wine cork project. I have a bunch of wine corks that my daughter collected from area restaurants and this is what I made..

It's a pumpkin! Here's the top of it..

I bought 3 bottles of paint, varying colors of orange and went to work. It was like doing a puzzle really. I used hot glue to glue the corks together and then to secure the stalk onto the leaves. Here we are entering into July real soon, and this little pumpkin eases the hot a little. Here's a picture from Pinterest that I borrowed..

I have more corks so I think I could do the bigger one too. You can see her dot com address there at the bottom of the picture if you're interested. There is not much to making these.

Yesterday my daughter got me out of the house of stitching, haha, and we met to listen to some Bluegrass..

It was still 96 but under the shade and a nice breeze, it wasn't too bad!

Well, that's my novel and I'm sticking to it! 

Oh, and I'm joining Justine's Just One July where you work on just one project for the month. I don't think I'll do the Spooked sampler but a WIP that I would like to have done. It's been a while since I've touched it.

Hope you all have a safe 4th of July to those of you who celebrate and to those who don't, have a nice week and that you get to stitch a whole lot!

Practice makes perfect, exchange pynkeeps

Experts like to say, in so many words, that if you declutter the space around you, you'll feel better mentally. I have quite the pile of stitching just waiting to be finished or framed. By finishing I mean the final finishing. One item I finished is this LizzieKate that I completed last year. I knew how I wanted to final finish it, it was just figuring out how to decorate it. That could also be my procrastination in rampant mode. But anyway, here it is..

Hats off to Halloween by LK. There's this seller on etsy who really does some amazing final finishing to her stitching. I saw a Halloween design that I really liked and tried to finish Hats Off like hers. This thing is big! Haha. The fabric on the left has tiny spiders on it and I just used the frayed side of the fabric along the design. And I used this shiny, hairy trim for it..

I'll just say cutting through this big of piece of foam board was not fun. Fine for smaller flat ornaments, big stuff, not so much! My hanging thingamajigger at the bottom is off center too but I've been off center lately, so that's my excuse! I still love it though and keep looking at it when I walk by.

This one below, though, has used up my finishing reserve. The tank is now empty! It's a Mission church on Aida that I stitched more than 6 years ago. I kept it, tried to sell it on eBay, no takers. After seeing Vonna's new mounted flatfold tutorial on video, the Mission became my practice piece. By the way, have you seen her Flosstube videos? She's so cute, funny, and personable. I subscribed to her videos. Anyway, here is Mission, my first flatfold..

Whew! I have learned that it's best to use thin cotton fabrics. That second photo you can see how bulky my fabric is, and my mounting boards I could've done a better job at measuring. Also, the ribbon that's used at the bottom to keep the A shape was not long enough so a nice breeze is going to knock it over! I hope you all can see my pictures, they're kind of dark. I still like how it looks and it certainly is my practice piece. All of this courtesy of Vonna and her tutorials for the mounted flatfold and bow making. Practice makes perfect!

The pynkeep exchanging is almost over at Dixiesamplars on FB. I sent this to my partner. It's a very old freebie from 2007. I changed up the colors to match my partners likes..

First time for attaching ric rac to the sides with beads. Here's the back...

My partner liked it.

Here is what I received and I love it!

The back has an orange piece of woolfelt whipstitched in place. This exchange was called The Very Happy Unbirthday Pynkeep Exchange, hence that birthday card. The ribbon is now in my stash!

Short and sweet! It was so hot last weekend, I didn't stitch for 3 or 4 days. I started feeling a bit sideways and knew stitching would cure that and it did! It's cooled up some and we even had a thunderstorm with rain come through last night. I started something new and have been stitching on a WIP.

I enjoyed reading all your comments last post. Yeah, I had smoking needles! Thanks for dropping in!

A Spooky Selfie, O.H.D., and finishes

Haha!

Gotcha! I bet you were expecting a truly terrifying selfie of myself, weren't you? 

Actually it's one of my finishes below.

I failed on my post before last to thank Cricket-bug from Cricket-bug Corner for the Mirabilia pdf she sent me in exchange for the magazine I sent her that she was looking for. It's this one..

I had kept that magazine with this design ever since it was released with the intention of stitching it. So Cricket-bug, a big thank you for doing this. I appreciate it! It's going into my 2016 to stitch pile.

Here are my finishes..

House without a Mouse by Blackbird Designs, my 18th DUCJ/FSAL2015 finish..8 to go..

I think I used 3 skeins of CC Blackbird here and had to break out another for a few more strands. Last year when I put in the date, I made sure to make it 2016 to force myself to finish it this year!

And here's Merry Berry by a Hands on Design/JABC collaboration..

Is that nice or what? I bought the chart with fabric and buttons and then the finishing package which consists of the hoop, the wool backing, black fabric for behind the design, and the ribbon. At the JABC blog, they have a finishing video for this and I whipped it up in 15 minutes. Love it! Took me 3 days to stitch though, haha.

As for my other finishes..

Yes, indeed because the next three are Halloween-y! First up is Spooky Selfie..

The fabric is soo washed out. Picture a nice green WDW Guacamole color. I bought this at Needlecraft Corner as a kit. It was a fun stitch. Next up is Fall Postcard by Summer House Stitche Workes..

I used 40ct Havana and it is tiny but a perfect size for the burlap canvas that you see on the model picture. I have bits and pieces collected to decorate this soon. My final finish is..

Halloween Delivery by Plum Street Samplers of PSS. The fabric is Chamomile. Isn't ghostie cute?! It's like you can see his outline! 

Yes, I stitched like a mad woman! I count 15 finishes for the year so far, a mixture of things started last year and this year, Crazy stitching included.

After finishing all those, I grabbed this WIP, also a Crazy 2015 start..

This is Autumn Delights by Barbara Ana, found in the November 2013 Cross Stitch and Needlework issue. You know this is a Barbara Ana design just by the quirkiness of it. Here is what it'll look like when done..

So I have the entire bottom portion left to stitch but I'm taking a small break from all the brown of the tree! FYI-I've noticed this design being sold as a chart.

The pynkeep I made for my exchange partner is on its way to Nebraska. This is an exchange hosted by Terri/DixieSamplar on FB. I will show a picture of what I made when she receives it. I'm not sure if she knows I have a blog.

Alrighty, that's it. Looking back at what I have on this post, it should be September or October! I wish because we still have summer to get through and it's supposed to be furnace hot here this weekend, 114-115 in the deserts, probably middle 90's where I live. I mean, I'm still pulling my blanket on in the early hours! How can this be?! I'm so not ready for it. 

Thanks for stopping by. Here's to stitching for hours straight!