Saturday, April 12, 2008

Getting my last stitching & sewing in for a bit.....

Tuesday I get my shoulder operated on so wanted to post what I've been doing lately. I won't be able to do too much for awhile depending on the extent of the surgery. I made this bag this week from a kit I picked up at a quilt show in January. The pattern is "Charm Party Tote" by Penny Sturgis. I just love it - the pattern was written so you could use the charm packs everyone is selling these days but of course you can cut your own squares just as well. It was fun to do - I did it all except the buttons last Saturday. I'm a big fan of pink and love the combination of colors and prints that were in the kit. It has a quilted lining and 2 nice inside pockets. For those of you still having a bit of winter, maybe the flowers will cheer you up a bit - we are having wonderful weather - today was breezy and about 80 I'm guessing. We're enjoying the last of "spring" as it starts to get hot sometime in May.


I also picked up a UFO the past 2 weeks to work on. This is "Sampler Gameboard" by The Drawn Thread.

I probably shouldn't say this....but.....this was my project from an RR a couple years ago - I only really had the bottom 2 rows of the gameboard to finish when it came back to me. HOWEVER........once I got it out to take a good look at it, I was dismayed about the quality of some of the stitching. Mind you, most of the piece is looking great, it was mostly one row that had a lot of problems and a few other spots here and there that needed a touch-up. I don't expect things to be perfect but I just could not leave in some of what I found - I'm talking knots, totally wonky stitches, missed threads, going over too many threads, I even found sections where the stitcher must have used the wrong color and then decided to just stitch over it in the correct color so there were 2 layers of stitching! Now I can see doing this for a random stitch or two but I'm talking about areas that were like 1" square. I plan to have this framed and just could not have lived with it like that. So I have been frogging like you wouldn't believe. The problem areas are very hard to take out because of all the problems - I just keep snipping and pulling and snipping and pulling....... I am down to the last square on the row I'm removing - it's actually not too bad and could probably stay in, but since I already removed the rest of the row I might as well be consistent. I will be re-stitching that whole row and I also already fixed up several other problems. I don't know....I've had some good RR's and some not so good. It seems like so many times there is some kind of issue with someone dropping out and not communicating, keeping people's projects, taking forever to do their parts (like 8 months for a few evenings of stitching!), doing poor quality work, etc. I have no problem if someone needs to drop out for personal reasons, everybody has things that happen in their lives that are unexpected. But just tell the group and mail the pieces back - that's all that is required. I have been in groups where we begged, begged, and begged some more to get pieces back. It's really frustrating. I just can't understand why anyone would treat a fellow stitcher or quilter that way. Anyway, at least I'm finally getting this done. I always did love this pattern and look forward to completing it and having it framed and hanging by the end of the year. The little blocks really go along pretty quickly.

I made a quick trip to the LNS this week to pick up the latest Loose Feathers pattern and a few others of course! I bought this nice scrap bag - I've had one for years but when I saw this one made out of the Moda sampler fabric and in a color I like, I just had to have it.


I also picked up a pattern from my wishlist called "Peaceful Garden" from The Stitching Parlor. I love the medieval look of this piece and especially the castle. I noticed after bringing it home that it uses 48 skeins of Crescent Colors over-dyed floss. Yikes!! I'll have to think about whether I want to invest that much in cotton floss or perhaps just convert to silks. However, the overdyes look really nice in the picture (of course!).

I'm happily anticipating the season premiere of "Deadliest Catch" on Discovery next week. That's the show about Alaskan crab fishing. To me it's amazing anyone can do that job - makes me less likely to whine about my own! I watch a lot of shows on Discovery and A&E. Now if '24' would just hurry up and come back on - can't believe we have to wait until January. I don't really watch very many TV shows so I really miss my favorites when they're not on.

Closing with a couple pictures of my 'kids' out playing in the yard today. Abby is the little one and Buster is the Sheltie. Thanks for stopping by my little world. :)




11 comments:

  1. Good luck with your shoulder surgery. I will send good thoughts for great success and a smooth recovery!

    I wondered why there was almost an entire row missing from your the Gameboard but when I read further, you explained it. What a shame that you had to do so much frogging. I have seen a friend's RR that was an awful mess when it was returned to her, its hard to believe some people can make such a mess with stitching X's. But I would much rather get one back than have it lost completely, that's heartbreaking.

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  2. Good Luck with your surgery and a super fast recovery. That's too bad on the mess on the RR Gameboard, hope you get it all straightened out.
    Love the Peaceful Garden, I will have to look that one up,lol.

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  3. Hi Jeanne - wishing you well with your surgery and prayers for a speedy recovery.

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  4. Recover well! We want you healed fast and perfectly.

    I'm so sorry to hear about your RR issues. Wow. It's unbelievable.

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  5. Your tote is beautiful! I too am a quilter/cross stitcher and love all of the "bag" patterns out these days.
    How terrible that the stitcher did not take the time do do "quality" stitching on your gameboard piece, that is just not fair and I can't understand why people do that! I have only had good luck with RR, thankfully!

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  6. Good luck with your surgery. That's a cute tote you made.

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  7. Anonymous9:31 PM

    Your scrap bag is absolutely wonderful. Best of luck with your surgery and recovery. Hope it doesn't interfer with your stitching for too long.

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  8. Wondering how you are feeling post-operation ... how's the shoulder?

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  9. Good luck with your recovery from surgery.
    Your garden is looking pretty

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  10. Anonymous8:09 AM

    I just found your blog and was so appalled to hear about the trouble you had with your RR. It seems to me that if a stitcher knows their skills might be sub-par or their stitching inferior (come now, we all have some idea), they might think about refraining from signing up! On a brighter note, I love your stitchy/ort bag! Can you tell me where to get one? brdstitcher at gmail dot com

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  11. Sorry to hear that you had trouble with your rr. Some nice stitchy treasures on your post. We are avid fans of 24 too and have been watching the full set on dvd. xx

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