Fast, Slow, Slow - A tale of three projects

Some sewing projects are like fast food.  Fast and easy and...satisfying...but not necessary quality sewing.  

Some sewing projects are like a carefully crafted slow - cooked Sunday dinner.  It takes some time to come together and is made with the best ingredients and the results...so worth it!

I have been sampling a bit of both in my sewing lately.  After my amazing long weekend of hand embroidery stitching with Laura Jenkins Thompson and all my friends at Stitchin' Charleston Style, 

Laura Jenkins Thompson (top right) and my Charleston friends.
The bottom right is a sample of the ways that Laura spoils us for lunch each day!

I was ready for a quick and easy sewing project.  My fairy goddaughter's birthday was coming up.  With the recent addition of an American Girl doll to the family, it was an easy choice for some "fast food" sewing. 




I found these scraps in  my stash and had the pattern from when my girls were into American girl dolls and in a couple of hours,  I had the bathing ensemble for Kaya, the American Girl doll. 













I used Simplicity 7688.   The best thing about sewing doll clothes - no fancy finishes.  The bathing suit doesn't even have elastic!  It literally took less than 30 minutes from fabric to done.  The coverup took a bit longer due to all those rolled hem finishes, but still an easy sew.

My daughter's Addy Doll modeling. 

After my fast sewing binge, I was ready to settle down to some slow sewing.

First up:  A present for my beautiful red-headed Irish friend whose birthday is St. Patrick's Day week. A shamrock theme was the obvious choice.

Hand embroidered linen/cotton guest towel.

I found the basic monogram on Mary Corbet's Needle and Thread website.  The original monogram has a flower in the middle of the monogram.  I switched it up to a shamrock and really love the result!  I also added the two groups of raised dots on the side of the letter B - a technique that I just learned in Charleston.

Madiera Applique linen monogram pillow
Design by Laura Jenkins Thompson

The final slow project was started in Charleston and just finished today.

All of our recent snow days (11!) let me slow down and focus completely on this project for hours at a time. 

Oh the joy of completely immersing yourself in something you love! 















I took a cue from Laura and added an old monogram pin to close the back of the pillow.

I love how some of the stitches are flat and silky and others are
so dimensional.
See the pin stitch on the Madiera appliqué?
See my mistake with the grain that is all supposed to be going the same direction?
Oh well...we'll can it a design feature.  :-)

So I ended this tale of three projects with a slow one.  Just in time to return to the school year mania after our last (I hope!) snow day.  Back to the fast lane tomorrow!

I'm back! And With a Monogrammed Pillow.

Wow!  It has been a long time since I posted!  A new job and some road trips to visit our son in college have dominated my time.  

Not that I haven't been cooking and sewing...I mean a girl has to have some creative time, right? It just came down to cooking and sewing or blogging about cooking and sewing...and you know what choice I made!

The good news:  I have a number of projects lined up to blog about - starting with this monogrammed linen pillow:

Monogrammed linen pillow

 I made this for a special friend's birthday.  She and I have a wonderful friendship based on many shared passions. She is also one of the most thoughtful people I know - one of those people who always know just the right thing to say at the right moment and the right little gift to give to make you feel so special.

I do not have the gift of gift-giving.  But I wanted a really special gift for my friend.  I thought and thought about something to buy her for her birthday, but could not come up with something that was special enough for my dear friend.  Then I remembered a book of monograms that she gave to me years ago.  On the cover is a natural colored linen with a large ornate monogram on it.  Perfect!

I had some nice linen left from a set of embroidered collars I made for some fall dresses for my daughters.  I had a pillow form.  I had a pocket of time to sew.  A birthday gift was born!

Of course, the monogram on the cover of the book was hand embroidery and time factors ruled that out.  I think that the embroidery machine did a good job with the monogram for the time that I had.

A twist on a traditional monogram

The tassels on the corners of the pillow came from some trim from a $5.00 fill bag at a home dec store that we visited during our Stitchin' Charleston Style trip.  

Overall it was a satisfying afternoon of sewing and I was happy to give my friend a gift that came from my hands and heart.  

Beach Sewing

Enjoying the last of summer has kept me from blogging, but, boy did we have  a wonderful time at our favorite beach house!  

Sunset Kayaking at my favorite place in the whole world!

We had two houses and the whole extended family.  The weather was perfect!  We filled our days (and I mean filled our days) with beach going and kayaking and ghost crab chasing and feasting and toasting the sunset each night!  It was sooo hard to come home! 

 Even with all the competing activity, I did manage to get a bit of embroidery done.  I worked on the tea towel from one of my Stitchin' Charleston trips. 

This is the start of Rainbow Row in Charleston

The houses are linen squares that are pin stitched onto the towel.  

The next step was to add the house details.  Here I have started the windows and doors.

A little more done...

Almost done!  Just needs a wash and press

Here I have added all the details:  Wrapped chain stitch palms, crepe myrtles, and even little flower boxes under the windows.  

Laura Jenkins Thompson, the designer and teacher of Stitch' Charleston Style is the most creative person!  Her designs are full of adorable details.

I'm loving it in my coral bathroom!

 Well...I didn't get nearly the sewing done this summer that I wanted to, but at least I got one UFO done!  

Enjoy the last few days of summer!!!

Tooth Fairy Pillow for a Sweet "Fairy" God-Daughter

I have two of the sweetest God-Daughters ever!  One of them is a tall, lanky, smart, beautiful blonde almost 8th grader who is my crafting/sewing and animal loving buddy.  

My Sweet God-Daughter #1

The other is a fire-cracker, Shirley Temple clone who is 4 years old already! She is the age when she is trying to figure out all the family relationships and has decided that Godmother is just too ordinary for her.  She calls me her Fairy God-mother and I could not be happier to comply!

So...As I was finishing this Tooth Fairy Pillow project from a Stitchin' Charleston Style from a few years ago...I knew just who it needed to go to!

Tooth Fairy pillow - Designed by Laura Jenkins Thompson

I love the little silk ribbon bows at the corners!

It is made of a beautiful silver-blue dupioni silk that Laura had all pleated up and ready in our kit.  I had finished the smocking and just needed to add the beads and finish up the pillow and trim.  

Laura's original design had the beads evenly scattered around the pillow, but I improvised a bit and have the magic dust flowing out of the end of the wand.  Just a little more magical looking, I think.

The back of the pillow includes a pocket just large enough for a small tooth and a dollar or two from the tooth fairy.  The pocket is edged with the tiniest piping ever!  The cording itself was tiny but add the fact that it was covered with a very slippery silk ribbon...I didn't even attempt to sew it on the machine!  

My favorite part...It hangs on the outside of the newly toothless child's door!

My son (3rd child)  will attest that the tooth fairy that came to our house by the time that he was losing teeth was somewhat less than...ahem...graceful.  She just might have been so tired that she kept falling asleep and forgetting the lost tooth.  After days of forgetting, she might have "snuck" in a few times before said son was asleep and said something along the lines of "Close your eyes.  This is all a dream.  You don't see me."  Subtle, right?  

With this pillow, all the magic happens outside the sleeping child's bedroom.  Why didn't I think of that before???? 

Tomorrow...I'm working on the muslin for the stretch lace dress...I hope!!!

Snow Day Sewing and Quick Beef Stroganoff

Today it finally happened!  Our long-awaited snow day!

Snow Day!

We didn't get anything like the 6-10 inches our panic-y weathermen predicted - more like someone dumped a slurpy on the grassy areas, but it was pretty and we got to have a SNOW DAY!!!

So what to do on a snow day?  Sew of course!  And cook a yummy comfort meal for dinner.  And...if you are a teacher...Do those lesson plans and grade those papers that you never have time to work on because you are busy - teaching.  Imagine! Ha!

It was cold and gloomy and the snow was falling in big snowballs so it seemed like the perfect day for hand sewing.  I cuddled up in the recliner by the windows with the view above and finished up one of the projects from my Charleston trip.

Linen Bag from Stitchin Charleston Style

This was so fun to stitch up and I love all the little details that Laura Jenkins Thompson includes when she designs these projects. 

Detail of the embroider work

I especially love the stump work nest with the freshwater pearl eggs.  It is hard to tell from the picture, but the nest is really raised so it is 3-D.

Laura had us do a super quick lining for the bag so everything is neat and tidy when you are finished. 

Now I have to figure out what is precious enough to put in my little linen bag...

So after all that stitching and snow watching I was definitely in the mood for some comfort food.  I turned to my old faithful Cooking Light Magazine and it did not disappoint.  

Quick Beef Stronganoff
with Grainy Mustard Brussel Sprouts

The Jan/Feb issue had a recipe for Quick Beef Stroganoff with Grainy Mustard Brussels Sprouts.  (My parents will faint when they see this because, until recently, brussels sprouts have been on my very short list of Foods I Don't Like.

This recipe was delicious!  It came together quickly and made 4 generous servings at only 357 calories each.  Guess what we are having for lunch tomorrow!  :-)

Sure beats a PBJ!

Here is the link to the recipe on the Cooking Light site.

Wishing everyone a snow day full of things you love to do with a yummy comfort meal to wrap it all up!

Share you favorite snow day fun/food in the comments.  You don't have to have an account to comment.  Choose the Name/URL and you can put in your first name, initials, special symbol, whatever.  Can't wait to hear what you have to say!

Stitchin' (and Feastin') Charleston Style

Sorry for the long absence...I have so much to share!

My friend and I went on our much anticipated annual pilgrimage to Charleston February 13- 17th for Stitchin' Charleston Style with the amazing Laura Jenkins Thompson and I have spent the last week catching up on everything - work, sleep, chores.  

What is Stitchin' Charleston Style?  It is the most fabulous long weekend of heirloom handsewing that you can imagine.  Ladies come from around the country to learn from Laura Jenkins Thompson and work on the beautifully designed projects that keep us sewing for four straight days. Many of the ladies have come for all 11 years so we have become quite a tight group.  Here we are on the last day.  Do we look weary from so much stitching?

I have posted about several of the projects from past years here and here.  

This year we had two projects:  A linen bag with stump work (raised) embroidery and a white linen lingerie case (I'm going to make it into a pillow.)

Natural Linen raised embroidery bag - in process!   :-)

White linen lingerie bag/pillow (Laura's sample).
Mine is still very much in progress!

We stitch from 8:30am until 11:30 am and then have a wonderful lunch at the hotel.  Then we return to stitching until about 3:30.  Then Laura has an adventure around Charleston planned for us.  This year it was the Charleston museum to see textiles and a walking trip around Harleston Village.

As if that isn't enough, Laura hosts all of us for dinner at her house for a wonderful southern feast of barbecue with all the fixin's and the most enormous bowl of banana pudding you have ever seen!

Laura's husband Joe makes the huge pudding.

Praline toffee cupcake from a
bakery on King Street

And what would a trip to the culinary capital of the South be without some feasting at the local restaurants?!  Of course after all that stitching we are starving!!!

Locally sourced mushroom bruschetta 

And from my favorite restaurant of all...

Boiled peanut hummus with pickled okra

Magnolia's

The veggie plate

Flounder with rice pirlou and a
succotash of asparagus, tomatoes and corn

We just managed to squeeze in a late lunch at Magnolia's before our evening flight.  I think it was worth the tiny rush to make it to the airport on time.  Don't you?

So a perfect long weekend of fabrics and feasting and a bit of a hard landing to reality.  I was so thankful to have President's Day to catch up!

Why do four days away add up to almost two weeks of catch-up?  More mysteries of the universe, I guess...

I hope that you have some time away to do the things that you love!