Boy Is It Hot!!!

Oh, my has it been hot here in Kansas!! We are in the second week of 100 and over degrees every day. Some of the older folks that I know, say this weather is a lot like it was about 80 years ago. I think of that and feel blessed that at least now, we have air conditioning to help keep us cool. My heart goes out to all of the livestock. When I was on my way into town yesterday, I noticed the cattle in the ponds. Hopefully we are supposed to get a break from this heat on Sunday. Can't wait. 

 

I finally got my studio all cleaned out and moved all of my fabric and sewing supplies to our home and barn. I have gone from around 750 sq feet to a very small bedroom, for now. My poor house looks like a storage unit!  I think that I will try, in the spring, to get a small pre-built building moved out here for my sewing studio. I will still use the barn for storage for my Ebay listings. This move forced me into something I had been thinking about for a long time. That is, I have opened up a very small booth at an antique mall building. My main items are vintage fabrics, patterns, books and sewing related items. I will also offer some quilts along the way. So far it has held its own, so I am pleased about that.

Needless to say, I haven't been getting much sewing done lately, but I have been doing some cross stitching in the evenings. My horses and stitching help to save my sanity :-)  The  coloradostitcher hosts an online summer camp each year, so I decided to sign up. It really has been fun. Keeping kept up each month has been a real challenge, but I have managed to get the stitching done, but only one fully finished. The first month, June, we were supposed to stitch a bird. I chose to do a robin by theprairieschooler. I'm not sure how I want to fully finish this one up yet.

For July it was supposed to be something that grows. This time I chose a small stitch from a book called 'The Sampler Motif Book by Brenda Keyes. It is a small basket full of oranges and grapefruits, I made it into a needle book. I just made it up as I went. It turned out pretty good.

Unfortunately, I got a late start on the August stitch. For this last stitch I have chosen Nessie Mitchell 1929 by MommaLovesYouGB. The assignment was to choose to do something you had never done. This is a black sampler and I have never done one in black before. I haven't gotten very far yet but am working on it almost every evening. Pretty sure I won't have it done by the end of the month, but hopefully, shortly thereafter.

I am so thankful that I found Cross Stitching again, I am a subscriber to Fat Quarter Shop's Video's with Kimberly Jolly and Quilt Roadies on Flosstube. This is how I found out that it has become very popular again.  I am thoroughly enjoying cross stitching again, and there are so many beautiful patterns out there! 

Thought it would be nice to close with a few pictures of some of my flowers that bloomed this summer.

Take care everyone, and Happy Stitching

Blessings to all. 

 What a Busy Time It Has Been!!

 For the past 10 years I have had my sewing studio in Auburn Kansas. It was a large building and I loved being able to spread out all of my sewing items and fabrics. Well, I found out that the ladies that own the building had decided to tear it down! I was so saddened by this news. I knew that the building was in need of quite a bit of repair, which I thought maybe this summer they would start on that, but instead they decided to just have it torn down. I have to admit I had this large building chuck full! I still had items from my parents' estate that didn't get in the auction and items from my brothers' estate. My daughter also had one corner full of things that she needed to store, not to mention all of my stuff. I have been busy going thru and getting rid of and sending the items left over from my family's estates to an online auction company. I have been doing all of this by myself. During all of this, my husband was diagnosed with colon cancer again and went thru surgery, my daughter started a new job in KC and commutes every day, and my son and his family decided to move back to Topeka, so they have been busy with their own move. The day before they were scheduled to get the big moving truck and load the large items my son took a terrible fall after his workout on his bike and dislocated his shoulder, broke his nose and was scrapped up quite a bit. He just had his surgery a couple of day's ago. Oh yes, I also decided to open a small booth in an art/craft and antique area called NOTO. So yes, I have been really busy!!!  It is finally coming to an end. I have to be completely out of the building by the last day of this month. Needless to say, I will be so glad when all of this is behind me. Here are a few pictures of my studio shortly after I got it set up.

Oh, how I am going to miss my studio!! It was my refuge, a place that was just for me and all of the things that went with what I love to do. A place to create, gather my thoughts and have the privilege of making and restoring beautiful quilts for my clients. It will be a very sad day for me, when I lock that red door behind me for the last time and say goodbye to my 'Loving Stitches' studio.

Now I must move on to new adventures, with my booth and downsizing my sewing space, by a lot.

Please wish me luck.

Blessing to you all.

 

Beautiful, Vintage Valentines

A Little Bit of History

and 

Pictures of Vintage Valentines

Who was the real St. Valentine?  There were multiple St. Valentines (including the decapitated ones), but it was a medieval poet who established the holiday's romantic tradition. 

It is on February 14th that we celebrate this day by sharing red roses, chocolates, fancy dinners or special teas, or beautiful Valentine cards with the loved ones in our life. We do this in the name of Saint Valentine. But who was this saint of romance?

One St. Valentine was supposedly a Roman priest who performed secret wedding against the wishes of the authorities in the third century. While imprisoned in the house of a noble, it's said he healed his captor's blind daughter, causing the whole household to convert to Christianity and sealing his fate. Before being tortured and decapitated on February 14, he sent the girl a note signed "Your Valentine".

Some say another saint named Valentine during the same period was the Bishop of Terni, also credited with secret weddings and martyrdom via beheading on February 14. 

There are some of those who say there is very little basis for these accounts. The fact is, Valentine's Day only became associated with love in the late Middle Ages thanks to the English poet Geoffrey Chaucer.

So how did Chaucer create the Valentine's Day we know today? In the 1370's or 1380's he wrote a poem called "Parliament of Fowl's" that contains this line: "For this was on St. Valentine's Day, when every bird comest here to choose his mate". 

By the 1400's, nobles inspired by Chaucer had begun writing poems known as "valentines" to their love interests. It was only at this point that stories began to appear linking Saint Valentine to Remance.

The above taken from History Show, This Day in History.

Formal messages, or valentines, appeared in the 1500's and by the late 1700"s commercially printed cards were being used, the first commercial valentines in the United States were printed in the mid 1800's.

Taken from: More from Britannica.

Here are some pictures of Vintage Valentines

I hope this helped brighten up your winter day.

No sewing this time, but I am working on a small counted  cross stitch piece. Hope to get it done in time to share before Valentines Day. Gosh, I better hurry!

See you soon.

Blessings, Jan

 

 Welcome 2023

 Hello! Here we are in 2023 and I have so many idea's that I would like to try this year. I will really have to budget my time wisely, of which I am not very good at ☺. 

I start each day with a cup of coffee and Pat Sloans daily video on YouTube. She has so many good ideas!  If you don't already watch her, you should give it a try. She usually gets a giggle or two out of me. This month she is sharing her idea's on getting our sewing rooms organized. I am in the process of getting all of my fabric's organized in open containers, by color and holiday. After I get this all done, I will be on the lookout for storage units to place them in. Whew, a BIG job, but it will be so nice when I get it all done. Here is a link to her website: www.ilovetomakequilts.com.

I have been struggling with which direction to go with my Etsy shop. The items that sold the best were the repurposed items that I had made. I love creating them, although they can be very time consuming which really cuts into my profit margins. So, I am trying to figure out how to create nice items without spending too much time on them. I am very fortunate to have two friend's that share their overflow of vintage laces, cutter quilts, doilies etc. with me to use in my project, which is a real blessing.

I did get a little cross stitching in over the holidays. I finally finished the Prairie Schooler Santa 2005. I can't decide if I want to mount him on sticky board to put on a stand or make him into a pillow. Decisions, decisions.

Another love of mine is small quilts or mini quilts. I have made a few and really enjoy making them. I came acrost a Kathleen Tracy book about them several years ago and became hooked. You can find her on facebook and instgram. I am working on one now that is a gift for a friend of mine, so I can't show you yet. I will put a picture of it in my next blog post. 

I have a favor to ask of you. If you see this blog would you please leave a comment for me. I was getting them but the last few blogs there hasn't been any showing, so I am wondering if maybe something is wrong with it. Thank you!

These winter months is a perfect time to get some sewing or stitching done. Enjoy the process and Happy Sewing/Stitching!!

Blessings to All❤

 

Fall is Here!! 

The leaves are turning to beautiful golds, oranges and reds and have started drifting down to the ground. On a nice calm day, I love to watch them fall, it is so peaceful and relaxing to see them floating down from the trees. The mornings and evenings are now much cooler and perfect for hot chocolate and making S'Mores by the fire pit. I also spied some bittersweet on our rural gravel road coming home the other day. My mom loved to decorate with bittersweet for the Fall season. It was a yearly event for my family to go bittersweet hunting that we always looked forward to. We would all pile into the car and Dad would drive down many country roads and we would all watch out for it hanging from the trees and bushes. Mom would pack a thumris of hot chocolate, sandwiches and fruit for a picnic after we had picked all of the bittersweet we could find. Those were the days. 

I have been working on designing a small Fall wall-hanging. It isn't turning out the way I had hoped it would. I tried to put a pieced leaf on the bottom border, but when I set it together, well, it didn't fit! Then after I got the leaf on the pumpkin appliqued on, by machine, I didn't like the placement of it either. Not sure what I am going to do with it, just might end up a UFO, for a long time. Below is a picture 

Cross stitching has become a real love for me. I really enjoy sitting down in the evening and working on my WIP's (works in progress). I'm not really into Halloween much anymore. This holiday used to be a fun one, with a bit of spooky. Now it has become so gruesome and grotesque. I did want a little something, so I decided on a dough bowl pillow to add to my collection of the different holiday ones I have made. I am designing one using some aida cloth that I hand dyed with boiled blackberries. It turned out a nice purple color that I thought would be perfect for a small Halloween stitch. I used an older book by Laura J. Conley, that a good friend gifted me with, for thee letters, and for the motifs I am using the Donna Kooler's 555 Fabulous Cross-Stitch Patterns. Here it is still in progress.

I am also doing the Fat Quarter Shop's Christmastime SAL in cross stitch. It took a while for me to make up my mind if I wanted to do it or not, so I got a late start on it. Needless to say, I am behind, but I am working on it every day so I can get caught up. The peppermint will have to be frogged out since I changed my mind on the colors I started with. I decided to use the called for in stead, except for the dark red. All are DMC. The fabric is an 18 ct aida cloth that I dyed a pale pink using strawberries that I boiled to make the dye. This picture doesn't show how pretty the pink color is.

I have several more projects that I am working on, but will save them for another post.

So I will leave you with one of my favorite Fall pictures. If you love Fall and like to look at beautiful pictures that catch it's essence, go to my Pinterest page, "Fall, Best Season of All".

Blessings to all.

September is Here! Fall is Just Around the Corner 

A Little Bit of Quilting, Crafting and Cross Stitch

At our house September is the beginning of Fall. I put out the wreathes on the front and back doors on the first and start my decorating the day after Labor Day. Fall is my favorite season. So many beautiful colors and yummy scents, like spiced pumpkin, dried leaves, a barn full of fresh hay and spiced apple cider. The days are becoming shorter, so evenings out by the fire pit with a nice cup of hot chocolate is delightful. 

I love the happy sunflowers starting to bloom. They are one of my favorite flowers, which is good since it is our state flower. We have a verity of small, wild sunflowers blooming in our pasture now. Couldn't resist running out and cutting a few to put out on the deck.

I am a fan of Pat Sloan and watch her YouTube video's every morning. She is so delightful and always has lots of smiles. I really like to start my day with her, right after I read my bible. She has so many great ideas! Wish I could make everything but just don't have the time. She showed a really cute wall hanging of a blue bird, I think it is called 'The Blue Bird of Happiness'. She suggested making the bird in any color that you would like...so I made a red bird. It did have a couple of very small pieces in it, like the bird's beak and the little skinny legs.  It was still easy and fun to sew. 

I am designing a new fall wall hanging for this year. It is still a work in progress, but here is a peek at it now. There are a couple of things that I think need to be changed. We will see how it ends up.

I made a Keepsake Keeper for my granddaughters' birthday. I came across these looking thru Pinterest and thought what a great idea. It is made from repurposed linens, laces, ribbons, buttons and vintage jewelry etc. Creating something using repurposed, vintage items is very fulfilling. 

My cross stitching has fallen a little bit behind since I have been working on quilting and client's work. Since it is September, I did pick out the sampler that I'm going to start for Sampler September. It is Nessie Mitchell 1929, design by MommaLovesYouGB. It is a black sampler; I will be using 18 ct Aida that I hand dyed and DMC 310 Black. My plan is to start on it this weekend. 

My hope is that all of you have had the opportunity to do some kind of needlework, sewing or crafting this past month.

I want to wish everyone a happy and fun Labor Day!

Blessing to All,

Jan

Fun, Exciting New's from Fat Quarter Shop!

If you are a fan of Fat Quarter Shop you probably already know about the QAL that is going to start on Oct. 31st. If you don't, here is a bit of information about it. The pattern will come from Lori Holts newest book, 'Scrappiness is Happiness'. I watched Kimberly and Lori on You Tube announcing and showing all of the quilts in this fabulous book. The QAL quilt will be made using a block from each of the quilts featured in the book. I love the happiness of these quilts, especially now with all of the unrest in our country and the whole world. I hope you go over to You Tube and watch the video about this new book and QAL. I think you will become excited too.

Also, if you go to the Jolly Jabber Blog, that is the blog site for Fat Quarter Shop, you can get all of the information about this upcoming QAL.

Happy Sewing everyone!