Fall House Exchange

My partner Ulla has received her Fall House exchange finally so it's okay for me to post it now. This is a pattern from The Drawn Thread, made into a flatfold. I like how it came out and Ulla says she likes it so that makes me happy. I was in a hurry to finish it up the night I took the pictures and you can see my glue hasn't even dried yet! It had to go all the way from Arizona to Finland and it took 3 weeks to get there. I'm just thankful it wasn't lost.


And here is the exchange I received from Suzanne - isn't it cute? It's my very first pinkeep to call my own. I'd love to have a basketful like some of you but I guess it's going to be awhile especially with my slow stitching.

Halloween is almost here - I have all my Halloween decorations out to enjoy and the candy is ready for the little munchkins when they come trick-or-treating. We always sit on our front porch and hand out the treats to prevent the kids from ringing the doorbell all evening and making the dogs go crazy.

I had to spend some time last evening straightening up the stitching room. Between birthday gifts, stash shopping etc things were literally piling up. We spent 4 days last weekend in the Chicago area for a family function. The weather was absolutely gorgeous. Thanks to a tip from a fellow stitcher, I visited a needlework shop in Orland Park called The Country Cupboard. What a cute shop it was! I loved it and helped myself to some new stash of course. I love visiting other shops and seeing different models and patterns. One of the patterns I picked up was "Prancer" from Nora Corbett - I had seen her reindeer patterns before but until I saw one actually stitched up I was able to resist them. They really are cute though, I love all the beads and sparkles on them. I also visited 3 Chicago-area quilt shops. I had a blast but will come down to earth when the credit card bill arrives! Sorry for the poor picture, I'm having camera issues.

I have been trying to put some thought into my neighborhood I'll be starting in January. I decided to do a Jane Austen neighborhood but I'm running into a few issues. Some of the house patterns I hoped to include are just too large so I'm going to have to swap out for smaller house patterns and I think I will just focus just on "Pride & Prejudice". Otherwise I'll end up with something so huge I'd never afford to frame it. I'm realizing I have no desire to be a designer - I'd rather stitch anytime and let someone else do that part!