Well Hello, 2013

I was going to start with a somewhat lengthy (and hopelessly dry) narrative about where I've been for the past 5 months, but instead I feel inspired to GET ON WITH IT and talk about stitching!  If this decision saddens you in any way, I sincerely hope you get over it and move along with the rest of us to the next paragraph.  (Thank you for playing.)

Let's start with some unfinished business from last year.  In November Ginger finally received the ornament I stitched for her birthday...in 2010.  This is Nickademus from Raise the Roof, an ornament in the 2010 Just Cross Stitch Ornament Magazine.

 For backing I used this cute ric rac theme fabric from my stash and a piece of ric rac for the hanger.

Yes, the photos were taken in the car.  The actual finishing took place...in the car.  No, I never wait until the last minute for anything.  Ever.

I spent a lot of time at the end of the year fussing about Christmas stockings.  Mark's family embraces the use of holiday stockings with vigor!  I decided it was time to take the whole pile of stockings to a professional machine embroiderer and have names put on them, doing away with the sticky-label identification method that had been used for years. 

A simple idea turned out to be impossible to execute.  In the end I hand embroidered names on two of the stockings and sewed two brand new stockings.  Do I have pictures of any of this?  Why, no.  Of course, I do not.  All projects were finished at the 11th hour (do you see a trend here?) and pictures didn't occur to me until the stockings were packed away (post-Christmas) in boxes in the attic of the in-laws.  See you  in December '13, stockings!

What I do have is a really bad picture of the stocking I made as a prototype.  (I had to find out if I was competent to cut into the really good fabric and sew it into something I wouldn't be ashamed to look at every Christmas for years to come.)  I found an outstanding (and amazingly easy) stocking pattern at Sew Like My Mom. 

The stocking is lined, has a cuff and the design is simple genius.

I dropped out of the TNT Guild last year but made a point to attend the annual auction fund raiser in November.  It is always a great time!  I decided to donate a little something.

It was really all about the cute frame - the hats are on springs. Very festive!

This is Isaiah 53:6, charted by me then stitched over 1 on 36 count Sand linen with Dried Thyme Silk 'N Colors.

I am really please with how it turned out!  It was much more difficult to chart and stitch than I anticipated.  It was a gift for my Dad's birthday, and was a labor of love for sure.

That's all for now.  I took a zillion pictures today so it's just a matter of uploading them to the blog.  It is always the ironing and pictures that takes the longest!