Category: Craft Room

So I Visited The Crochet Expert
Afghans · Craft Room · Crochet · cross stitch · Hand Dyed Fabrics · Mermaids · Mirabilia · Nora Corbett · Passione Ricamo · Pixie · Shannon Christine · Shannon Christine designs

So I Visited The Crochet Expert

My Time Stitching19 Comments

Wow!  Another post so soon from me?  I’m on a roll, LOL.

So on Wednesday, I went to my Local Yarn Shop for a session with the Crochet Expert, Jen.  She was amazing.  I feel like I learned so much.  Not just for my blanket, but for crochet in general.  So here is my blanket how I left it Wednesday night:

Spicier Life blanket 2

Not a whole lot added since my last post, because I now have tendonitis in both of my elbows.  Ugh.  Too much knitting and crocheting the last few weeks.  So I am wearing a brace on my right arm, which is the worst.  I could barely dry my hair yesterday 😦  But, I do have the correct number of stitches and I am using  stitch markers to mark the first stitch of every row.  It appears that I have left some stitches unstitched on my ends.  And Jen is going to help me with my border when I am ready so that it looks evened out since I opted to just continue on rather than rip it all out.  So I am more confident going forward from here…when my elbows stop hurting.

This week I stitched the October mermaid on the SAL and even started beading 🙂

Mermaid SAL Oct

This piece is going to have so many beads!!  I was so excited to start beading, being that I am on the bottom row, that I forgot that I still have January to do since this SAL started in February.  So I didn’t put the rest of the bigger beads on October since I am using a scroll frame.  The biggest bead, at the top of October, gave me such a tough time.  I just couldn’t get it to lay properly.  It took me about 40 minutes to finally get it the way I wanted after putting the other white bead on, so I am not taking them out.  I will put some felt or batting on top of the beads before I roll it up when I do January.  So for now, I will skip the beading.  It was fun putting all those gold beads in.  I love beading.

So last night I pulled out my Pink Princess.

Pink Princess progress 1

It is really called Dawn, the Fairy Spirit of Grace, by Passione Ricamo.  But I am going to stitch her without the wings, so I call her my Pink Princess.  I am stitching her on 16ct Aida Tintagel from Fabrics by Stephanie.  And when I pulled this out, I saw in my notes that I started her in March of 2015!!!  What?  It just could not have been that long!  Where does the time go.  There is no way I should have these things as WIP’s for this long.  I will stitch on her until the next section of the Mystery Sampler comes out on Oct. 31.  Hopefully she won’t be put away for too long.

A couple of weeks ago, I hung some stitchings in my craft room.  I was reminded by a blogging friend that I hadn’t shared photos.

Ella framed and hung

Ella, the Frog Princess.  I love seeing her when I am crafting in my room.  Which obviously isn’t enough as my plant is dying.  No worries.  I did water it after taking my photos.  It should be all perked up tonight.

pixies on the wall 2

I added the White Angel Trumpet pixie to the other pixies I have stitched.  They all look so cute hanging together.  I don’t have much wall left though.  I can fit one more to the left of Iris.  I’ll have to figure out which one that will be.

And lastly, I hung the Mystery Sampler 2017 right beside my desk.

Mystery Sampler 2017 hung

While I am working at my desk, I can look up and see this one.  This was my very first Sampler and I am happy that it is hanging when I can see it when I am at my desk.  Oh,  I was in my craft room this week.  I put together an 8 x 8 travel scrapbook which is where I am planning on putting my pictures from my trip up north last weekend. So I guess I can say that I am in there at about once a week.   I love seeing my stitchings on the wall when I craft 🙂

So what are you up to this week?  Any stitchy plans for the weekend?

 

Good Things are Happening in June
Craft Room · cross stitch · Mermaids · Mirabilia · Stamping stuff

Good Things are Happening in June

My Time Stitching41 Comments

Hello my blogging friends.  It has been a busy month for me.  I don’t know if you know, but I am a demonstrator for a company called Stampin’ Up!.  I teach people how to create their own greeting cards and scrapbook their memories with stamps.  April 3, 2016 marked 15 years as being a demonstrator.  And on June 1, 2016 I reached $200,000.00 in career sales. It may not mean anything to most, but for me, these are  2 goals that I wanted to meet,  and I did.  And within months of each other.  And June 1, 2016 was the launch of the new Stampin’ Up! catalog, so I have been busy making new samples and planning a New Catalog  Open House which I had on Saturday.

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The Open House went well and everyone that attended had a great time seeing new products, creating a couple of cards using new products and getting freebies.  Now I can get back to a normal kind of routine 🙂  I also had another exciting thing happen this month.  On June 1, I received an email from a company called Stamp N Storage that my new craft room photos had won May Studio Showcase!  I won $75 which I chose as store credit because there are 2 more storage items that I want for my craft room.  You can read about my craft room win and see phots here.  I LOVE their storage units.  My room looks a little different even now, because I keep moving and adding things to better suit my stuff, LOL.  Once I get the last 2 items I will take a couple of more photos for you.  Hopefully that will be the end of rearranging.  I am having fun creating in my new space.  It is my own little piece of happiness 🙂

I have been so busy, and I had 2 little vacations in the middle of everything, that I haven’t been able to do much stitching. During vacation time I didn’t stitch at all!  Seven straight days with no stitching.  I thought I was going to lose my mind! This last week I finally had some time to stitch a couple of nights. But I was only able to put in 12-25  stitches before my eyes drooped too far to see anymore.  But here is how I left Aphrodite last night (my best stitching day in a long time 🙂

Aphrodite progress

Not a whole lot more added since my last post about her, but every stitch counts, right?  I am hoping to stitch a lot more this week. So sorry I have been out of touch, but what have you been working on lately?  I’d love to see 🙂

My New Craft Room, Injured Back and Pixie Anne
Craft Room · cross stitch · Nora Corbett · Pixie · Uncategorized

My New Craft Room, Injured Back and Pixie Anne

My Time Stitching37 Comments

So my new Craft Room is pretty much finished.  I still have things to move in and some organizing to do, but I have a new room!  Here is a before picture of my sons room before we had it painted:

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And here it is after the walls were prepped and patched and painted:

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My husband worked very hard putting all of my furniture together and set up.  My first desk went in on move in day on Feb 7.  And then the rest of the furniture arrived and started going in.  My space kept getting smaller and smaller and I realized that everything I wanted to put in this room was not going to fit.  But that’s ok.  It’s going to be wonderful.

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My other desk went in but when we opened the carton with the corner piece, it was shattered, so we had to wait for a replacement.  And it came rather quickly and the decorating began!

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I just love it!  I have even created in it already.  It is not finished.  I am still waiting on some organizational shelving and I still have drawers and cubby’s to fill.  But last week I injured my back-first last Monday night and then again Tuesday, bringing in boxes of furniture the UPS guy delivered. It was the worst back pain I have ever had and I have had a few.  It’s still not 100%, but getting better a little bit everyday.  I am hoping to get back in my new room tomorrow and fill up a few drawers 😉

I couldn’t even stitch last week, but in the last few nights I have put a few stitches into Nora Corbett’s Queen Anne’s Lace.  She is so sweet and will be the first thing I hang in my new craft room when I get her finished and framed. I am stitching her on 16ct Aida Carmel Macchiato, a hand dyed fabric by Stephanie.  Here is my progress on her:

Queen Annes Lace

Once I get the metallic pink portion of the right wings finished, I will have to put her down until the rest of the supplies I have ordered for her come in.  I have had the silk thread and the rest of the beads on order for 2 weeks or so.  She must be a very popular design.  She is so sweet and I cannot wait to get her finished.

I worked on some knitting while my back was hurting, but I guess I couldn’t concentrate as I had to rip out many times and re-work.  I hope to work on it a bit more this week and then I will post a picture.

So, while I was moving into a new craft room and nursing a hurt back, what have you been up to?

It Was Only A Matter Of Time
Craft Room · cross stitch · Nora Corbett · Pixie · Storage · Uncategorized

It Was Only A Matter Of Time

My Time Stitching28 Comments

Warning, this is a long post, so grab your favorite beverage and hang out for a bit 😉  I have put Ella down to make a new start.  As the title says, it was just a matter of time before some beautiful design captured my full attention, making me want to put Ella aside.  Here is my new start!

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This is Nora Corbett’s new design, Queen Anne’s Lace.  Right now it is a FREE PDF from Just Cross Stitch Magazine.  Gotta love that!  It will be in the April issue of the magazine but for now you can download it from JCS magazine site.  It will be the first piece to hang in my NEW craft room when she is finished.  More on the NEW craft room in a second 🙂 I am stitching little Miss Anne on 16ct Aida Carmel Macchiato from Stehphs Fabbys.  Can I say I am already tired of green and want to get to the Pink?  I am not a fan of green, but there is not as much as the yellow in Ella.  Here is how I left Ella yesterday:

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She is coming along, but not fast enough for me.  So Pixie Anne is the perfect distraction.

OK, so I mentioned a NEW craft room.  A few years ago, hubby was encouraging me to take one of our boys’ bedrooms for my new craft room.  Our oldest moved out 3 1/2 years ago, and while the thought of a new craft room sounded wonderful, I couldn’t take over my son’s room. So last year, my youngest said I should take over his room, he will move into our oldest’s room and I can have my craft room.  So I decided I would do it in the Spring of 2016.  The last few months hubby has been pushing the idea and I have been thinking about how I would like to decorate it.  I will be losing quite a bit when I leave my current room; like a desk, shelves above my head, cupboards to the right of me.  You see, my current craft room is a narrow space in my laundry room, which also contains the furnace and water heater.  Here is a glimpse into my current space:

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I have made great use of the space I have had for 17 or so years.  But I have really outgrown it.  And the floor is concrete and is very cold.  Here is the other end of my current room:

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So a couple of weeks ago, hubby and I were at the office store and I ran into some furniture that just blew me away!  I was originally thinking a new desk would be white, to match my current cube furniture.  But this furniture I fell in love with is glass!  And silver frame. So I thought about it for a few days, had taken measurements and went back to the store on the last day of the sale to take a final look.  I even gathered some things from the store to put on my desk to see how it would all feel.  LOVED it and ordered the furniture.  That was on Jan. 30.  That day, hubby also called a painter to come in and give us an estimate.  The painter said he could start on Wednesday and be done by Sunday!  What???  That only gave us 3 1/2 days to box up one room and move the other room in!  It was moving way too fast.  I thought I had until Spring to start on it.  So, hubby and I began the move on Sunday and the painter arrived on Wednesday evening to an empty room that needed some patching and a border removed and prep for painting.

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So I am SOOOO excited about my new room!  I want the walls Pink (of course) and the trim gray.  The carpet is a light gray, even though the photo looks like it is purple.  After many times changing my mind, I made my final decision on paint swatches last night:

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So many pinks and grays to choose from (there really are 50 shades of gray, or more! LOL) but I finally decided: Impatiens Petal pink and Software gray. Sorry for the blurriness on my color choices.  So by Sunday, I think the painter will be done and sometime next week we can start putting my furniture together, which were delivered this week.  I plan to have all of my stamping, scrapbooking, cross stitch and knitting and crocheting all in this one room instead of spread throughout the house.  The room is not really that big, but bigger than the space I have now so I am looking forward to decorating and organizing it.  My wonderful husband is totally responsible for this happening.  If it wasn’t for him, I still wouldn’t be getting a room.  Spring would come and I would still have reasons not to move the boys’ things. My  boys are perfectly fine with what I am doing and my youngest was even here earlier in the week going through his things, and helping me move stuff.  I am feeling better about the whole process and can’t wait to move in next week 🙂

If you are still here, thank you for listening to me go on and on about my craft room.  Do you have a special place where you like to do all of your crafting?