The Table Is Set

Set my table this morning for our dinner guests and an evening with "Chef Tammy" from the Wooden Spoon.

I will put the rest of the napkins on later.  I wanted you see how pretty the plates looked with all of the different colors.  I thought each of the ladies could take home a Gerbera Daisy.

Here is tonight's dinner menu:

                                Amuse bouche: Eggplant caponata, tomato, goat cheese brushetta     

          Salad   :  Spring greens, artichokes, red onion, gorganzola croquette, roasted tomato vinegrette

                                                         Entree : Short rib canneloni

                                          Dessert: preserved lemon souffle with rasp  coulis

Have a great day stitching.  Please do extra stitches for me, as I have no time to sit down and make "twisted lazy daisy" fingers for my frog, and I have to tape the last episode of "Mr. Selfridge".  I promise I will take pictures tonight and get them up this week.

Thought I would mention that the Fiesta Ware was on sale at Macy's this week, and the glasses I bought at Pier One yesterday with my coupon.  If you haven't "liked" Pier One on Facebook, that's where all of their coupons are.

Hugs and Stiches,

Diane

Finishing From Angela

Just thought I would showcase a few pieces of finishing that I got back from Angela today.

Earmuffs, by Linda Lahm.  You hang them as is on the Christmas Tree, as an ornament.

Beautiful Bookmark by Renaissance Designs

Painted Pony Angel for our friend's son.

She does such beautiful work and I wanted you to see it tonight.

Have a great stitchy evening.

Hugs and Stitches,

Diane

Here's To A Great Weekend

The weather has finally changed here in Michigan.  We should be in the 70's and sunny all weekend.  Can I get a "HIP HIP HOORAY"!

Not a lot of time to stitch this weekend, but I'm hoping to finish my "Frogs Breath" with the expert help of Amy Bunger's wonderful stitch guide.  It has been a lot of fun to stitch, with the exception of the black on black.  No matter how many little tricks we have been taught, it is still hard on the eyes.

Look at those frogs feet.  Not bad for never, ever, ever doing Boullion Knots before in my life.  Yikes, I sound like Taylor Swift.  You get the idea; I'm very excited for how they turned out.  Next up - Twisted Lazy Daisy for the hands, finish a little on the bottom, a tongue, and a fly for the tongue.

My stitching time is limited this weekend because we are having a dinner party Sunday evening.  We attended a charity benefit for our public library this past March, and one of the auction items was for the chef from one of our spectacular restaurants, The Wooden Spoon, to come and cook in our home for Kim and I and six of our friends.

I will post pictures Sunday afternoon when I have the table set; hint - Fiesta ware. Then Monday I will post pictures of the big event.  I am really looking forward to it, and it should be a lot of fun.

Have a "stitchy" kind of weekend for me.

Hugs and Stitches,

Diane

Taking Time Out To Needlepoint

I think when we get a chance to sit down and stitch, we take advantage of every minute, and that I did. Can you believe that the month of May is almost half over and before we know it the Halloween deadlines are going to be upon us.  So I finished up a few Halloween pieces and off to the finisher they went today.

This is one of the new Kathy Schenkel Trick or Treat Bags.  The directions had you make a little leaf out of felt and sew it on as an embellishment.  My pumpkin leaf button from JABC (Just Another Button Company) was the perfect fit.  This is one is labeled, small pumpkin leaf on their website.  I sent the finishing instructions with the canvas to Angela and I can't wait to see it finished.

Then I needed another one of those cute spiders from Associated Talents again.  This one was part of the monthly ornaments from The French Knot and it came with a stitch guide from Diana Bosworth.  Two nights and it was finished.  The light orange is the glow in the dark Kreinik Ribbon.

I also finished the baseball and now I am going to put it up for a few weeks so that I can think about how I am going to stitch the fur.  I'm thinking, interlocking gobelin with Fuzzy Stuff?

Then, one last finish this weekend.  Joseph, the second in the series from Carol Dupree and Nativity Club from The French Knot.  The Baby Jesus should arrive shortly and as soon as I finish him, then I will do the background stitch on Mary, Joseph and Baby Jesus.  They are the same and then the other pieces have a different background.  I have to tell you that on this piece, I had a difficult time with the hair and beard stitch on the stitch guide.  So in the immortal words of June McKnight, "Deep Six It" if you don't like something and do your own thing.  After all it's your piece of work and you have to be happy with it.  I ended up doing an alternate of french knots and basketweave.  I think Joseph would have liked his new "do".

Have a great stitching week. 

Hugs and Stitches,

Diane

Oh, Those Boys of Summer.

After being home for a few days and taking an inventory of my messy desk and my works in progress,  that definitely need my attention, I pulled out my Santa baseball.  I thought I would spend a little time working on the actual baseball.  Ruth, in her newsletter this month, talked about a Diagonal Double Woven and making the stitches move in a certain direction.  I knew I wanted to use perle cotton, to give it a somewhat glossy look but the woven stitch, I think, made it too busy for a baseball.  Not to mention compensating around the stitching. Yikes! Compensating, Random, such ugly needlepoint words to me.

So then on Pinterest this week, Janet Perry pinned a stitch called a Hungarian Diamond Stitch.  I know I have used it a million times as a background stitch, but until I tried it out on the baseball, I never would have thought to use it.

It actually is going to work out quite nicely.  Gives a little interest to the ball, not to big, largest stitch is over three and the slant of the stitching on the ball works with it quite nicely.  Fairly easy to compensate as well.  I'm all for that.

 Then, yesterday afternoon, I needed a little break and thought I would take a ride over to Joann Fabrics.  Not that I needed anything, but it's always fun to peruse the aisles.  Yes, I mean slooooowly walk down each aisle and look at everything and by all means purchase something you don't need.  When I stumbled upon a display of MLB ribbons and buttons.

What do you think?  A ribbon and button added when the ornament is finished?  Possibly tied and attached at the bottom of the finishing loop??  Oh Angela, I hope you can help me accomplish this!  I'm sure if anyone else is working on one of these Sandy Grossman-Morris MLB ornaments, your Joann Fabrics has a display of your MLB team.  

Now one might say that she is spending toooo much time over a small baseball ornament but, this team makes a certain son of mine very happy and when Mom has a computer glitch, he never says "no" or "wait a minute", that's why we got a slideshow of Mackinac Island.  So this is the least I can do for him.  

I hope to complete the baseball tonight and tomorrow and then I need to start thinking about the fur.

Also, a few pieces back from the finisher this week.

 My Little French Country Dress from Shelly Tribbey

And yes, another candy cane.  They are going to be given this year for Christmas gifts to a few of my nieces and my best girlfriend, for her four grandchildren.  

I would like to end by saying Happy Mother's Day to all of you wonderful Mothers and Grandmothers.  Mine has been gone for almost 20 years, but I wouldn't be who I am today without her.

Hugs and Stitches,

Diane

Mackinac Island Grand Hotel Limoge Box

Now for pictures from our class at the Grand Hotel.

 We are greeted by June McKnight

as she hands out our projects upon our arrival

 Our classroom is off the main dining room in the most sunlit room.

 If you can see in the enlargement, the curtains have the cutest dogs on them

We are all busy stitching away

Then we start the project

 First we worked on the awning and windows

Then we began work on the pillars.  We padded them with felt and then stitched over them with perle cotton to tack them down.  From there you stitch over them with a satin stitch using 12 strands of white floss

Close-up of the padding

The bottom of the pillars are a combination of decorative stitches.  The red carpet is a brick stitch

The top is all ribbon embroidery to make the Tussie-Mussie

I have to tell you, that slide show was a lot of work.  I must have worked on it for four hours yesterday and then I finally called "Uncle" and Zach, my son, came to my rescue to make it possible.  I think I must have the wrong date on the camera, that's why it said 2014 on the first slide.  Boy, what a learning experience.

Time to get caught up on a little stitching.  I truly need to make time to needlepoint this week.

Here are a few pictures of the Titanic Event at the Grand Hotel.  It was so much fun to see them walking around in their period costumes.

Off to stitch.

Hugs and Stitches,

Diane

Our Arrival To Mackinac Island

I thought I would post our trip to Mackinac Island and the Needlecraft Seminar in different blogs this week.

 Here is our arrival to the Island.  Please click on the actual picture, not the arrows and it will take you to the slideshow.  Enjoy.

Hugs and Stitches,

Diane

p.s.  I have to apologize that I only could figure this out for the computer and not the iPad