Small Communities

A while back I had the idea to put together some small kits for fabric collage work. 

The stARTer Collage Kit

I finally got around to doing this and used a few to test out my instructions with a small group of friends. They were my "alpha testers". They enjoyed the process and we had a pleasant afternoon working on them. My directions were not finished but we did our best. Here's a photo of the results. 

The work of the first testers

One member enjoyed it so much that she has continued the process at home. Here's a photo of her work.

Donna Atkins addition work

This Thursday I spent an evening with one of my small communities. Our main emphasis is art. We do a variety of handwork and machine work from painting to weaving, knitting to crocheting, embroidery to quilting, etc. You get the picture – that’s why our group name is EtCetera. So for this session I had agreed to do little stitch meditations using my art collage kits. I had plenty for them to choose from and each kit contained 4-5 small pieces of fabric along with 3-5 colors of perle cotton thread, a felt backing and some needles. A rough draft of my instructions was also included.

The hope was they would be my beta testers and give me some useful feedback on the kits. That hope was definitely realized.

Collages from the EtCetera Group

Even though I was exhausted from working late the night before and from early in the morning preparing the kits I left with a feeling of satisfaction and well-being. Was that from the success of the kits? No.

It was from a sense of community. As the group of about 15 ladies sat around the table working out their designs and stitches, they carried on with conversations about life. Not politics, not religion, just life in general. One person shared a bit of joy that had happened in her life, we thought about our “leader” who was unable to attend due to her husband recently having surgery. But mostly the conversation dwelt around animals, both wild and domestic and their antics and interactions with each other and with humans.

It was a very enjoyable and relaxing evening. I think we, as humans living in a very busy, sometimes disjointed age, need to have more of these small community gatherings where we just work with our hands and engage in chit-chat.

More collages from the EtCetera Group

I meet with a number of small groups loosely formed around the bigger world of quilting however it wasn’t until this meeting that I used the words “small community” to describe these gatherings. That to me is what we are – small communities doing life together.

One of the participants said “the group wound up chatting like magpies, telling stories, and laughing while we stitched. I really didn’t want to leave”.

More collages from the EtCetera Group

The youngest member of the group came up to me at our guild meeting to show me her finished piece although she said it wasn’t finished she wanted to put a backing and binding on it to turn it into a coaster. Her mom said she had already taken over her piece to “fix” it for her and that the daughter was planning on doing even more to use as practice pieces to improve her stitching. I was thrilled because that is my strongest wish to encourage and give young people the thrill of hand stitching.

Keep on stitching and sharing!
Rose

What Am I Working On You Ask?

Okay so you didn’t ask but I’m going to share anyway…

So I said I’d post updates on my healthy eating habits. I’m still down 10+ pounds but I haven’t been being good so I’ve just been maintaining. I know, I know I’ll get back on track, you’ll see.

Now for some project updates:

SummerSewing Club

I’m still stitching away on this project. I’m caught up with the weekly embroidery and have started sewing some of the hexies (hexagons) together in rows. I think sewing the rows together will be a little tricky.

 Here’s the latest embroideries:

Picnic Basket

A sweet little picnic basket with a woven handle. I added a blanket to the basket so we can spread it out on the ground.

Shaved Ice

For the icee one I went for a shaved ice look with a fine French knot packed in nice and tight like the old-timers make for shaved ice in Hawaii. The ice is very finely shaved and packed well not chunky and loose like. My flavors, watermelon, lime and coconut. Yum, yum, you can’t see it but there’s a scoop of ice cream in the bottom of the cone.

Coconut Drink

Then we received a pattern for a coconut drink. I decided to try and make the coconut more coconut looking and put a striped straw with a fancy umbrella.

Lime Popsicle

Next up was an ice cream bar which I turned into a popsicle so I could share with a friend. Lime of course.

Radio

And finally a radio so we can have some music while enjoying the summer breeze. I went with a silver gray radio with black to represent the speakers and yellow in the dial area to show that it was turned on. I made the music notes colorful but I think music is colorful and I added a few more notes than the pattern had. I wasn’t sure I like this one but once it was done I rather like it.

I also started and finished embroidering a stitch-a-long that was published by FeelingStitchy. The pattern was supplied by Megan of Studio M.M.E.

Front of Pirate Hummingbird Print

Back of Pirate Hummingbird Print

If you visit the blog and see the pattern you will notice that mine has a different orientation. This is because I decided to print the design on some fabric that was prepared for printing (I found a roll of it in my stash when I was looking for something else). I cut off a piece 8.5 by 11 inches. I wasn’t paying too much attention to what I was doing and printed it so the design filled the piece. Second I didn’t adjust the intensity of the lines so it printed quite dark. Not wanting to have to try and cover the heavy dark lines I turned the piece over and noticed that the back was better, so my hummingbird faces the opposite direction. You can see in the photos the difference (sorry for the wrinkled state). I plan to turn this piece into a pillow that will go with my hummingbird chair once I cover the chair with hummingbird fabric. That project is still in the planning stage.

Stitch Along Reginald the Pirate Hummingbird

A neighbor asked a while back if I knew how to crochet and would I be able to finish a doily a friend's mother's mother had started and not finished before she died. Sure I said although I hadn't crocheted with fine thread for quite some time. It just needed one more large motif and then the joining motifs and the edging. Luckily she also had the directions for the pattern. I finished it and gave it to her the other day. She was thrilled. So that was my good deed for the month and another to add to my 1000gifts.
Being able to use my skills to bring happiness to a friend.

Crochet doily finished

Well that’s about where I’m at for now. I did finally start writing directions as to how I do my fabric yoyo’s for a friend who wants to do a vest similar to mine. This will also come in handy as I plan to offer kits for my button/yoyo flowers in the near future.

I’m behind on sewing some blocks together for the quilt guild I attend so I guess I’d better get on that next. Pieces are cut for them just need to clear the clutter from around the sewing machine. You know how that goes – lol!

Summer fun!

Happy Stitching!

Rose

Did I Say I Was On A Diet?

Lamb Stir Fry

Does this look like a diet?

Scrambled Eggs with Veggies

Tuna Salad

Well I’m not but I am trying to flush fat from my system and get healthier at the same time. Sensible eating, light exercise (chasing after my grandson and swimming) enhanced by a little help from the Fat Flush Plan. 

I've used this plan before quite successfully, unfortunately I didn't stick with it or I wouldn't have to start over again. 

The lamb Stir Fry is 4 portions, the Scramble Eggs with Veggies and the Tuna Salad are single portions. Yes that's right I ate the whole thing!

Week two is over and I’m down 10 lbs. Yea! I’ll be posting updates as I go along.

Now for some project updates:

Summer Sewing Club

We received our pattern a little early and it was a sweet sunhat! Okay I had to dress it up. First I thought of making it a red hat with purple flowers but I finally decided on a Hawaiian lahala hat with a hat lei of fuschia and yellow flowers.

Sunhat with Flowers

Oh yes and I made my hexagons, now I have to start stitching them together. I think I’ll sit outside to do this and enjoy the summer weather.

Summer fun!

Happy Stitching!

Rose

Oh No! Not Again?

 Hmm, I’m thinking I need to stop getting on the internet, Facebook, Pinterest, Flickr, and blogs. Oh the blogs! Okay I went and started yet another project. I really would like to force myself to finish something before I can start a new something but there’s too much eye candy and too much fabric and thread tempting me.

So I’m cruising the web and come across a Summer Stitching group, well I can stitch all year long but this one just caught my eye. I must confess that I really wanted to see what the setup was and how it operated. And well the creator was offering the “class” at a discount so there you go.

The creator is Mollie at Wild Olive and the “class” is really booked as a “club”. I’ve seen Mollies work around for some time and love her cute little faces on everything. Just couldn’t resist them. We’re making hexagon blocks (something I’ve never done) with hand embroidery (something I’ve done since forever) on some of them.

It’s a summer theme and each week we get a new embroidery design to work and turn into a block. I’m keeping up (kinda , sorta– need to prepare some more of non-embroidered ones). Here are the first three embroidered ones.

Embroidered "Cat" Sunglasses

I couldn’t resist turning the sunglasses into a fifties style with cat eyes. 

Embroidered Intense Sun

For the sun I did more than just an outline stitch, I thought since the summer sun is so intense it needed some pumping up so I did a satin stitch with a ring of French knots inside and added some French knots to the ends of the rays. I think this is my favorite so far. 

But then there’s the swimsuit. Haha just couldn’t get the song “she wore an itsy, bitsy yellow polka dot bikini” out of my mind.

Embroidered Polka Dot Swimsuit

Okay well it’s not really a bikini and the polka dots are lime green rather than yellow you you get the point.

Here’s the background fabrics I’m using ,I’ll probably bind it with a sandy fabric. I might do a small border with some deep red. The rose flower fabric is fussy cut so that I have flower(s) in the center of each hexagon.

The blue is for my swimming pool which I am very much enjoying this summer and the green is for the shade of my trees.

Summer fun!

Happy Stitching!

Rose

I've Been Busy

French Knot Closeup

Pin It

Bird's Eye View

The beginning owl doodle

Well kind of busy. I did get my owl embroidery and my Bird’s Eye View done. Like I said in my last post I can sit and stitch for hours. I get lost and love what is happening with the thread and the stitches. The more I thought about this the more I realized how often I’ve heard sayings that revolve around “Do what you love …” theme. And I’ve been convinced for a long time now that most of us discover what we love to do in our childhood. The only problem is we forget, get bogged down in other things, listen to the voices of well meaning family and friends and turn our backs on the “what we love”. This is true for me. I learned to embroider at a very early age (7) from a lady(my mother) who also had a love for it starting at a very early age. I moved out on my own in the late 60’s to San Francisco no less – that’s right - home of the hippies! I did not pick up my needle and thread at that time. Too bad! I did do some work in the early 70’s for my youngest brother and I still have a shirt I made and embroidered for him. It still looks pretty good; too bad I don’t fit into it. I have memories of things I worked on as a child and as a young girl. A few of these items are still with me today. While going through my stash of unfinished items I was surprised to see how many revolved around embroidery. And I am so happy to be back in the groove again!

Owl on Vintage Fabric

Faux Lava Rocks on "Lava Fabric"

One of the items I came across had nothing to do with embroidery. Here is some muslin I painted with a textured paint that was called lava. My original intent was to make some beads that looked like lava but were lightweight.

They kind of worked and I’m not sure where I was thinking of using them maybe on my woven necklace. But looking at that fabric gave me an idea. So now it has become my inspiration fabric. I’m not sure if I will actually use it but I decided to try my idea on regular fabric first. 

Here’s the first of a series of work I plan to do. I will probably sell both the readymade and the patterns once I have a few worked up. I think they are coming out quite nicely.

Big Island Hawaiian Petroglyph #1

And I discovered another piece of the painted fabric I didn’t remember I had. Haha!

However I’m so far behind on my 52 projects that I think I better start doing more work and less thinking.

Bone Rings and Button Blanks

Okay I’m off and running on another idea to accommodate my needle habit which I like to carry with me to work and other places. I was looking for some bone rings (well now they’re made of plastic) that I’m sure I had (that’s how I discovered my other piece of painted fabric!). I finally found them after muttering under my breath several times “I guess I have to go to town because I really want to make this – today”. In amongst them I found a button blank (part of a button that didn’t get to actually be a button) that would work just as well as the bone ring I was looking for. Now I’ve got another recycle, reuse, repurpose item! Just love it when that happens! And I know I have a lot of them somewhere but I’ve found enough to get me started. So now I’m off to my sewing machine to make it so I can take it with me tomorrow. You’ll just have to wait to see what I’m doing.

Happy stitching!

Laughter

Most of us have probably heard the platitudes: “Laughter is the best medicine.”; “Laughter is good for the soul” and others similar to these.
I’ve never given it a lot of thought but lately with prodding from my online friends and my daughter I’ve been considering things. Most of these prodding’s fall in the range of “tell us seven (or ten, or five) things about you that no one knows.
So I’ve been thinking and last night while trying to drift of to sleep it occurred to me “I like to make people laugh and I like to hear people laugh”. Now most of this laughter comes from telling on myself, or about something happening in my life, or just making merry about a difficult situation that’s been taken a little too seriously. It’s definitely not telling jokes cause I’m not much good at that!
I’m not sure where this comes from. My mother always told me I have a weird sense of humor. According to her I'm like her mother in the humor department. So I guess maybe I take after my Grandmother Clough. It’s true I find humor sometimes where others do not. For example I think it’s funny how I can get lost because I’m not paying attention to where I am or I decide to try a different route. Once when exiting a freeway I almost hit the guardrail because I wasn’t paying attention, I laughed but the passengers didn’t.

Or I could tell you about the time as a sophomore in high school when I put the entire varsity football team on the run. It was very embarrassing at the time but is now a funny memory with the passing of the years. Then there was the time I was setting up our computer training room for a workshop I was to present. Not my normal routine! I had turned on the laptops but couldn't figure out how to turn on the PC's (a task I do everyday at my desk but for the life of me I was so nervous I couldn't get it!). In a panic I was getting ready to call our regular trainer and confess to her when it finally dawned on me "Just push the power button on the CPU!" I told the trainer about my panic later and we both had a good laugh.

Once when my invalid mother was living with me we (the home aids and nurses who took care of her while I was at work) were surprised and happy that she was drinking a lot of water. Something she normally didn’t do, she hated our water. All of a sudden I started laughing because I realized what might have happened. You see I always made her cream of wheat or something similar to it for her breakfast and I always added a lot of cinnamon to it. That morning I think I might have grabbed the bottle of red pepper instead and that was why she was so thirsty. Of course we flushed her with a lot of water but she didn’t complain.
There are things that have happened that when told to my friends bring a smile, maybe a chuckle but which give me a real belly laugh. Even several months later when I think about it I want to break out in a loud, throw the head back laugh, but mostly I settle for a chuckle, a smile, or even a silent inside laugh. After all I wouldn’t want the other people on the bus to think I had lost it! And I certainly wouldn’t want to go into a long story explaining my laughter. Chances are they wouldn’t see what was so funny about it anyway.
My dad used to get us to laugh at the dinner table. I was raised with six brothers and we would all try and keep from even cracking a smile when dad started his fake laugh. He would start to laugh about nothing in particular it was just his goal to get us to laugh. And he always succeeded. We kids would start out biting our lips, then the giggles would start and then before you knew it we were convulsed with side splitting laughter just from his infectious laugh. We loved it of course. I think we slept better on those nights. I know a good solid laugh will always help me sleep better.
Laughter is good for easing tension as long as it is either at something and not someone or with someone and not at someone. Maybe that’s why clowns are so beloved, they make up laugh with them or at least a good one does. Comedians too! Favorites of me and my dad’s were Red Skelton, Jackie Gleason, Bill Cosby, Carol Burnett and many others.
I’m considered by most to be a very serious person but I consider it a good day when I’ve made someone laugh!
Smile and the world smiles with you, put a little humor in someone’s world today, tickle their funny bone and you’ll feel better for it!