July Smalls SAL

07/29/2016

Payday, yay, it's payday!  I love it when payday falls on Friday, there's just something about  starting the weekend with a pocketful of money!  Although with one son in college and another starting his senior year of high school, I never really have a pocketful of money, more like a bottle cap full :)

July was a productive stitching month for me and while it isn't quite over yet, I wanted to get my post in for Heather's monthly SAL Challenge.  As always, thanks for hosting this Heather; it's great fun to check in with everyone and see what they have been stitching.

Where to start...

 Finished the last two Lizzie Kate Flip Its. Now I have to figure out how I will turn them into a page a month calendar as  a Christmas present for my sister-in-law.

 

Lots of Christmas stitching, most of which will be turned into cards.  Patterns from a variety of places.

 

Anniversary card for my husband. Pattern from Cross Stitch Crazy Oct. 2014

Wedding card for a friend's daughter.  Pattern from Happinest

Some card orders through my Etsy shop

 

A special request birthday card for  friend's granddaughter.  Pattern by Artecy

This three just because I wanted to make them. Patterns from Bewitching Cross Stitch, Cyberstitcher's and I'm not sure where I got the balloons from.

 

Birthday card for my husband ( he does most of the cooking). Pattern from Cross Stitch Crazy April 2016

Wedding card for a cousin's daughter.  Pattern from Daily Cross Stitch

And finally a small handmade notebook/ journal for a co-worker's birthday.  Pattern from Cross Stitch Crazy Aug. 2014.

I'm hoping August is as productive because I've got a lot of stitching planned.  However, high school starts mid-month and since my youngest plays both soccer and football, I will have considerably less free time.

Stay cool!

Michele

Another finish for June

07/01/2016
As mentioned yesterday, I was able to finish the  March Flip it Bits by Lizzie Kate.  Only 2 months left to finish on this series.

Happy 4th,

Michele

June Smalls SAL

06/30/2016

Happy last day of June.  This year has gone by so amazingly fast.  It seems like school just got out and in 5 weeks or so, my "baby" will be a senior in high school.

On to stitchy goodness.  Thanks, as always to Heather at Stitching Lotus, for sponsoring the Smalls SAL.  I enjoy looking at everyone's posts to see what they have been doing.  The creativity does my soul good.

This month I focused on getting the Flip it Bits from Lizzie Kate completed.  I was able to get 9 months done and if I were posting this tomorrow, instead of today, I'd probably have March done.

 

 

 

 

I also finished the monograms that will be used as gift tags for Christmas presents for my in-laws

And a couple of birthday cards for co-workers.

I also made a couple of small inspirational magnets for some co-workers/ friends.

 

I'm still participating in the Debbie's Ultimate Crazy January/ February Challenge, and have 183 starts for the year, with 95 of them finished.  I'm not sure if I can have a new start  every day for the year, but I know I can get through Sept. 1.  A large portion of my current unfinished starts will be Christmas cards so my number of finishes will go up as I get closer to Christmas.

Have a great July 4th everyone,
Michele

Updated finishes

06/01/2016

June 1st??????????  Seriously, where has the year gone?

As mentioned in yesterday's blog, I had to turn three stitched projects into cards last night.

Darling Daffodil freebie from World of Cross Stitching which, for some reason, loaded upside down. Well, it's rainy and kind of yucky outside, so maybe the daffodil is feeling a little gloomy?

Green birthday blackwork.  Picture is a little blurry but I like the combination of the green papers as background.  This one may have to go on my Etsy shop.

And last but not least, the going away card for a co-worker.  A little difficult to choose paper because of the minty green floss, but I think it turned out ok.

Happy rainy Wednesday!

Michele

May Smalls SAL

May 31, 2016

Happy Belated Memorial Day! I meant to log on over the weekend, but my youngest son played in a soccer tournament and it seems we spent most of our weekend there. Especially since his team made it to the championship round.  They lost in the finals, but it was a great soccer weekend.  Between soccer, laundry( which really should be a 4-letter word) and a barbeque with the neighbors, I didn't have time to get online.

As always, thanks to Heather at Stitching Lotus for sponsoring the monthly SAL.  I would never write anything on my blog if it wasn't for her.

And here's this month's finishes

 

Friends are like bras; I love that saying.  And while it isn't really a "small", it was a finish for the month.  This Lizzie Kate pattern was a gift for a close friend and the Friday's Child card was for her since she was born on a Friday.  The Happy Birthday card is for a co-worker.

 

More graduation cards.

 




The green and purple card was a commission by a neighbor for her nephew who is getting married in June.  The purple cardstock is from their wedding invitation.  The sympathy card was for a class mate of my youngest son.  Her older brother died from colon cancer.  He played lacrosse in high school.

 

Thanks you for my youngest son's soccer coach for a great season.  The airplane card went to a co-worker. They are doing a travel theme in their nursery.  His baby was born 8 weeks early, at only 2 lbs 5 oz and while doing well, has  along way to go.

This windmill is for WOCS as they are making a travel based quilt.











A few more pieces that are stitched but not turned into cards.

 

Darling daffodils, which is a freebie  from World of Cross Stitching Magazine and another blackwork "Happy Birthday".    The "maze" is for a co-worker that is moving on to another company.  I wish her the very best of luck. I'll be busy making these designs into cards tonight as they need to be done tomorrow!

And finally, this scrabble board has been a work in progress for 3 years! There's a lot of color #822 and frankly, I just got tired of stitching it, a couple of times.  It's for my mother-in-law, who is a Scrabble fan.  I was determined to finish it and stayed up until 1am Saturday night(technically Sunday morning) to finish it. Her birthday isn't until August, so I have time to put it on a card.  But no more DMC #822!!!!!!!!

Happy Stitching everyone!

Michele

April Smalls SAL

05/02/2016
Happy Belated May Day.  Not sure what weather everyone else experienced, but April ended with a gentle roar in Colorado as we  had intermittent rain/ snow Friday through late yesterday.  Finally, today, we have some sunshine!

Thanks, as always to Heather at Stitching Lotus for sponsoring this fun monthly event.

April was filled with lots of stitching goodness as I took a few days off from my insane work load for some much needed "me" time!

I continue with Debbie's Ultimate Crazy January/ February Challenge 2016 as one of the few trying to have a new start or progress on a WIP every day this year.  I'll admit, it's a challenge keeping it all organized!

But let's get to some finishes

 




Card for a co-worker and sympathy card. The hand bag and purse pattern is from World of Cross Stitching #202 and the sympathy card is my own design.  Sadly, I never seem to have enough sympathy cards on hand.

 

A couple of stitches for me.  Live Laugh and Love is from Daily Cross Stitch and the Dragon of Spirit is a freebie from Dragon Dreams. This is the 5th in a series and I'm not sure what I'll do with them, but I fell in love with the patterns and had to stitch them.

 

Sweet 16 card for my niece from Cross Stitch Card shop #94 and a birthday card for a co-worker. I got the pattern from Pinterest and I think it's a Byrd's Next pattern.

Mill Hill Haunted Hotel. I started this last year and stayed up waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay too late one night to finish it.  I love the Mill Hill Kits and have the entire "haunted" collection.

 
Thinking of you card.  Just stitched to have on hand.  I designed the pattern and wanted to see how it looked on this fabric.  The Flip Flops are a freebie in the Sullivan's Floss summer collection.  This piece was stitched for WOCS.

 

And a couple of Christmas finishes as it's never too early to start Christmas cards.  These patterns are from Byrd's Nest Blackwork, which is a great resource for free blackwork patterns.

 


And finally some graduation cards.  The top two are for neighborhood boys and the third was a special request from a co-worker for his niece who goes to the same high school as my son.  Unfortunately, when I showed the cards to my son, he informed me that Franny now goes to a different high school.  Ugh, I'll check with my co-worker today and find out.  And if it's true ( which I'm pretty sure it is) I will have to track down the school color's, including cap and tassel colors.  Oh well.  I guess that will give me another start for my crazy challenge :)  The pattern is from an old Bucilla kit that featured many small holiday patterns and I've personalized it to match school colors and added names, etc.

I had a couple of other finishes this month, but they are a little larger than  what I consider small, so I'm saving them for another post.

Hope everyone had a great April and looking forward to a wonderful May!

Michele