Is There Anybody Out There?

Quick! My title comes from a song. Tell me the name of the song and what singer or band it belongs to and be the first to guess correctly. Please leave a working email so the prize can be emailed to you. Good luck!

Well! Where the heck have I been?? I've been marathon stitching my exchange gift! My last post on April 26, I mentioned my giftee was in New Zealand and that I better get started on stitching something. It's hosted by Caroline Pajak in the Facebook group Homespun Needleworks. So I rifled through all my freebies, PDFs, charts, magazines, and found a few ideas. I finally chose this design..

Designed by Jan Hicks and found in the Punch Needle and Primitive Stitcher 2024 Summer issue. I had some mystery linen to use but had to substitute a lot of the called for floss. I also changed the bird from an eagle to a seabird found in New Zealand. Unfortunately, like I always do, I forgot to take a picture of the finished piece. I finished it as a pin pillow. Then around last Sunday I was in the group and the exchange host posted that all exchanges need to be mailed on the 23rd, just 3 days ago. What?!?! Commence the marathon stitching! I thought I still had a week to go! Every waking moment in between work was spent stitching on the gift and I finally finished on Wednesday and FFO'd it on Thursday and got it in the mail Friday! Whew! 

Just as I was starting, I realized it's not summer down under, it's turning late Autumn for them. So I took a pillow ornament with an owl and its Autumn colors and sent that to her too. I sent her a piece of fabric, floss, some seashore type straight pins, candy, and this cute project bag...

It cost me $41.00 to send a pound and 4 oz box to New Zealand. I had the money and I knew it was going to be expensive but these exchanges are even funner when people overseas can get in on the fun.

Okay, looking at my notes....

After I finished the exchange gift, I took a break from stitching for a couple of days. I then picked up Martha Richardson 6 Years Old...

I concentrated mostly on the house.

After that, I started back on Tomato Santa and finished him...

I now have 2 finishes for May. You can see I gave Santa a different beard instead of a soul patch, lol.

The next WIP I pulled out of the pile is...

I love this one! When my iPad kicked the bucket this PDF was lost to me, so I had to buy another and printed it right away. It's a good size, 197 x 134 stitches. I'm using 36ct fabric, Prairie Land by Atomic Ranch. Here's mine...

My plan is to have it framed and placed on the wall in my living room😁

By now, I'm sure you're all wondering if I have abandoned my 61 New Starts SAL; not quite. I'm enjoying myself working on my WIPs and I may join in on Summer Camp hosted the the Colorado Stitcher. I still have kitted things to start though. Stay tuned!!

Housekeeping!

Sandy asked what I use for pillow stuffing. This is what I like...

I found this at Joanne's but we all know what's happening there! My only option is Hobby Lobby now. It was Vonna the Twisted Stitcher who got me using better stuffing. This poly fil that I use feels cotton-y. It doesn't have a polyester feel to it and I don't have the little fibers sticking out of my pillows. It packs well unlike the other stuff that just didn't pack the corners good, too slippery I think. I stick a hole in a corner of a bag to feel the stuffing at the store.

A couple other things to mention are Katie(Jeremiah's Mom) is now doing floss tubes, and the daughter of The Primitive Needle is releasing her mother's designs in PDF form! I've already bought this one...

I've always liked this one. I also need Witches Hollow. I'll get that next time.

I think this is it! I must say that I've been unable to leave comments on some of your blogs. It's just my phone. It's not uploading the captcha thingee and when I press publish it gives me an error message. I'm trying!!

Last but not least...

See you soon!