America the Beautiful

This is my version of Julie's flag quilt. It is 26" x 44". Lyrics to America the Beautiful are embroidered on the white stripes. The stars are machine blanket-stitched to the blue field. Just in time for the Fourth of July!  It is bound and hung up.

Books and clock embroidery

I just finished (and I mean that literally) embroidering the "books" block from the Calendula Patterdrip's Cottage quilt by Crabapple Hill. It is stitched in Cosmo "Seasons" embroidery floss - 4 skeins. 

Next step: get it framed.

I just checked my watch, and this is Very Weird --  The time is the same as on the clock in the embroidery!! 

Because I'm focusing on "getting things done" and not on "how long did it take to finish that, you've got to be kidding, you couldn't spend the hour to finish over the last month?" . . . . Here is another completed project. At the Roblealto Child Care Association in Costa Rica, our church sends work teams yearly to help with maintenance and reconstruction at their foster care facility. This year I helped the house moms  (each taking care of her own family PLUS 10 seriously hurting foster children) make happy birthday banners. There were a couple empty houses waiting on new house parents, so I took those banners home to finish, and here they are, ready to mail back


The cakes were made based on an idea from Julie's book: Quilted Memories, Celebrations of Life by Mary Lou Weidman -- the banners aren't appliqued and quilted, just pretty fabric ironed on with fusible interfacing. The candle flames are made by drawing on the fabric with permanent markers, then releasing the dye with alcohol : http://iamsusie.blogspot.com/2009/11/sharpie-tie-dye.html

Here is a finished, blocked project: a soft warm Qiviut/wool blend scarf. I ended up with less than 9 inches of yarn, including the tail for casting on -- the pattern creator really knew what she was doing! 

My third lace project - I'm getting there, but still had to unknit a lot of rows in the process.

Crocheted Tablecloth

I stopped work on this about six years ago. Crocheting was making my arms hurt and I quit
However, this tablecloth was in progress. Last month, I stumbled upon it and realized I only needed to attach a few motifs and crochet a single crochet border

So here it is!  It has been so long since I started this project, I don't remember the pattern source. It was vintage.
Dimensions : 68" x 28" and just fits the top of my table.

The Green Lace Shawl: Phase II

Phase I: The central portion of the shawl. 40 motifs long, 12 rows to the motif.  85 stitches wide. This is the Myrtle leaf shawl with willow border, from Victorian Lace Today, by Jane Sowerby.  

Now that Phase I is complete, I have started on
Phase II, the border. I think there will be about 300 repeats of an eight-stitch motif, which is thankfully only twelve stitches wide. Whew!  I feel like I'm on the home stretch, and I cannot resist posting a photo. 

Ding Ding Ding Ding Ding
I finished something -- a very simple roller blind of repurposed drape fabric. Have had the parts for oh, um, well a LOOOOONNNGGG time. Terry even hung the roller for me months ago. But I finally did it. It took less than two and a half hours -- now why didn't I just do it earlier? hmmmmm . . . . will think on that.

Beaded Coin Purse

Here is "ELAINE", a beaded knitted coin purse pattern that comes in a very nice kit from Purse Paradise. It is knit on size 0000 needles, with size 8 pearl cotton. The beads are 11/0 Czech seed beads.  The kit has everything in it that you need to make the purse, except for the knitting needles. It even has a John James needle the correct size for sewing the purse together with the size 8 pearl cotton.