Speaking of Queens . . .

Last year, when I visited In Stitches in Alexandria (after going to the show at Woodlawn), I picked up this little chart by JBW Designs called "The Queen".  There are a whole series of these little treasures that you can see HERE.  It appears the designer no longer has a web page.

Anyhow, the little chart went into my tiny not-so-tiny stash to languish.  However, last month I was trolling the aisles at Blue Ridge Hospice Thrift and found a tube of black and white Charles Craft Aida.  Well, actually I found two, but only one went home with me.  Don't get too excited yet!  I have discovered that this black and white fabric is called Hopscotch.  Some is for sale, this very day on Etsy.  I looked at that roll of fabric in the thrift store and said to myself, I know what to use this for and I know what to put on it.  Not too long ago, I was gifted with a late Christmas-early-Birthday present.  It was a new car.  A hot little number in my favorite color scheme . . . red, black and white.  And when I stood there looking at the tube of fabric I said, that Queen Bee chart needs to be stitched on you - and then you need to be a pillow for the backseat of my car!  And, here's why I told you locals not to get too excited.  Because I went back and got the other tube a week later.  It's going to be a car pillow too.

I stitched this up over the weekend!  It's all ready to go upstairs and be sewn into its pillow form.

Terri posted a question in the comments about the Birth Sampler that I did.  I had to go back through my Amazon Order History to find the answer as I cannot, at this precise moment, lay my hands on the book; which probably means I've loaned it out and forgotten to whom.  Anyway, it was not meant as a birth sampler, Terri.  I tweaked it a bit.  But, if you click on the title, you'll go to Amazon and see Splendid Samplers to Cross Stitch by Chris Rankin.  The sampler is on the cover of the book.  Of course if you go to the label cloud and click on "Birth Sampler", you'll see all my entries on the sampler, and read about how I tweaked it.  Thank you all so much for your kind comments on my Queen Stitches and the birth sampler.  And to ya'll that I nominated for the award, you are totally welcome - it was sincerely meant and well deserved.  Hope you enjoyed!

Presenting Her Majesty, The Queen

When last we saw our intrepid stitcher, she was nervous, downright hesitant about her upcoming meeting with the Queen.  However, she has persevered; with bravery and diligence, she faced down the demon doubt and come out the other side smelling like roses.

May I present my Queen Stitches -

In the upper right hand corner of the nearest strawberry flower you can see I've drawn a blue arrow.  That arrow is pointing at where I had an inauspicious beginning.  The original American Sampler was designed to be stitched on 25 count fabric.  The cross stitches are called for being done with 3 strands of floss and the queens call for 3 strands.  So, since I'm stitching my sampler on 32 count fabric, I stepped down my cross stitches to 2 strands and thought that stepping down the queens to 2 strands would be fine too.  But, my first queen was very fat.  That's the one that the arrow is pointing at.  I very quickly snipped out the second strand and put all the rest of the queens on a diet with only one strand of floss.  It has worked out very well.  The strawberries, strawberry flowers and the luscious bloom below are all queen stitches - with one strand of floss.

As I've been stitching these queenies, initially I was quite surprised by my success.  Then I began thinking about it.  I'm coming off six months of working on The Chase sampler and remember, I didn't think I'd be up to snuff on that either.  I surprised myself.  I have decided that I had plateaued before and by working on The Chase, I stepped up my game and moved onto the next level.  I am now most confident that I will finish this sampler and it will be worth looking at when I'm done.  Maybe even another one that my husband will say "We're keeping that one, right?"

I had a question about the sampler - remember that at any time you can click on the label "American Sampler" and all the blog entries remarking on this project will come up for your review.  That goes for anything in the labels list.

I finished the baby birth sampler.  I'd done it all, was just waiting for the details to be finalized so I could stitch them in.  So, here are a couple of pics of that.....

I am really pleased with how it looks.  I'm not going to frame it right away.  We're trying to plan a trip out west and what I'll do is take it out there with me and go to the framer's there with my son to get it framed. 

Tomorrow I'm calling the quilt lady and setting up an appointment to take the baby quilt over to her to be quilted.  I picked up the batting and backing fabric so that show will finally get on the road.  Gabe is doing really well, but his parents are a bit frazzled.  I was last told that just when they think they've got him on a schedule, he changes and they have to start all over.  Ahh - babies - glad it's them and not me!

Lots of projects waiting for my attention - hope you enjoyed!