Memorial Day 2014

We have so much to be thankful for here in America.  I want to give a special thank you to all my ancestors who fought in the American Revolution and Civil War.  Another thank you to my Uncles Jim and Bill and my Father in Law for serving during World War II, my uncles Luther, Ernest, Sam and Jimmy for serving in peacetime, my cousin Gwyn and schoolmate WC for serving in Vietnam, my cousins who served in Afghanistan, and all the many others who have served and fought that we might have the freedoms we cherish today.

This sampler, I designed 4 years ago, say it all, Faith--Liberty--Freedom--Family--Country.

I am working on another piece, which will be a limited edition pillow kit that honors our tradition of Liberty.  I hope to have it finished and released by the 1st of July.

It has been a good week here at Cherished Stitches.  The goodies I ordered at TNNA market have started arriving.

My French Lace.

My Natural dyed silk fibers.

Two new books.

And then Friday I received my silk gimp fibers from Trish for my Cabinet of Curiosities.  I had stopped stitching on the little mini box top, while waiting for them to arrive.  Now I can't wait to attempt working with them.  I love working with something new.

We had our annual Fowler family reunion on Saturday.  It is always a happy day when I get to see  and talk to family members I only see once in a while.

Yesterday we grilled burgers on the grill and ate out on the deck with my son and his girlfriend.  It was such a beautiful day.  So nice in fact, that Bob and I decided to grill pork chops and eat outside for dinner also.

Also new this week, I have 2 tomatoes on my plant.  I really hope they don't get stolen by birds or chipmunks.

With today being a Monday, I guess it is time to go do more Laudry.   I don't have to worry about lunch, because my cousin sent home a huge plate of pulled pork, and Bob has Lions tonight, so dinner will be a sandwich all alone.  (That is a good thing, no cooking)

Hope you all have a very blessed Memorial Day.

Since I spent the day with my daughter Robin yesterday, working on how to improve my blog and try to get more followers, I thought I better work on it today.  After reading through several blogs, it appears I have a lot to live up to in order to get those followers.  I am told I need lots of photos to make my blog interesting.  As some of you know, and many of do not know, I was a professional photographer for over 20 years.  I still do occasional work in the studio, but have found that I developed a serious aversion to taking photos, once I left the studio.  So, now I must push myself sometimes to even take a camera with me when traveling, whether for Cherished Stitches or for vacation.  I really do like that most of the time I can use my phone and ipad for quick snapshots, when I remember to pull them out.  So, my goals are to take more pictures and make a better blog.

I really wanted to go to the Penn Dry Goods event this weekend, as I so enjoyed the event last year.  But, I have been on the road quite a bit this year.  I just read the Tot Hill Farm blog, and I am so jealous.  Chris has always made a trip into an adventure.  I just love the way she always comes up with such interesting places to eat.  Really looking forward to our trip to Nashville 2015 next year.

One of the things I have been working on this past week, is a class to teach at Nashville 2015.  I hope this is of interest to the shops, as it is something I have been wanting to work on for some time.  As an artist, (yes, one of my jobs in our studio was to do hand tinting, and full oils of portraits), I just cannot resist anything to do with paints.   For the first part of the class, I plan to teach how to distress paint a box.

First I gathered supplies

The Finished product.  

The second part of the class will be a design to fit on top.  I was very excited about working on the Jamestown jacket with simple Blackwork stitches, and plan to work up the top with this style  of needlework.  I have always loved the simplicity of Blackwork, and after stitching some of the smalls for my Cabinet of Curiosities and working on the jacket, love it even more.

Hope you all have a wonderful day.

Donna

It has been almost a year exactly since I last posted on my blog.  I have started posting on Facebook, and although I say I will be more active on my blog, only time will tell.

Yesterday I posted a picture of the small neck roll I stitched and made up for my cousin, Donna, who is fighting breast cancer.  I said I would post the chart as a freebie today if I could.  All directions should be on the post.

I hope you enjoy this.  Send me a photo of the finished piece, and what you did with it and who you stitched

it for.

A Special Guest

For the past 2 days, I have had the pleasure of taking a fellow stitcher on tours of special places.  Darlene Lara, owner and designer with The Marking Sampler, was in Greensboro, and we had 2 beautiful Carolina Spring days.

On Friday we started with a tour of the Greensboro Museum. It is the home of Dolly Madison's red velvet dress.  The dress has just returned home after many years at the Smithstonean. It will only be on display  for a short while, before it goes into storage, maybe forever.  Also, some other pieces of her belongings were out.  All of the objects were found in a trunk several years ago.  The photo below  is one of the motifs from a silk tablecloth.  There was a water stain in the center where Dolly had turned over a vase of flowers.  I found the workmanship very beautiful, even though it was probably a professionaly made piece.  These motifs were couched or appliqued to the gold silk, and it was very hard to see any stitches.                                                                      

After lunch, we spent the rest of the day antique shopping.  Sad to say, we did not find anything to tempt our money from our wallets.  Maybe that was a good thing.

Bright and early Saturday morning, we headed ot to Salisbury, NC, with the Piedmont Sampler Guild.  Fifteen of us began our day shopping at Spring Robin.  What could be better than a Needlework shop. Robin, the owner, had invited Threads of Gold to hold a trunk show.  So, in addition to shopping, we got to view some wonderful antique sampler.

Lunch was at a great sandwich shop downtown.  After a short walk, we enjoyed sitting outside in the beautiful weather, while eating our sandwiches.  

After lunch, we walked another coulple of blocks to the Dr Josephus Hall House. What a beautiful place.  The home had been built in 1820 as a girls school.   Dr Hall and his wife bought it and refurbished it in 1859.  It remained in the family until it was donated to the Salisbury Historicl Foundation.  You can visit www.historicsalisbury.org, to find out about upcoming events at the house.

The image above is of the house, and the image to the left shows the iron work gate.  The same motif is used on all of the columns an railing on the house.

After touring the house, Darlene, my daugher Robin, and I headed out to find an antique shop we had been told about.  Sadly, it had closed.  But, we had another unexpected treat in store.  The shop had been located in Spencer, just down the road from Salisbury.  The NC Transportation Museum is located there.  They were having a big steam train event, and we got to see the old steam engine go by. 

The photo is one that my husband, who is a train buff, took yesterday.  He did a bit of manipulation Awsome, isn't it?

More soon.

I wanted to share this with everyone.  This wonderful blog was shared by a friend. My Fairest Flowers series is based on Elizabethan gardens, and I really thought this article was inspiring.  The Elizabethans were very proud of their gardens, and they put them on their clothing and into their homes with needle and thread.  You can find the article here:
Flowering by Embroidery

Sunday Afternoon

What a lovely afternoon.  Maybe Spring really has arrived.  As you can see, Mama B knows what you are supposed to be doing on a day like this. 

Unfortunately, she is in the spot where I stand to put in my contacts.   I had planned to  stitch after posting.   So, you know who had to move.                        As for the blogging, I continue to have issues.  Like trying to get a consistant alignment, and trying to make paragraphs.    If I hit the enter key, it goes all the way to the bottom of the page.   It also took over an hour to figure out why my photos were not coming through from the new ipad to my e-mail.  Turns out my password was not entered, even though I had put it in yesterday.

I was so excited yesterday.  My new fabric samples from Wichelt came in.  Now to decide which one to use for Autumn Whimsies.  The colors shown do not do  them justice.  I worked with them a bit, but still they are not quite correct.  They have a bit more yellow than shows.

Time to stitch.                   

Fryes Mill

Thought some of you might like to visit this site.  They really carry some nice things.

http://myemail.constantcontact.com/Frye-s-Measure-Mill---Spring-2013-Silent-Auction.html?soid=1103001797014&aid=nYjoMDKW3YM