Happy 4th of July!

Hello out there...hope everyone is enjoying a nice summer. We've been having a heat wave here in the Southwest but that's normal for June.   We finally got some rain last night to cool things down a bit hopefully for the weekend.

I'm so happy to report that a couple weeks ago I finished stitching my Fruit Bellpull by Teresa Wentzler!  This old UFO was a big monkey on my back and I'm glad it's finally done as I started it over 10 years ago.  It sat for years without any work being done but I got it out earlier this year and finished off 2 more blocks.  The pattern has 6 fruit blocks but I just picked 4 to do and that's enough.  I just need to get some bellpull hardware and sew it up one of these days.

It's so hard sometimes to choose what to stitch when there is so much you love and have in your stash!  My list seems to be a mile long of things I want to stitch.    I recently stitched this little free design from Threadworks Primitive and I made it into a needle/scissor case.  I'm happy with how it turned out!  

"Dutch Tulip" freebie by Threadworks Primitive

And speaking of finishing, below are some photos of what I did with one of the Little House Needlework ornament patterns.  A dear friend gave me this wooden spindle from Bloom Woodworks. It's a great way to display small pieces. I sew a little sleeve on the backing fabric before I put it all together and that holds it on the spindle.    I have so much Christmas stuff but I just can't stop making more! 

"Season's Greetings" from Little House Needleworks

I'm doing an SAL with a cyber-friend and it's going well.  This sampler is from the Blackbird Designs "Joyeux Noel" book. I've wanted to stitch this sampler for years so I'm glad to finally get it done . I just have the bottom part and border to finish.  I changed a lot on this sampler.....I substituted several of the colors and as I went along I stopped following the colors on the chart and just made things whatever color I wanted.  The book says this was charted from an antique sampler and there were lots of missing letters, letters out of sequence, etc.  I added in some of the missing letters and corrected the letter sequence...I just can't leave things alone but I cause  myself a lot of extra work!  Here's my progress:

The list of things needing framing is starting to get too much on it again....framing costs are so high. I like to get museum glass on my pieces and it's so expensive.  Also....I've been stitching for almost 40 years and I have about 60 framed pieces!  Not all of them are on display because many are seasonal or holiday pieces but what am I going to do with all of this?!?!    I'm not going to have room to keep adding to the collection constantly so I try to figure out other things to do with some of the finished pieces.   My DH and I are planning to downsize to a smaller home over the next year also so I have to keep that in mind too.   Not to mention all the quilts I have too - good thing I only have 2 hobbies!!