Challenging Challenges

Over the past several months, I've been enjoying my cross stitching again. It had fallen by the wayside over the years, so it has been wonderful to get back to it.

At the end of last year, I decided to challenge myself to make 2 ornaments a month. (If you'd like to join me use the hashtag #2amonthsal) Since I will be making some of my ornaments from a couple of  my books, these will also be part of the #craftbookchallenge.
I've created facebook groups for the 2 a month SAL and the Craft Book Challenge.

You can find the 2 a month here. and the Craft Book Challenge here.

While most of my ornaments are likely to be stitching, I do plan on a few quilted and crafted ones as well, don't feel like you can't join in if you aren't a cross stitcher, The point is to make 24 ornaments for your tree/gift giving by Christmas.

In the past week, I've also jumped in on a couple of stitching challenges,  #stitch9challenge and #yearofwips2019. To make things even more complicated, In YOW, you can "upgrade", so to speak, to extreme by adding as many wips as the number of your birth date (1-5 get special rules..N/A here)

My birthday is April 30, so I added an additional 30 wips to my challenge.

Here are my picks for these challenges. All of them are part of the Year of Wips, or YOW, so I am only notating the Stitch 9, and 2 a month.

Works of Jane Austen Mystery SAL

Stitch 9 

1801 House by Chessie and me

Olde World map by Diane Thomas for Janlynn 

Stitch 9 

Super Star Mario by Nintendo America INC

Stitch 9 

2019 country Christmas ornaments club
series counts as 1 for Stitch 9, 12 for yow and 2 a month

Tritons Treasure by The Stitching Parlor

Stitch 9

Little Red Bird by La-D-Da

Stitch 9 

Dragon Heart by Black Swan

At Home with Jane Austen by The Sampler Girl

Stitch 9 

Aure Fairy by Fanta-Cat designs

Stitch 9 

Wolf Moon by The Stitcher's Habit

Stitch 9 

Santa's List by Country Cottage Needlework

Enchanted crow by Threadwork Primitives

Beggar's Night by Threadwork Primitives

Bats in the Belfry by The Drawn Thread

Casting a Spell by Blackbird Designs

Welcome to the forest by Country Cottage Needleworks

Yikes by Erica Michaels

Noah's Christmas Ark 2 by Plum Street Samplers
Only stitching the honeybees for sure this year
2amonth

 Noah's Christmas Ark 3 by Plum Street Samplers
Only stitching the Whales for sure this year
2amonth

Vintage Christmas by Country Cottage Needleworks

Jinx by Raise the Roof designs

Quaker Bat by The Workbasket

Stitch 9 

 Winter Row by Bent Creek

So there they are..I tried to get a good mix of small, med and large designs. Some are certainly more simplistic, though not necessarily due to their size.


I'll be back soon with challenge updates and news from the sewing room soon!
M

Sweet vintage kitty pillow

I recently acquired some of the cutest Vintage kitty and puppy scraps via the bay.

I couldn't open this package fast enough when it came in, and immediately sat down and sewed up this sweet little accent pillow!

 After fussy cutting one of the kitties, I added some Maywood Studios vintage inspired prints, and finished it with vintage trims

It will be for sale in my facebook group here and a new favorite here

Until next time!
Michelle

An experiment in quilt binding.

I am so excited about this one..
a lot of time, I will have an idea and it fails, miserably, but this experiment went SO well, I LOVE the finished result!

I've not *seen* an actually ruffled binding before, only faux bindings, and the occasional ruched rounded corner.  It took 10 times longer to do than a traditional binding but it was so worth it!

Would you just look at all of that ruffly goodness??  Almost makes me want to have another baby (not..just kidding universe!)

 Oh..and the rose fabric? yeah..I recently scored yardage of OOP Paris Bebe fabrics, so you'll be seeing more shabbiness coming from me :)

And here's some gratuitous shots.

This is my favorite frame ever, I found this in a little shop in the make an offer pile..$5 later and she was mine. Brought her home, cleaned her up and gave her a coat of my own chalk paint mix.