Spring

                                                             Pollen season is upon us.

Lori Holt's Chicken Salad Sew Along

 

I just can't wait to start on this sew along! I ordered the kit a little late so I'm going to be playing catch up when it comes. 

If you haven't heard about Lori Holt's new Chicken Salad quilt or her new Cookbook fabric line you need to go and check them out on her blog: Bee In My Bonnet. Hope to start my quilt this next week!

Happy sewing,

Holly 

Little Pumpkins on Display

I have been working on something fun and exciting! These little guys have been so much fun to make. Each one has its own personality. 

Love these little guys! Seeing them clustered up like this reminds me of my favorite Halloween poem.

5 Little Pumpkins

Five little pumpkins sitting on a gate.

The first one says "Oh my it's getting late."

The second one said "There are bats in the air!"

The third one said "But we don't care!"

The forth one said "Let's run and run and run!"

The fifth one said "I'm ready for some fun!"

Oooooooo went the wind! Out went the light! 

And the five little pumpkins rolled out of sight!

Hand sculpted candy corn pin made out of paper mache clay.

I made his hat out of 1940s recycled newspaper from a paper pieced quilt square. I want to use the quilt squares to make a quilt but hated to destroy the vintage newspaper on the back of them so I recycled them. I have had these squares for about 15 years and it is time to make that quilt. It is so fun to read the newspaper and ads.

Paper used on his hat was from the same batch of quilt squares. I believe that this was probably a grocery sack. It is thicker than the newspaper.

Each head is hand sculpted by me, dried for 2 days, painted and dried for a day, stained then dried for two more days. Attaching the head and making clothing takes about 2 hours and pincushion takes about an hour. Hat takes a day to complete with drying time included. So all in all these take about a week to make per kneehugger. I do have assembly lines going but not always. The hats take a while for mod podge to dry and several coats are applied so they take 1-2 days. The fun little paper mache pins take about 3-4 days-dry paper mache for 2 days and then paint and the stain takes 2 days to dry.

These little guys are so fun to design and create. I have a few snowmen made and will put them in my Etsy shop soon. I do have a few pumpkin kneehugger pincushions with thread buckets attached in the shop. 

Hope you have a wonderful day,

Holly

 

A Look Back At Summer Stitchin'

Few stitchy pieces from this past summer. All below pieces finished in the style of Priscillas2000 blog and bow tutorial from Javagirl Stitches on Youtube unless otherwise noted. Floss used was in the Priscilla and Chelsea's Fancy Floss Favorites by Fat Quarter Shop.

August by Hands on Design. Stitched this year. Changed the ants and large sunflower. Did not use called for colors.

July by Hands on Design. Stitched this year. 

All pieces with exception of Honeybee Sampling by Little House Needleworks were stitched and FFO'd this year.

Piesafe with a few stitchy pieces. 

All the flowers are from the garden. 

Buzzy String from Lizzie Kate. Priscillas2000 inspired. Mounted on "old" wood from Hobby Lobby.

Old Red Barn by LHN. Stitched and FFO'd this past summer.

4th of July Holiday Hoopla by With thy Needle and Thread. Mounted on chalk painted tray. Tray was very shiny and new looking, painted it with white chalk paint and then antiqued it with antiquing wax. 

Summer Whirligig by Heart In Hand. Chicken was cut with my Silhouette out of black cardstock.

Merry Making Mini Heart In Hand: Land of the Free.

Merry Making Mini Heart In Hand: Home of the Brave.

Mason jar painted to look like buffalo check.

Cute patriotic cookie and smores cookie from a local coffee shop.

Have a great weekend,

Holly

Change

A season of change. The blog has a new name, something that I have been contemplating for a while now. I love the story of the little red hen. She worked so hard all by herself. While I do love the help of others I also enjoy figuring out how to do something on my own.

Cotton and wool. Made this little quilt in 2016. It is so cute! Colors inspired by Pumpkin Patch Primitives. 

Lantern bow with cross stitched medallion. Pattern by Brenda Gervais.

This was a fun and quick stitch! It is Hands on Design. Very fun stitch using substitute colors that I had in my stash.

Handmade spider with fuzzy/fluffy body.

To use this most of the year, I replaced the pumpkins in the door with chickens and the pumpkins on the hill with sunflowers.

28 ct coffee/tea dyed monaco using called for threads.

Fall ready Hoosier. 

Hands on Design using Priscilla Blain's finishing inspirations and Javagirl Stitches youtube tutorial on bow making!

Stitched years ago. Scissors keep.

Happy stitching,

Holly

It's Been A While

I can't believe that it has been over a year since I blogged! Whew! It has been a crazy year! We sold our suburb house and bought one out in the country with acreage. This has been a dream of ours for a while. It is now the end of a school year so this means teacher gifts!! I love making teacher gifts.

Crochet chicken pot holders, monogrammed tea towels, slumped jar spoon rests are what we made for this year's teacher gifts. Little m made a sweet card also. She is turning into a little artist!

Little m's card for the teachers!

We have started keeping bees! I have two hives so far and hope to eventually have 5.

Honey bee on clover. All worker bees are girls :)

Opened hive to make sure the queen was released from the queen cage. When you order a package of bees you have to let them get used to the queen before she is released into the hive. 

Passed the written part of the test, now just have to past the practical part in about 4 mths to be state certified.

Some assembly and paint required.

Did you know that bees have pollen baskets on their back legs to carry pollen back to the hive for food for the worker bees and larvae?

Have a wonderful night,

Holly

Remembering.....

Remembering the brave who sacrificed all.

Trash to Treasure

Spring is almost gone and Summer is almost here. I have been working a lot in the yard and redecorating the deck. I decided to go with a patriotic theme this year for Summer. My neighbor gave me these wonderful Adirondack chairs that needed some work but had great bones.

 The chair were wobbly so dh (dear hubby) reinforced them and I painted two coats of primer and two coats of oil based outdoor paint. The above picture was after he pressure washed them and I scraped the old paint off and painted one coat of primer.

In keeping with the patriotic them, I cut stars out of outdoor vinyl and added blue cushions.

View from the Adirondack chairs. The glider to the left was my dh's grandmothers that I painted white. We have had it for years. There are many layers of paint on it :) Dh had to weld some areas that had broken loose. Good as new!

Cute little terracotta pot frog. Instructions here. The original is holding a flower but of course I had to add a flag instead. It turned out so cute! Instructions are pretty good. This frog was 100% free. I mixed my own paints to get the color that I wanted. I found the old pot and saucer behind the shed and I already had the wooden beads.

Close up. I am so happy to have him finished. He has been on my to do list for at least 3 years.

Tadpole and Ladybug tic tac toe, anyone? Using a piece of canvas and rocks from the yard made this game free and easy to do! It's fun to play while enjoying the great outdoors. If you make this don't forget to spray everything with outdoor varnish including the canvas pond. 

I will show more of my yard in the next few days.

Have a great day! Holly

Slant-O-Matic With A Side Of Peas And Carrots

I love vintage sewing machines. They are just so durable and have lasted for many, many years. While I love Singer machines, I am not partial to them. I love all vintage machine but Singer just seems to be the one that I come across most often. I usually pick them up at Estate Sales or antique stores. I try to not pay more than $40 for one even if it has a cabinet or case. This way I am not a hoarder but a collector ;) I have a few Japanese clones and these machines not only look beautiful but run so smoothly. 

*drop in bobbin* This area only had about 1/2 thimble full of fuzz!! Usually I pull out a cup full of the stuff and also pull out threads galore! So I was pleasantly surprised. She had been well taken care of.

When I found this old girl she was in pristine condition but her power cord was missing so I couldn't try her out and see if she worked. I looked her over and decided to take a chance for $20. I figured that since she was so well taken care of that she probably worked. It was worth the gamble. 

How to thread guide. She was very, very dry. Not a speck of oil in her. Following the manual, I oiled and lubed her. I also cleaned a tiny bit of gunk off of her head with sewing machine oil and soft rag. I believe that I spent a total of 30 minutes oiling, lubing and cleaning her. Just to give you an idea of how clean she was, I normally spend 3-5 hours cleaning most machines. I have one in line that probably needs 10+ hrs of cleaning :( not to mention cleaning the table that it is in.

Love the brown tension disk dial! Clean as a whistle. 

Sweet little note attached to the manual. I believe that the lady that owned this machine either sold it or gave it away before it ended up at the Estate Warehouse Sale. I am probably the third owner or 4th if you count the Estate Warehouse company. She left such detailed instructions that it sounds like she gifted it to someone. "Go to Singer & (or somewhere) get some sewing machine oil Follow instructions for lubricating. Flip container/holder inside cover to remove box of tools & bobbins-the instruction book is in the box. To remove cover, just lift out & up on the side latches." 

Look at the sweet graphics. Loves all the ladies gathered around the lady with her new sewing machine. 

Love the old Singer Service vehicle.

See the angle of the needle and presser foot? The pencil is straight for comparison. This is why it is called a slant needle 404 and also Slant-O-Matic. It is made of aluminum which makes it lighter and all the gears are steel except one that is plastic. I only found this out while cleaning the machine. I was a little disappointed because they can break over time but do not plan on giving it heavy use so it should be fine. It will probably last for another 50 years or so. This particular was also at the lower end model of the 400 series and an economy model. Very heavy duty and so easy to use. This made it perfect for beginners and I found out it was used in Home Ec classes worldwide. I can't remember what my old Home Ec sewing machine looked like but I know that it wasn't this one.

Making the block "peas and carrots" for my Farm Girl Vintage quilt that I am still working on. Ordered a new power cord and she runs like a dream! The Singer 404 aka Slant-O-Matic is a wonderful machine. It makes a wonderful and beautiful straight stitch that is similar to the Singer 201 or the more famous 401A in quality. It has all the same features such as: tension assembly, bobbin winder, presser food adjuster, location of light, etc. A very beautiful machine and if you ever get a chance to purchase one for a good price I say "go for it!!". You will not be disappointed.

Happy sewing,

Holly