A pyn pillow from Finland

Recently I received these photos of Eliza's Pyn Pillow from Daniela in Finland. She used this complimentary WMN design in an exchange.   Isn't it wonderful how our love of stitching and the internet have connected needleworkers worldwide?

Daniela's pyn pillow front

Daniela's pyn pillow back

Eliza's Pyn Pillow is a complimentary design.  You can find it at my website.   Go there and print it.

You can see photos of other items using the design here.   Maybe this will get your creative juices flowing.  Please send me photos if you stitch this sweet little piece.  I'd love to see how you decide to finish it.  Enjoy!

Carol spends time in San Antonio with her Friends in Stitches

How thrilled I was to learn that Carol B. of Baltimore, Maryland would attend my Friends in Stitches class last year in San Antonio!  I first met Carol when I taught several years ago for Rae Iverson at her Stitchers' Gathering in Louisville, Kentucky.  Over the years Carol and I have become friends, but unfortunately we don't see each other as often as I would like.

Carol recently sent me photos of her completed Friends in Stitches project.  She wrote, I actually was able to purchase "Friends in Stitches" as an “Away Swan” several years ago but it ended up in the “to do someday” pile. “Someday” arrived in July 2010 when I was invited by some of my dearest friends to come and stitch with them and you in San Antonio. I’ve always enjoyed stitching your designs, and with a chance to visit with my friends, this trip to San Antonio in July was a “no brainer”.

Once I got started on the stitching in class, it was hard to put down. I loved all of the specialty stitches and just a small taste of each of them was great. The project is a quick stitch once started so probably within 2 weeks of returning to Baltimore I had the piece stitched and ready for finishing. Finishing though took much longer – not to do the actual finishing itself, but to get around to doing it.

All of my friends know that I put off finishing as long as possible! This project was no different! Finally after reading through all of the instructions several times, I just sat down and tackled it! Ellen’s directions are so good – if you follow them step by step the finishing is a piece of cake! I am so pleased that the set is now done! It is a wonderful addition to my collection.

Thanks Ellen for such a fabulous piece, and thanks to my Texas friends for inviting me to come stitch with you!

Here is the front of Carol's sewing case.

And here is the back which is designed like a small sampler.
It is personalized with the name of the event and the class date.

This shows both the front and the back of Carol's case.

This is the inside with a pincushion on one side and a divided pocket on the other side.

The next three photos are a bit blurry, but I'm including them so you can see Carol's needlebook.

Carol's name may sound familiar to my regular blog readers because she has completed quite a few of my designs.  Just type "Carol B" in the Search This Blog box on the left side of this page to see more of her beautiful work.  

Before long, I think I'll be able to show you her Work'd Pocketbook, the piece with all those queen stitches!  Carol has told me she has completed all the stitching.  How's it going with the assembly, Carol?

Friends in Stitches is a class project and is not available as a retail project.

Tying up loose ends

Thank you to everyone who has left comments over the past few weeks.  I'm so sorry that I haven't been able to respond to all of them.  I truly appreciate every single one--more than you can possibly know!  Thank you! 

I'm going to use today's blog post to follow up on previous postings and comments.

First, here are a few more photos from our weekend with our grandsons and their parents.  The photos I showed a few days ago were collages I made using Picassa.  The portrait studio where we went took 92 photos.  From those we chose the best ones to purchase. The studio gave us a cd with all 92 photos to do with as we please.  The photos on the cd were uncropped and are in  low resolution and are not suitable for printing, but they were perfect for my collages.

Here are a couple of the photos we chose to purchase.  In reality, they look better than these images color wise and the way they are cropped. I took these images off the cd.  (For example, the top of little Garrett's head is not really cut off in the photos we bought of him.)

Since we couldn't get a good photo of the two boys together, we had the studio put individual photos of the two boys in one composite photo.  We chose the first photo (from above) of each of the boys, and it looks like they are facing each other.  The bracelet on Haiden's right arm is the one they put on him a couple of weeks ago when Tom and I took him to Entertrainment Junction.  He doesn't want to take it off.

Someone asked about a whole family photo.  Yes, we got one of those also--I just didn't show it to you.  If you think it was hard getting our two little ones by themselves, try getting them with six adults.

After lunch and before going to the birthday party, Haiden wanted to play Batman.  By now, most of you know that is one of his favorite activities.  However, he chose someone new to play Robin other than his mother, Tom, or me.  (You may remember that various people get to be Robin, but we always have the same Batman.)



Do you see Robin in the background?  The cape was a bit too big for him.



Look who got recruited to be Robin.



Thank you for all your notes about my Elizabeth Mears sampler and my huge frogging experience.  "She" is now with my framer.  The frame was already assembled the first time around, and I've even already paid for it.  Perhaps that was part of my motivation for not procrastinating any longer on getting her fixed.  My counting mistake was too big and would be too obvious once the sampler is framed not to have been fixed.

Also, thank you for all the notes about yesterday's copyright infringement report on EBay.  I guess that like most of you I'm amazed at the acts of some people.  We reported the incident to EBay so they can take action.  I would like to ask the seller what on earth was she thinking?  Sadly, copyright infringements are multiplying like rabbits.

Ine asked if we have considered making note cards using With My Needle images.  I must admit Tom has been trying to encourage me to do some for years, and I haven't investigated.  I want good quality at an affordable price, and then there is packaging.  Perhaps I'll seriously look into this once I get out the charts for my Quaker Needlework Box and the Hannah Cummins reproduction sampler.  Both models are completed, and the rough directions and charts are done, but there's still a lot more to do.  Wish us luck!

Again, thank you very much for spending a part of your busy day with me.

You won't believe your eyes!

I was getting ready to do a blog post when I received an email from Kim H.  You won't believe what she found on EBay!!

Someone had the nerve to make note cards  of my designs using my copyrighted photos!  Yikes!!  Can you believe that??

The four samplers on the left are mine.  In fact, one has my initials and another has my entire name!   The sampler in the upper right corner is one of Catherine Theron's teaching pieces.  I'm not sure about the one in the lower right corner; it looks like either a Joanne Harvey or Essamplaire reproduction sampler.

If the samplers look distorted, they are  indeed so that the culprit could get them to fit her note cards.

I think that everyone who reads my blog knows how wrong this is. 

Looks like as a designer I have a new battle to rage.  Not only do I need to stop pirated charts but now photographs that others are making into products.  Thank you very much, Kim, for making me aware of this.

If you should ever see any item which you think is illegal, please let the designer know so she can handle the situation.  Thank you on behalf of everyone!

I'll try to do another blog post once I cool down.  Please bear with me!

What a difference a year makes!!

Last year at this time I was in the midst of my back problems.  In fact, I was actually bed-ridden for the week before my surgery on September 22nd.  We were also awaiting the arrival of our grandson, Garrett, who was due on September 20th.  Perhaps he felt sorry for his poor grandmother because he waited until September 23rd to make his appearance to the world.  We now have 3 birthdays (my son Stephen, Garrett, and Tom) within a two-week time period.

One of my daughter-in-law's good friends offered to host a first birthday party for Garrett here in Cincinnati.  Knowing that our daughter, Carolyn, and her family would also come into town for the party, I decided to take advantage of the situation by having some family photos made. I particularly wanted a professional photo of our two grandsons together. It sounded like a good idea at the time.

Things didn't go quite as planned.  I tried to work around nap times, lunch, and the party, so the only time we could go was 10:30am.  Unfortunately, little Garrett, who is normally very happy and a ham for the camera, got a little bit grumpy because he missed his morning nap.  Then, for a while, Haiden didn't want to cooperate.  He had also refused to wear the outfit our daughter had chosen for him.  (Carolyn and our daughter-in-law, Michelle, had tried hard to coordinate the boys' outfits by emailing photos back and forth.)

I made some collages of some of the photos to show you what we faced.

First is Haiden. What a bevy of faces he made!

Next, here he is with his parents, Carolyn and Greg.

Next is little Garrett, ready for nap time, but what a trooper he was.

And here he is with his parents, Stephen and Michelle.



We tried several times to get photos of just the two boys, but it was impossible to get a decent one of the two of them together as you can see.

We ended up buying individual photos of the boys instead of ones of them together! (I think you can see why.)   Perhaps we can try again next year when they are older.

Then after lunch and an attempted afternoon nap time for the boys, it was off to the birthday party.  The theme was little monsters.  I asked a friend to make the cake.  We were all blown away with the spectacular job she did with the "main" cake.  She also made a "smash" cake just for Garrett.  We were all so surprised that Garrett didn't make a big mess.  Perhaps he was too tired from all the other activities of the day.

C'est fini--AGAIN!!

Early this morning I finished stitching the Elizabeth Mears sampler, a reproduction by Barbara Hutson of Queenstown Samplers.

If you've been reading my blog for a while, you may be scratching your head and asking, Didn't Ellen show us this sampler months ago?  Yes,  I did.  Back on February 15, I showed you this photo.

Unfortunately (or perhaps fortunately), when Carol started to frame the sampler she found a major faux pas on my part!  Would you believe that when I stitched the eight motifs and the fence at the bottom I had them in the wrong place!!  I started with the small bird on the far left and instead of placing it under the "F" in "Front", I stitched it under the "r".  I then proceeded to merrily stitch the motifs and fence using the "misplaced" bird as my reference point.  Egads!!!  My small counting mistake meant that the entire bottom section of the sampler was now 10 linen threads too far to the right! Neither Carol nor I noticed my mistake until she put the sampler in the frame.  Yikes!!

For months, I tried to ignore my mistake hoping that it would go away.  But alas not!   So several weeks ago, I pulled out Elizabeth again and began a major frogging session, or rather sessions.

Here is Elizabeth once the frogs visited her. (Please excuse the lousy photo.)  Do you see the large empty space?  Do you feel my pain?

And here is Elizabeth as of the morning.  So you see, Elizabeth Mears is finished AGAIN!!  (I hope to take her back to Carol later today.)

More"eye candy" from Anke (Part 2)

On September 14th, I showed you several of Anke's lovely projects.  She also has completed  Strawberries So Faire.  In fact, Anke stitched the project twice!!

Anke wrote, Had the "Strawberries So Faire" Sewing Rolls stitched there for a while and was waiting for the right satin ribbon. Eventually I used green for the one backstitched with #8 644 and red for the other one -backstitched with a slightly variegated lighter green floss. Both are stitched with "Examplar Spinach Delight" -2 plies because I didn’t like the coverage of a single ply- and "Gandy Tango"HDF silk floss on Summer Khaki Belfast linen. Used the Herringbone stitch for the fruits the way you charted it and love the interest it adds!

Anke continued writing, First time I used Dupioni silk fabric and got a taste for it. (Don’t know whether my wallet will thank you though. Just kidding!)

There is just one thing that had me wondering -the assembly instructions regarding the pocket. They are very precise and clear as how to prepare it, place it and attach its sides. Attaching its bottom end however is never mentioned. Of course the only thing necessary is logical and obvious -sew/ladder stitch it to the lining. Still it had me re-read the instructions several times. -Got my copy of the chart towards the end of 2005, I think.

The cap was where I almost met my Waterloo -the ruched ribbon was a messy scrunched up something quite unlike the illustration in the instructions and even numerous attempts to arrange it on the strawberry later, it still didn’t look right and I was close to conceding defeat. Gradually I came to understand the inner workings and then it was hard not to shout out loud: brilliant, ingenious way to create the caps from ribbon!!! (It's the one at the back that had me excited.)

I’m tickled pink how the sewing rolls turned out. Very special design this one. 

I absolutely enjoy the variety of your designs and your detailed, easy to follow finishing instructions. Thank you!

Important Note from Ellen

Yes, Anke, we goofed on the directions by not telling you to sew down the bottom edge of the pocket.  Yikes!!  We corrected the charts October 2005 once we learned of the omission.    If you bought the chart before the correction was made, you can find it at http://www.withmyneedle.com/errata.htm.  Please accept our apologies for our faux pas.

Thank you very much, Anke, for all your photos and your note.  I'm very happy  you persevered with your ribbon strawberry caps and are happy with your results.  You should be!  You did a lovely job!  Also thank you for your kind words about my designs and our detailed assembly instructions. 

I hope to see your completed Acorn Sampler Sewing Case sometime in the not too distant future.

LOTS of "eye candy" from Anke! (Part 1)

Oh my goodness!! Look at the photos Anke from Australia sent me of some of her needlework!!  In this post, I'm showing you photos of her Busy Bee Sewing Case, Maidens of the Sea, and Quaker Turtles.  I'm saving her photos of Strawberries So Faire Sewing Cases for later in the week so that you aren't on overload.

Anke wrote, I came to realize that by now I’ve stitched -and finished!- a few of your designs. A bit of a surprise as it is either the design itself or the way it's finished that makes me choose a project and not its designer. But then again your "Acorn Sampler Sewing Case" was one of the very first charts I bought when I started cross stitching back in 2005. Daunted, I put it aside, and now even with some finishing experience and a few projects that incorporated specialty stitches done, I’ll savour the chart some more.

 Loved doing the "Busy Bee Sewing Case" -not only because my grandfather kept bees. Did it in 2008 using a mix of over-dyed and DMC threads; stitched the bees because I don’t like charms.

At the beginning of 2010, it was the "Maidens of the Sea" turn. Used HDF silk floss on 32 ct linen tinted a light antique blue. The needlepage is made from flannelette tinted grey and it’s closed with a freshwater pearl. The mermaids got eyes -didn’t add them to the "Busy Bee"women and find that without eyes they look somewhat soulless.

Got a very soft spot for tortoises, terrapins and turtles; add to that a love of stitching smalls and one cannot possibly go past your "Quaker Turtles". Stitched one set using the recommended materials and, as I liked the design so much, stitched it again over 2 -gives the design room to breathe. While I like the petite finish working over 1 effects, to me it sometimes blurs the finer details. The other set is worked with ‘Imperialosity’ HDF silk floss over 2 on tinted ~40ct unevenweave. I adapted the backstitch pattern to be worked over 3 threads -wasn’t brave enough to even consider picking up regular backstitches.

Remembered a stitcher cum lover of these ancient reptiles and made another scissor weight from scraps left over.  In case you’re familiar with Dr Suess' "Yertle The Turtle"… click here.




Oh my goodness, Anke!  So many wonderful pieces!  I love the extra turtles you added to your set!  Looks like you have quite a bale of turtles.  ( I have to admit that I had to look up what you call a group of turtles.)

Part 2 of Anke's beautiful needlework will be in my next blog post.

A Day of Remembrance

Another feast for your eyes from Chizue!

Chizue, who is from Japan, stitches (and finishes) so many wonderful projects!  I'm always excited when she sends me photos of some of her beautiful needlework.

Here are photos of her Miss Trenner's Needlework Academy. Look what she did to the lid!  Instead of putting the design on the inside of the small box lid like I did on my model, she put it on the outside where it could be more easily seen.  What a great idea!

Chizue, I hope that you are finding your needlework boxes and the accessories very useful as well as decorative. 

Thank you for once again sharing photos of your lovely needlework. Your photos show what a truly talented needleworker you are!  I'm looking forward to seeing what masterpieces you create next!

Batman Visits Cincinnati, Part 2

Here are some more photos of Haiden's Cincinnati adventure. I don't know who had a better time--him or us.

Outside of Entertrainment Junction

As you can see from the blur, Haiden is in perpetual motion.

All aboard!

Boy, did he like to shovel coal.  I think he'd still be there if we hadn't said we had to leave.

Playing with Thomas the Tank Engine is always so much fun!

Look at this fun ride!

Riding the train!

It was lots of work to make this little car go!

Whew!  Almost there!

We also played Batman alot.  Tom and I never knew who would be Robin and who would be the "bad guy".  Of course, we always knew who would be Batman!

Robin and Batman are planning how to capture the "bad guy".

I have an idea, Robin!  Let's go get him!

Here I come!  Robin, are you with me?

Now for a change of roles...I'm now Robin, and Tom is the "bad guy".

Help me, Robin!

And then, all too soon, it was time for Batman to leave!

Batman sure doesn't travel lightly, does he?

Even Batman sometimes needs to take a nap!