February Small and a new start

Although Valentine's Day is over for another year, I chose to stitch another small along that theme to add to my bowl of small finishes next year. 

This is Key To My Heart, designed by Shelly Auen of Primitive Stitichin'.

A sweet little stitch which is just perfect for a pinkeep. I'm looking forward to displaying this next year in my bowl of smalls.

Having just completed a larger finish it was time to sort through my stash and decide on a new start. Yesterday morning we woke to a snowy day which quickly turned into a mess of freezing rain. I was dreaming of spring on such a day and decided to start on a design which would get me thinking of better weather ahead. This design is a beautiful collage of spring tulips and is appropriately called Dreaming of Tulips. The designer is Karen Kluba of Rosewood Manor. I'm stitching this on 32 ct antique white linen.

 I love Karen's designs and I love the way that she always charts smaller vignettes that can be stitched from the main design. There are so many different small finishes which are the perfect gifts.
I should have a few more progress pics in the coming days. I know I'm going to enjoy my time spent with this.

A week or so ago my husband and I travelled to the city of Kingston, Ontario to meet up with my brother-in-law and his wife for dinner. We decided to check out some antique shops in the afternoon prior to our meet up. There were several shops in the area but I found one in particular that had a lot of what I was looking for. It wasn't in the budget for any large purchases but I did come home with a few choice items.

 
 A wooden spool, some antique lace and a small heart baking tin. I love to use these larger wooden spools to display some of my small needlework finishes on the top. I look for ones with a smooth surface as seen in the pic below. You can then wrap some of the antique lace around the spool. I use the lace for decorative purposes and also to add to some of my finishes.

If this tin had been just a little larger I would have used it to display a needlework finish within it. As it is I will use it for display purposes in a bowl with some of my smalls. 
I'm definitely planning a trip back to this shop. There wasn't enough time to check out everything. There were lots of antique sewing items...... lace, buttons, fabric, ets. I'm looking forward to my return visit! 

February WIPocalypse

February... a short month to begin with and even less time for stitching here due to a bathroom renovation. I'm determined to finish off a few of my WIPs from last fall before starting anything new other than small stitches. There are two remaining projects which include Kathy Barrick's And Heaven And Nature Sing and Stacy Nash's Thistles and Spells Pinkeep. 

 And Heaven And Nature Sing posed a number of problems for me. Rather than purchasing the required silks I decided to use silks I had in my stash. Unfortunately I ran out of one of the main colours which is by Vicki Clayton and no longer available. Stitching friends to the rescue! I put a call out on Facebook and one of the ladies had the necessary floss and gifted it to me. I also came very close to running out of 2 other silks. It's hard to tell just how much floss you have remaining when they come on spools. 
Then I stitched one of the trees in the forest in the wrong spot! No frogging for me as I didn't want to waste my silks. Instead I redesigned my forest to accommodate my mistake. 
After that the only thing remaining was some beading. I chose to add beads to the holly around the deer's neck rather than just stitches. 
 Finally, a finish! I'm thrilled with the results, challenges and all. Here are some other close up pics.

After finishing this I turned to my one remaining project from last year which is the Stacy Nash design.
I am soooo close to a finish on this one. Just a few leaves left to stitch and it's complete. Once again I ran out of some floss. I was sure that I had two skeins of the necessary colour to begin with but I was wrong. Duh!!
So this piece is on hold until the floss order arrives.

I have recently started a small stitch which will hopefully be finished by Thursday so I can post a pic for the Smalls SAL. I've been hunting through my stash to determine my next big project and I've already put in my first few stitches. I should have a progress pic to share very soon. Until then, I'll keep you guessing! 

Just a note to let you know that I have finally created a WIPocalypse 2016 list of projects I'd like to complete this year. Better late than never! Check it out by clicking on the link just below the header on my blog.