Grip &Stitch

I just got up from some thread painting at my sewing machine to go make myself a cup of tea. On my way I checked the mail and found this gift that I won from Leslie . What perfect timing. I've been trying the pads out instead of wearing gloves and I must say I'm convinced! No more having to pull the gloves off every time I need to rethread or even wipe my nose.

I'm sorry I don't have much to show right now. I've had to temporarily put my Christmas sewing aside to meet an unexpected deadline. So that means I can't show it!
Tomorrow I'm going to UFO day and I'm hoping to get time to free motion quilt my Christmas runner.
Have a great weekend! As it's really cold here, I'll say stay warm. I'll definitely be putting on the new fireplace tonight.

Brr it's cold!

It's a sunny but cold day again today. I believe it was around -1C when I went for a walk around noon. I made my first batch of Christmas cookies this morning, a new recipe I found in a grocery flier for cranberry pistachio shortbreads. They're shaped into a roll like an ice box cookie and after chilling, are sliced and baked. Of course I had to sample one! I'm trying to be good and keep loosing weight so I'm not going to bake a lot this year.

Yesterday, I finished stitching down all the snowflakes on the runner and this morning I sandwiched it to take to UFO day on Saturday where I'll free motion quilt it.

Since I had such fun the other day playing with the paints and glitter, I also did three more cards.

I've slowly been trying to get projects finished and decided to try machine stitching the binding onto this piece. I haven't figured out how to make it even. As you can see its a little wider in some spots. Can I live with it? I'm not sure yet. This not a very large piece, and is heavily thread painted as well as hand embroidered. I debated how to finish it off. Should I zigzag it? That seemed kind of unfinished by itself and since it has batting in it like a quilt, I didn't really want to frame it.
In the end I opted for the simple binding.
Now that I see it on the screen, I quite like the binding fabric but don't think I can live with its unevenness. Does anyone have any hints or suggestions?

Indoor fun on a cold windy Monday

I did get a line of bedding hung on the line and went for a walk with my husband at noon. We were bundled up against the brisk cold wind and so enjoyed the bit of sun. For the rest of the day, I stayed inside getting into some creative fun.
This afternoon I sat at my machine and started stitching the snowflakes down using a blanket stitch. I spent about an hour and a half and still have some left. If I did another one, I'd either zig zag or straight stitch,

Before the sewing, I glued down Christmas music to three more cards in perpetration for painting more trees.

I've since added a thin layer of clear gesso so they'll be ready to paint onto tomorrow. I actually ironed the first one That i showed last post at this point to flatten it out.
The blue houses you see are some cards that I printed using a homemade stamp a few years ago. I didn't care for them at the time but now I've decided that it might be fun to decorate them for Christmas.
Then I turned on my fire and curled up with a cup of tea. How was your Monday?

Painting Christmas cards

It was snowing a bit when we got up this morning. My son and his girlfriend were home for a visit and we got to discussing the Christmas menu. It put me in a creative Christmas mood.

After reading Leslie's blog this week, I starting thinking about painting my own Christmas cards.
This one is painted on a purchased watercolour card onto which I glued the music for Silent Night using matte medium. Then I applied a thin layer of clear gesso and once dry, I painted the trees using Silks acrylic paint. A little sprinkle of glitter dust makes the red bulbs sparkle.

I have to apply the music to a few more cards, but in the meantime, I added the finishing touches to the chickadee. A little glitter may find itself on this one too!

Winners

Congratulations! I used the random number generator and the winners of the Blogathon are:
Lesly
butrfly
cherylj
Kathy MacKie
Shirley
cpup40
BGreene

I've sent everyone emails but neglected to ask for addresses! Can you email me with your mailing addresses please?
Also, if you make one with the kit, I'd love to see it.

Chickadees

I didn't get much creative time today; did errands and had lunch with friends. Then as it was exceptionally mild and sunny, I took a walk down the trail, feeding some chickadees along the way. There was one I was able to identify by a little white spot on its head that followed me down and back. It seemed a little more brazen than the others too, staying for a bit to eye me and peep at me. Now I'm curious to see if the same one will be around next time.

I started some quick chickadee sketches and a small watercolor yesterday but did not get back to finish it today. It needs a few touch ups and a little darkening in the background to make it show up better.
It's promising to continue to be decent weather and my son and his girlfriend are arriving tonight so I think it'll be a nice weekend.

Christmas table runner

Would you believe most of my shopping and gift making is done? My daughter's gift had to be mailed almost two months ago in order to make it to Korea for Christmas. We've kept it minimal this year for the rest.
My husband and I are not putting gifts under the tree because we just bought an electric fireplace for our living room. I'm pretty excited about that as we haven't had a real fireplace in years. Having thyroid issues means I'm often cold in winter, especially at night. This will add to the heat and the ambiance.

This is the Christmas project I mentioned yesterday. It's all ironed down and ready to stitch. The pattern came in a free e booklet from Quilting Arts. You may find it on their site.
My colours are almost the same as theirs but I had to use less Christmas fabric as I didn't have any. A couple of the greens are actually batiks.