Weekend Reading–12/12/15

Posted on December 12, 2015 by Rabbit Girl Crafts

Next week is the finals week at the university where I work, and this past week the library was packed with students finishing papers and projects for their classes. I’m exhausted, but this week I have a lot of fun stuff to share for your weekend reading:

Satsuma Street has a simple embroidery hoop framing tutorial.

The Surface Design Association picks their 20 favorite textile books of 2015. Slow Stitch by Claire Wellesley-Smith got added to my wishlist. 

Carina is posting some hilarious Tiny Santa photos on her Instagram account.

Little Treasures has a tutorial for a beautiful embroidered fabric necklace inspired by Macedonian folk costume.

I fell off the exercise wagon this year, so I can totally relate to Summer Pierre’s comic about trying to restart a habit.

Cathy Habermann of Hands on Design tells a story about collaborating with chalk artist Priscilla for a new series of cross-stitch patterns for Just CrossStitch magazine.

“We often think that building an art career requires sacrifice… But are you really sacrificing these things when you’d rather be making art and sharing your gift with the world?” This article by Alyson Stanfield was like a punch to the gut.

Video of the Week

Matt Harding is building peace on earth one dance at a time. If you can watch this without crying, well, then you’re made of sterner stuff than me.

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12 Days of Christmas Patterns

Posted on December 9, 2015 by Rabbit Girl Crafts

I’m on a quest to find pattern or set of patterns for the 12 Days of Christmas that I really connect with. I ended up buying this set of patterns from Satsuma Street on Etsy:

12 Days Christmas_SSI love the bright colors and graphic style of these patterns. I also love that they can be stitched as ornaments or as a single sampler.

But, there are so many other wonderful 12 Days of Christmas patterns available. Here are just a few:

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  1. “Twelve Days” by Donna Vermillion for Sudberry House
  2. “12 Days of Christmas” by Frosted Pumpkin Stitchery
  3. “12 Days of Christmas” from Stoney Creek Collection
  4. “12 Days of Christmas” by Jim Shore for Mill Hill
  5. “Santa 12 Days” by Prairie Schooler
  6. “12 Days of Christmas” by Joan Elliott

Does anyone have a favorite pattern not listed here for the twelve days of Christmas? Let me know in the comments!

 

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Weekend Reading — 12/5/15

Posted on December 5, 2015 by Rabbit Girl Crafts

Here are just a few things that caught my eye this week:

Interesting profile of Marie-Sophie Lockhart, the artist behind Good For Nothing Embroidery, which has captured celebrity attention.

Design Milk features the intricate embroidered portraits of artist Cayce Zavaglia.

Dear Little Tracks has a sweet free Christmas embroidery pattern.

The New York Times has published their 100 Notable Books of 2015 list. The only book on the list that I have read is Here by Richard McGuire, and it was one of favorite books read this year.

I’m not on Instagram, but I may have to break down and create an account because I love the Friday Instagram Finds posts from Feeling Stitchy highlighting needlework and embroidery photos from the site.

Video of the Week

It’s that time of year, so I must share this video of The Drifters singing “White Christmas.” Enjoy!

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2015 Guild Ornament Exchange

Posted on December 2, 2015 by Rabbit Girl Crafts

Last night I attended my EGA guild’s Christmas party, and, as I mentioned last week, one of the party traditions is to bring a stitched ornament to exchange. So, now that the party has passed, I can share the ornament that I completed. And, yes, I did finish it!

I decided to attempt a pattern by The Prairie Schooler from the 2006 Ornament issue of Just CrossStitch. It looked small and simple, but it ended up being more complicated than it looked at first glance. For one, I should not have picked a pattern that was solid stitching. Second, this pattern had many confetti stitches for the snowflakes.

Thankfully, my husband was kind enough to do all the driving home from St. Louis where we spent Thanksgiving. So, I got a lot of stitching done in the car on the drive home on Saturday. Here is where I was at by Saturday night:

Prairie Schooler Winter 2006 Ornament

Sunday I was busy with choir practice, church and helping my husband do the final fall clean-up of the backyard, but I found time to continue stitching in the late afternoon. Here was the Sunday progress:

Prairie Schooler Winter 2006 Ornament

I had completed the top portion and had made a good start on the snowy bottom. But, I still had some ways to go…

Monday I went to work and only managed a tiny bit of stitching during my lunch break. Monday evening my husband and I had tickets to a concert. I was getting desperate by that point so I brought my stitching along and stitched before the concert began and during the intermission, which I have never done before. But, I was able to finish the stitching before going to bed late Monday night.

Tuesday I gathered my supplies to transform my stitched piece into an ornament and dragged everything to work with me. I spent my lunch break cutting, sewing and gluing all the pieces together until I finally had a finished ornament:

Prairie Schooler Winter 2006 Ornament

Huzzah!

And here is the lovely sled ornament I received in the exchange, which was stitched by guild member Sue H.

2015ornament_5

It was a nice party, and I’m glad I pushed myself to participate in the exchange. Seeing the ornaments everyone has made is one of the highlights of the evening.

Now, back to my regularly scheduled stitching. :)

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Thanksgiving & Weekend Reading 11/28/15

Posted on November 28, 2015 by Rabbit Girl Crafts

My husband and I drove down to St. Louis for Thanksgiving to visit my sister, her husband and her husband’s family for the holiday. We got back this afternoon, so I am catching up with the “Internet stuff” this evening.

We’ve been doing Thanksgiving in St. Louis for probably ten years now, and I look forward to the trip every year. St. Louis is a great city with lots of great neighborhoods, museums and things to do.

My husband and I love to frequent local bookshops where ever we travel, and St. Louis is home to two of my favorites which we visited yesterday:

Subterranean Books
I bought a copy of Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert and the newish creative journal by Keri Smith, The Imaginary World Of…

Left Bank Books
They had some awesome boxed Christmas cards on display, so I bought my holiday cards here. I was bummed because actor Ethan Hawke is doing a book signing there tonight, so I just missed it, but my sister is there and bought an extra copy to get signed for me. Best sister ever!

Other highlights:
Craft Alliance, where I found a wonderful silver necklace with two little bunnies by Figs and Ginger. They also have an Etsy shop.

The Museum of Contemporary Religious Art at Saint Louis University, where we saw an exhibit of work by artist Salma Arastu. The reproductions of her painted prayers on her website just do not do the works justice. They are breaktaking in person. I cannot quite describe the meditative, contemplative and prayerful quality of these works.

Other Links:
Tap dance is in danger of disappearing forever.

ArtInfo finds some interesting early American documents in Harvard University’s just-published digital collection, The Colonial North American Project.

Artist Stan Herd turns fields into crop “paintings” which can only be properly viewed from an airplane.

Video of the Week
This video is one of my all-time favorites. I recently rediscovered it while cleaning out some bookmarks on my computer.

The Lost Tribes of New York City from London Squared Productions on Vimeo.

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Selecting a Project for My Guild Ornament Exchange

Posted on November 24, 2015 by Rabbit Girl Crafts

Time flies sometimes, doesn’t it? I realized somewhat belatedly that my guild’s Christmas party is a week from today. Every year members are invited to participate in an ornament exchange, and I had not even picked out a pattern let alone started stitching an ornament yet. So, what to do?

Just Cross Stitch DVD

Earlier this year I received a 25% off coupon for Annie’s Craft Store, and I used the discount to splurge and purchase the Just Cross Stitch DVD-ROM with all the issues from 2001-2010, including all of the ornament issues from those years. The DVD has high-res PDFs of each issue, and the files are optimized so you can search the PDF for keywords or the names of designers to find specific patterns. As much as I love my stack of print magazines, this is so much easier sometimes.

Monday night I popped the DVD into my computer and browsed through the Ornament issues and found two patterns that I liked that I think I can finish in less than a week. One was by Heart in Hand Needleart, and the other was by The Prairie Schooler.

The next step was to dig through my stash to see what kind of fabric and threads I had. I ended up going with The Prairie Schooler pattern because I was able to pull together the supplies I needed just from my stash. Huzzah! Here’s a peek at the kit:

2015 Ornament Exchange Kit

Hopefully I will get some extra stitching time this Thanksgiving weekend, and next week I can reveal the finished project if all goes well!

In the meantime, I really need to learn how to take better photos. Ugh.

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Weekend Reading — 11/21/15

Posted on November 21, 2015 by Rabbit Girl Crafts

There are a lot of reasons to despair these days, but I am trying to hang on to the good things and give thanks for the countless blessings in my life that I take for granted every day.

This week I give thanks for:

  • going to the circus with my husband, brother, sister-and-law and 2 year old nephew
  • my new pair of glasses — my first new pair in 7-8 years!
  • the first snowfall of the season
  • an excellent concert by Kristian Bezuidenhout

And here’s what I’ve bookmarked this week:

Textile artist Louis Gardiner shares some of her explosive embroidery from her new gallery show on the Selvedge blog.

Creative Live has a tutorial to make an easy embroidery sampler for Christmas.

So many people are stitching the 12 Days of Christmas patterns being posted by Plum Street Samplers, but I love the colors that The Copper Fox has chosen.

The U.S. National Archives shows us that at one time samplers could be used as legal proof of marriage.

Video of the Week

Because we just saw Kristian Bezuidenhout last night, I have to share this video of him performing the Andante from Mozart’s Piano Sonata 16 in C Major. Lovely.

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WIP – Anhinga Blues

Posted on November 17, 2015 by Rabbit Girl Crafts

This is a WIP that keeps threatening to turn into a UFO, but I am determined to finish it. All I have left is the backstitching, but there is a lot of it.

Anhinga Blues Cross-Stitch by Ikki Matsumoto

Here’s what it will look like when it’s completed:

Anhinga Pattern by Ikki Matsumoto

When I have shown people this project, usually the first question is, “What is an Anhinga?” If you are from Florida or around the Gulf Coast of the U.S., you know an Anhinga is a bird!

Here’s a great photo of one by Homer Edward Price found via Flickr:

Anhinga-(female)

I purchased this pattern years ago at Three Crafty Ladies on Sanibel Is., Florida. The pattern is adapted from the artwork of Florida artist Ikki Matsumoto, who I have just learned passed away last year.

You can still find some of the licensed cross-stitch designs on Etsy via RK Portfolio.

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Weekend Reading — 10/13/15

Posted on November 13, 2015 by Rabbit Girl Crafts

What I’ve been reading online this week:

I’m not on eBay, but maybe I should be. Apparently I could be rolling in money. Ha! Handmade needlework arts are a high profit item on eBay.

I love seeing artists’ workspaces. This week Textileartist.org visited with UK embroidery artist Isobel Currie, and she is super organized. Her work is also amazing.

Noreen Crone-Findlay shares a beautiful prayer shawl she woven for a friend on a triangle loom.

Science says art will make your kids better thinkers (and nicer people).

Melanie discovers this creative collage finishing technique by Summer House Stitche Workes. You can also find a tutorial with video on the SHSW blog.

Video of the Week

I heard this song for the first time this week and it made me cry. It’s simple melody and touching message is perfect for this month of Thanksgiving. You’ll be humming this one for days, even after one viewing. Watch “Grateful” by  Nimo Patel with Daniel Nahmod (and friends).

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Free Tiny Chart: Thankful

Posted on November 10, 2015 by Rabbit Girl Crafts

I wanted to do something for Thanksgiving, so I created this little chart. Very little!

Finished Thankful Magnet

This tiny guy stitches up in no time at all and I could think of dozens of ways to finish it. I stitched this one on 14ct plastic canvas, and I cut and applied some magnetic tape (like this) to the back to turn it into a little magnet.

But, I also thought of lots of other ways to finish it, such as making a pin or brooch, a wine bottle charm or a charm for a scissors fob.

Here’s the chart for “Thankful.” You may click on the image to download a PDF version of the chart.

Thankful tiny cross-stitch chart

I focused on the many people and things in my life for which I am thankful as I stitched, and now I have a little magnet in my workspace to remind me to be thankful every time I look up from my computer.

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