HOE Woodland exchange

Here is the stitched piece I sent to my partner in this exchange, Leigh. I'm glad you like it :)
I chose to stitch a fragment of PS' Band Samplers, over one, with my choice of overdyes, as usual :)
To the corners, I attached four little pieces of a pussy willow (left after Easter) branch I cut into tiny trunks.
When I read about this exchange, I immediately knew I was going to stitch a PS piece, but the ones I had in mind were the Santas in the woods... I browsed thru my collection and I liked this one even better, it has a tree and some animals that live in the forest, which were the criteria for the exchange. Like with the BD Red Sampler pillow, I just stuffed it a little bit. leaving it soft and delicate, it was so tiny since I stitched it over one on a high count linen.

Some goodies traveled along... all in the same 'green' or 'arbor' theme.

Have you read about Edgar's blogoversary and Steph's amazing giveaway? I never win anything (the surprising exception was the gift certificate from lovely Nicole end of last year), but I'm passing the info along! It's so funny to enter these drawings anyway and there's always one lucky winner :)

Toska asks... ta...ta...-what? ta-tting? not food-thing?

Here's as far as I am in my trying to learn this art. Oh, I just adore it. Wish I can learn much more. But let me tell you, on the tatting course I participated in, I was the worse learner of all 5 ladies. Not that any of us did wonders that evening, but at least they were able to learn to tie the knots properly. At several moments I felt I was so ridiculizing myself that I wanted to leave... just couldn't understand the trick about doing the knots. Not because our teacher wasn't good, I think I sometimes require more time to learn some things - some, I hasten to add ;-), I'm not totally retarded LOL! Anyway, I stayed and I'm glad I did. I took my piece with me on the train and hey, I learned. Still not pushing the thread with the middle finger of the left hand at one moment, but rather helping myself with the index of the right hand, but who cares! :) I also got a book to learn more than the knots and the picots and joining, it's so well explained that with some patience and time I think I'll manage. The second course is scheduled after my flight to Norway, so I hope I'll do well on my own till I can ask the girl for help in the autumn.
On Monday, I'll be learning to do jewellery. Nicole, if you read this, have no worries! I'll never create pieces as beautiful as yours. Easy things, of course, but one has to start somewhere. My goal is just to learn enough to be able to make easy stuff for myself, for friends...
I was talking to the girl who organizes these courses in the gallery and she comforted me, saying she does a lot of crafts, but only when it requires one tool. She's never been able to do knitting, for example, she says it's impossible for her to coordinate the two needles. How funny! Anyway, it helped lift the frustration I was cultivating after the tatting course.


Thank you so much for your kind words in response to my last post. I needed to get some things off my chest, but then I regretted posting all this in the public space and thought about deleting the post, but reading your comments really sweetened the burden.
As of today, grandma isn't leaving for anywhere. Once more she confirms her body is just amazing. Her head has come back for the most and the cold is over. Today she's getting her injections for the last time. Noone knows when she will leave us, but it's not a simple cold that will have her. Should I mention the broken tiles when she fell on the stairs two years ago? Her head was perfectly fine.... ;-)
And no, May still doesn't work for me, but what, life is a sinusoid... need to learn from my own mistakes, and I've made plenty the last years.

Happy Friday evening, everyone!