Oh Mia my oh!

Sewing and stitching have come to a complete halt.  My poor clamshell quilt sits neglected exactly where I left it as of the last posting.

No stitching at all -- but for a very good reason.  As of Tuesday, July27, we have a new family member.  Meet Mia.

She's a little over 8 weeks old now.  We got her after a certain boy child fell in love with her while babysitting her for a friend.

See how small she is?   :D   Anyway, the boy child called me (this was the day before we welcomed her to our family) and asked in his boy child way (rather noncommittally but obviously totally smitten) if we could have a certain little kitten.  And so here she is.  She has definitely stolen everyone's hearts.

The boy child's heart.

The girl child's heart.

The father type's heart (although Mia was a bit doubtful about this loud, boisterous fellow at first).

And of course my heart.  (Please ignore the frowsy woman in the picture.)

But of course, having a kitten in the house is like having a baby in the house.  lol!  I am hoping to attempt some stitching soon.  But in the meantime, Samantha P and I have been spending lots of time with each other while a certain kitten sleeps on my lap.

Samantha P

Which reminds me.  "Mr. Rosenblum Dreams in English" by Natasha Solomons.  Good read.  I promise.  It might start a bit slowly, but it's worth the read.

Now that I've bored you all with our new family member (who is currently sleeping on my lap and thankfully no longer helping with this blog post), let me see what greatest hit I can come up with for your entertainment.  Ah yes, I'd promised the other Merry Cox piece, hadn't I?

This piece is what prompted me to want to take classes with Merry Cox.  I just love this one so much!  I hope you don't mind a bunch of pictures.

But I do think it's so pretty!

In other news, the girl child is doing the last days of her internship this week.  It sure seems to have gone fast to me.  I think she's enjoyed it, but is tired of the commute -- altogether it takes her about 2 hours one way. 

Mia is keeping us busy day and (parts of the) night.  I was hoping she would grow out of the early risings and the periodic nighttime wakings, but the father type thinks that cats are a bit nocturnal and she'll keep on doing it.  Is this true?  I'd love to hear from you cat people out there.  She loves to sleep with someone (so far she's slept with 3 out of 4 of us), which is a problem since once she wakes up, she thinks the person she's sleeping with should wake up too.  lol!  She is such a sweetie though.  And very smart, IMO.   Can you tell I'm in love?

Well, thanks for stopping by and saying hi as always.  I will do my best to keep you entertained with my greatest hits while the stitchy stoppage continues.  Here's hoping Mia lets me stitch once in a while!

Ho hum.....

Not much to show this week.  I seem to be in a stitchy/sewy slump.  My clamshell quilt doesn't look very different from last time.  Just one more row of the pretty fabrics and one more row of the plain.

I have to admit, I think at least one culprit is my new toy.  I've been spending time reading books and watching things on my iPad.  Has anyone watched Desperate Romantics?  The first season is out finally in the US (it's a BBC series).  It was fun, all about the pre-Raphaelites and their wild lives.   I'm looking forward to the next season.  It's not for kids though!  A bit raunchy.  :D

This past week, I received a nice package in the mail.  I won a giveaway from Jan of Only One Ewe and Tree of Life Samplings!  I won one of her newest designs, The Sparrow, along with the fabric and fibers to stitch it. 

It's such a pretty design!  In fact, all of Jan's designs are pretty!  Thank you, Jan, I'm so thrilled to have won!

I've been trying to decide what to show for my greatest hits this week.  Let's see what I come up with.

Oh, this is a nice one!  Do you know what it is?

A few years ago, I took a couple of classes from Merry Cox down in NJ.  I finished both the pieces that I took too!  This is one of the pieces, A Beautiful Day in Williamsburg.  It is a beautiful tray that you can use to hold all your stitching materials.  It has pockets for some scissors and a ruler and a needlebook.  I of course personalized it with my own information.  I left Williamsburg up at the top though.  I love Williamsburg -- my mom loved it as well.  And I have fond memories of visiting Williamsburg when the kids were small -- the boy child spent the whole time climbing any steps he could find (he was in the cruising-right-before-walking stage of life).

Maybe next time I'll show off my other class project.  :D

In other news -- well, there's not much other news.  It's just full throttle summer mode around here.  The boy child is officially topsy turvy sleepwise.  I discovered him Sunday morning at 6am saying he couldn't sleep so he was taking a walk.  By 9am, he was crashing on my bed.  He slept till 4pm.  Ahem.  Hopefully he'll get un-topsied  today.  He has something to do in the middle of the day today.

Thanks as always for stopping by and saying hi.  It always makes my day to read your comments and visit with you all.  Have a great week!

Quilty stitchy quilty stitchy ......

I seem to be stuck in a quilty world at the moment.  I did pick one stitchy thing up this week, but nothing seems to have come of that development.  In the meantime, here's my clammy progress.

It's actually getting to look more like a quilt now!  Quite exciting!  Of course, I have a long way to go, but I keep dreaming about having a real quilt, albeit not a bed size quilt, to show for it.  At least I don't think it will be bed size.  Probably bigger than lap quilt size though.  Hmmmm.  Anyway, I'm happy with how it's going.

Here is another greatest hits for you stitchy folks who couldn't care less about quilts.  I did 3 of the Carriage House Samplings Hawk Run Hollow series a while back.  I think it was before I started blogging, so here are my pictures.

This is my Houses of Hawk Run Hollow.  I used AVAS and some 40ct fabric or other.  The wonderful Jill Rensel did the framing.  Look at the mat detail!

Here is my Village of Hawk Run Hollow.  I used the recommended fibers and fabric.  Again, Jill did the framing.

And finally, my Shores of Hawk Run Hollow.  (Recommended fabric and fibers.)  With Jill's amazing artwork.

I love my Hawk Run Hollow pieces!

Lizzie from A House in the Country recently had a giveaway to celebrate her birthday, and I won!  And I received the package yesterday, which was my birthday!  Yay!   Here are all the wonderful goodies Lizzie sent.  I was so thrilled!

So much lovely stash!  A hexie package and some charm packs, pretty little felt flowers and pom poms, and some DMC,  (And some candy to try!)

Also some gorgeous fabrics -- William Morris perhaps?

And some patterns/kits and a quilt magazine all the way from Australia!!

Thank you so much Lizzie!!  I love all my goodies!   I've so enjoyed getting to know you and I always love reading your blog!

Finally, it's been a while since there have been any family pics here, so here's one the father type took of the boy child practicing.

Still can't get used to how tall the child is.

I mentioned that yesterday was my birthday.  Wanna see my birthday present?  :D

I'm so happy!  If you look closely, you can see I'm all set in terms of ereaders -- I have the Kindle app, the Barnes and Noble app, and of course, the ibookstore with its app.  Love it!!!  And going online or checking my mail is a snap.  Watching movies?  Gorgeous!!  The father type is gobsmacked by it.  It says a lot for the ipad that my father type has decided he wants one too.  The father type doesn't say such things but once in a blue moon -- he's too practical to fall for every gadget out there (like me!).  Anyway, I'm thrilled by my present!  Thank you, father type!

The girl child got me a gorgeous tote bag -- which I immediately adopted as my new purse -- and inside was a rain check for the Nonesuch Dickens edition of a set of 3 of Dickens' works: Our Mutual Friend, The Pickwick Papers, and The Old Curiosity Shop.  The set is due out in November.  I'm so impressed that the father type remembered and could advise the girl child on which are my favorite Dickens novels.  Our Mutual Friend has always been my favorite.  And The Pickwick Papers has always held a special place in my heart because of Sam Weller.  To me Sam Weller and Samwise Gamgee from The Lord of the Rings have a lot in common.  And the two Sams are two of my favorite characters in the world.  Such a thoughtful girl child!

Thanks as always for stopping by and saying hi.  It's so lovely being part of the blogging community and getting to know you all, bloggers and nonbloggers alike.

Clamming away, plus hornbooks

Well, I'm definitely starting to pine for some x's around here, but I still haven't settled on a project to start -- or to continue.  So it's lots of clams instead.  Doesn't feel like a lot though.  Hand applique always takes longer than you would wish.  Kathie last week asked for a whole picture of the quilt so far.   So I did my best to do that this week.  Sorry -- I'm not the best photographer!  Here is the quilt as is. 

I actually like this next picture better -- the quilt is just the right size for my little guys.

I decided that since there wasn't any x-stitching going on at present here, that I would show a greatest hits of sorts of my past projects.  For some reason I'd never taken any pictures of the few hornbooks that I've stitched.  So I thought this was the perfect opportunity to do just that.

Pitifully few, as you see.  I have others waiting to be stitched but I just haven't gotten around to them.  The one on the top left is the Folkart Hornbook from Hillside Samplings.  It was a limited edition piece from 2005.  The one on the top right is the Quaker Hornbook from With My Needle.   It is available if ordered as a group of 10 or more.  And finally, the one on the bottom is the Sampler Hornbook by the Prairie Sampler.  I love hornbooks.  I hope do to more someday.

In other news -- well, not much is going on.  It's definitely summer, with summer activities and summer heat and humidity.  I'm starting to debate more and more with myself about what stitching project I want to pick up, so we'll see what happens. 

Thanks as always for stopping by and saying hi.  Your comments mean the world to me -- it's so wonderful to get to know you all!  Have a great week!

Jane leaves lingering aftereffects, stitcher forced to seek solace elsewhere...

Have you ever finished a stitching project that you loved?  Have you ever felt lost and abandoned when you finished that lovely project?  Well, Jane has abandoned me.  Or rather, I've abandoned her since I put the last stitches into her.  She's patiently waiting until I can take her in for framing.  And now, I feel so lost without her.    What to do?

Well, after some debating, I decided to turn to something I've been obsessing over for a while.  Sorry, stitchers, but I think I'm going to be quilting for at least a while.  Until I find that next stitching project that calls to me.  Here's what I've been working on.

I know you quilters out there have been seeing these clamshell quilts popping up all over the place.  Well, they got to me.  I started obsessing.  Then Linen and Raspberry showed off her version and it just knocked my socks off.  Scroll down on that link and you'll see what she's done.  Gorgeous!  She later posted a link to Brigitte Giblin's new website with the clamshell quilt pattern that she was using.  And so I bought it!   I didn't think I'd do anything with it for a long time, but I guess I was wrong about that. 

I will proceed to bore you with shots of the whole length of the quilt so far. 

I'm using mostly Rowan fabrics -- Kaffe Fassett, Philip Jacobs, and Brandon Mably.  I'm just loving the colors!

I was afraid the large scale prints wouldn't work well, but so far it's been just fine.  I think!  I have no clue how to get a shot of the whole thing though.

So Laurie, Deb, and Kim, I hate to say it, but hand applique is still my first love.  That and English paper piecing.   The Farmer's Wife blocks are still languishing.  Ah well.....   And Lizzie, I love hand applique, but I still can't face tons of complicated applique!  This is easy compared to the Civil War Bride Quilt.   I'm lazy.  lol!

Both kids went out to see the local fireworks with their own sets of friends.  Nice that they do that since the father type and I are content to sit at home and watch the Macy's fireworks and the Capitol 4th on TV.  Such stick in the muds we are!  It's really feeling like summer now.  Wimbledon is done for another year (congrats to Rafa -- I'm not at all surprised he won.).  Time to settle in for a long summer.  Why do I feel like I'm ready for fall already?  lol!

Thanks as always for stopping by and saying hi.  It's wonderful to be a part of this lovely blogging community!  Have a great week!  Hope you have today off and get to have a good stitchy day!