Finally Fotos!!! :]

I've been such a long time without updates of my stitching because of the one thing and another that I've whined to you about. So, finally, I have something to show you. Hope you like them...



Let's have Marie's and more Marie's to start this show, want to???? She's always the best....

Above: a very sad pic of a lovely sampler I've just started...."Sarah Siddal" Go see it as a better pictured chart on Scarlet Letter. I've only started the border. I wish you could see the very lovely colors. Not switching these to silks...some things need to just be cotton floss, don't you think??? :)

Below: Shepherd's Bush: "Quaker Heart" I'm stitching this one as a little respite one between all the biggies calling me on my Rotation. It's just so sweet...aren't all of their designs? I happened to have this handmade necklace that matched so well. Focus was off....don't worry, I'm figure it out one of these days!!! :PMore Marie in our future.....

My update on "The Plantation Sampler," along with a necklace I'm making for Jessica (DD), and a gorgeous letter packet I just found of...Marie Antoinette! I'm not sure what could make one sigh more than that with joy. LOL

Testing, testing....amber light on the progress of my "As Days..." Can't really see the progress well, but take my word for the fact that the little critters are there, the tree trunk and branches are there and I'm starting on leaves! I really love the look of this one and keep experimenting with colors as I go.

A fiddlin' around with this camera will be helpful, I can see. This is an update of my "Beatrix Potter Quaker Sampler/Ackworth School" SAL. Did the "no-no" and pressed this and all other pieces, so I could get better pics.... (Are you reading this, Nicole?) I stayed away from my threads while pressing!!! LOL Just pressed the linen. :) I'm continuing to love this color linen, which is Porcelain. It has some very nice blush colored markings in the over-dyeing.

I have a couple of more things to show you, but they have to wait until they're received from friends or posted to our Friendship Sampler sites.

So happy to be able to send some pictures to you. I know the next ones will be better.

Tuesday is my 59th birthday, ya'll!!! LOL Surprise! I think DH and DD (Jessica) have something up their sleeves. My "naughty" children(now all grown up) always have had a "race" on my birthday and special holidays to see who's the first to get a card &/or gift to me....and of course, which "morbid wretch" is the last to have remembered and come through for Mom! LOL They love this competition.

This year, JASON has won the first card to get to mom round!!! Thank you, Jason, Honey....you always said you were the one I could really count on! :]

Also a salute that means my "Stitching Birthday Twin," Barbara of Mainely Stitching will be having her birthday, as well, on June 1st. Happy Birthday, dear Barbara. I hope your package gets to you in time! Fingers crossed.... :)

Have a wonderful weekend everyone. I'm thinking of you, and will be checking in with you on blogs all weekend.

Love and hugs, Deb

PS: Special love and thanks to all of you, my friends, and family who have sent lovely thoughts, greetings by mail and email, phone calls, prayers and gifts this past year. My 58th year was not my best healthwise....now I'm hoping to be past that and going on to better things in my 59th!!

A Poem for You

When my children's Kent Quarterly (from their prep school) came this time, there was this beautiful poem published inside. I was so touched by it, and wanted to share it with you:

If Words Could Save Us

if words could save us (and they can,

my darling) i would whisper in the

chambers of your ears every wistful

sound (like the warblings of the wood

thrush) until (my wren) even the small

boys whose voices are like angels

would cry for more, and you (my swan)

would sigh like the sun setting behind

the ocean floor.

if touch could save us (and it does,

my dove), i would take the wounds

of time and touch them all until the

soul (my sweetness) shines with

all the light of God in the newness

of now. Healing is the only

language of love (my lamb) and

wherever i have touched, the tree

that grows will be blessed (my bliss)

and the fruit of that tree will be

life (my love) the fruit of that tree

will be life.

by Anthony Abbott

Class of '53

Everytime I read it, it just makes me want to cry with a feeling of the love and hope he expresses.

Just wanted to share with you all. Wouldn't even a part of this be wonderful on a sampler?

I want to thank those of you who are faithful friends and who continue to comment despite the fact that I have no pictures recently....camera issues.... :)

Hugs, Deb

Shrub Saga

Thank you all so much for your understanding and empathy about my landscaping disaster. We live in a secluded "gated community" down here in Naples, FL, so the association Board makes the major decisions about our landscaping. That's where all of this issue started, but I'm sure even they never imagined this disaster! I'm betting once they see my neighbor's and my yard, they'll be calling the landscaping company!! Then, we'll be the ugliest homes in the neighborhood....:[ I'm only hoping everything DOES grow back even better than before....or the association will be pulling up stumps and replacing them with new, gorgeous and full plants!!!

End of saga. As DH said to me today from Warsaw, Poland (he's been on a business trip there)just don't think about it or let it upset you anymore...I'll take care of it. Okay.... :P We shall see.

Thread Tip:

This is a tip I received from one of the thread companies years ago when I had my Cabbage Rose Needlework online shop. It applies to hand-dyed threads.

The best way to distribute your thread color and variegations fully around a border is to divide the peices onto 6 different bobbins. Use a strand from each bobbin as you move around the border. You have to cut your threads originally into different sections to do this. And, you may want to use less bobbins... But, this seems to be the way to insure that you get a good stream of color throughout your border.

Gotta go now! Love and hugs, Deb

Woe Is Me!

A garden lover's lament: Yesterday, early afternoon I was on the computer minding my own business when Clara began to bark furiously. This really aggrevates me because I don't like barkey dogs to disturb neighbors... Anyway, I went onto the lanai to fetch the little thing and gasped!! Our home association gardners had literally chopped my flowering shrubs down to sticks!!!

I ran out my front door and was stopped in mid-step....they had just butchered my entry walkway, destroying any privacy and beauty of the entry!! Everything just chopped down to the ground leaving sticks!! (As my BFF said, "So much for the hedge keeping you safe from the Peeping Tom!)

I had just thought to myself, literally that very morning, how lovely and shady and cozy the front walkway was and how much I loved it. And, now I felt as if someone had set fire to my house. :[ I ran after the gardening man and asked what had he done! He said they had found it "too much work," to just keep trimming and manicuring the plantings, so they were cutting them all down...but they would grow back in a few weeks.

You will believe me when I tell you that I said to him, as I stood there with my mouth hanging open and a distressed look on my face, that I could, "beat you (him) with a stick!" There were several sticks available.

My landscaping looks like a disaster zone. I'll post a picture when I can.

Funniest thing is, when I asked him to take out the old flowers they'd planted around the front garden that are now getting brown leaves and scraggly....he said, "Oh, no. Those will come back in the summer!" I could have fallen on the sidewalk!!! :] It was like the Theatre of the Absurd talking to him.....rotten little, dried up pink flowers with browning leaves..... humpf... but cut down to the nub the gorgeous flowering shrubs!

Evidently our whole community can look forward to this disastrous way of landscaping...it is just an eyesore. So, I'm really in shock down here, friends. Pray for my little plot of paradise!!!

Hugs, Deb

PS: Do any of you have: "Strawberry Garden" by Blackbird Designs, or "A Colonial Garden" by Abecedarian, by any chance? I would love to find them, and I have things to trade! I have a few OOP Just Nans, some CHS, lots of Victoria Sampler Designs and a Brightneedle design among

other things. Please email me.....

Odds and Ends

I have my new laptop Dell computer, everyone, and it's RED!!! Whoo whooo! I've been using it, but I have the problem, which I have to get resolved tomorrow, that I am not able to scan and save my pictures like my old computer did so easily. I don't have a memory card camera.

Therefore, all of my progress on my rotation pieces is sadly missing right now. I've really found this rotation method to be helpful, and I never knew it could be!

I was sorting through my stash and found that I have several duplicates of CHS and Blackbird Designs and some oldie/OOP Just Nans. Please contact me through my email if you're interested in a trade or something.

New stash...mostly new stuff from the latest Market. I love the Owl scissors!! I had to have another Zecca fob, too.

Oh, I have to talk to you about Belle Soie threads. Nicole and I recently had a talk about these silks....they are having some issues. I actually talked to Kathy at Golden Needle, Port Charlotte, FL, about them this week. Kathy confirmed that she's been hearing more and more from her customers about the Belle Soie issues. She's calling the designer/owner about it this week....

Here are the issues Nicole and I have identified and some suggestions:

1) The silks are bleeding onto our hands and onto the linen, leaving stains! Yikes!! Here's a suggestion: Pre-rinse all shades of red (including deep pinks, corals, oranges and purples!) and all jewel-like tones to remove any excess dyes that remain loose in the threads.
I know this is a difficult thing to do when you love the color that it is originally...but would you rather have a stain or 3 on your piece if it ever needs to be laundered, or if there's an accident with water spilled or humidity touching it???
The other real sealing factor is to give the threads a salt or vinegar cold bath, too, to set the colors.

2) The silks may tend to snag. Well, this is simply a factor of using silks. For best results, silks should be cut in 12" to 14" lengths. If you cut them or stitch with them any longer than that they will lose their luster and will tend to snag or fuzz up on you. The whole reason for using silks is to get the sheen on your stitched piece! Longer lengths can also tend to tangle. Because of this "rule" you will need to follow a "cut length" method of dealing with your new thread bundle.
If you get a snag, here's how to repair it: grasp the thread firmly from below and above the snag, and then snap the thread sharply. You'll hear a sort of rubberband snap sound! LOL Be sure to really just grab hold of your thread on both ends so you don't pull on your fabric.

Hope that helps and saves your stitching! I really have a stain on my Beatrix Potter Sampler because of the bleeding of one of the dark reds. Not such a happy person now.... :(

See ya! It's late or early, whichever you prefer. Thanks for your comments and sweet compliments about my WIPs. I'm really enjoying stitching these last few weeks!

Hugs, Deb