Antique Embroidery and Cross Stitch

This antique embroidery was sent to me by a lovely lady named Nancy who you may know from her former blog "Lovely in Chocolate."  She doesn't have her blog anymore but we are Facebook friends and one day she just announced that she had found a nice antique embroidery and was going to send it to me!  I was flabbergasted but couldn't say no since I love old embroideries.  

I carefully attached it to some fabric that I think goes well with it and made it into a wall hanging.

There are lots of pretty details to look at, such as the bunny at the base of the tree and the little bluebirds in a nest up in a branch of the tree.

I don't know who stitched it or when it was done but I love it!

Just beautiful!  Thank you, Nancy!

I stitched this from an old stamped cross stitch kit that I found on Ebay.  I had seen a finished one on Pinterest and loved it so much that I knew I had to try and find one to make.  I love the colors and the vintage look of it.  I have not yet made it into a hanging, but it's sitting on the fabric that I will be using, I think it will look nice with it.

It may seem strange to you, that someone would want to stitch an old thing like this, with its unruly X's and a lack of precision compared to a counted cross stitch piece.  I would not have liked this either, years ago, but for some reason, I just love things like this now.  I hope you have enjoyed looking at these and I'm so glad you came to my blog for another visit!

Katrina's Cottage and An Embroidery

This is Katrina's Cottage by Vintage Designs and the first good sized cross stitch project I've done in a while.  It's also the first time I've used an aida fabric in years but it's a nice soft one and very pleasant to stitch on.  I used the called for DMC threads and it was a nice relaxing stitch!   If anyone would enjoy having the chart for this design, I will be happy to give it away.  Just let me know in a comment and if there is more than one person that would like it, I will do a drawing. I will even send a piece of the aida, too, since I have some extra.  It is a nice brown flecked natural color that I think goes well with the design.  Let's say that you have until noon next Monday, Sept. 2 to let me know.

I know, this embroidery is completely off season, but I finished it in the middle of the summer and didn't get around to posting it until now, almost fall.  But I thought you might like to see it anyway.  I adapted it a little from the Spring part of a four seasons set of designs that I got from The Pattern Bee.  They have the most wonderful selection of embroidery patterns there!

I love this pink variegated thread, it reminds me of cotton candy!

Some colorful flowers in a variety of stitches.

That's it for this time, I'm glad you took the time to see what I've been up to, thanks for visiting!

Antique Linens and Selvage Fun

This is one of the treasures that I found recently at a nearby antique shop.  I don't know how old it is,  or who stitched it, I just knew it had to come home with me!  And at a price of only $5.00, the decision wasn't difficult.  I thought the word "hame" was odd, but I did some googling and found that it was a Scottish word for "home".    However it's said, I agree with the sentiment!

Some of the stitching has rotted away from being so old.

If you look closely, just above and to the right of the little black dog, the thread from an entire animal has gone missing.

The happy couple!

If anyone has an idea of how old this sampler might be, I would love to hear from you!

More treasures:

This lovely cross stitch design is on what looks like a dish towel made of very soft linen.

It was stitched with what looks like one strand of flower thread over four threads of the linen.  The linen is so fine I can barely see the threads, but this cross stitch was definitely counted and not done over a stamped design.

Another beauty, I'm guessing this may have been done in the 40's or 50's.  I love the crocheted edging.

A nice doily for only $3.00.  I'm often amazed at the bargains that can be found with antique linens, I bought all four of these pieces for $18.00!

Now, here's a couple of fun selvage projects I've been working on:

A drawstring bag to use as a purse or to hold needlework projects.  As you can see, I shop at Jo-ann Fabrics quite a lot!

A smaller bag with a slightly brighter color scheme.  Thank you for stopping in again to look at my pictures!  I'm going to leave you with one last one.  

This was an old abandoned house, built in the 1800's just around the corner from us.  The owners decided to let our local firefighters burn it down for training purposes.  I know it was a good thing for the firefighters to be able to use it this way, but at the same time I hated to see it go.  We have been driving and walking by that old house for 22 years and and will absolutely miss it!  

Thanks again for visiting my blog!

The Grubs Ate Our Back Yard and Other Pictures

Last summer most of our lawn was eaten by grubs.  If you haven't experienced these little devils, they are fat worm-like creatures that burrow under the ground and eat the roots of whatever grass you may have.  Then the grass dies and you are left with bare dirt.  At first, we were a little upset, but then the area began to fill in with a variety of plants.  Of course, nature abhors a vacuum!

Some came from nearby flower beds, some probably just appeared when seeds blew in from elsewhere.  Mostly weeds, like the yellow flowers here.  I know they're weeds but I don't care, I think they are rather nice looking!

One of the things that we now have are these adorable miniature violas or Johnny-Jump-Ups.  The larger viola that is in the middle is a normal sized one so you can see how tiny the other ones are.   One of the advantages of our new wildflower garden is it doesn't have to be mowed, my husband likes that!

Close up of the yellow weed flowers.

This picture was taken in the woods by our neighbor's house.  She was out walking and found this darling little fawn.  Its mother was probably away finding something to eat and when Mom tells her fawn to stay put they will not budge.  We took pictures while being careful not to disturb the little one and then we crept quietly away.  At one point I saw the fawn's eye flutter open to look at me, but he/she did not move other than that!

Just a picture of some ground fog that appeared one evening, I like the way it looks kind of ethereal.

I call this Forget-Me-Not Lane.  It's part of one of the walking areas in our town, this probably goes for about a quarter of a mile with loads of the little blue flowers on each side of the path.  I love waking through there!

My latest tattoo! I have always loved the look of bird's nests with eggs and when I saw this picture on The Graphics Fairy, a wonderful website full of vintage images, I knew it would make a great tattoo.  If you haven't been there, be sure and check it out at The Graphics Fairy
This tattoo was done by Erik at Lakeview Tattoo, the same artist who did all of my other ones, I think he did a beautiful job on it!
Thanks for visiting again, I appreciate it!

Another Cottage and Sarah Loves Tigger

I sure love embroidering cottages!  This one was just as fun as the other ones I have done.  I used a wide assortment of threads as usual, including DMC, Cosmo Seasons and Valdani.  Every thread used is a variegated or over-dyed except the bright yellow one in the center of some of the flowers and the French knots over toward the right side, that is a DMC Craft Thread.  

I decided to cover the house with vines, I hadn't thought of that idea before, it reminds me of pictures of vine covered English cottages that I've seen.  

A couple of close ups of the flowers.  What cottage scene doesn't have a lot of flowers?  You can't have too many, I think!

Now, a couple of kitty pictures:

This is Sarah and Tigger.  In case you don't remember, Sarah is one of our newest kitties.  We adopted her and her baby, Pepper, last spring.  Well, Sarah has decided that she's in love with Tigger.  She wants to snuggle with him as much as possible and loves it when he gives her a bath.  She thinks he's just the best thing ever and I think maybe he loves her a little bit, too.

It's so sweet to see these two together, I think they are going to be Best Friends Forever!

Thanks so much for visiting, I really appreciate it!

Patchwork Bag Set

It's been a while, but I finally have something done to show you!  I picked out some of my favorite fabrics from my stash and made a nicely sized bag that I can use as either a purse or a stitching bag.  In the middle is a tiny basket of flowers embroidery.  The pattern for it is yet another one from the Flickr group Hoop Love Vintage Transfers.  I don't know how I lived before I found that place and its huge supply of vintage patterns!

This embroidery only took maybe 2 or 3 hours to complete.  I used some of my favorite Cosmos Seasons variegated threads and the brown thread for the basket is a DMC variegated.

There's a large patchwork pocket on the back as well as two small side pockets.  And since I already had some extra patchwork squares cut, I decided to make a little pincushion and needlebook to go with it.

I got the little pom-pom trim on sale at Jo-an Fabrics and thought it would look nice around the edges.

Here's the inside of the needlebook.  I just love these fabrics and the nice thing about patchwork is having so many favorite fabrics all together on one thing!  The vintage doily underneath it is one that I was lucky enough to find at a yard sale one summer.  

Thank you for stopping in, it was nice visiting with you!

Some Recent Embroideries

When I happened to run across the pattern for this vintage design, I knew I had to have it.  I was thrilled to find that it was available to buy from a seller on Etsy.  I used a variety of variegated flosses, mostly DMC.

It looks like a cheerful place to live, doesn't it?

I didn't stitch it exactly like the original, but I think it still has a definite vintage look to it.

Now, here are a few of one of my other favorite subjects for embroidery;  baskets with flowers.

 This embroidery was done with a selection of Needle Necessities threads that I have in my collection.  This is a brand of floss that is no longer available, although the company was bought by Threadworx and I believe they reproduce pretty much the same colors themselves.

More baskets:

If you haven't guessed it yet, I love pink and blue!

Except for the black on the butterfly, I embroidered this whole design with Caron Watercolors.  I just started using these threads recently and I love them!  They are nice and thick and come in a myriad of colors.

Last basket, this one was done with Rainbow Gallery's Rainbow Tweed.  It's a soft and slightly fuzzy thread that works well for embroidery.  I really love working with various types of threads, I think it makes embroidering just that much more exciting when I can experiment instead of always using the same old thing!  How about you, do you like to try different threads that are new to you?  If so, I would love to hear about your thread experiences!

Thank you for stopping in for another visit, I appreciate it!