A new project, some yellow scraps, and slow stitching

     I am so excited about this new project! Yesterday I took a class hosted by                                                           CraftyMonkies.                                                        BTW: I love that I can take a class in Great Britain thanks to Zoom! This is the 2nd class that I've                                  taken through Craftymonkies and they do not disappoint!                               The class was called Mindful Stitches by GaryMillsDesigns. Gary taught us how to create a fabric journal that you can store your keepsakes, pieces of art, stitching, even photographs! It really is up to you! Here is my journal!

I stamped the words Mindful Stitches on a piece of scrap linen and hand stitched it to the front. 

The cover is made of red/cream ticking fabric and the inside cover is some cream linen. Both I had in my stash. I used perle cotton thread to hand stitch around the journal. The pages are made in set of 4 that are folded to make 8 double sided pages. We made 2 set in class. I used some light colored calicos, some muslin and a piece left from a baby quilt I made. 

On my 1st page I put a scrap from a quilted jacket I made back in 1997. (Yes, I still have scraps from that far back! I also made quilted Christmas stocking ornaments from these scraps. 

On the backside of that page I put a candlewicking piece made by my mother. Over the years the piece got soiled/yellowed around the edges. I needed a way to preserve it. I cut it to fit and hand stitched it to the page. I added the lace flowers and  beads. I blanket stitched around the page edges. Here is a close up.

Other ideas I have to add in are my zentangle squares I made back in 2014 and some small orphaned quilt squares made as trial pieces. 

This is an ongoing project. Many more pages will be added before this journal is finished! I'm linking to Linky Party @Patchwork & Quilts. 

I worked on some additional yellow scraps for my EPP ~ tumblers project. 

I will link up to Scrap Happy Saturday @SoScrappy. 

I haven't given an update on my Slow Stitching hoop embroidery in a while. Slowly I've been stitching more flowers. Here is where it is today!

I'm almost finished with on half!

I'm linking to Slow Sunday Stitching @Kathy's Quilts.

I hope you have found some time to sew or stitch! If your interested in taking a class, go check out Craftymonkies!

Slow Stitching Progress

 I was able to spend some time on Sunday working on my flowers. I have almost 1/4 of the flowers complete! Yay! It has been fun learning new stitches or relearning stitches. It is relaxing but I find that good light is needed for these old eyes. 

I also finished knitting a hat for my daughter! It is a simple pattern with a new to me cast on method so it is nice and stretchy. She loved it! Linking up to Slow Sunday Stitching @ Kathy's Quilts

I'll leave you with this cute picture of my grandson. He loves to play! Here he is playing with his stretchy newt. (His mom had a pet newt when she was young) 

Some Hand Stitching

 I have started a couple of hand stitching projects. The first are some tumbler blocks using the EPP method. Most of the ones I have done so far are pinks since I was playing with my pink scrap bin it seemed the easiest. 

I don't really have any solid plans for these but it is nice to have a hand stitch project to work on.

The second project is my embroidery hoop project. I drew this several months ago but wasn't sure of the colors for the embroidery. My daughter helped me with the                color scheme and the choosing of threads from my stash.                                                    (Yes, I also have an embroidery thread stash)                                            I started embroidering the flowers using this little book and some                YouTube videos to refresh my skills. 

Slow but steady! No deadline for this one. 

I'm linking to Slow Sunday at Kathy's Quilts.