Pretty Kitty

I've been dabbling in embroidery. I was never into it before, but on a whim, I picked up Jenny Hart's Stitch it Kit, and have been hooked ever since. A lot of traditional patterns seemed a bit too stuffy for my taste, and looked too difficult for me to even want to try.

Her designs only require mastery of a couple of different stitches, and are totally awesome. How do skulls, pinup ladies, and sushi sound? I'm currently embroidering a cat on a handkerchief for a friend. I'm not sure what to call it (Is it a dresser scarf? A wall-hanging? A doily?) but I think it is turning out very cute. I plan on adding some more details but wanted to post a picture to prove that,yes, I am working on craft related stuff. :)

Those shadowy stars are from one of the patterns, I just haven't embroidered those yet. I made them very light on purpose, because I like the patterns so much I want to get lots of use out of them.

This is what I've been up to with the skull quilt. I found a great book called Take Away Applique, by Suzanne Marshall (she's in my quilting links). In it, one of the things she explains is how she quilts with no hoop or frame, so she's able to move from room to room with her project. One of the ways she makes the method work is she bastes the heck out of a quilt. This way, she doesn't have to worry about it coming apart, she just fills in with the quilting stitches.

This woman's work is fantastic. She does it all by hand and it's so beautiful, it defies description. You have to see the pictures on the site. Besides, it's outrageous to ship something like a quilting frame or even just the hardware here, and then I'd have to keep the kids from getting their fingers caught in it. At any moment I may have to literally drop my work to chase after the boys. The excessive basting is a very good idea in my case.

Even thought I've never tried applique, I want to try one of the bug quilts you can see on her site or in the book. Don't Bug Me is the quilt on the cover, and Wyatt immediately started pointing out all the different bugs to me. I love traditional applique designs, but never saw anything that made me say "I have to make this now!" until I saw that quilt.