Vintage puppy embroideries

My brain power has seriously decreased, therefore my stitching output is almost at a complete halt. My priorities included getting the baby's room done and decorated. Other than cleaning up some general clutter, I am finished with this room. Whew! And with five weeks to spare! So I give you the baby's room, with finished puppy number 3. I'm also showing some of the other items used to decorate this room, most of which were made by friends or relatives.

PS: Sorry for the terrible photos. I had to use an old point-and-shoot because I still do not have the proper lens to do short range shots on my Nikon. Aw well.

This was part of a tea towel set of iron-on patterns. Picked it up at Hobby Lobby and cut out the day of the week text. I put him on an 8 x 10 inch canvas with a blue gingham ribbon to hang. I also used pink and blue gingham bow to fill in some space at the bottom. In my scramble to finish this today, I didn't center the pattern as well as I would have liked.

Here are all three together, above the baby's dresser. I used the 3M removable, plastic hooks instead of nails.

The three pieces hanging on the left are pieces that my mother embroidered for me when I was a child. Guess the desire to stitch runs in the family! You can also see two handmade quilts on the chair. The red one is comprised of more vintage puppies and was sent to me by the lovely Pam!

Another view of those above mentioned pieces.

This is a terrible photo but it's so hard to get a nice shot with the dark paint and bright colors. These decals were about $10 off Amazon and you can re-position them. I like that they are an inexpensive, fun way to add color to a kid's room. After all, who knows what the child's taste will be in a few years?

Finally, this is the crib and changing table. I ran the decals over the crib to add more color. (I intentionally blanked out the name on the name plate. We'll announce that to everyone in about 5 weeks!) I purchased that handmade item off Etsy. The blanket in the crib was handmade by a friend.

So that's about it for now! I have a couple more things I'd like to cross stitch before the kiddo arrives but who knows what will happen. I can always try though right? Have a great day! Tschus. :)

Pups and bugs!

My friend's baby shower is over so I can post this!

This only took about two weeks for me to stitch on and off. My friend loves her Boston Terrier and she also recently added a bee hive to her property. I used three patterns to create this for her on a baby towel.

She is due a few weeks before I am so it has been really helpful to trade stories with her. It's nice to know someone else who is going through this along with me! I was really happy to be able to attend her shower and give her this personalized gift. Hope you all like it too!

Halloween stitches!

Wow it's been about a month and no posts! What have I been doing?

I decided to switch gears and get ready for fall, whether or not the weather would cooperate with my mood. Just as the heat wave broke I was able to finally put up two pieces that I think are really cute.

Both patterns are from The Stitcherhood and you can find her website here. Her designs are really cute and she has some free patterns there for Halloween, which is where I got these. I am thinking of buying some from her though because they are really fun and easy to put together.

I chose to put both of them on 14-count, oatmeal colored Aida fabric. The cemetery one I modified slightly from the original because I messed up some of the spacing in the design. I think it works though!

Now that the baby's room is painted, I can see how things will go on the wall. Next up is one more puppy to fill some space. I'm going to make this one to fit a 8 x 10 inch canvas and then flank it with the two 6 x 9 inch canvases.

I hope to make a bunting for one of the walls too but we'll see if I ever master my sewing machine!

Until next time, tschus.

Another puppy!

I keep going back and forth between the silly and gross and the cute. I did another puppy for the baby's room. I'm not sure how much more to do so I might wait until we get the room painted and set up before I do much else.

By the way, any good ways to hang things by ribbon without putting a nail in the wall? Seems a shame to get the room all nice and painted and then put holes in the walls. Also I'd like the flexibility to rearrange the art work over time. I know there are non-permanent sticky hooks (for lack of a better description) but they are kind of large. Maybe there are smaller versions?

So here is the Scotty dog, looking all prim and proper. Again, I got this from French Knots.





I wish I hadn't continued the thread near his neck but oh well. I still like this little guy!

So there ya go! I finished the stitching a while ago but finally got off my lazy behind to stretch it over the canvas. I think the next project will be another humorous piece using an established pattern.

Stay tuned!

Tschus.

Fapping Meme

WARNING: The following depicts masturbation humor.

My husband loves Failblog and even more, he loves the Meme page on it. I had to laugh at one of them and promised to stitch it for him. Before I post pics, you can find the meme stuff here. It's fun to do something kind of gross and silly.

Note to self, work on embroidering words.

I present to you, the fapping meme.

He's taking it to work, by the way. Good thing it's a small company.

Hope your days are cool, calm and full of humor!! Tschus!

The Sinister Stitch Chronicles

My friend Victoria Crowder Payne has launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund her work and upcoming exhibit called The Sinister Stitch Chronicles. I can't describe it as well as Victoria has, so here is a summary from her Kickstarter page!

"Sinister Stitch is a mixed media embroidery project composed of two parts: the Exhibit (which will debut in October 2011) and the Chronicles (airing July through November 2011, with the feature film compiled at year's end)."

The exhibit will be "a mixed media embroidered collection consisting of 13 ancient poisonous botanicals anchored by a central personification of the Mandrake Root’s fabled consort: the Womandrake.  (Additionally, the Sinister Stitch poisons are Monkshood, Wolfsbane, Foxglove, Poets Narcissus, Black Hellebore, Snakeroot, Moonseed, Angel’s Trumpet, Rosary Pea, Hemlock, and Oleander.)" I love that she is using dangerous, beautiful plants and humanizing them. It's like a modern day fairy tale.

And the second part of her campaign is the documentary/webcasts: "The Sinister Stitch Chronicles include the web-casts beginning July 2011 that detail creating the exhibit and the documentary film project (scheduled for release in December 2011)."

Please jump on over to the Kickstarter page to read more about how to donate and get involved!

And here is one of the episodes available on Youtube. Victoria was so kind as to include a couple of my little pieces along with our other amazing, talented friends to illustrate different types of embroidery.



I love this episode so much because you can see the artist in her space, how she organizes herself, her beautiful family around her lending hands and paws to the project and just get a feel for who she is as a person. Her first episode was amazing as it described her inspiration for this project. I am a big believer in the subconscious influencing us, especially in our art. I've woken up in the middle of the night and connected an image to a feeling that I wanted to express in my embroidery. Those instances have always pushed me out of my creative blocks and the feeling when it happens is so very cool.

To get up to date news on this project with even more details, photos and inspiration, please see Victoria's blog here.

I hope you will take the time to get to know Victoria and her awesome art work. I am so excited to see this in person in the fall! Good luck Vic!!

Current faves

I've enjoyed visiting my mail box lately. No, not bills. Who enjoys those? However my mailbox has been regurgitating some lovely things I've purchased or been fortunate enough to be gifted as of late. Take a peek!

I was given these by a friend: a screen print baby onesie along with an adult zombie book cleverly disguised as a children's book. I love it!



Check out her Etsy store and see the other awesome things she makes!

This is a whimsical, clever brooch my friend Bascom made for me!



It makes me smile! Kind of reminds me of the ancient fish that decided it wanted to stop eating in the water and live on land. So it grew legs. This fish looks like it's got a great idea and gearing up to start walking! Smart little bastard.

Finally, here is a quilt I bought for the baby's room. I think it will fit our crib nicely.





You can find this gal's store on Etsy as well!

I love the happy dogs and the colors. There were a lot of puppy quilts on Etsy but I was in love with another quilt with the same kind of fabric and color, however the seller raised the price before I could purchase it. This quilt fit my budget and I will purchase a blue dust ruffle for the crib and a breatheable bumper in blue also. We're thinking chocolate brown for the walls and then all the handmade goodies we can make and find for decoration. I don't care if things don't match. It's almost better if they don't because then the baby will have tons of colors to look at all the time!

These are my favorite handmade things right now. What is on your list currently?