Thursday, January 21, 2010

Here is the story..

Two weeks ago a teacher called me looking for fabric. She described the project she is planning and was hoping I could sell her some fabric at a good price. When I heard the story, I told her I would sell it at cost and promptly ordered some. It isn't here yet...but that is another story. Let's just say my supplier dropped the ball...but the aida is en route now.

Anyway...Kerri's story... Her elementary school is closing its doors forever this June because it will be amalgamated with another small rural school and both will be moving to a new building in a new location, with an entirely new name. Therefore, South Cramahe Public School will disapper into history. This year's Grade 8 class will be the last graduating class.

They are planning to have each grade 8 student design a cross stich block, and then stitch it. The blocks will then be put together into a quilted wallhanging which they will call the belonging quilt. It will go to the new school in the Fall and thereafter Kerri plans for each graduating class in the new school to also stitch a self-designed block, make them into another quilt which will be attached to the original and so on...

I think it is a great plan. It is made easier by the fact that Kerri has made it a practice to teach her grade 4 class to stitch each year. These graduating grade 8's were her students in grade 4 and are all on board and keen to get started.

My request... they will all have the same fabric and they are designing their own blocks...they need floss and needles. I told the story to the Thursday and Friday stitchers and they came through like the generous people they are...we all scoured our stash and came up with duplicate skeins, thread left over from kits, some odd ball skeins from Anchor or Coates or no name something, that we will likely never use and came up with some thread for the kids. They do not need specific DMC colours as their patterns won't be specifying 304 for example...they just know they need red!

If you are interested in cleaning out a few skeins or bobbins or loose threads from your stash you could send it to :
South Cramahe Public School
1136 Purdy Road
Colborne, Ontario
K0K 1S0
Attention : Kerri

You can also send it to me at
Knowledge and Needles
190 Smith Street
Brighton
K0K 1H0

However Dan and I are going away at the end of next week and while there will be someone here looking after the house, dogs, cats and mail etc., it is probably easier to just send it to the school.

Thank You. I wil be sure to get a photo of the finished project in June and post it here on my blog.

Saturday, January 16, 2010

A finish finish!

Well...here it is ...my version of Jeannette Douglas' "My Stitching Album"
I am very proud of it!
This has been an ongoing project since September of 2008 and while each page gave me immense satisfaction, you cannot imagine how great it feels to see the whole thing right there before my eyes and knowing that I stitched the whole thing.

I was very uncertain as to how I would finish it. My good friend Sharon was here at Friday stitching last week and brought along some pages she was attaching together in an accordian for the guild. That was it, I knew that was what I wanted to do as well. She had tried to describe the technique to me but until I actually saw it I couldn't visualize my book done that way. But once I saw it on Friday, I got myself in gear...finished my last page, went for backing fabric and timtex , and then spent 2 1/2 hours Tuesday with Sharon and all day Wednesday and voila the book is complete. (Well I am omitting the last "wrought by..." page since my name is inside on the final stitching page)So thank you Sharon for taking so much time to teach me that lacy stitch between the pages and showing me how to attach the backing and make the pages stand up...and thank you to the guild for teaching Sharon the technique in the first place!
And Jeannette...what an undertaking...thanks for designing such a great project...even if I strayed a bit from your suggested colours and book design.


And if I wasn't pleased enough on Thursday and Friday to show off my newly completed masterpiece to the stitchers, look at what Fran made for me to wear when I go to Nashville...you can be sure I won't be waiting that long to get into it. Aren't I just the luckiest person to have so many generous, thoughtful friends??
There are more pictures of me in the sweatshirt on Fran's blog,
as well as some of the Friday stitchers.
I have one last question ... Dani, Beth, others??? How many new starts does my finish finished Stitching Album qualify me for?
Also...next blog...I'll tell you a true story about a local teacher and a project she and her students have tackled and if you are interested in helping out I know she will appreciate it.








Monday, January 11, 2010

MAJOR Happy Dance

I just finished my last page of Jeannette Douglas' My Stitching album...well the last page I am going to do. She has a back page that says ... wrought by.... but I am leaving that one out since I put my name on the bottom of this one...Herringbone Hour...
I had let this page languish over Christmas but I got inspired during our Friday stitching session when Sharon showed me how they are finishing a project they did at Guild. That was it...I finally knew how I wanted to finish finish this book. As soon as Sharon is free to help me with the finishing technique I will get all the pages finish finished and display them here. I would like to have it done before we go to Florida and on to the Nashville show. I'll be seeing Jeannette there and would love to show off my version of her great designs.

I sometime cursed my choice of black fabric but all in all I am terribly pleased with the project and with the fact that I kept up with it. I have learned many new stitches and feel that not much in the stitching line can intimidate me now!

Monday, January 4, 2010

40count

I bit the bullet and am finally working on some 40 count fabric. This is the sampler designed by Sharon Cohen that appeared in two parts in JCS magazine early last year. I am using the called for GAST threads and am quite enjoying the 40 count experience. I especially like the tiny stitches. If you are familiar with the design you may notice that I changed the colours of the large flowers. There were 4 colours in each petal and I chose to go with only one. Also...lest Dani think she is the only one with two finishes so far in 2010...let me tell you that I also have two finishes. This is the first one and once I take another photo of the second ornament I will edit this post and show it too.

I found this year that I gave away more ornaments than I stitched so I have decided to try to make at least one ornament per month so I am not in this deficit predicament again.

The two ornaments have been stitched entirely from stash and that is the plan for the rest of them as well.