Sharing the girls

 Hi everyone.  My day is a gloomy, dark, rainy one, but as long as I'm here to complain about it, it's a good day.   Hope yours is also.

I got Elizabeth Clayton's threads onto the drops and cut my tunic top along with the loops because I had the floss in my lap.  I also wasn't paying attention and folded the length to create the pull through loop, and cut it.  Hey!  It was a loop!  So all in all, high gear of crabassiness.  (I have not found a spelling check in the new format so crabassiness stays.)  I pulled Winter Brew in 36 count, and started.  But I can't see well enough.  I just did the Gigi R design on the same fabric!  Seeing the eye doctor again tomorrow.

Once Ann's threads are on the drops, I will make an effort to begin her border.  Mary will be done on a lower count linen and her border is freehand after the body is completed.  But I want to start her also.  Never before have I worked on more than one, but I can't make up my mind and am tired of waiting for the gumption to begin.

I will list the bag tomorrow but today I am offering Kathy Barrick's Stitching Girls.  

My version is with a simplified dress, very abbreviated from the original, and I am finished with the chart.  If you are interested in this offer, comment on this post with your initials or contact info (email is OK also).  If more than one request, I will draw a name Thursday evening around .... oh wait.  Supernatural is on at 8 so let's make it 7 pm.

Why can't we align photos next to each other anymore?

Petey is still scratching and swatting me right after he rubs his head on my hand and arm.  I'm not going to waste another flea med vial since he bolts, instead, I will use a spray.  But not spray it.  I poured some into a small glass and have a dropper handy.  When he is busy eating and I see the tick on him I hope to land a direct drop on it.  Best I can do.

Have a good day!!

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Next step

Put the floss onto thread drops, 

add to separate floss stands, 

gently nudge linens to the shade I prefer, 

and suck it up.

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Where's the pumpkin?

 I keep missing the new canned pumpkin stock, which may be a good thing.  Otherwise, my piehole would be filled.  Trying to cut down on calories and fat, I usually put the filling in a casserole dish and bake crustless.  

These green tomatoes are the last of summer's bounty, love the color, frying this afternoon.

We went for a ride yesterday and the sun was making the colored leaves sparkle.  But a beautiful day with colored scenery doesn't change the fact that summer is over and I'm ticked.  We stopped at Apple Castle in New Wilmington and the fields around the store were filled with cars.  The hay wagon was giving rides through pumpkin patches, people were picking their own apples from acres of trees.  We passed but on the return spotted a parking space so ventured into the crowds inside.  I bought an orange cauliflower (their produce is all local) and my goodness it is great.  The taste is as if it was smothered with butter, very very good.  I hope to get another this week.  Down the road off a very narrow and dusty lane, an Amish farm was selling pumpkins of any size for THREE DOLLARS.  There were many so large that a dolly was handy for transporting to your car.  My inside decorating amounts to the huge wooden bowl filled with large gourds and my twig tree.  Pumpkinhead is still guarding my unframed samplers.

I haven't decided on fabric for the drum, the brown matches the basket perfectly, but I do like the muted red.  Probably not the best choice for a drum though, better for backing.

Some of us are already into cold weather habits.

I will be offering this frame tote in a day or so if anyone is interested.  Not sure if Facebook groups would be a better place, but I am not that experienced with the site.  The new format showed me messages that were sent a year ago, never saw.  Very nicely made with gusseted bottom and fully lined, 24" high and 16" wide (flat).  

Hope your weekend is peaceful!

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Being left out

 Hello stitching buds.  First off, if anyone has spotted PTP Vellum 36 or 40 in a shop, please send me the name so I can call them.   Thanks much.

Has anyone decided that a border was not necessary and finished a sampler without it?  Have I considered it?  Yep.  I'm trying to decide the next project and chose a few medium sized and several large that I have been avoiding for some time.  The Sarah Needham border is too magnificent to ignore, but what about Ann Spence's?  Ann's is the style that I dislike most, not in appearance, but in execution.  The sampler is mostly motifs (which I usually have issues with) but I do want to stitch her.  So how about working on smaller and easier projects between stitching the borders of a few big girls?  If they're completed, maybe I would be less reluctant to start them.  But do you think it's better to work borders as the body is stitched, easier to keep aligned?  Unless the body is off and all of my mostly motif samplers are.  Stitching the bottom first and working up each side would be my choice, with a horizontal basting line every 30 threads.  I am considering this for Ann, Sarah, and Mary Barres and weighing the good and bad of this idea.

The pin was removed this morning.  He had no choice since there is infection, which is why it's been so painful.  Antibiotics causing diarrhea and a yeast infection coming up! 

My gorgeous fern still growing like mad.  The orange mums I purchased?  All five are dark maroon.

Hope your week is going well.  Thanks for visiting.

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Finished

 All the little floaters (that's what I call motifs in mid air) were not stitched.  I actually prefer this without them.  They aren't really distracting in the model because of the light linen but on this Dolphin they are quite noticeable and there were many more to stitch than the few that I did include.  But also, my dryness has been so bad I can't focus even with the magnifier and darker fabric is extremely difficult.  So I'm done. 

It fits perfectly in my little recessed shaker box lid, but I think I would prefer a drum finish.  The color of the box stain against this color linen is not very pleasing to me.  And we all know the crabass must be pleased.

The cream linen for the needle roll won't be shipped for a while.

I ended my subsctiption to A Simple Life magazine a few years ago but searched for the 2020 Christmas issue which features the Primitives in Pine house and the sneak peek looks really nice.  They are ending publication with the Winter 2021 issue.   I found it on a site that charges 9.95 for shipping.  Really?  No thanks.  I purchased it on Ebay and can't wait for delivery. 

I've decided to tell my doctor Thursday that I want the pin removed and out of the boot.  My toe is so painful to the touch (I am hoping that's because of the pin) and since I have been limping around since May, it's time to give in.  That afternoon I am taking Carole for her mammogram, it's also her birthday.  

Mid October.  WHAT??

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My favorite little tool

 The Dritz sewing gauge is used on so many of my projects for a variety of reasons, and is critical to me when mounting needlework.  Whether laid flat, on edge, upside down, it makes the task much easier.

I should have been finished with this but it was a bad eye weekend.

Happy Monday!

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