Stitcher's Angel Needle Book

I finished my send gift to send my Stitcher's Angel recipient last night. I finished up this needle book.

I have an idea about my 3rd gift, just need an opportunity to make it.

Canning Season

This is what has been occupying a lot of my spare time recently. I started out making bread and butter pickles which we love. I gave part of them away when my family was here for the wedding in August.











I also made grape jelly from our grapes and gave a lot of these away in August when family was here for the wedding. My brother especially loves grape jelly.












Then my friend Jan, showed some pictures on her blog of some dill pickles they had made, and kindly shared their recipe with me. These are just delicious. I could barely wait for their curing time to dig into them! I am worried about running out of these, I think I am going to have to make another batch!
















And lastly, Allie shared her recipe for corn relish which I made last week. I still want to make labels for the lids, so these are still sitting on my counter. I haven't tasted this yet, but I know I am going to set this out at Thanksgiving.

Self-Portrait Blog Challenge

I recently participated in Marilyn's blog challenge. We had to create a 8 x 10 collage using
a picture of ourselves as a child. This was mine
finished project.

I used a combination of elements on Photoshop Elements, added some digital effects, did some stamping, and paper collage, and spritzed a paper doily with some color.

Stitcher's Angel Needlework Bag

I have just completed my first project for my Stitcher's Angel recipient. This is a needlework bag, and this is the outside.
I started this right after I signed up for the Stitcher's Angel project.


















This is the inside of the bag showing the various pockets, and pin cushion.
















This is one of the pockets on the outside of the bag, and even has a place to hook your scissors.














This is the bag all rolled up and tied.

















This needlework bag was a pattern I have made before, by Pat Sloan.

Giveaway at Retro Cafe

I just found out that Retro Cafe is offering this digital sheet giveaway:

I hope to have something creative to show tomorrow. The past few weeks I seem to have lost my creative muse, and can't seem to find it. I did do one paper type collage-swap using a baby picture of mine, which I will share later.

I have tons, and tons, and tons of things to do before November, and I hope I find my creative muse in the next couple of days.

TIF-August, TAST

I am still trying to catch up on my challenges. I finished the one for August last night.
Sharon's TIF challenge for August was about balance, what balance is to you, whether you maintain a balanced life, and how you balance aspects of your life.

This was the color scheme:




I have to say, that most of the time I maintain a balanced life, I am able to keep a lot of things
going at the same time. I was doing really well before our daughter's wedding, I was getting a lot of things done, getting ready for the wedding, working, and doing some projects too. Then I just sort of lost my balance. We had our granddaughter's birthday the week after that, for which I made her some gifts. We had our daughter's (the bride's) birthday the week after that. I had some computer issues (which I work on most of the day) which I got straightened out, but it took awhile. I had some Photoshop Element issues which I finally got straightened out, and some printer/scanner issues which I gout straightened out, but these all took time, and in the evening
I did not feel like doing anything creative.


This is my piece for August, representing me trying to keep all the portions of my life in balance. I think I have it back again and am trying to get caught up. The colors really matched the color scheme, although it doesn't show up very well on this photo.
'
Also for the Take a Stitch Tuesday, the balls were done using the barred chain stitch, and alternating barred chain.

TIF-JULY, Sticher's Angel

With our daughter's wedding in August, and preparations for that, time sort of got away from me
for July, although I did get my block pieced. Sharon's concept for July was "half", "way", "mark". I thought long and hard about that, but could not come up with anything to do with it.
I instead just pieced my block using the color scheme.





I am going to use this stitchery to make a needlecase for my
Stitcher's Angel recipient. I hope to get this made up in the next day or two.

KARRIN'S UGLY BLOCK

My "ugly block" is heading off today for a round robin with my small group of friends, Susan, Gail, and Moira.

I probably made this block more than 7 or 8 years ago, and it was sent off on another round robin with another crazy quilting group. This was how it came back home, with not too much done, and it has been in a pile of UFOs since. I added the piece of lace last night, but I am hoping my dear friends can help me "pretty up" this ugly block. It needs some major help! I have a lot going on right now, swaps, etc, and didn't have the time to make a new block.

N2G-CQI GRASSHOPPERS

Another long interval between posting, unintentionally. I use my computer to do my transcription all day, and have been having some issues. I installed some new memory. That was quick, and went well. My copy of Photoshop Elements that I use to crop my photos and do various things had problems. I have a lot of add-ons, and I needed to reinstall it, and add all my add-ons back in, which took about a week. Then my printer/scanner had problems, (it kept saying my scanner was not hooked up, but the printer worked fine). So finally got that problem taken care of. I have had pictures to share, but had not had time to share or blog, trying to take care of all the other issues. Hopefully all is OK now.



Back in February, I sent this block I made off in my round robin group in the Crazy Quilting International Group. We were all new to the group so we participated in this round robin. This is how my naked block looked when I sent it off around the world. This was my cottage garden block. The little cottage I had originally painted as a watercolor for my mom, I scanned the image and printed it on silk fabric and added it to this block.





This was what my block looked like when it came back to me the end of July. I am thrilled with the results! My heartfelt thanks to my fellow members of this round robin:

Virginia from Spain
Kari from Maryland
Sandi from Washington
Carol from Florida
Sherry from Minnesota.

TIF MAY, JUNE

I just realized, I never posted pictures of my finished projects for May and June TIF. I am trying to get caught up after the excitement and preparation of the wedding this past Sunday.

Last week, I gave away the project I had finished for TIF May, an eyeglass case as a play it forward gift on my blog.

I had intended to give this to my sister for her birthday,
but I decided the June colors were more of my sisters colors, so I gave this one away.








This was the TIF color scheme for June, and this I also made up into an eyeglass case. My sister loved this when I gave it to her for her birthday this past weekend.

I still have July's to stitch, and August's colors to put together.

WEDDING PHOTOS

I have a few photos of the wedding to share. These were taken by the grooms mother/family and they gave Katie the photos on a disc the day
after the wedding which she let me copy. But the images were set at 50" and I needed to scale them down, which I finally got a chance to do this morning.

Katie's sister Kristen is the maid of honor and standing behind her.
























We were getting photos taken by the photographer and by families at the same time.

DH John doesn't usually smile for any photos. He is looking good in a suit he hasn't been about to wear for awhile.

He lost around 18 pounds, and I had lost 27 before the wedding.






This is Kristen's youngest, Keaton, who will be 2 in October. When the music started, he was out dancing every dance, especially the fast ones. Keaton and older brother Jaeger were both out on the floor dancing with Kristen to La Bamba, it was the cutest thing. Jaeger has all the fancy foot movements, like Papa John used to be able to do. But Keaton consistently was dancing every dance.

I can't wait to see what kind of photos the photographer has.

A Couple of Giveaways

Sorry I have been away so much recently. Our youngest daughter was married yesterday. Had been concentrating on getting the yard, house and food ready for that celebration. The wedding was held in Victorian house in the older part of town, and went off pretty well. It was held in the gazebo. DH told me that DD went through a box of Kleenex before he brought her down theaisle. The bridesmaids came out, and I looked at matron of honor, DD1 and she had tears in her eyes, and I got teary, with no Kleenex. I was able to lose 27 pounds before the wedding and got a wonderful dress. It was a great day, and a great weekend visiting with family and friends. The last of the company went home yesterday, so DH and I have the house back to ourselves.

Hope to get stitching this afternoon after work. I plan to take my stack of beads, theads and everything else where it usually resides by my comfy chair and get stitching again. Also have some sewing to do in my sewing room for granddaughter Kyleigh's BD on Sunday. She wanted me to embroider some motifs on a couple of more hooded sweatshirts. I also plan to make her a dress or maybe 2.

This morning, came across a couple of giveaways:

Candace is celebrating her 100th post with a giveaway.

Lise is celebrating her 100th post giveaway.

Cheryl at Polkadots & Ric Rac is also having a giveaway celebrating her 1 year blog anniversary.

For Debbie in Maine, the winner

This is for Debbie in Maine, the winner of the eyeglass case:

I have tried contacting you 2 times through both addresses you have given me, and gotten no response. Your comments come right to me no problem, so I know the e-mail address on my blog is OK. Everyone else has gotten through that link with no problem.

I even tried contacting you through your second e-mail address with my alternate e-mail address and no response with that one either. I really don't know what else I can do. I have checked to see if you have been filtered out as spam in my e-mail program, and that is not happening either.

AND THE WINNER IS...

I have been very, very, very busy this week. DDs wedding is 8 days from today. I have done nothing at all stitchy in any way. Been cleaning, and weeding, and everything else. I bought shoes, and a dress.

But wanted to announce the winner of my eyeglass case and it is Debbie in Maine! Congratulations Debbie. I will get that off to you this week.

LOOK WHAT I WON!, GIVEAWAY, 100+ POST

My name was recently pulled in Cathy's Play it Forward contest, and my CQ goodie bag arrived in yesterdays' mail. This is what I received, and there are lot of trims I can use in my CQ. Thanks so much again Cathy, this really made my day!















As part of my own Play it Forward gift, and in celebration of my 100th (actually 104th post), I am offering this eyeglass case I just completed.

If you would like to win, just leave a comment, and I will choose a name next Saturday morning, 8/2/2008.

BRILLANTE WEBLOG AWARD

I have been honored by my friend Rengin with the "Brillante Weblog award, and I appreciate this award being passed on to me.





The rules for receiving this award are:
1. The winner can put the logo on his/her blog.
2. Link to the person you received your award from.
3. Nominate at least 7 other blogs.
4. Put links of those blogs on yours.
5. Leave a message on the blogs of the people you’ve nominated.

At first I had a hard time finding blogs I follow to receive this award, as the ones I checked
have already received it. But the below named blogs are some of my favorite ones.

I would like to award:

Carole

Jan

Karen

Lea

ChookyBlue

Nancy

Mrs. Goodneedle

N2G ROUND ROBIN-KARI'S BLOCK

This is the last month of the Crazy Quilting International "New 2 Group" round robin I have been involved in. This month it was Kari's block I was working on, and I am sending it home to her today. I did these cast-on pink flowers, the feather stitching around the circle, and the pink string-of-pearls stitching on either side of the circle.







This is a picture of the entire block. Kari had a fabulous block to start out with and the other 4 ladies before me have done a gorgeous job.

Stitcher's Angel, Secret Sister

I am joining Helen Stubbings (Hugs and Kisses) Stitching Angel project. If you are interested in joining you can find out more about it here. August 15th is the deadline for signing up. You can even stop by the blog every week for 7 weeks and get a new stitching project if you can't commit to pampering someone else.