I just recently received a couple of things from The French Needle, a really nice online shop I've ordered from a few times. The first is a beautiful kit for making a tiny felt fox in a natty little suit.
And the second is these adorable fox-n-chickens counting pins.
I don't do really large projects, so I have no need to grid my fabric, but I do occasionally need to keep track of long rows of stitches and I love to use counting pins for this. As I wander around the blogosphere, I don't see them in use much, and I'm not sure why. They're so convenient and quick to use... and they're super cute! The French Needle has some lovely sets. And we all need more toys.
A sweet little raccoon for February...
We had a nice little snowstorm Monday night. It's been unusually cold here, and that extreme cold produced the most beautiful snowfall we've seen since we've been here. The snow was incredibly dry and powdery--almost gritty--and in the light from the street lamps it looked like silver glitter falling. This picture doesn't do it justice, but if you've never seen this kind of snow before, it gives you an idea of what it was like. Everything was covered in sparkles.
As the sun was setting Tuesday evening, Mr. Wonderful and I went for a walk in the snow. We weren't the only ones who'd been walking.
Perfection:
I love winter.
I'm only working on this one for the first week of the month or so, but I did manage to get another couple of bands done. I slightly altered the red band to make a row of full circles.
For information on the design, fabric, fibers, and all of my changes, just click on the Snowfire Christmas label below.
Just a few changes to this guy. I wanted a slightly different expression on the face, so I changed the eye slits and also moved the nostrils down and made them French knots instead of full cross stitches. I also changed the blue band on the top hat to grey.
Happy Groundhog Day! Six more weeks of winter, according to the little critter. It hasn't been that cold here today--up in the 30's--but the wind has been howling all afternoon. A good day to stay indoors and play.
I found this little fox charm at Hobby Lobby and got two, one for a necklace and one for a needle minder of course!
I also found this, but I have no idea what it's for. It's a roll of crocheted-looking stuff, 6" wide by 70" long.
Since my brain is always in stitchy-mode, I thought, "Hey! Instant bell pull!" So I got one white roll and one off-white roll. Not sure what I'll end up doing with it, but if I need it, it'll be in my stash! Here's what I was thinking when I thought of a bell pull:
It would be easy to temporarily attach some smalls to it for a cute seasonal bell pull, and then switch them out as desired.
Does anyone know what this stuff is really for? It was in the spring decorating section, not the fabric section. When I was in there the other day, I noticed the white and ivory were gone, but they had bright green, purple, and pink.
I just finished the final seasonal freebie in the series from The Stitcherhood. I stitched this one on 28 ct. raw opalescent linen with DMC blanc and 3021, and Caron Wildflowers in Evergreen, and added a little sheep button. Also, since I wanted this to be more of a winter design than a Christmas-y one, I replaced the gifts with more trees.
Hope to get the finishing on this one done soon. If you'd like to see my finishes of the other seasons, just click on the freebie label... they're in there somewhere!
