Goin' gardening!

That is where I will be this weekend. We have some major catching up to do in the garden at Cranberry Cottage so it will be a nice spring weekend here and we plan to use the time pruning and clearing things up.


But I am also gardening indoors with my crochet flower afghan. I have lately become totally addicted to crocheting these flowers. While my afghan has big and blousy flowers, I started some small ones using this tutorial for a shawl. They are so much smaller and it is fun to make both sizes.

I am using a very fine yarn which I think will give this shawl a chic look for wearing out to a restaurant on a summer's eve.

This weekend, I am going to try and crochet many more flowers for the afghan and will show you my progress next week. I have a great incentive to finish as I have already bought yarn to make an African flower hexagon afghan next.

Can you tell I have become totally hooked on crochet??? so much so that I joined the CAL (crochet a long) at The Flower Bed. They are all so inspiring there!

I promise a quilt-y and stitch-y post later this weekend. I am very busy with a couple of projects and want to share them with you.....

Have a great and creative weekend!

This is why.....

Please turn off my music on the sidebar as you need to hear the clicking of the knitting needles which is something I remember as a child. Make yourself a cup of tea or coffee or hot chocolate and take time to watch this amusing video and be sure to watch it to the end.....

Mother...will you make me a scarf??? *wink*

Now my mind turns to two conclusions after seeing this cartoon:

1. Now I understand why my mother has always had short hair!

2. I know why I took up crocheting instead of knitting. *grins*

Hope you are all having a great weekend!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas.....

...at least it is in Ohio with all its snow. So I will celebrate it with a little Christmas finish here in a springlike Holland. *wink*


Yesterday I found this freebie and decided it would be nice to start and finish stitching something on the same day. All my stitching projects at the moment are large. So I dug into my stash and pulled out some 26 count unbleached linen and thread. I was aided along with yummy dark chocolate covered raisins from my friend Carolien who visited on Tuesday for a fun playdate. They are delicious so thank you so much Carolien.

Even though I am having another fibromyalgia attack today, I was able to sew and stuff the little pillow today. I am having attacks much more often than I used to have. I think my having Hashimoto's disease now is making my FM flare ups come much more often.

At least, I have the comfort of needle and thread and can enjoy this finish. I want to make more little pillows including some little quilt block pillows. I am going to use them as bowl fillers for my large wooden trough (dough bowl) at Christmas with some green branches and berries. Oh how I do love Christmas and we have such a long wait until it comes again. *sigh*

Anyone else working on fun Christmas projects? *grins*

I'm in the garden.....

...the front garden that is. Time has been passing too quickly and I had a couple of blog entries to write which I never got around to. We spent two weekends working on our front garden of our new house. It was a big job as there seems to have not been much maintained in this garden in the 16 years since it was planted. It looks like the only thing done was trimming the beech hedge and even that was not done well resulting in a hedge that is far too high and too deep out onto the street. We worked on cutting out dead wood from the tree, trimmed some plants, weeded out the moss which was everywhere and turned the hard and compact soil. We also created a larger path so that we can enjoy the evening sun there when spring and summer arrives.

Gardening must be on my mind as I was persuaded by Hazel to start working on a crochet flower blanket. My first flower is sitting outside on our bench but it is too chilly to crochet out there just yet. I will be attaching the next flower to this first one today so I am excited to see how it comes out. I decided to work from what little yarn stash I have to try a flower out. Seeing how it work up and the yarn matching my couches well, I decided to go ahead and make the flower blanket from this yarn. I have 8 skeins of this yarn so I will see how large the blanket will become as I go along.

I will be planting up my crochet flowers along with real ones out in the front garden as the temperatures allow.

With all this gardening, you must be hungry? How about a cookie and a cup of tea? I love cooking and baking. I have been trying out many new recipes for the last two months.

When I do not have a needle in my hand, I have a book instead. I finished reading a young adult historical fiction series which I really enjoyed. It is The Quilt Trilogy by Ann Rinaldi.

The first book is A Stitch in Time introducing you to the Chelmsford family. Sisters Hannah, Abigail and Thankful are each stitching their part of the family quilt which goes with them as their lives take shape far apart from each other.

In Broken Days, Thankful's daughter returns to the family with her piece of the quilt. Thankful had been captured by indians in the Ohio territory so will her daughter be accepted by the family?

In the final book, The Blue Door, Abigail's granddaughter returns to the North to visit a family she has never met. These books combine quilting with American history especially the history of the mill houses of Lowell, Massachusetts.

Speaking of gardening, here is the stitching UFO that I finished recently. I had mentioned it but wanted to share it after I had sewn it into a finish. I have not had time to do it yet and thought I would go ahead and show you the piece. It is from a SAL I did last summer. I had been waiting for the last email when I realized that I had missed it. I got the email but it ended up truly getting set aside. There was so little left to do that it was a shame it got pushed aside. Now it is done and I want to have it totally finished well before the summer this year.

Jos and I have both been sick. We have bad coughs that keep us up at night. He has a terrible cold along with it and I have lost my voice. It was a whisper for the last four days but today it is starting to get stronger. You don't need a voice to garden, crochet, read, stitch...do you? *wink*

Life is a ball of yarn?

Yep...it just rolls along and I am week farther before I blink an eye. Gardening, more fun with friends and preparing for the quilt group tomorrow has kept me from blogging again. In the meantime, I also finished a baby blanket.


My niece is having a baby girl named Abigail Lynn this summer. She is already being referred to as Number 3 Lynn by us in the family. You see I am Number 1 Lynn and Abigail's mommy is Number 2 Lynn. So I wanted to make my little namesake a blanket (click here for the pdf of the pattern) for her mommy and daddy to wrap her up in when she comes home from the hospital.

I did not lay it out very flat so sorry about that. I used 3 colors of baby yarn which is so wonderfully soft. Abigail will have the cuddle factor a little extra when wrapped in this soft afghan.

This is only my fourth crochet finish so I was really pleased when the edging came out so nicely. I searched online for one and used this pattern which worked up very easily.

This beret and scarf have been finished for a couple of weeks and I still had not posted it. I must tell you it is not easy to get a good picture of these without wearing them. *grins* For some reason, my scarf has grown about 60cm in length since I finished it. Is that from the loose stitch used for it? Anyone know? I keep teasing Jos that if it grows much longer, we can wrap it around both of our necks. *wink*

The past few days, I have been making the next series of 20 granny squares for my afghan. I have to make 140 of them total so I am working on it on and off...20 at a time. It is fun to work on but not that many of them in a row. I do not have a deadline for it to be finished and just want to have fun making it.

Humm.....tomorrow evening my quilt group comes and I must go take the photos of the next block to share with you. Until then.....

I heart (love) finishes!

Don't you just heart finishes? I have a number of them but just seem to be too busy to get online enough to blog. There have been a number of friends come by over the past month. I realized I have not even shared my crocheted beret and scarf plus I have another stitching finish but first this one.....

Recently, I decided I had better unpack a moving box that had many of my UFOs in it. I kept hoping that if I left it all in there long enough the stitching fairies would come by in the night and finish them for me. No such luck. I opened the box and there they all were staring at me, begging me for a little appreciation of their beauties. This heart was so almost done that it was ridiculous that it ever achieved the status of being a UFO. I stitched the last bits and turned it into a heart ornament.

By the way, see the sweet little pincushion sitting next to the heart? It was a gift from Jantine who came here last week for a day of sewing little quilts. It was fun to finally really get together, something we had planned to try and do about a year ago. Why did we not do it sooner could be the only question as it was really great fun to sew together and the day was over before we knew it.

A rose pearl button as accent.....

Red plaid backing fabric and a ruched ribbon to trim the heart. In my quest to use stash in all times when possible, I have to make the ruching a little less full. It feels so good to use something again that I already had. I want to make more heart ornaments in the course of the year and hope to only work from stash. I am dreaming of my Valentine's tree filled with my own stitched hearts. Here is a peek at that tree (click for link to my other blog) which I put up each year.

I promise to show you another finish yet this week since I have another stitching finish and two crochet finishes.

Intertwined

Interwine - to unite or be united by twisting or twining together

Being intertwined pertains to two levels of this post. I have two finishes to share so they are united in both being finishes. And of course, bobbinlace and crocheting are both methods of intertwining threads. Okay...enough of the English lesson. *wink*

I finished my bobbinlace singing angel and am really happy with how she turned out. She will happily take her place on my lace tree again next Christmas. I will be starting another ornament next Monday. This time we are making a Christmas tree with pearls hanging as ornaments from the branches. It is becoming enjoyable to be working on lace again. I neglected it for too long time.

What can you do with kitchen twice besides lacing up a stuffed roast? Why get out your crochet hook of course! That is just what I did with this blue and white twine and crocheted two new potholders. I already put them to good use today getting a chocolate cake out of the oven as I am having a blogger over tomorrow for a day of quilting together. I am really happy with how they turned out and they work very well too.

I have more finishes to share. I have been working on getting some UFOs finished so I can start something new. I have an adorable chart which was given to me by my friend Carolien for my birthday last weekend. I decided I have to finish two old stitching projects first so this gives me lots of incentive. One is finished and the next is almost there. So back to stitching.....

Meaning.....

The meaning of happiness? Finishing a quilt, of course.


Back in December, I mentioned this UFO (unfinished object) that I decided I wanted to finish. I had the stitching done and patchwork sewn together in time for the holidays but then decided I would rather spend time hand quilting this than rushing it finished by machine quilting it.

You see, I really enjoy hand quilting. I find it so relaxing and soothing. I love seeing a quilt come to life as my needle gathers through the layers.

I took my time, enjoying each and every stitch! The results are very pleasing to me and I now have a new quilt to look forward to using next Christmas.

A quilt is never finished until the label is sewn on. Another step in the quilting process that is great fun to me is naming my quilts (I call this one The Meaning of Christmas) and making a label for them. I could do this as a career that is how much I love creating labels. *grins* They are always done freehand, letting my inspiration work itself out on the fabric.

Speaking of fabric...this is an extra special quilt since it is done with the fabric I bought at my friend's quilt shop. She passed away and I think of her when I see this series of homespun fabrics.

Off to grab another quilt UFO to work on.....

Down on the farm.....

Time to visit the farm again. Tonight the farmer's wives...meaning my quilt group...will gather round the table and share their choices for their first blocks. I am excited to see them all.

Each month, I translate a couple of the letters to Dutch from the book Farmer's Wife quilt sampler and test the blocks. Last month, they had 7 blocks to choose from and this month there are these eight blocks...

I am looking forward to thinking about deciding which fabric I will use for setting me blocks in this sampler. Once I have about half a year of blocks ready, I will be able to make some concrete decisions about what color to use for my sashing. The stack is growing in the meantime.

Holland is a small country but has much diversity in the 12 provinces that make it up. I have been including the various kinds of farm buildings in the monthly newsletters showing how different each area built their farms. A farm in Holland is unique in that the animals sleep in the 'deel' which is the barn section right in the house. There is only a door between the family and them. You can see some photos of Dutch farms on an entry I did last year from the open air museum in Arnhem. Just click here to read the entry.

Above is an oil painting by Jos Lussenburg entitled Farmer's wife darning socks. It shows a typical Dutch farm inside. Funny but we have lost so much of what was good in the world in the good old days. We throw away socks with a hole in them and a darning egg or mushroom is now considered a sewing antique. We are such a throw away society and just pitch the socks, run to the store and buy new ones. Am I crazy for thinking it would be fun to try darning a sock once? First I will have to get myself one of those antique darning eggs. *wink*

Speaking of eggs, here is a fun school blackboard saying from the 1920s farm life...

"Words spoken, like eggs broken, are hard to repair."

Keeping warm.....

Bet you thought I got lost huh? Nope! I have been on my computer very little. Just been very busy with lots of fun playdates with friends and working on tons of projects. Speaking of projects...why did I ever learn to crochet????? Now I have one more thing that I desperately want to do each day. Yeah, like I needed yet one more thing...


So I was online searching for a beret pattern, as one does, and then I found this pattern for wristies on a blog, as one does, and could not resist so I grabbed my yarn and a crochet hook, as one does, and got tucked in yesterday. Okay, now do not call the grammar police. I know that was an incorrect and long sentence but that is how the crochet muse got a hold of me yesterday. *grins*

I wore these this morning with my winter coat since it is rather cold outside at only 0C/32F. They felt so soft and kept me warm. I think I am going to make another pair as it would be fun to have them in other colors. I am also going to add one more row of the single crochet row at the start as they will be just a tad longer.


Oh and by the way, I also made a beret but I will save that for another post as I first want to finish the scarf I am making to match it.

What are you up to this weekend?

My Christmas Cat!

As I mentioned, I have another finish to show you. I finished the second cat sampler. It is S. Claws by The Goode Huswife.

This ended up being my own version of the design. I had many comments about the fun of changing the cat's colors to Dagi. Thank you so much! I worried about this as I received an email in the past from a designer about my changing a color on her design. I just hope that if the designer of The Goode Huswife ever sees this blog that she will never take offence to this. I am loving making my wall dedicated to my sweet Dagi from her beautiful designs!

I used the recommended colors (DMC 400, 680, 3051, 3053) for the most part only changing the cat to DMC 3032 and 3781 once again. I left out the filling in of the patchwork motifs under the cat as I like the fact the Ohio Star pattern stood out more this way.

Fabric: Zweigart Autumn Fields 28 count stitched 2/2

Dagi really is my Christmas cat by the way. His birthday is on December 23rd so he is like a little present under the Christmas tree.

"In a cat's eye, all things belong to cats."

~ English Proverb

I'm hooked!

On crochet that is! I am surprised that I like doing it as much as I do. I just do not know how to delegate my time to be able to crochet, stitch, quilt and make lace. Anybody know where I could buy a few extra pair of hands and perhaps a couple of extra hours a day while I am at it???

I have put together the granny square I have made up to now. I am going to make this into an afghan we can use while laying on the couch. I use my afghans and quilts often on the couch due to my health. I am making this 10 squares wide which means I have about another100 squares at least to go...

My squares look so plain after looking in my new book. This just arrived in the mail and it is a fabulous book. Many of the projects have a patchwork feel to them so they will satisfy the quilter in me too.

Have a wonderful weekend! I will have a finish to share at the end of it. *grins*

Dagi's sampler wall - Minerva

I have finished the first sampler for Dagi's sampler wall. I am making a wall of little cat samplers this year. The first is from this book from The Goode Huswife which you can see in this previous entry. Oh and a photo of my adorable little man Dagi himself! *grins*

I started this last Thursday and hated the color of the cat so I ripped it back out again and started over. I changed the colors to DMC 3032 and 3781 for the cat creating one that looked like Dagi. Dagi is a Mandarin cat which is a half long haired Siamese and his color is lilac tabby ticked. When he was a kitten you could see little bits of stripes on his fur which fadded as he grew. Okay, okay...I know the color is lilac but there is nothing purplish about my little man. He is a beige color actually. I am thinking about changing more of the cats to look like him as I go along.

Used for this sampler...

Zweigart Autumn Fields 28 count stitched 2/2

DMC 3032, 3781, 3045, 3012 and 3371

In the meantime, I also started pulling thread for the next cat sampler from the book called S. Claws. I have to start searching for frames now as I finish these. They are all small samplers so it might not be easy to find frames for them. I have to start looking around. Humm...an excuse to shop?

Note: I call Dagi my little man since he has such a big personality. He is really a little human with fur.

Needlework 12 Days of Christmas - 12th day...

On the 12th day of Christmas...

...you! Yes...you! I cannot hold a 12 days of Christmas without thinking of how lucky I am to be able to blog and having 'met' you in the process. Back in August 2006, I decided to take the plunge and start blogging. I had no idea if anyone would read it. That blog is now full and I since started anew here. I have been inspired by so many people I have met online. It has been a journey filled with passion for needlework and wanting to share that with others.

I am a very old fashioned girl. I do not take easily to new found trends and appreciate doing things with a tint of days gone by. This is what attracts me to how I try and make my quilts look faded or older while still making it unique. I love stitching samplers. But there are advantages to new things and one is that we have such beautiful patterns available to us online. In November, I came across this sampler and fell in love with it. I decided that I wanted to start stitching it but wanted to wait until the new year to start it. I start it on Monday evening so there is very little progress but I just love these cornflowers. With full excitement, I am looking forward to starting on the letters too. Oh, how I love alphabets on stitching! Here is the link to this sampler. I wonder if anyone else will be tempted? Jenny...you love alphabets too...won't you join me? The only thing better about stitching is stitching along with friends!

Thank you each and every one for taking time from your day to read my blog and share my passion with me. If you have never done so before, why not say hello. I would love to hear from you.

Needlework 12 Days of Christmas - 11th day...

On the 11th day of Christmas...


...finishing up more old projects. This is another piece of stitching that my mother did for me but gave me to finish. She made this because it reminded her of me ringing the doorbell for her to come to the door when I was a little girl. She answered the door and I was everyone except Heidi but loved saying I was Little Red Riding Hood best.

When I took this out of the cupboard, I noticed that the fold of the fabric from being in the packaging before she used it had yellowed. Now what to do? Well...coffee stain, of course. I know my mother would have cringed if she would have seen me doing it but the yellow stripe has disappeared.

Dress it up with some pretty fabrics, lace and trims and you have a festive pillow for Christmas.

I puckered the tips and added some buttons.

Next year, I will have a well dressed couch for the holidays. And less projects left sitting in my cupboard waiting for some loving attention.

Tip: Instead of buying expensive filling, go to IKEA. They sell a pillow called the Gosa Slan for only 99 euro cents. Cut open the end and use the filling material for your projects.

Needlework 12 Days of Christmas - 10th day...

On the 10th day of Christmas...


...family inspirations! I come from a family that was always busy doing some kind of handwork. My grandmother, aunts, mother, big brother, sister... I suppose that is why my own stitching and quilting takes a huge place in my life.

One year for Christmas, my dear aunt sent me this child's hat she knitted for Christmas. Not when I was a child but as an adult. She often sent me her wonderful knitted or crocheted dishclothes and edged hand towels but this time it was this hat. And a very special hat it is too! It is the same pattern she used to make me a little green hat when I was a little girl. That hat we no longer have. My mother has a picture of me in it somewhere but we talked about it and my Aunt Janey made me another one.

This was not easy to get a good photo of as I cannot fit it on my head obviously. I hope you can get an idea of how cute it is? It is very special to me. My aunt passed away a number of years ago now yet I think of her often. I put this hat out during January along with my winter decorations.

Needlework 12 Days of Christmas - 9th day...

On the 9th day of Christmas...


...SALing. Now I have stitched along with online friends but for the first time I am am doing a SAL with two of my quilt sisters. We are getting together for a playdate to kick off each pillow of this project so it makes it so much fun! Bep (no blog) and Saskia are ready so we have to set out next date and start on the next section of this pillow Christmas tree. You can read more about it here.

I am using some of the homespun fabrics I bought from my friend's shop which I talked about in this post. I am going to finish each pillow as I go. The trick is getting it filled but not too full so it hangs well when they are all connected. I am anxious to get more of these finished. Shall we set our next playdate Bep and Saskia?

It is never too early to think about Christmas projects. *wink*

Needlework 12 Days of Christmas - 8th day...

On the 8th day of Christmas...


...mystery novels with a needlework theme. They are another fun passion of mine. In 2010, my online friend Joanne mentioned that Terri Thayer's quilt mysteries where a favorite of hers. I ordered the books but never made time last year to start on them. So this year, I am resolved to read these.

I really enjoy reading books with stitching, quilting and knitting themes in them. My love affair started with these kind of cozy mysteries back in the 90s when Monica Ferris wrote Crewel World. I was even able to get my mother hooked on them. *grins* We love Monica Ferris (needlework), Maggie Sefton (knitting) and Laura Childs (tea house and scrapbooking) for their handwork cozy mysteries. We also love reading Joanne Fluke (cookie) and Joanna Carl (chocolate).

Another favorite of mine is the Cottage Tales of Beatrix Potter by Susan Wittig Albert and I would love to make time this year to reread them again starting from the first book. Yes...they are that good!

Any cozy mystery fans in blogland that balance reading them between stitches?