My Studio

I realized I haven't posted any pictures of my studio makeover.  Bob likes to call this room my studio; actually it's a sewing room, craft room, stitching room, morning room, office, all rolled into one.  I'm fortunate to have a large room with high ceilings and lots of windows.

I really don't have any before pictures.  The previous owners of the house used this room as a media room which consisted of black out curtains, a reclining sofa, a HUGE tv and it was decorated with John Wayne memorabilia.  I guess you can imagine that.

My first order of business was built-in in shelving and workspaces for my computer and sewing machine.

I did a T shaped workspace since the room is so large.  The extra peninsula space is available on the office side and the sewing side which really helps.  The shelves provide tons of storage for books and stitching/craft supplies.  The blue apron hanging in the center was used and made by my Grandma from feed sack material.

The end of the peninsula is a bookcase for extra storage.

Moving to the left is an outside wall with sliding glass doors leading on to a porch.  The high ceilings allow space for hanging stitched pieces that haven't found a home anywhere else in the house.  I have a large counter height worktable in front of the sliding glass doors.  The light pouring on to the workspace is fabulous!

Still moving to the left, opposite the built-ins, is a sitting area with lots of lights for stitching.  The sofa is a sleeper so we have some extra guest space if we need it.  The quilt hanging on the wall was made by my Grandma and was the inspiration for the wall color.

The fourth wall has a closet which is full of shelves to store more craft, sewing, and stitching supplies.  The white shelf unit mounted on the wall has glass door knobs as hangers and is where I hang my main stitching and project bags.  I've got a TV in the corner on a roller cart that I can pull out to watch while I stitch.

I seem to spend most of my time in this room doing something or other.  Hmmmm what will I start on today?

Hope you enjoyed the tour!
Sherri

Hand Stitched Ornaments

Our tree is bedecked with mostly hand made ornaments and many of them stitched.  Techniques include cross stitch, needlepoint, beading, and punch needle.  A lifetme collection from friends and relatives along with many I stitched myself.  I enjoy them so much!  Here's a sample of some of my favorites.

I also finished the stockings for the mantle. They're made with fabric from a Moda French General layer cake.  I am absolutely in love with all these fabrics and I use them for all sorts of finishing work.

I guess I'm ready for Christmas now.  The packages are sent, presents wrapped, and stockings hung by the chimney with care.

Hope you all are ready for an enjoyable holiday!
Sherri

I Love Pinerest!

I am in LOVE with Pinterest. When I'm wake up in the middle of the night, I peruse Pinterest until I get sleepy again. There are so many wonderful ideas, I've found myself copying some of them for holiday decorating.

 

 

I saw a photo of a holiday table with a cake stand used as a candle stand.  Brilliant!  However, I don't have a cake stand and have never really felt the need for one.  So off to ebay I go to find the perfect vintage cake stand for my own table.  I found this wonderful heavy glass stand that's perfect.  I love ebay, too.  Now that I have a cake stand, I might find more uses for it during the rest of the year.  And it will work really well with some of the pieces I have that were my grandmother's!

 

 

I made my table runner out of 16 count Chili Pepper Heatherfield fabric and hand hemstitched it all around.  I think it works perfectly with the cake stand.

 

 

Speaking of getting ready for Christmas (as I was) .  Daisy says . . .

 

 

"I'm ready, bring it on!"

 

Beaded Ornaments (the rest of the story)

I'll start wth the ta-da . . . here's the light fixture in our dining area decorated for the holidays.  I wish the camera picked it up, but the silver beads on the silver ornaments really sparkle.

 

Now, the rest of the story . . .

 

I made this beaded ornament for an ornament exchange.  Of course I had to buy a package of 6 ornaments at Hobby Lobby and a lot more beads than this one ornament needed.  I had the brilliant idea of making up the other 5 balls to hang on the light fixture.

 

I worked and worked.  Of course I had to run to Hobby Lobby for a new supply of one kind of bead, but my 5 balls were done.  I decided that the fixture needed some garland, too, so off to Hobby Lobby I go again.

 

The garland went on the fixture just fine.  I wasn't sure how I was going to hang the ornaments, but after several tries I came up with a plan.  1, 2, 3, 4 ornaments hung.  I'll bet you know what's going to happen!  You guessed it, I dropped the fifth one and it shattered all over.

 

The only thing to do was to run back to Hobby Lobby again and get another package of 6 ornaments.  Good thing they were 50% off!

 

As I drove back home I was contemplating what to do with the 5 ornaments I would have left over after replacing the broken one.  I hung the bead netting on the new ornament and promptly dropped it, too.  Broom and dustpan out again.  Okay, now I'll only have 4 left to do something with.

 

I did manage to get 5 beaded ornaments hanging from the light fixture and I like the look so much I'll be packing them carefully away to use in years to come.  Oh, what did I do with the 4 extra ornaments (you ask)?  They stayed in their original box, carefully placed in a closet.  You never know how many I'll break next year!

 

Happy stitching,

Sherri

Early Thanksgiving Morning . . .

Here I sit on a beautiful sunny Thanksgiving morning. The finches are singing, the family is still asleep and I'm sipping my first cup of coffee.  This is my favorite time of day.  Today it's made more special by the Starbucks French Roast in my cup.  I love my Keurig coffee maker, but I've really missed Starbucks coffee.  Yesterday I stumbled across Starbucks k-cups in the store and I was so excited I could have jumped up and down!  Yum!

I have a few ornament exchanges coming up, and thought I'd make some special gift bags to put them in.  After a bit of rummaging in my stash here's what I came up with.  Although why I decided on yo-yo's, I don't know.  I've never made yo-yo before but found this tutorial on Heather Bailey's fabulous blog.  The steps are much easier than I expected, but the execution is a bit tougher! I'm sure I'll get better with practice. Recycled gift bags, fabric scraps, old sheet music and some buttons from my button jar and Ta-Da!

Last weekend we managed to get a few things done around the house.  I really wanted to get the kitchen finished before all the cooking today.  Here are before and after pictures.  It's hard to see in the first picture, but the breakfast area ceiling was lower than the rest of the room.  Since we were having the porches and siding redone on the back of the house, we had the contractors raise the ceiling to match the rest of the kitchen.

A little bit of paint and some new light fixtures, and now it's much more open and bright.

The kitchen is ready, but I didn't get around to replacing the dead plant by the front door.  I can't believe I've let it sit there so long - I should be mortified :)

I'm thankful to have a sense of humor and family and friends who can appreciate it!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!

Sherri

I'm not the only one who has stash!

If I haven't told my readers before, I tell you now.  My husband is a keeper!  Among his many wonderful and loveable traits, he completely understands why I have an entire room for my stash.  He understands why I don't like to throw scraps of things away.  "It might come in handy some day."  And he understands about purchasing the right tool for the job!

How can he be so understanding, you may ask?  I present to you a small portion of the shop we added on to the house just for his woodworking hobby.  This is the "stash" end.

So, it was no problem gathering from our mutual stash the materials for my jewelry board.  My jewelry box is overflowing, so I had the idea of putting something like a bulletin board on the end of the shelves in my closet.  The idea is to hang necklaces where I can see them and use the jewelry box for earrings, bracelets, pins, etc.

Of course, hubby had the perfect scrap of wood to cut the exact size I wanted.  I rummaged in my stash for fabric, quilt batting, and corsage pins. and TA DA!

I feel so organized now!  This is just one example of how ideas become realities at our house.  Most of the time it takes pieces from both caches of stash.  And isn't that what a good marriage is all about . . . teamwork!

Until next time, happy stitching!

Sherri

A Reader Identified My Mystery Stitching Room!

About a month ago in this post I talked about inspiration for my sewing room/office/studio makover.  The second picture was picked up from Google and I didn't know whose it was.  Karen was so sweet as to let me know its origin.  It belongs to Alicia Paulson of the Posie Gets Cozy blog.

Believe it or not, the room was a BEFORE photo!  I won't post any of the after photos but here's a link to the post "My New Room".  The new room is fabulous and even more inspiring for what I have in mind  Actually, Alicia's entire blog is so inspiring, I became a follower immediately!

I've posted some pictures of my studio, but not of this entire wall:

I started taking things off these shelves before it occurred to me to take "before" pictures.  These clunky built in shelves are coming down and being replaced with new built-in cabinets, workspaces and shelving.  It's the first step in the makeover.  I want to really pound them out like they do in the makeover shows.  That seems so fun and theraputic, I can't wait!

Top 10 Things That Keep Me From Blogging - No. 8

Having a fairly major face lift done to the back of our house . . .

Teaser photo!  Bob's keeping a pretty good photo log of the progress so I'll post some before and after shots later.  What you're seeing here is the deck our hot tub will rest on before the 2nd deck is built up around it,the new concrete patio and roof, completely replacing the siding, and replacing the windows.

We spent about a year thinking and deciding before we got this far.  I'm amazed at the number of decisions that still need to be made during the process!

Later, Sherri

Top 10 Things That Keep Me From Blogging - No. 10

Searching for inspiration to redorate my office/stitching room:

Loving this room by Candice Olson . . .

And this one (I don't know whose it is). . .

I think something in between would work best :)

Later, Sherri



Recycling For Gift Boxes

I finished my Christmas present sewing yesterday and tried to put my mind around boxing and wrapping.  I no longer care for traditional wrapping paper and purchased gift boxes (such a waste).  So this morning I grabbed some cereal and cracker boxes, some ribbon remnants from Michael's floral department, and some tissue paper I saved from a recent shopping spree. 

I'm please with the result.  I think these look interesting and scream "Green Christmas".  I found a tutorial for turning a cereal box into a gift box here.  Once I got the hang of it they went pretty fast.  Now I'm off to find some shipping boxes to recycle!

Winner . . . and my projects for today.

I am so pleased with the number of entries for my Prairie Schooler giver-away.  Thanks everybody!  I printed out all the entries, cut them out, folded each piece and dropped them into my favorite antique mixing bowl.

When a friend from EGA stopped by, I asked her to draw for me as an impartial party.  The entry she drew was . . . (drum roll please) . . . marjord1

marjord1 said...

"Thank you for the chance to win a Christmas design. Would love to make it for my daughters new house."


Marjord1, please contact me via the email address on my profile and let me know where to send your Prairie Schooler kit.  I hope your daughter loves it in her new home!

I'm spending this bright sunny day in my workroom fnishing up a bit of sewing for Christmas gifts.  I've also pulled out a nice piece of Christmas Red Heatherfield that would make an excellent holiday table runner.  I decided to hemstitch all around.  I've never hemstitched on Heatherfield, I might regret it :)  I'll be sure to post my progress.

My Stitching Space

We've been in our new house just over a year.  Time really flies by!  I've been wanting to show off my nice big stitching/craft studio, but it's way far from being presentable.  I have so many ideas of what to do in here, but now it looks like a hurricane hit.  So here are a few highlights of what's somewhat presentable.

In it's former life, this room was a media room with some clunky built-in painted shelving surrounding an opening that held a HUGE flat screen tv.  Did I say it was HUGE?  Now that opening houses my sewing table.

I used the clunky shelves to set up displays of stitched pieces and supplies.  I think they kind of look like shadow boxes.

I have this fabulous solid oak magazine rack that I used for display in my shop.  It sits at the end of my cutting table and houses my WIP's and some vintage sewing magazines.

I keep my projects in plastic bags or sleeves when I'm not working on them.  The fabric is out of the frame and all the instructions and floss and other stuff is kept together.  Actually, not all of these are WIP's; some are HSSY's (haven't started stitching yet).  But when I have everything together and ready to go, it goes in the rack.  When I feel like stitching on something, I can easily see what's waiting.

This room also has my desk and computer, some bookshelves and the cage for the zebra finches (a.k.a. the Bird and Breakfast).  Someday I'll get motivated to paint, hang my stitching on the walls, sew some window treatments . . .

Spring!!

Yesterday I saw my "first robin of spring".  
 

While I was on the porch trying to take his picture, I noticed a bit of color in the garden.  Where did this come from?

One thing about moving; it's always fun to watch the yard and gardens in the spring time to see what comes up.  Of course, one must always accept the weeds with the flowers!

I'm getting deeper into tax season and too busy to blog much.  Hope you all are doing well and seeing signs of spring in your own yard.  Later!

Feedsack Treasures

Meet Nellie. She keeps me company in my sewing/work room. She is named after my Grandma Shingleton because she's wearing Grandma's homemade feedsack apron.

I absolutely love this apron and feel so honored to have it. You can tell that it was well used. It was sewn on a machine except for the handmade buttonholes.

I really like the rick-rack trim she used.

I also have a quilt made by Grandma that used mostly feedsack material. This quilt weighs about 50 pounds LOL but it sure is warm!

I just have to share a story my father told me about Grandma and dresses made from feedsacks. Now, Grandma was not a small woman so it took a few feedsacks to have enough material for a dress. Daddy remembers an activity at his school where Grandma wore a new feedsack dress she had made. One of the other mothers showed up in a dress made with the same feedsack material. I guess that would be embarrassing enough, but it was obvious that the other mother only needed one feedsack for her dress! Poor Grandma.

Here's a feedsack treasure from the other side of my family. My great-grandmother (aka Grandma Daisy) made these potholders and hanger.

I love them so much that they hang in my kitchen. I don't actually use them, but I love to display them and the colors go so well with my fruit and rooster stuff. The top is decorated with a ribbon that feels like silk. Somehow feedsacks and silk ribbons don't seem to go together!

One day I found this interesting feedsack quilt in an antique store and just had to have it. It was pieced together from matching feedsacks.

This one was definitely hand quilted.

Thanks for visiting my modest little feedsack collection.

New computer, new fireplace, new project

Okay, so this really isn't a new project, it's just the one I'm pulling out to stitch on this week. This is the Long Dog mystery sampler featured in the gift of stitching magazine. The first part was in the January, 2007 issue and then 3 parts released monthly. So now you know how long ago I started it. I had the best intentions of keeping up, but got sidetracked somewhere in part 2. I really love the birds and the colors and since my 2010 stitching is about working through some older projects, it's time again.

I finally broke down and got a new computer. My last one was at least 10 years old and had finally slowed down to the point I couldn't stand it. Since it just couldn't be rebuilt again, off I went and brought home a brand new one. It has great speed, lots of ram, and Windows 7 which I love! All the configuring and software loading has been eating into my stitching and blogging time. But it was worth it.

And . . . new fireplace, you wonder? We had a propane tank put in and a propane fireplace insert installed inside the original wood burning fireplace. We were hoping to have it in by Christmas and really wished for it with the snow. But it was finally installed this week. I'm planning to enjoy it throughly.

Now off to get cozy by the fireplace with my Long Dog sampler. Happy stitching!

I'm finally back on line!

I decided to treat myself to a "computer free" holiday so I could concentrate on enjoying family. We had Christmas at our house since we're the ones with the new house this time. I so love having a bigger house now and this kitchen has 2 ovens which was great for cooking the big turkey and ham dinner. A good time was had by all and do I have pictures? Of course not! This fact seems even more ridiculous when I tell you that I got a new camera for Christmas! What kind of idiot gets a new camera for Christmas and has absolutely no pictures of the family, the decorations, the meal, the present opening or anything. Aaaaargh.

But I did manage to get a couple of picture of the snow. We actually had a white Christmas here, much to the chagrin of our company from Michigan. I took these pictures early in the day on Christmas Eve but the snow kept falling and Christmas day was absolutely beautiful!




One fun thing about company - - - seems like we all either showed up sick or left sick! I was completely wiped out with some wonky cold/flue thing for an entire week. Bob missed the first go round but ended up with a head cold that I have now, too.

So this week I've been playing catch up. All the laundry is done, clean sheets and towels put away and guest beds remade. The Christmas decorations are put away and the house is somewhat clean. Then I decided to completely wipe out my computer and start over with a fresh install of Windows. Now I'm baaaaaack!

I had a surprise package in the mail from Lisa, a dear stitching friend in Hartsville. She sent this cute plaque which was immediately given a prominent resting place in my stitching studio. The orange roll thingy opens up to reveal a grocery bag style tote. I love the colors and it will tuck nicely into my glove box so I'll never be caught without my own bag again.

It's beautiful when it's opened up with stuff in it.

I participated in the stash exchange on the Legacy Embroiderer's Guild. I forgot to take a picture of the stuff I sent to my secret sister but I did remember to snap some shots of what I received from Valerie.

Of course, I have finished all the chocolate already! The cute "wishes" bag had 3 nicely wrapped presents in it.

What great gifts! A new paid of embroidery scissors (great excuse to stitch a new fob!) a fat quarter of cream Belfast linen (I can use that for sure!) and red, green, and white metalic threads (now I'm motivated to start next year's Christmas ornaments!). Thanks so much, Valerie!

I've been enjoying catching up with my blogging friends and seeing all your wonderful posts. May 2010 bring us all many happy stitches!