There, there Wolf

Again some crafting fun for Craftster.org Nerd battle... This challenge was vampire vs werewolf. I chose werewolf. I went cute as opposed to my normal leaning, but I think he turned out nice. He's just a little standing pillow. Lots and lots of french knots, all of his fur is french knots!

Working On

Portal Turret Sneak Peak, a photo by ezri_b on Flickr.

Here is a sneak peek at what I'm working on for my husband.
Like many households, Portal 2 has become huge in our house. Even though I do not play, I have seen my fair share.
It was meant to be a surprise for my husband, but my nosey youngest boy found it and showed him before I could stop him. So cat's out of the bag, and now he gives lots of input!

Cousin's Wedding Towel

My cousin is getting married today, and I wanted to give them something besides cash, so I embroidered them a dish towel.



You'll notice the "Aug." is a little spread out. Well, I originally put "Sept." on it, and well, that was wrong and my husband (thank God!) noticed last night, so I quick changed it.

Swaps Received

I've received some lovely swaps lately, and thought I should quick share


My dishcloths from Kimtastic on craftster.org


My mini quilt from taylynnsbean on flickr


and this one I made for taylynnsbean on flickr the theme was "out of the box" mini quilts. I have always wanted to do hexes, but they seem so daunting on a big quilt. I have been obsessed with wanting a beehive lately, so they sort of went together. I really like this, and may have to make one for myself. The bee was hand embroidered.

Stuff I've Been Working On

Ok, here's 2 of the things I've done recently. First is the tea towel for the tea towel tour. She requested our state or something that represents it and the year it was established. So here's what I did.

And here is the doll quilt I made for the Doll Quilt Swap I was in. She's received it, so I can show it now.

Baseball embroidery

Here's the crayon tinted and embroidered one of Lore. The colors are off because it's early in the morning and hazy. I'll try to take another one later, but once the day starts that just always becomes less likely.

The waterbottle isn't as wonky as it looks on the picture either.

Now to make the rest of the doll quilt. Picking the colors may be difficult for me. I matched his clothes and such to what he actually wore, but those colors won't match my living room at all, so I want it to look nice on it's own, but match my living room. (Pink walls, light blue curtains with red white and pink in them.)

Gifts For the Nieces

We made a few gifts and were able to give them to the recipients this weekend.

First, you've seen me working on this, but it is finished. I wanted to keep it simple, and I think it looks pretty good, if I do say so myself.

Here's the finished front. (I these this crazy early in the morning, so I know the color is a little funny.)

Here's a bit of a close up, and you can see a peak of the corner of the back, and my mild label.

We also made my nieces (the ones in the quilt above) a frog game. The boys had tons of fun making/helping with these. We took the idea from Mama Urchin's Lilypad Game. We also used the same Purl Bee Frogs and they worked excellent.

Just a simple zipper bag to keep it all in. I meant to add handles, but I made it quite late at night, and forgot, so..... ooops.

And also, something I forgot to post a picture of. My Levi was in a musical version of Treasure Island. He played Chief Pigaloo. He spoke Pig-Latin and ROCKED THE PART! I was so proud, and truly impressed!

Sketch #2

Ok, so I fiddled around with the picture, and I took some suggestions, and this is my second try.

I got rid of much of the bench. Put in a bat and ball, and added his water bottle. What do you think?

Baseball- Embroidery

To a point baseball has consumed our lives. Funny thing is, only one of my boys is playing this year. Lore loves baseball, he especially loves being catcher. I think all of that gear gives him a sense of power!

I love baseball too. Mine is far more selfish than it should be. Practices and games for kids around 7 years old, is a lot of waiting. Not a whole lot of action much of the time. But we're outside in the lovely fresh air just sitting... or not. I have a hard time sitting still. Especially as the controlling person I truly am inside. So I need something to distract me. In comes embroidery.

Oh, Embroidery, how I love thee!

My doodles (and the patterns of others,) look so lovely stitched out. Far better than mine do on paper!

I have been on a doll quilt kick, and I have another one in the works now. I will work on this as I watch my little Lore running, catching, batting, making sandcastles, leaping onto home then doing a pirouette because he made a run and all of the other fun things he does while playing baseball.

I am fairly happy with it, but I feel it is missing something. I tried a chain link fence, but it didn't look right, and it made it too busy. I was considering some birds or something flying/sitting above the bench. Any other suggestions?

PS The mohawk was much more difficult to draw than I had anticipated.

Playing with crayons and embroidery

Right now I haven't had any time to get on my sewing machine, but I have had a bit of free time in cars, at parks and stuff like that, so I can bring along embroidery. I have been making my doll quilt for the doll quilt swap, I have also been making one for myself, and I have started one for my sister in law of my nieces. Although, I'm not sure if I like it. I don't know if it looks enough like the girls or not. The picture looked more like them, but the stitching didn't quite translate. Anyway, here's what I've been working on.

doll quilt swap with the scrappy border

The one for my sister in law. I don't know if it looks enough like the girls. I may just be being too hard on myself. (I do that sometimes)

The first kiss embroidery that's the same as the one I'm making for the doll quilt swap. I was afraid I wouldn't be able to send it, so I made one up for myself. I think I like the one for the swap better, so I think I will keep this one.

Doll Quilt 4 Swap Preview

I have been having lots of fun working on my swap doll quilt. I haven't been able to do any real sewing since the flooding, so this is what I've been still able to work on.


The picture is something I've been working on for quite awhile. I took inspiration from a few different pictures, but it was all totally drawn by me. It's supposed to look like my oldest son. I guess it's how I imagined his first kiss will be, and the girl is supposed to look like the girl I imagined it would be with, but it must not look too much like her because my son and my husband didn't recognize her, so I said I made her up. We'll see how psychic I am.


Anyway, I colored it in crayon, set it, then embroidered everything in brown with a backstitch.

I forgot my camera at friends' house, so it's a scan, hence the little ripples.

Rainbow cupcakes

Well, baseball is off and running! Quite literally really. We are a little village, and so our village and 2 others combine to form one baseball league. So we play and practice in all different villages. Each week is in a different village. So it's quite a run to most games.


Today is my day to bring our little sluggers some baseball snacks for after the game.


Initially I wanted something healthy and wonderful for their depleted bodies after a hard game, but my son out voted me. (Did I mention he's 7?) He wanted cupcakes and gatorade. Well, he won. So here is what I made for the cupcakes.





Here's the inside.





I omitted the yellow, and sort of regret it. But they're still cute. They also sort of match my son's personality. Oh, did I forget to show you his latest look?

Yes, that's a red mohawk! It's his annual haircut, but we upped it with a bit of red this year.



Also, I forgot to post my returned tea towel. I think it still needs something up in the left corner. So I'll have to think about that a bit.

Swaps and more sickies

Ok, first sickies. This has been a rough winter with sickies here.Tim and I have seemed to have gotten the worst of it. I think I may have had a nasty allergic reaction, but exactly to what we aren't sure. I swelled up like a balloon and had a hard time breathing. Things are looking better now, but I really still don't feel like myself yet.





On a much more positive note. I have been finishing up swaps. I mentioned a gnome swap earlier, well, Canadian post has come through, and it was received. Here's my not so great quality pic that I quick snapped before sending it.

It's an embroidered gnome corduroy messenger bag that I made for my male swap partner. I got the image from a David the Gnome coloring page that I modified a bit. I also carved him a rubber stamp, and I made him a shrinky dink bookmark. Those are all pictured. The one item I made that isn't pictured is a zip pouch. I completely forgot to snap a pic of it. But it's coordinating corduroy.

I also finished up my lunchbox swap from Oh Fransson. My partner hasn't received (that I know of) yet, but it's a blind swap, so she won't know it's hers anyway. So I may as well post it right!


Made with Oh Fransson's Vintage Pillow case pattern out of Moda's Swell fabric and a satin bow. I used Insulbrite batting. I made my own place mat and a little napkin tucked in the pocket. I am quite happy with how it turned out.

Tea Towel Tour (are you sick of it yet?)

I have been quite busy, but most of the things I've been working on have been for swaps, so I don't want to post here until it is received. So those pictures are coming soon.


I did finish the next towel on the tour.

Parts of her I love other parts, I probably would change if I had more time. Overall she looks like old tattoos which was the goal.

Tea Towel Tour

I finished another towel today. I did Bluesparkie's towel and her theme was fallen women and mushrooms. So this is what I came up with.

Also, I'm very happy to announce that a secret has been unveiled. Jenny of Sublime Stitching had begun the Tea Towel Tour in an attempt to received feedback on a new towel she was developing. Well the original disappeared during the tour and hasn't been found. So a few of us on Craftster.org got together to make her a replacement. Well, it is finally competed and it has been delivered to Jenny. So we are not keeping it a secret any longer. Here's a link to pictures of the towel being given to Jenny. Here's a picture of just the thing I embroidered.

Tea Towel Tour Again

I realized, there will probably be a lot of these posts for awhile. This is Sew~Amy's towel from the craftster.org swap. She wanted an underwater/sewing notions theme.

Here is the whole towel so far, sew~amy did the one on the right, mine is in the middle, and UrsulaDiamond is on the left.

Here's mine a bit closer. The chest is full of sewing notions.

Tea Towel Tour

I finished UrsulaDiamonds heart for the tea towel tour. I read while stalking her that she likes Kewpie dolls, so I did a stitching Kewpie doll. It turned out kind of cute.



Here's the heart in it's entirety that she sent me. You can see the diamond that she stitched on the bottom.

Tea Towel Tour

I am in a lovely swap for a Tea Towel Tour on Craftster.org. I haven't had the priveledge to participate in any of the other ones because I always seem to just miss sign ups. I didn't this time and I couldn't be more pleased. I have a lovely group of women, most I haven't worked with before. The premise of this swap is that each of us has a towel (or apron, or pillow, etc..) and we send it to each of the women in our group. They each get to embroider something on it, and then we get this lovely towel sent back to us to keep forever. I embroidered a bit onto my towel, and will be sending it off this week.

I had to quick take advantage of the little bit of sun to snap this picture. I learned I still need a lot more practice with french knots, but overall I'm quite happy with it.

*Edit* The pattern is a freebie from patternbee.com and the font is LittleLordFontleroy

Gift for my niece

My niece is celebrating her birthday this weekend, so I made her a little gift. She loves horses and loves to read. So I made her a reading pillow. It has a pocket to hold a book, and elastic to hold it while she reads. I embroidered a horse and her name on the pocket. I also carved her a stamp with her name on it. I made it a little bag too.

We also gave her a book, but not the one pictured, this was just to show the pocket.
This is how the book is held open while she reads.

Quick tutorial added

My group shot of patches

I received 4 amazing patches in a swap. Here they are all together at my home

The detailed and amazing inner workings of a Dalek is by trifarina (I believe will be going into a quilt)
The adorable running imp is by Craftybernie (I'm not sure where she'll go yet, maybe on my Christmas tree skirt or framed)
The gorgeous bird and flowers by rectangel (I am pretty sure I am framing this for my living room)
Last, but certainly not least is Monsieur Hedgehog by SewSewAGoGo. Who is going on a cozy for my beloved Kitchen Aid mixer (what a great start for my soon to be woodland themed kitchen!)

I truly feel I am the luckiest girl. These are so amazing! I was really a beginner at the start of this swap, and I feel I have grown so much. I can't wait until the next round!