Framed!!

   I had been holding off taking Summer at Hollyberry Farm to the framer in eager anticipation of picking up the framing I had previously dropped off.  I called on Friday and she was just putting the backs on them so I went over first thing Saturday morning to pick them up.  I am so pleased with how both pieces turned out!!!

Close-up of the frame
Love this moulding!!

Harriette Coe is in the same frame, just a redder tone.  Both of these will be residing at my LNS for a while.  I will be picking up One Nation in December since it is for The Hubs for Christmas but leaving it at the shop until then ensures he won't see it until he's supposed to!!  He likes to peek!
  Well, I don't know why IH&SWeekend never seems to go like I plan but this one was certainly true to form.  At the time I signed up, I didn't have a thing on my calendar but by the time it rolled around I was up to my eyeballs in other things I needed to do.  I didn't get to stitch as much as I would have liked but that seems to be a recurring theme so I won't dwell on it.
   I managed to get that last line of verse in on Ann Bowers.  Yeah!!!!!  This is the last 4 lines of this section and I think you can read it pretty well.  I was a little worried about the method I was using to stitch it but if you're not looking at it with a magnifier, I think it's okay.
  

So, this is where I am now and the end is in sight!  I do have 2 more rows of over one verse to stitch but after what I just finished, it should be a piece of cake!!  And after the over one, that 45 ct over 2 is looking like burlap!!  Not really but it is a lot easier to work on than I remember.

   So, for the IH&SW report, I stitched the last row of over one verse above and I started one of those fall pieces that had been calling my name.  Not much to look at yet but I promise, you're going to love it next time.  I confess to taking liberties with the colors, again!!

Butternut Tavern Sampler Pinkeep
by Stacy Nash
40 ct Lakeside Maritime white
with GASTs

Well,  that's all I have for now.  Hope you're enjoying your stitching as much as I am,  Laura

Long Time, Little Stitching

  I find it hard to believe that it has been so long since I last posted given how little stitching I seem to have gotten done.  When I looked at my calendar, I was surprised that it has been almost 2 weeks since my last post and that we are already past the middle of September!  I would say time flies when you're having fun but I'm not too sure that has been the case.  In fact, I'm not sure exactly what I have been doing for the last 2 weeks!!
  I have been working slowly but surely on the verse on Ann Bowers.  It is such slow going that I can spend an entire baseball game and only manage to get in one line of verse!! I had bemoaned the idea that it would take me a whole week to get that first section completed  if I could only stitch a line a day but there have been some days I couldn't get to it at all so it still isn't finished.  But, even though it is tedious as all hell,  I think it's beautiful!

Ann Bowers by The Examplarery
45 ct. Italian Linen
DMC threads

One more line of verse here and then I can roll it to the next section!!  That makes me smile but under that large band you see at the bottom of this picture, 2 more lines of over one verse awaits!!!
   This past weekend we put on a workshop at my local sampler guild, Tidewater Sampler Guild.  We hosted a relatively new designer who is, like Betsy Morgan, out of the Loudon Samper Guild in northern Virginia. This is my second time in one of her workshops and we had a wonderful time!!!!
   I took both of the classes she taught as well as the Sunday project, which was our regular meeting, and each was more challenging than the next!!  The first was a lovely Quaker design stitched on a piece of joined linen.  The joining was, of course, the objective of the class and although the technique is pretty simple, the act is very tedious and challenging.  Needless to say, my linen is not yet joined but it is such a pretty sampler I hope to get it done soon!!

Red and Gold Sampler
by Pamela Darney of Guildhouse Samplers
32 ct. Weeks linen w/Gloriana threads

  The 2nd class was a PA German sampler.  We were given a black and white photo of her model and were to select our own colors and linen for our own project.  Seventeen colors, I think, and all to be used somewhere in the piece!!  Talk about a challenge!!!

 I have  started with someones color palette and made changes to suit myself before but having to come up with all the colors on my own was a little daunting to say the least!  But she had brought hanks of different colors that we had a big throw down with on our selected linen and it was such a blast!!!  Totally worth it just for that part, even if I never manage to finish the sampler.  Which I better since we are supposed to meet in a year so we can see what we all did!
   The Sunday project was like the class above but one step farther.  It was called Variation on a Quaker Diamond and it was all wide open!  Choose your linen, number of diamonds in your piece, motifs in the diamonds, colors of motifs,  my head is still spinning!!!  My plan is to do them in the order that I took them, learning each lesson and adding to it as I move to the next.  Hopefully, it will feel less overwhelming by the time I reach the last one.  Which assumes  brain doesn't explode before I get to the last project!!!
   I have also managed to get a start on the last birthday piece I need to stitch for this year but I can't show it yet since the recipient reads my blog.  I wouldn't want to spoil the surprise!!
   It is IH&SW this weekend and I have really been looking forward to that!  Gives me an excuse to stitch all weekend and not feel guilty about it!!  My calendar has become crazy lately and I could use some guilt free stitching time.  I am also feeling the tug of Fall stitching so I think I may have to give in to that urge this weekend.  I have some things kitted and ready to go that I never got around  to last year and it would be very easy to get those underway.  And since they are small, I could, in theory, have some finishes in short order. Fingers crossed!!

Hope you're enjoying your stitching as much as I am,  Laura

The Happy Dance Continues

    After throwing the rotation out the window and much 'nose to the grindstone' stitching on just this one piece, I finished Summer at Hollyberry Farm on Monday!!! Yeah!!!  There were many color changes and adjustments made but I am very happy with the outcome and I will be getting it to the framer asap!!!

I've  been working on Randje per Week a little too, not up to the 10 rows I usually do before posting an update but getting there!  

   I know I said I was going to go back to Dorothy after finishing SaHF but Ann Bowers has been calling loudly from her perch on the bookcase and I just had to get back to her.  The over 1 verse on 45 ct. is going VERY slowly but it won't go any faster by not working on it at all!!

I am working the verse in a combination of tent and cross over one, to try to avoid overcrowding but to also get adequate coverage.  It seems to working out okay so far.
  I have Ann on the list to finish this year so I think I am going to work on her until she is finished now.  There are six rows of verse in this section and when I roll it, there are is another whole section of verse (not sure how many rows, don't want to look!!) to be done before the grand finale. It is too close to put away again though so I will push through if I can.
  Dorothy is also on the list to finish this year too and I intend to get her done.  I have one last October birthday gift to stitch but I don't think that will keep me from getting Dorothy wrapped up within my deadline. That floral area is half of the sampler but it's mostly cross stitch so should go quickly once I get back to her.
    I am very happy with how closely I have managed to adhere to my list this year! When I did stray, I still found a way to work things off my list too!  Some of my friends have laughed at me for making that list every year but it keeps me focused and seems to get a good number of those UFOs onto the other list I keep of finishes for the year.  My list is growing and since it is only September, I hope to add a few more finishes to the list by the end of the year!

Hope you are enjoying your stitching as much as I am,  Laura