Thank God for air-conditioning! In spite of the heat, I was able to get a bit of indoor stuff done. Chores of a sort that would have been well nigh impossible in the heat: like emptying and cleaning the refrigerator in anticipation of a service call. Ironing and a bit of mending. And finally completing the switch from cool weather to warm weather wardrobes by getting all the cool weather stuff into storage. It's amazing how long supposedly simple tasks like the last can take when you're working full time and not as spry as you used to be. I even managed to get out early this morning while the temp was still a relatively cool 75 degrees and clean up my side of an untended hedge from my neighbor's front driveway that is growing through the fence, scratching my car and obscuring my view when backing out of the driveway. There are a lot of advantages to townhouse living but one careless or negligent neighbor can really make thing unpleasant. The neighbors on the right are a great family who own and takes pride in their property, just like we do. However, the neighbor on the left is a 20-something female renter who either hasn't the time or perhaps, the contractual obligation, to tend to maintenance issues like hedge trimming. When her whole family lived in the house, things were maintained but once her parents and brother moved out things have definitely gone to seed. No outdoor work is being done at all. The task took me a little longer than it should have since, not owning any hedges, I don't have any hedge trimmers. I ended up using my long handled pruning shears [I do have trees] and snipped off a branch at a time. An irritation, to be sure, but I just couldn't tolerate the situation any longer. I wonder if my neighbor will even notice.
This is one of the sewing finishes that has been sitting in the to-do pile for a very long while. It's a Cross-Eyed Cricket mitten ornament. I finished it as a flat board ornament and used some twisted white cord I had left over from another project. It is hard to see but the hanger is a beaded one, white and pale turquoise glass beads from Mill Hill Beads. The backing is simply material cut from one of my husband's old broadcloth business shirts and dyed in a coffee bath.
One of my favorite Christmas ornaments: La D Da's Winter Cardinal. It's a great way to use up odds and ends of floss since the scarf can be any color you wish. I always finish the back of this ornament with the same chart stitched in reverse. I am getting pretty good at reading charts backwards!
Here you can see the reverse. The colors in the photo above are true. I don't know why this one came out differently: same place, same lighting, same inept photographer, same point and shoot digital camera. Go figure!
I finished up Aury's 2012 Quaker Heart. I used Belle Soie silks Chester Blue, Cranberry, and Icing on a 28ct linen called Meditation. In the photo, the Icing tends to fade into the light blue linen but the contrast is far more pronounced in reality. I finished it as a small stuffed ornament and will be using it on the Patriotic ornament tree which I will next display on Veteran's Day and then, not again till Memorial Day through Independence Day in 2013. And here is the Star Theater from the Indy Town Square SAL. Finished as a flat board ornament. One minor irritation, when I went to make the twisted cord trim for this ornament, I couldn't find my cording drill. I'll have to tear my various stitching areas apart to find it tomorrow.
Well that's it for the weekend. All in all, I felt it was pretty productive even if I didn't manage to work on Black'd Skie.
1 comment:
Very nice work Riona. Keep cool. I'm trying.
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