Pebble ready

My first pebble. I am not sure if there comes second one. It is addictive though..
I used whipped wheel stitch, french knots, raised cup stitch, buttonhole stitch, bullion stitch, cast-on stitch, drizzle stitch.
The size is about a CD. I didn't get a real stone from the shore. I used an CD with batting and sheepfleece.
When you would try to make one for yourself, HERE is the how to do link.

Pebble adventure

It seems that on Stitching Fingers many members are joining a pebble adventure in the subgroup Hand Embroidery. When I looked a the pebble it was love on the first sight. I had to try it!
But I didn't own a embroidery hoop, I never use one.
 But for this project it is necessary.
Yesterday I bought an 8 inch hoop. It was the only size available in the little shop I have in the little town nearby.
Yesterday evening I have started right away and had done this. It is very addictive :)
Today I am working further on this project. When the weather becomes a bit better in the weekend I 'll go to the shore to find some pebbles to sew in the fabric.
Now it is raining cats and dogs and storm!

block number 16

Block number 16 for my wool quilt. One more to go of this size and the four corner blocks.
This size is 20 x 40 cm. (8 x 16 ")
I cannot write any longer that is is my WISP quilt (Work In Slow Progress).
The embroidery work goes faster now, so I call it now WIP :)

next block wool quilt

 The next block for my wool quilt. Doing the TAST stitches every week and a few extras, the embroidery goes faster now than last year. I am determined to finish this quilt this year!
Below you see the planning. I have two empty blocks on the left side and four corner blocks to go.
And the new seams which come when I sew everything together.
But I am nearly finished  :))

Romance in the rose garden.

CQ wall-hanging. Made from a baggie what I got from Hideko in 2008.
size 46cm (18") square.
See the photo from the start two posts below.
I have made more detail photos, they are on my Flickr photopage.
 Just click on the next photo when you are there :)
The border is not made from fabric yet!
I made it with a photo program :))
I have to buy fabric for the border in the right colors. That can take a while. I don't have fabric stores here. The nearest is three hours by car and a ferry. It has to wait to Spring.

baking day

Baking day today. I like to bake many things in one day. The table dusty with flour, the oven heat and everything ready in one day. Muffins with topping in the freezer. Norwegian 'boller' and 'hvetestanger' , half part in the freezer. ( glazing them later). Dough for two whole corn breads are rising in the bowl.
 If you could smell it......or taste....  LOL

finishing things

 Last week I was looking for something in one of my fabric boxes and also found this CQ block.
Sewn in January 2008 from a swap baggie I got from Hideko. ( Japan)
I wasn't happy with the block and have put it away with other ufo's.
When I had a better look on it I saw why I didn't like it in 2008.
I took the block with me to my sewing room and began to remove things. Much better right away.
I couldn't leave the block in a box forever, the fabrics are to nice for that! There is an almost white piece, it is old kimono silk with a stylish dragon woven in it. And other nice fabrics all from Japan.
I have added more to the seams and add and little crochet doily from my grandmother's stock.
Made a plan for the rest of the block. It is large! 46 cm ( 18").
I am stitching on it every day now and maybe next week I can show it to you.
Below how it looked yesterday.

fabric book pages

 This is a fabric-book page for Robin in Australia. Robin asked for pages in green/blue. I made a page in CQ work. The lace is light blue. It looks more green on the photo. Making a good photo is very difficult with silk fabrics. Below a page I got from Helga in Germany. Helga made a page for me from a painting from Ton Schulten.

 Below a page for me from Maria in Portugal. Maria made a page from an textile artist named: Joanna Vasconselos, it is named ; the Princess. This page is a few months late due family illness at Maria's.

Wisp block 14

I don't like spiders but what is a crazy quilt without a spider web? I had to make one on block 14!
Size 20 x40 cm. The lavender is made with feather stitches.

DYB rr block

This is a "tone on tone" DYB block for Annamaria. Annamaria sewed six beautiful blocks, three pink and three violet. I choose a violet one to embellish. Stitched all the seams and added beads. I painted a lace butterfly with Ozecraft to go with the centre piece. A few stem-stitch roses in the corner.
The size is 15 x15 cm. (6").

beautiful day!

 On thursday and saturday I machine quilted this quilt for my neighbour. She sewed the top!
This is a quilt for a little girl and the size is for a single bed.
And I made a fabric book page in CQ style which I have sent to Australia now.
I forgot to make a photo of it :-(
Below a view to the east from my house. We have such beautiful weather today!

a new block for my wool quilt

Again a block ready for my wool quilt. size 20 x 40 cm.  (8x16")
The TAST stitch samples are in the future on my Flickr photosite.

wisp block 12

Again a block ready for my wool quilt. Size 20 x40 cm. (8x16") The pink pieces are not that pink but more magenta. It is difficult to make nice photos with flashlight.
Five to go of this size and four corner blocks.

Journal: Treasures of the past.

The journal is ready. If you like to see all the pages large and read what I have written below them about the stuff which is sewn on the pages; go to my Flickr photo stream and click on next photo until you have seen all 12 :)

CQJP 2012, January block

 Here is my January block. The size is 8 ".
I 've planned to make a kind of calendar from the 12 blocks.
We don't have snow yet so my block is mostly green with a bit of white from the few snowflakes and the hail storms.
It is unusual weather for January this year. Even the meadows around our house are still green and our neighbour farmer has the sheep out every day!

tresures of the past

 I am making a journal called: Treasures of the past. I have inherited so many needlework treasures, just bits and pieces. Some unfinished.
I also got beautiful bits and pieces from my friend Eva K.
When I keep it all in a box, what will happen to those bits and pieces when I am gone?
That's why decided to make a journal to keep it all together.
I make single pages and double pages and try to arrange it free.
Just a bit shabby chic style like my other journals.
To be continued.....

fabric-book pages

 This is the fabric book page I made for Ritva in Finland. Ritva asked for "Hundertwasser".
I sewed lines from a building on the background and made needlefelt 'trees'.
Below the page Helinä also from Finland made for me.
She likes paintings from the painter Cézanne and this is her interpretation.
I like it very much.
Those pages are 15 x 15 cm.

new start

The start of a whole new year!
It lies in front of us and we are free to fill it with our dreams and wishes.
The year is empty as the CQ blocks below, white and clean.
It is up to all of us what we do this year.
So many choices. I hope we all make the good ones.
I wish you all a happy, healthy and creative new year!

Those blocks will travel trough Europe soon. Every member of the group has to embroider one block. They will come back to me in a six months time.
 In the meantime I have to embroider the blocks of the other ladies.

review 2011

A little review from what I did in 2011.
I like to say "thank you " to my blog friends and followers, whether you are just looking or leaving a comment.
Please know that I really do appreciate the fact that you take the time to read and to look what I did.
I wish you all a nice new years eve.

Christmas cards

In November I made some Christmas cards to sent far away. They have reached their destination.
Now I can show them to you too. I have printed a vintage Santa postcard on fabric and assembled some lace and other things in a corner.
I wish I could send cards to all my followers but that is not possible.
With the photo from my handmade cards I wish you all a Merry Christmas!

BD cards

Last month I made some birthday cards for the ladies of the FF group I am in.

The whole year round we have to send cards and when I had my bd I got 16 handmade cards in return.

Those three are the last ones this year and they all have reached their new homes now.

They are made in the shabby chic style.

Julekuler

 A while ago I got a gift from my eldest daughter. A book.
Just for fun , she said. It was not a hint ;) no, no.
But she loves the knitted Christmas balls and she cannot knit with 5 needles in the round... so...
What would you have done?
I have sent her to the shop and ordered 2 skeins yarn: 100% wool. Viking superwash.
 I have used 5 needles 3 mm. (US 2,5) 
And have knitted 4 balls for her Christmas tree.
Below the book with 55 patterns. Very good knitting instructions and clear patterns.
The book is translated in 8 languages!

outside it's snowing but inside, mmm

 Wish you could smell it :)

fabric "Mothers" book ready

 The fabric mothers book is ready. And I am happy how it turned out.
I have started the pages with the eldest mother and worked toward the present time.
The page with me is the last page of the ten I made.
Working on those pages made me think of all those women whom have lived before me with their struggles and joy. Of all of them I have something inherited in my character and existence.
This book is made to honour the women I come from.

 On an old linen napkin I simple embroidered the word Moeders, which is Dutch for mothers.

My page, the last one in the book. On the left page a piece of an old doily which I have embroidered when I was about 10 years old. I remember when I got it as a present, printed with the cross-stitches. And 3 skeins of DMC floss, green, red and yellow blended.
In the upper right corner of the left page a piece of my wedding veil and a few flowers of the wedding crown. A little silver ring of my childhood and some buttons from dresses. On the right page pieces from my clothes and a part of a bobbin lace doily which I grabbed from the side table a week ago :)
I have made bobbin lace from 1980 until I moved to Norway in february 2002.
You see also a little piece of the inside cover which is made from a Dutch farmers handkerchief.
I made a pocket on the back-cover and will tuck a little notebook inside with the stories from all the mothers.

the last great grandmother

The grandmother of my grandmother. Unfortunately I don't have a photo of her but I have her handwriting! A page in my grandmothers poetry album which I have printed on fabric.
I have used original fabrics from the period she lived and original laces! On the right page a piece of handmade bobbin-lace and 5 original red coral beads. Necklaces with those beads were often used in this period on sundays.
On the left page a front of a nightgown with handmade Swiss lace and hand-made buttonholes.
The nightgown itself was used for something else but the front with the lace was still in a box at my aunts house when she had died. On the left pages also a piece of a fashion magazine from 1898.
I printed a part of a page on fabric.

In a shoebox on the attic in my aunts house there where little bits of fabric of an old blouse. All the clothes in this period were sewed by hand and the left overs were saved too.
And the original blouse was there!
 I like to show you the blouse I have from Grietje Baan. Saved in five generations!
 My aunt told me that.
It is hand sewed of course and worn out. But never thrown away!
Is is a blouse in Empire style, made in about 1840. Worn with a long wrinkled skirt.
I have asked my neighbour girl to show it and here are the photos.
The blouse of 150 years old and the jeans from 2011 :)
Wish my great-grandmother could see this!

 Thank you very much Malin being the model!

wisp block number 11

A new block for my wool quilt in old style. Block number 11. Made from old clothes.
Only embroidery, no lace, no beads. It is difficult at this time of the year to make nice photos.
 Too little daylight so I had to use flash. The colors are much richer in real.
This block measures 20x40cm. ( 8x16")

fabric book-pages

 Here are two fabric book pages from the Fibre Fever group swap.
Above the page I made for Peggy (USA). Peggy's theme is "all shades of pink".
I made a page for her in crazy quilt style, size 15x15 cm . 6".
Below the page Juliette from GB made for me.
It is an impression of a landscape by van Gogh.
Juliette likes the van Goghs landscapes very much, she wrote to me.
She made it from wet-felted wool and added some machine stitching.

An other great-grandmother

 This is a new double page for my fabric mother-book. The grandmother of my father.
The fabric and lace on the left page are authentic. The braid and the bobbin-lace on the right page too. And a few pieces of fabric on the right page and the buttons of course!
This is the only photo which I have of her. Scroll down for more :)
Below a detail photo of the antique laces. On the left the hand embroidered Swiss lace, on the right the handmade bobbin-lace which was used for the caps. ( made in Belgium) The Swiss embroidery is wrong side up on purpose so that you can see it is hand embroidered.
You always can click on the photos to enlarge them!

 Below the family photo with my great-grandparents and their children. Taken in 1904!
Some of the older girls were married at that time and their husbands are also on the photo.
The tall boy on the right is my grandfather.
This is the farmhouse were I grew up.
The beautiful wooden gate is replaced by a smaller iron one in the '50.
I remember that. This wooden gate is given away by my grandfather to the open air museum in Arnhem (the Netherlands). When I visited the museum in the '80 I didn't see it!
Maybe all the parts are still in a storage place??

chair pillows

I am sewing pillows for dining table chairs. The chairs are old Ikea chairs and painted by DD.
 They are hers. But grandson said: they are too hard and cold, mum!
That's why I decided to make pillows.
 I have used the leftovers from this quilt to make the tops.  Patchwork squares 2,5 ".
I  never made chair pillows before.  Sewing the tops was easy!
 But making them fit for a piece of 2" thick polyester is an other story!
The first one was a disaster, Grrr... The second one went better and the third one is good :)
Now the fourth one will be a piece of cake , I guess.