Best Friend's birthday presents.....

Today I get to post about my best friend's birthday!  Karen (best friend) and I exchange xmas ornaments for our birthdays since we both have summer birthdays.  It was her idea to do that and I agreed.  That way when Christmas time comes around and we start decorating our trees, we each have a NEW ORNAMENT to enjoy for the entire season that we keep the tree up.  Here is the ornament I did for her this year.  It is Just Nan Holly Knot freebie chart xstitched in premium HDF silks and metallics.  And of course....the lovely beads just add to it as well.

Karen also wanted a special xstitch kit with horses on it that she saw on Amazon.  I was able to get that ordered and shipped to her as well as some new stork scissors.   I think we all need a new pair of scissors on occasion.  Don't you???   I don't have a picture of either of these but the kit was of horses running in water.  I also sent her a new cookbook that the Officer Spouse Club from Luke AFB were selling earlier this year as a fundraiser.  And I included some little notecards.  We all need little notecards for that "last minute gift" that comes around sometimes.  Then to top it off I enclosed a Kohl's gift card for her to go shopping for some new clothes for herself!!! 

Happy Birthday Karen!!   I Miss You!!!

Birthday present for a dear close friend....

Today is my dear friend Pat's birthday!!!  She is not a fan of sewing and says her sewing machine just hates her.  I really don't think it does but I can sympathize because my paint brush HATES me!  So for her b-day I xstitched her iStitch Sew Pretty in Pink because Pat and I are such PINK FANATICS and we love the same things. You can find the chart HERE at this link -- just click on the left side where is says CHARTS. So I thought I would xstitch this wonderful little iStitch chart, in HDF Murmurs of Sea Pinks, and then I sewed a new xstitching bag to sew it on the front.  I even personalized it by stitching "Pat's Stitching Bag" over one thread at the bottom of the chart.  Of course.....I couldn't just send just the new xstitch bag with the stitching on the front so I filled it with a mini spool of HDF, a pink crocheted dishcloth, mints in a pink tin, pink nail polish, some pretty pink floral tissues and a tube of Udder Cream.  She said the tissues and lotion were going into her new stitching bag.  I loved her bag sooo much that I cut another one out for me to have as well.  Oh darn....now I need to stitch up the same design and put "Brenda's Stitching Bag" on mine like I did for Pat.  Then I had wrapped it all up individually in pink Mary Englebrit wrapping paper so Pat would have just the most wonderful of PINK BIRTHDAYS!!!  Here are the pics to see what I'm talking about.

I hope she enjoys her bag.....which I'm pretty sure she will! 

HAPPY STITCHING AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY PAT!!!

More stitching photos......

More stitching photos for your viewing.  I am trying to space these out over several days so that one blog post will not be so picture heavy.  And it's nice to get inspired by seeing other peoples stitching and WIPs.  I will also try to show some photos I took when I went to the Attic's Sampler Sunday this past Sunday.  We had such a GREAT time as always!

Here is my LHN Stars & Stripes finish.  I am not sure if I want to frame it or make it into a standing cube.  I stitched it in HDF premium on 32ct Natural Belfast with my own color choices.

I have also joined a German xstitch message board and I am doing a SAL project called Tulips Praise.  Here is my first part finished.  This is a 6mo SAL.  I am stitching this one on 32ct Natural Belfast with DMC.

Now....to get some more "finishes" done so I can show you.....besides just xstitch finishes.  I know I have 4 or 5 more LHN ornaments to put the backing on sometime soon.  Now.....I'm off to xstitch the night away.

Happy Stitching!

MBT The Lord's Prayer WIP.....

I know I said I was going to start posting more pictures but there are some days I don't know where in the world my time has gone.  So I decided to work some more on this huge project for my husband.  I am also doing it for Becky Bee's BAP contest for her blog.  You can find the link to her blog on the right side.

I had thought about taking this project home with me when we vacationed in TN for a month visiting family and doing the "touristy sites" with our 2 kids.  I'll post those pics here soon too.  I did manage to get a lot of stitching time in and finished 5 complete projects for the month I was gone and also managed to work on 2 other medium projects.   But decided against taking it because it is SO HUGE of a project.

Here it is........ My Big Toe The Lord's Prayer WIP to date.

I apologize for the wrinkles.  I just folded it out on my loveseat in the LR this a.m. and didn't bother to iron it as I will be working more on it today.

Now to go play in the pool with my son and then come in for some serious xstitching for the remainder of the day.   I did get my ornament of the month done for this month.  YEAH ME.  I will close with a pic of that one.  I just need to do the finishing work for it.

LHN Six Little Cardinals

 I have more stitchy pics to show but I can't do that just yet because some are for birthday gifts and the recipients have not received them yet.  When they do I'll be happy to share pictures.

Happy Stitching!

Happy Birthday America!

I know it has been a long time since my last post and I had great intentions of getting right back to blogging but my mind must still be on vacation.  My family and I took an extended vacation from AZ to visit family back in TN for almost an entire month.  While there we took 3 mini vacations with our kids and I still managed to get quite a bit of xstitching done.  YEAHH!!!    I hope to show pictures soon of my finished projects and my WIPS also of course.

Tonight I have pulled the Hand Dyed Fibers to start xstitching LHN Stars and Stripes project on 32ct natural linen.  Here is what it looks like and will be a nice addition to my Americana room.

I will show you a progress picture soon.  But I hope yall have a wonderful 4th of July and get to spend it with your family and celebrating our country's birthday.  I really want to start 272 Words by Primrose Needleworks, but I'm not ready to start another BOP (big ole project) just yet.  Google the project to see what I mean.  One day I will though and it too will have display in my Americana room.

Happy 4th of July everyone and Happy Stitching!