The past two weeks have been about leaving my old job and starting a new job along with a hearty cold thrown in for good measure!  Needless to say, it has been a little crazy with keeping up with hobbies.  I am going to make the following commitments to get myself back on track: 

1. I will iron two finishes and bring them to be framed.  

2. Even though I am afraid to, I am going to rinse out a project that says in the directions to rinse it out so that the ink will disappear.  This is what I can determine from the directions that are written in French.  I am going to the fabric store tomorrow to see if I can find some detergent for this. 

3.  Find a creative way to finish the project in item two.  I have to keep telling myself that I can do this, and that it will turn out just fine!  

4. I have another stitched project I don't want to just put in a frame.  I didn't spend a lot of time on the stitching, so I am not going to worry too much about this one.  I am planning a trial run with some foam core and a glue gun- we'll see how it comes out. 

5.  Photography- I have to take pictures of these finishes!  I have four differnt things to show in various finishing stages.  

Stay tuned for more updates!

Always, ~Jaime 

Valentine's Day is my favorite holiday!  I realized that I don't have really any stitched projects for Valentine's Day, so I am going to make it a goal to begin looking for patterns.  Here is a heart I made over the summer.  In September I went to California to meet my fiance's family.  All summer I kept thinking about what to bring as a little gift.  I ended up buying two little things that are regional to this area to bring in a gift bag, and wanted to make everyone a little heart stitched ornament to include also.  Well, the stitching project was a disaster!!!  The idea I think was a good one, but the execution was terrible. :) I had never, ever done any finishing before, and I went about cutting the linen all wrong.  I didn't have enough of a seam allowance, or the design wasn't centered properly on the linen to make it into the heart shape.  Also, I had only started using a sewing machine about a month before that.  I actually stitched 4 different designs, and ended up throwing away two of them becaue I couldn't fix them.  This is one that survived! lol.  I did learn a lot from the mishaps, and think that in the future I will have more success finishing.  I know one bit of advice I have read multiple times is "measure twice to cut once".  That is certainly true!  I would definitely go about the finishing differently with what I have read about.  I am also a perfectionist to a fault, so that does get in the way quite a bit of the time, and I could see how that trait was getting the better of me in this project.  I am definitely going to try this again for when I go again to meet his family and friends.  Any finishing ideas/suggestions are always welcome on this blog!  Happy Valentine's Day!

Always, ~Jaime

I wanted to post a little bit about the workshop that I started yesterday.  It will continue today for the full day today also. I will tell you, embroidering with the tambour hook certainly challenges me in more ways than just using the hook itself.  You need an incredible amount of patience learning this.  I think for every 50 attempts I made, I was maybe able to complete a stich 1/4 of the time. (they say the first million stitches are the hardest with this- I would questimate I am up to about 1,000) :)  You have to leave your perfectionism at the door.  I found that it took me so long to do the stitches, that the little punctures in the organza from where I had too much tension will have to stay there even though they bug me immensely.  The crooked row of beads?  Those took forever, so they will have to stay too.  Also, no warp speed here! This part I completed took the better part of a day.  Granted some time was spent on the teaching of it as well, but still- it took a long time!  As I was practicing another row in the hotel room last night, I couldn't help thinking about monks who spent days and days creating a letter for a manuscript they were copying- stitching a row was kind of like that.  I will update more tomorrow! Kindly, ~Jaime

I am off to a workshop to learn aboutTambour Embroidery, and using the Luneville hook to attach beads, sequins etc.  I have my camera ready and will post pictures about it after the workshops.

I am very excited- it should also be a beautiful drive because we had a rather big storm with 12 inches of snowin my area on Wednesday.  I hope everyone has a nice start to their weekend! Always, ~Jaime

Here is another January-inspired stitch.  I love stitching things for the months, especially these small pieces.  They seem to stitch up quickly.  This is a Rouge du Rhin kit.  Many of the embroidery stitches I hadn't attempted before, so it has been a good learning experience.  I will say that this kit is very unforgiving if you make a mistake!  I used the wrong color green on the leaves, and there was no extra to take it out and re-stitch it.  I think that it will be okay, and that I will have enough to finish it!  I will have to pay extra careful attention on the next one.  Any finishing ideas?  I was thinking of maybe a little ornament....

Kindly, ~Jaime

This is a Flip It a year with charm by Lizzie Kate.  The January is the third one I have worked on.  They are quick to stitch.  I bought the patterns for the twelve months and hope to finish all of them this year- that is one of my stitching goals.  I was hoping to finish this in January, but that is okay!  Kindly, ~Jaime