New Comfort Kitty Doll & Mermaid

We went to a flea market yesterday up in Wisconsin and I found a few little do-dad's but nothing all that exciting. Some bits of lace, a few appliques and a couple of pretty buttons. Nothing worth mentioning really. I had a good time as I always do but by the end, it was so hot outside, I was getting delirious.

My husband bought something kind of nice and I'll share a photo when he gets it done. It's a an old Singer sewing machine stand. You know, the really old iron ones. The cabinet part is missing so he's going to make a nice oak top for it and we'll use it as a side table somewhere. He worked on it yesterday when we got home so maybe he'll have it ready in a few days.

Once we got home and my heat exhaustion passed, I finished up on my little mermaid:



I know she's a little cartoony but I like her! As you can see, I crayon tinted her and added some sequins. Ya'll know how I like my glitter! Anyway, I didn't stitch the sand or the do-dad in her hand. I plan to work her into a CQ so I'll add "sand" later. And I want to add a seashell to her hand which I'll do once I get her sewn into a block. Stay tuned for that project!

So later today, when I get to sitting down and stitching, I'll be starting on another little Comfort Kitty Doll to send to Pat:



I'm thinking "yellow" always looks nice with aqua. I just don't have a lot of yellow do-dads but I'm sure I have enough to make this work.

1900's DMC Patterns

Just a quick post for today ladies. Scott and I are heading up to our favorite flea market in Elkhorn, Wisconsin shortly.

I wanted to share a link with you a site that offers a nice collection of vintage DMC charted patterns from the early 1900's. Albums D'antan is a french site but as we all know, needlework needs no translation!

These are gorgeous patterns so do check them out.

Mermaid & Hand-dyed Threads

I spent yesterday afternoon hand-dying some embroidery floss. You know, I'm not sure I enjoy doing that. I love to do lace, fabric and ribbons but I've never had great luck with embroidery floss and ended up with quite a few imperfect skeins:



These either didn't take the dye right or I just didn't care for how they came out. So I put them all in a ziplock bag and added them to my Etsy shop. Maybe someone can use them. The colors are permanent and they're perfectly usable, they just didn't come out the way I intended.

When I finished up with that, I started on this little mermaid:



This design is from Aunt Martha's. I believe it's a current design but transfer is vintage. Anyway, I plan to add some sequins to the tail and I have some little orange sequins for the little fish. I thought this would cute worked into a CQ down the road.

I was going to sew this afternoon but I'm feeling more like I want to stitch so I'll work on this and then I plan to start stitching on one of the cats to send to Pat. Maybe I'll do some sewing tomorrow.

Blue Santa Ornament

I sewed for hours yesterday! In fact, I ran my sewing machine for so long, I never did get to any stitching!

The first thing I did on my machine was to finish up this Santa Ornament:



I then did a ton of foundation piecing including 2 more Comfort Cats to send to Pat:



I really love making these so there will be more!

I sewed up some more purse blocks, a couple of ornaments and another cellphone pouch for Margaret, my mother in law. She loves them! This one will have an Autumn theme.

Ok, so speaking of sewing, can anyone tell me what happens to my brain when I get into a fabric store? I swear, I either need a 12 Step Program or Hypnosis! If you could see my stash you would wonder why I keep buying more fabric. I have absolutely no control!

So, I've decided to put together some more pre-sewn crazy quilt block kits. I could never just part with my fabric and I love to sew blocks so doing some more kits will be fun and I'm sure there are tons of stitchers out there who would love to stitch a CQ but either can't sew or maybe doesn't have a machine.

Anyway, I figured I'd do my 9 inch block kits at $6.00 and some 5 inch ornament blocks at $4.00. I'll include some lace (as I have no control in that department either) and some other do-dads from my stash. Ok, so I have no control at all when it comes to stash! Ha, ha, ha!

When I get back from running errands tomorrow, I'm going to put some heavy duty miles on my sewing machine! Because I must make room for stash!!!

Goody Package From Gina

Just look at what Gina sent to me:



Gorgeous laces, trims and buttons and a piece of fabric! I'm in heaven!!! Thank you so much Gina for thinking of me. I can't tell you how exciting it is to see a package from Australia in my mailbox!

Since I have all sorts of new things to play with, I will be sewing up some new blocks today. I already have a pile of things that are ready to stitch but my new stuff is calling to me! I might even get some stitching time in later today.