June 19, 2008

And for Nath's birthday....

It was my friend's Nath birthday last week and here is what I sent to her... This time the mail gods worked fast so I can show it here today :)

First, the little box I made... First one I did of this type, so I asked Nath for forgiveness... it has some imperfections... my perfectionist soul is not 100% happy but I liked the result! I reworked it twice, though.

I used a box from Panduro on the lid of which I placed the stitched piece and added the same type of ribbon in two widths to complement the whole thing. Inside the box, I cut and glued a piece of red felt in the shape of heart as well and I added some nice silks to make Nath' smile...







And here is the rest of the birthday goodies I enclosed...


Talking about these quaker turtles, I just discovered that someone made them in pink HERE. What a beauty, hm? :)

June 14, 2008

HOE freebie exchange from Edgar



Oh see the beautiful piece I received from Edgar today... I am so fond of it! It is finished so beautifully, it feels so soft, I adore the colours... and Edgar, I hope you won't mind me saying this, this is the first piece I ever received stitched by a man... such a precious gift, thank you! I am just delighted with it... :)

Edgar also sent me two pieces of fabric, some DMC skeins, an adorable metal box with chocolate mints.... they disappeared FAST! :)

Time for a major update...

Watch this space over the next days... :)


Yup, I'm in Norway since 3 weeks and nope, life hasn't slowed down :)

How do you busy mothers manage to squeeze some stitching and blogging in? In between work during daytime, cooking, cleaning, gardening, walks with doggie and renewing the house gradually, I don't find time for blogging at all! But I've finally managed to stitch a bit yesterday and today.... a bit :)


Now that my HOE exchange piece is winging its way to my partner, not without hiccups, because not only I sent it late... which I never do! - but I also received it back today... from a country which name sounds very similar... and it's resent, of course... and now that another package is on its way to Nath in France, I signed up for the HOE needleroll exchange, that will be fun!! It's so long since I did the last needleroll. Or was it the first and the last till now? :)



(a cat, a dog, two big pieces of luggage and a backpack with laptop... a yearly summer challenge I am getting used to :)


May 30, 2008



A warm smile from the birthday girl, and a big THANK YOU to everyone who made my day special today... so many wonderful surprises!!

A huge update is in order and will happen... tomorrow.... it's been a long, lovely day... :)

(photo taken today at a restaurant in Oslo - yup, I'm in Norway till end of August!)



April 20, 2008

A rainy Sunday

Rrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!! Major RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR!!! I just accidentally deleted a long post... and I just don't feel like retyping it all.... aaaaargh, computers!

So I'll leave you for today with a photo of a last year's PS finish I never posted, I think... just found it again in my files. A favorite of mine :) I adore embroidered/stitched dollies, tableclothes etc. and collect them.

Prairie Schooler - pattern from #22 "Borders and Corners"


April 18, 2008

PS blog spring exchange from Ela

Now here's a true gem I am delighted to show. I've always wanted to try my hands on making one of these tea pochettes, but I delayed it in time thinking they're not easy at all. And I always thought how wonderful it would be to have my own, and have it with me in my new favorite bag (big smile to Tracy!), filled with a couple of my favorite teas... So imagine my surprise when I opened the package from Ela! Oh how I love it.... I love it!! The tag says Herbata on one side and Wiosenna on the other, which in Polish means Spring Tea. How suitable :)
Ela is one of the most talended ladies I know... and a person I'd love to learn a lot from. Her projects are so creative, so neat, so everything... I feel lucky to be the regular recipient of her work pieces.




And knowing my sweet tooth, Ela sent me not one, but two very special treats... I still remember the ones she sent me for Christmas, green marzipan with chocolate ends... it certainly was one of the best chocolate specialties I ever ate. Now, for the disclaimer - I seldom buy chocolate here in Poland. I just don't find it very good. There are a few Belgium chocolate boutiques in town but with their outrageous prices, I stay clear most of the time. But fancy French, Swiss or Belgian chocolate, I just don't resist. I so miss French pâtisseries... Along with good olives bought by kg, they must be what I miss most from a previous life... Heh.
I can be annoying at times... I don't miss one opportunity in France and Switzerland to have a cup of coffee somewhere with a lemon tartelette... H. follows but he just doesn't get it... Well, it's something I am totally fond of and which I can't buy here. Over the years I learned to make various French lemon cakes, much to H.'s grief because while I love lemon taste, he prefers chocolate :)
Don't get me started on Moroccan pastries... Oh, I miss them so.
But to go back to the main topic of this post.... I also received a piece of awesome sampler Moda fabric Ela knew I loved and couldn't find...

... and one of Ela's hand-made cards... (the texts says Spring greetings in Polish)...

...one of the packages contained (note the past tense! LOL) these eggs...

... and a cute chart!
... and another package was hiding this superb bird... with a belly stuffed with yummy chocolate figurines as well!

The packages from Ela and Donna mark the end of my blog PS spring exchange... a wonderful experience, thank you so much to everyone who participated!
I'm thinking of a new blog exchange... have yet to decide if the timing is right, provided also there would be some interested blogger friends :)

PS blog spring exchange from Donna

Donna made me a tin! I love the little girl on it and its colors, they look so subtle and sweet :) It's my first altoid tin and I love it, thanks so much, Donna!

Donna wouldn't be Donna if she didn't include lots of nice goodies... The self-stick notes are so lovely, and the Milky Way bunny was.... way too yummy!! The little flower-like thing is a little pack of golden ribbon.

Le Camembert de la Brodeuse

My Polish friend Ela from France had her birthday in the last days of March but I waited for an order to come in from the US to add some things to her birthday package.... I did my best to choose from what she likes best :)

Here is what I made for her... from the I. Vautier book I received from Elisabeth for Christmas... it is the first project I made from this book.

The name I gave to it is "Le Camember de la Brodeuse" - my French readers will understand, it looks like a camembert cheese :)

I meant it as a paper holder or pinkeep, or whatever Ela might like to use it for :)
Rond de l'etang from the book
"Les Samplers en Rouge et Blanc" (Isabelle Vautier)






The goodies included a pack of cute pink flower buttons, 3 pieces of R&R and hand-dyed fabrics, the new Blackbird Designs, 3 specialty threads, and a charm pack of 37 pieces of Moda fabrics.... I love to make good friends smile ;-)
I and Ela chatted a short while on Skype tonight, she's currently visiting her hometown and family in Poland. They were all pooped after a long drive in car and arriving in the middle of the night :)

April 16, 2008

Rants of the day

Okay, I have to get it off my chest. I am sooooo in love with that set. And I understand that it contains 10 designs - but let's be honest, lots of small ones also. And I understand that the basket must be nice. But one hundred and eighteen dollars just for the basket and the charts? Is that fair... isn't that overpriced.... Tell me what you think. From what I read, the design is not sold without the basket. Not that I think that finding a basket with an oval/round top like this, of the correct size, would be an easy task. BUT. Or am I being cheap... I'd really welcome your thoughts on that. Drema has a special price for the set with the silks and linen, but 199 usd... Okay, kill me, but that was my rant of the day.
Maybe it's triggered by seing recently so many lovely kits - but I mean *very small* kits containing a couple of skeins of silk, a small design, a chart, all that for 50-60 usd. Some of them are really lovely. But I'm thinking more and more often if the market is not going in a wrong direction... sort of like computer manufacturers (won't mention the name) creating equipment that requires more and more ressources.
Oh, I don't know. Bear with me today :) I've lived the weirdest compact 10 minutes in my life. Minute 1: I meet a lady whose husband I loved and knew since I moved in here in 1993, who had one doggie, then another, we often walked a bit in the park and chatted, he was somehow a famous person in his specialty and a government expert, well, I learned he died within 2 hours three weeks ago, and he was in good health, and he took care of himself... anyway. I will dearly miss his presence during my doggie walks... he was a very special person. Minute 5: a man sneaks into the building right behind me, tries to push me in the lift - I resist, he barks something, his eyes are dangerous, I go out, he takes the lift, I hear noone opens the door for him so he might be waiting at one of the floors, I wait till someone else arrives and take the lift with that person. Minute 10: I meet someone at my floor who tells me that the plumber who took care of our building, a man that helped and repaired a bit of everything in the apartments, and who did lots of works in my own apartment over the years, and whom I knew well, died of a heart attack on Monday. That was a bit too much for this afternoon ;-)
That tops three other persons of a certain age from my building that died in the past few weeks but I wasn't close to them.
I wish I could learn coping with the unexpected death of someone I knew and cared for. Life.

New Carriage House Samplings

Have you seen THEM? Frederick is a must-have no-matter-what, even if I have to sell my last shirt! LOL

April 10, 2008

Prairie Schooler fob exchange

Here is the fob I made for Milly. This is the first fob I ever made, partly because I don't own more than two pairs or small scissors and partly because I was never sure how to make one with a metal closing and beads. I am ashamed to say it was extremely easy! :)

Prairie Schooler - adapted from leaflet # 110 Santa & Friends
Stitched over one on opalescent hand-dyed fabric.







PS blog spring exchange from Cheryl

See the lovely spring ornament I received! Thank you, Cheryl!




Good news

Finally a good week :)
I got the cells result after the surgery and all is super fine, no c... word danger!
I had a CT scan this week as well and there too, all is super fine.
Which puts and end to 4 months of anxiety and visits at various docs and checks and tests and analyses and and and... I am in heaven!
I can honestly live with the underactive thyroid and PCO, I can learn tricks and ways to fight some nasty symptoms. The other two problems were much more serious.
I have some some other non-medical issues to work on but honestly, these good news put me in a state where I can't worry on anything else till at least Monday, and next Monday is also a good day to start solving problems.
Oh happy days! :)

To top it all, I finally received my biiiig order from the US, the one I put back in November 2007, that got returned to the US in March 2008, to which I added some items... yesterday I got it and I still have a huge smile looking thru it! Many small hand-dyed and R&R pieces of fabric, perfect for small samplers and ornaments, some kitted designs, some charts. Now I don't know what to start first! :) I have a small idea though, there is a biscornu and one Blackbird Designs that I might start tomorrow. Today, I still need to put the last finishing touch to one birthday giftie and the last stitches on Quaker Alphabet.

But that's not all. I also received my PS exchange from Cheryl and Milly received her PS group fob exchange from me. See next posts!

April 03, 2008

PS spring exchange from Nath

What a joy today to receive my PS spring exchange from Nath! You might remember it got returned to her because my apartment number was missing. Oh what a joy... I'll let you discover this beautiful project bag (is that the name in English?)... Nath put so much work into creating it for me!

We start with the front....

The back....
And once it's opened.... take time to see all the little details: the two skeins of threads, the small PS bunny pillow, the round pin keep, the miniature wooden pegs, the tiny buttons....

But that wasn't all... see the thread sorter.... it's Nath's husband who made it, and she told me it takes a lot of time to male!! It has so much value for me... I tend to be terribly nostalgic about such things :)


Nath, encore une fois, MERCI!! :))

April 02, 2008

Something on its way over the Atlantic...

Hopefully Milly will get her PS fob exchange very soon now. I am very ashamed for sending it at the last moment, I usually am within the first persons to send out.