Well doesn't time fly? wow, I had all kinds of blog posts in my head, and I was sure I had posted them and then low and behold I go to check out what I did and it has been a month ago. Needless to say it has been rather busy with the needlework market and then the event at Needle Orts in Florida. Thank you to Debbie of Needle Orts for just a stellar weekend, wow! and to Susan Leonard Black Cauldron Dyeworks for dyeing such a lovely mermaid coloured fabric to work on. We had a super time at market also. It is always maybe a bit repetitive to say but it is so very nice to see our peers in the industry and the shop owners, to put a face to the shop names and as the years pass - it actually means you recognize people! Thank you to all of you who made the trek to Nashville and shop at JDD. Our new patterns are listed under the Designs tab. Quilt Box, Roses and Acorns, The Mighty Acorn, Potpourri of Stitches and Cape Cod Vignettes all have embellishment/thread packs to go with the designs as they are stitched in silk threads. The others Just Stitch, Friendship no Borders, Vintage Birds & Dutch Pincushions all use cotton floss. There is some samplers, some challenging stitches and some just plain fun! On Quilt Box you can certainly do that in any of several colours that you like - I used one main overdyed colour with several colours to draw from - like Kelp that usually has, aquaish blue, green sometimes gold and sometimes brown or burgundy - dyelots! so I matched Kelp with a blue, green and burgundy. You could do this with any number of beautiful hand dyed colours that are out there. Do keep in mind that Quilt box was stitched on 40 ct fabric and uses Tudor silk to stitch it.It certainly can be done on a larger count but then adjust your thread accordingly. Please check the JDD Facebook page for photos of all the designs or on our Designs page here on the website.
Dale concetrating at the needlework market
Florida Sunset
We have finally caught up on all the bits and pieces that made up market and the Needle Orts event. (The header photo is from the deck at the back of the Needle Orts shop, need I say more!) There is always so much paperwork that is generated and then the emails etc. that my stack in the office was rather high, plus I felt the pressure of getting our French cruise piece to completion. I can tell you that we have ordered the threads and fabric and I need to write instructions but otherwise we are set! I go to the framer tomorrow and the photographer in a few weeks and then as we know it will be another month later..... I am so looking forward to our lovely cruise down the Rhone. Have you picked your excursions yet? I think I have settled on mine. Dale has a countdown on his phone and gets me excited when he shows me how close it is getting!
Now that those things are set I am back to keeping the Canadian Patriotic series going and shipping the next installment. We will ship on April 5th - #5 & 6. With that chart I will be adding a sheet for you. When I designed the charts they werepincushions in my brain and sort of a separate thing from one another but still to appear like a set. I did motifs that I felt were part of our history and our Canadian pride. This meant the past and my focus was to show the start in 1867and then on to our modern motifs and designs. It was not until looking at them again with fresh eyes that I saw I should be putting in the date of the celebration year especially on the sampler. So I designed a small row to go at the bottom of the sampler, this will be included in #5 & 6 chart- there will be 2 options for you to choose. I see on social media you are enjoying your stitching and I am thrilled so many of you are stitching it. It seems to me that it unites us across the country that we are working on the same thing. Thank you again for your support in this journey. You know I started my design career doing the 8 geographical Canadiana designs in the Canadian Journey series. It sure has been fun to do a different take on being Canadian rather than nature/geography for the snippets. Thank you for sharing your progress with me!
Two notes:1) Zappy dots had a great display at the needlework market of many new stitch dots or needle nannies whatever you choose to call them - here are the dots we choose to use, we will be continuing on with a needleminder for each new Canadian Patriotic snippet throughout this year.
2) Due to my intense schedule for the past 3 years and my daughter getting married in 2 months I will be taking Friday's off till July! It has been a rather unending pace, and I keep thinking I will just get this done and I can tend to my home and family, well shoot as soon as that gets done - the next thing looms.
For now enjoy the warmer weather, some great stitching before we head out to our gardens!
as always, jeannette