"Strawberries, Queens Of Berries" Breadcover and More

Today I'd like to show you some more "Strawberries, Queens Of Berries" designs.
I promissed to show some new finishes for me. They are not new for you, many of you like to stitch these things and some of you are stitching them now.
I made a"Strawberries, Queens Of Berries" Kitchen Set which includes a jar cover, towel and breadcover.
For a long time I've wanted to make a jam jar cover. I remember my grandmother's jars looked so lovely with the white caps on them. My jar cover is a little more complicated than my grandmother's but I used almost the same kind of cord to wrap around the jar neck. :-)


Last year I bought several grab bags and in one of them there was a Charles Craft towel. I can't say that I was happy to see the towel in the grab bag and was thinking how to get rid of it.
The towel a year later:

Well, I love it now!

You can go to Yoyo blog and see her towel with my design. For stitching the tendrils she used Whipped Backstitch which made the tendrils look so real!

And one more piece in "Strawberries" Kitchen Set - a Breadcover. I made designs for two opposite corners:

It took a little longer to stitch and finish the towel and the breadcover because they must have a neat back and must able to withstand multiple washing.
The back is not perfect but very close to it. If you want to see a perfect back, you must go to blogs of Brazilian girls, they are so good at stitching towels!

Now I am working on "Strawberries" design for Charles Craft Huck Towels - the idea of which belongs to Yoyo. "Strawberries" Biscornu will go next.

If you are interested in buying any of my designs, please contact me.

My e-mail is in my Profile.

I stitched a little more on Mary Wigham's sampler. It is my car project and the sampler goes with me wherever we go. Everything I need for stitching is in this basket. In the picture you can also see my palette for the sampler.

I wanted very much to keep White in my Palette, I like White on White but it did not show up on my fabric. I frogged the white motif and restitched it in Antique Mauve, now I am quite happy with the substitution.Some pictures of Lilies, they are blooming in my garden now.
I want to thank everyone who left comments on the previous post.

Special, huge thank you to my friends for their support and understanding. Hugs,

Olenka's Stitches

"Strawberries, Queens Of Berries" Collection

I love all kinds of berries but strawberries have always been my favorites, they are like queens of berries for me. Today I will show you my new collection which is called "Strawberries, Queens Of Berries".I finished my "Strawberries" into a pinkeep and a framed picture:
After taking pictures the pinkeep was put into an envelope and now it is on its way to a new home. The framed picture is in my stitching room.
I plan to continue working on this collection and try to make "Strawberries" designs in different styles and I will make a biscornu and also try some new (for me) finishes. Some of the designs are already done, I only have to stitch them.
If you are interested in buying my designs, please, contact me.
My e-mail is in my Profile.
Now have a look at what I made for my husband for Father's Day. Not long ago my dear friend Mylene sent me Cross Stitcher # 212. When I was first browsing it I knew that one design was a must for me.

It is "Lighthouse" by Joan Elliott.
I enlarged it a little and added a boat and some-gulls. Now the picture sits on my husband's desk and reminds him that it is high time for us to go to the sea.

Now on so many blogs we can see WIPs of Mary Wigham Sampler, you can find more detail here - Needleprint. I have wanted to stitch a Quaker sampler for a long time and seing how pretty Mary's sampler is, I could not resist the temptation and started working on it last Sunday.

As you can see I am very much behind the main group, besides I do not have much free time. I decided to steadily stitch on the sampler when I find some time and at my own pace. I am stitching the sampler 1 x 1 on 26 count of unknown fabric ( got it in a grab bag) , the sampler is going to be less than 12" x 12". I reduced the number of floss colors and on my WIP it is seen that I started some motives just to see how well the colors go together. After I took the picture I frogged the stitching in white.
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I 've got an award! Claudia from casa cuori colori (if you have not visited her blog yet, you must do it, Claudia and her friends are so creative!) is passing "From Russia with Love" award to me:
Thank you very much Claudia, it's a great honor to get this award from you. I am passing this link of friendship in no particular order to:
Hohla Bliss Dany Yoyo Lia. My heartest congratulations ladies!
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I also want to thank you Mylene for this sweet card which we received just on the day of our wedding anniversary. It was such a pleasant surprise, Mylene, thank you!
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Well, on a quite different note...
To celebrate our anniversary I was going to make a giveaway, another gift design. But when I was working on, I found out that my design which I dedicated to my Mother's 80-th birthday, a gift design for a limited time, was abused. Now I am too too much upset to think about giveaways... I will, probably, never want to make another "free" design.
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Some pictures from the garden:

This is our Master Gardener, Friendic (Подружка - ru).

Thank you for visiting my blog, your comments and e-mails are always treasured and appreciated!

Happy stitching!

My Wedding Sampler

I was not going to stitch a wedding sampler but after we made some renovations in our bedroom we thought that we needed a picture for above the chest of drawers. And the picture must be neither too big nor too small, it can be square or sideways rectangular and ... . So I looked through all my stash and found Bucilla wedding sampler, I do not even remember how it made its way into my stash! But it was not a bad find! I substitued some colors of floss and beads, charted new words for its center. After the personification I like the sampler, my husband likes it too. Now he is glueing the frame for the sampler: we could not find the frame we liked and we decided we would make one ourselves.

I have some more finishes to show today.

So many bloggers stitched "Petites Lettres Rouges" sampler which Alma Allen, Blackbird Designs, offered free on her site. I especially liked the idea of dedicating the work to loved ones. I dedicated the sampler to my mother, made it into a sewing organizer and there I will be keeping some of the tools that my mother gave me. I stitched the sampler one over one and it is rather small but I turned it into a big piece - an organizer with many folds, pockets and other hiding places for notions, floss and charts. I hope it is convenient for trips, it can fit all necessary things for a few small project. I stitched a couple of hearts, it's clear what they symbolize and I stitched a bird - not very much sure what birds mean in samplers, probably, happiness or something else good, right? Anyway, my mother likes birds. And here is the organizer:

One more finish is "Rose", freeby by Niky from Niky's creations. This sweet design is also stitched one over one and I made it into a much smaller organizer ( for shorter trips ;-)) ).
Here I put my initials in the upper coner in front and stitched the funny bird on the back.
Here is the organizer inside and also beaded fobs made for the scissors for both organizers: I finished one more ornament for "Stitching for a Cure" project. It's Breast Cancer Awareness free design by Romy in Austria, Traditions with a Future.
Lia from Brazil and Mylene from the Netherlands stitched my design "A Russian Motif, Spring" and send me pictures of their lovely works. Lia made her ever first pinkeep and Mylene stitched 3 !!!biscornus:

Thank you dear friends for your wonderful work, I am pleased and honored to see my designs stitched by you. Huge hugs to both of you.
And at last some pictures from our garden (for those who are still here):

Does it look like a duck?
Thank you for stopping by, your comments are always treasured and appreciated. :-)

Have a great Sunday and happy stitching!

"Wisteria" designs and more...

The last two weeks were rather hectic here , besides our Internet did not work properly - now I am behind in reading the blogs. I want to thank those who left wonderful comments on my last post, I will visit your blogs in the next couple of days.

On the stitching front - there was not much time for stitching but I have something to show to you today.

First, I worked on "Wisteria" designs more and made two "Wisteria" Scissor Fobs:

I am pleased with how the fobs turned out and it seems the biscornu looks much happier now.

I participate in Christmas Challenge and decided to make my own design for this month. Here is "Christmas Lantern" Ornament :

If you are interested in buying my designs, please send an e-mail to me. My address is in my Profile

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I have not shown my progress on EMS "Rose Sampler" for a long time. I did not forget about it and keep on stitching on it from time to time.

I have not shown pictures of my dolls for a long time either. I played with two more dolls lately. Unfortunately, I do not know their designers and the names of the dolls are given by me. This one is Annabell, she got a new hair-do and new flowers for the hat and dress.

This is Monique, I also worked on her hair-do a little, still too much hair to my taste, lol

Annabell and Monique are sending "Hello" to their Italian friends from this blog http://passionevera.blogspot.com/2009/02/amici-per-sempre.html .

I was asked not to post new pitures of bugs and to show more flowers. Fine with me as I do not like bugs so much either. I prepared some pictures for you, they can be called "Tears Of Spring" or "A Garden In Red And White" :-)) .

Happy Mother's Day!!!!

Thank you for stopping by. Happy stitching to everyone!

Wisteria Designs

After hard work on "Hearts" Sewing Set I wanted to take a few days off and to read a book and to stitch a little, something from my stash, something by Just Nan to be exact. But everything went a little different.

I started stitching a design but it was not a Just Nan and before I finished stitching it I was asked to make a design with Wisteria (Глициния - ru). Wisteria was very pretty this year here but it did not bloom long : heavy rains and cold killed the blossoms. So I had to look through my last year pictures for some inspiration and here is what I have designed: a little sampler/picture and a biscornu:

"Wisteria" Sampler/ Picture and "Wisteria " Biscornu

I tried to make the picture look delicate like a watercolor and the biscornu is a little brighter with some sparkle.

"Wisteria" Biscornu has Butterfly and Bee sides:

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If you are interested in buying any of my designs, please write an e-mail to me. My e-mail address is in my Profile.

And here is what I have stitchinged from my stash:

This is "Lavender Luminescence" by The Sweetheart Tree.

I also finished an ornament for Donna project "Stitching For A Cure":

You, probably, noticed that all my stitching is in purple this time but I did not plan this. Psychology can explain this, well I know what it means.

I also want to thank Yoyo for passing an award to me, it's a great honor to receive it from you. I really appreciate this.

And traditionally some garden pictures for you:

And again a bug... Why do they keep coming to my garden?!

I thought it is a leaf on the fence, when I realized that it is not, I again asked the bug to wait a second, brought my camera and took some pictures of it.

Thank you very much for your comments, it's a pleasure to read them.

Happy stitching to everyone!

"Hearts" Needlebook-PInkeep and more

Honestly I thought that I had finished working on "Hearts" Sewing Set, at least this year. There were some more ideas and sketches left and I wanted to return to them much later. It was Yoyo who first said that the sewing set must also have a needlebook. So I started working on it.
From the beginning I decided that the needlebook must have a heart shape and it must be two in one: a needlebook and a pinkeep ( for pinkeep lovers :-) ). I am not so fast in finishing my stitched pieces, it took me 2 days ( and nights ) to find a pretty and easy way to finish this neddlebook-pinkeep. Here is what I made:

Some of my customers told me that they want to stitch this sewing set as a gift for their friends. So I thought it might be nice to make a gift tag which can be made into a floss tag as well. I finished mine as a gift tag and put a charm on my friend's name to hide it ;-). For those customers who order the complete set the tag design is a gift. Here is the complete "Hearts" sewing set, 10 items now:
After the post about my mother and "A Russian Motif, Spring" design I got so many wonderful e-mails in which readers of my blog told me about their mothers and grandmothers. Vera in Russia ( I do not know if she has a blog) sent me pictures of her mother's works, one of which is almost identical with my mother's work. Jean and Anne R told me how they first learned about Russian and Ukrainian cross stitch. Thank you ladies for the interesting e-mails , it 's so nice to get to know you.

I could not imagine that the little design in Russian style would be such a success. On some blogs I saw you finished stitching but were wondering what to make it into. Well, into anything : a fob, a pinkeep, a floss tag. I made my stitched pieces into biscornus :-). Lately there appeared so many different varieties of biscornues. I made two of them: one is a traditional, the other one has many names. I like two names : a tulip or a lantern biscornu. Here is my lantern, it was stitched on 32ct: I embellished the traditional biscornuit with tassels, they are just right for a Russian design. The biscornu is stitched 1 x 1 on 28 ct. Antique White Linen. To give you an idea of its actual size here is a picture of the biscornu and well-known stork scissors:Here is "A Russian Motif, Spring" Biscornu Set :

If you are interested in buying any of my designs, please contact me.

My e-mail address is in my Profile.

Vee and Marie sent me pictures of my "Purity & Passion" biscornu. Both ladies did a great job on making their biscornues. Aren't their stitching and finishing lovely? Look how creative they were in taking their pictures!
This biscornu was made by Vee:

And this is Marie's biscornu:

Thank you ladies for your work and wonderful pictures of your biscornus.

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I want to show you one more work by my mother. This crotchet shawl I got from my mother a few days ago, just on my birthday. :-) Do you remember I told you what kind of projects my mother likes? Yes, you are right - huge!

Knowing my mother very well I can tell you that that is her own pattern. Will we be able to do something like this when we are 80 years young?

I want to thank Anne R and Theresa for the new awards and today I will break my tradition and pass all the awards I've ever had to the best crafter I've ever known, to the wisest teacher I've ever met to my dear loving mother. :-)
And to finish today's post here are some spring pictures from my garden:
This is a busy bee and that is a Bumble Bee:

But! Have you ever seen a bug like this?
When I saw the bug on my Azaleas I asked a neighbor what bug is that. I was advised to kill it to have a better look at it. Instead I asked the bug to wait a little, brought a camera and took some pictures of it. To my husband I described the bug like " half a Bumble Bee, half a Humming bird , looks like a flying shrimp." We Googled on the bug and found out that it is a Humming bird Moth or Humming bird bug, a rather rare one here.

Thank you for stopping by, special thank you for those who leave comments and send e-mails, this is a great source of inspiration for me!

Happy stitching to everyone!

Hearts" Bourse and more

Our secret project was a great success! My mother asked me to thank everyone for the nice birthday wishes and comments on her works.
Today I will show you some more new designs from my St. Valentine Collection. I wanted to do it yesterday but again Blogger was not too kind to me, I hope it works better tonight.

I added three more pieces to "Hearts" sewing set: "Hearts" Bourse, "Hearts" Tape Measure Cover and "Hearts" Thimble Case.

I have wanted to try these three finishes for such a long time that I decided I'd better try them now or never! :-))It was a great pleasure to make designs for these smalls and then to assemble them.The bourse is not so small as it might look: there is enough space for whole sewing set inside it. Here are some pictures of the bourse when it is closed and open:

Here is "Hearts" Tape Measure Cover:

And here is "Hearts" Thimble Case:

The thimble case has different designs on each side:

And here is what is inside the thimble case:

I am very pleased with how these three pieces turned out. And I will sure make more designs for these finishes. They are so cute and fun to make!

Now the "Hearts" Sewing Set includes 8 items!

If you are interested in buying any of my designs, please contact me.

My e-mail address is in my Profile.

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I also wanted to show a Christmas ornament which I made for February. It is The Prairie Schooler 1996 Santa. I got the leaflet from Angela, my HOE partner. Thank you Angela for the lovely design, I enjoyed stitching it. It was my so-called "car project": I always keep a project in the car to stitch during our trips. I tried to finish this design in a very simple way, no fancy trims or bows this time - PS designs call for something simple, don't they? So I stitched it on hand dyed Aida, 18 ct., made it into a soft hanging ornament with a handle made from the backing fabric and even a couple of jingle bells are tied to the handle with the threads pulled from the Aida. :-))The ornament does not have country or primitive look - I am not good at these styles - but it looks rather old-fashion:

There is no snow for the poor Santa in my yard, only Pop Corn bush is all covered with tiny "snowball":* * * * * * * * *

I want to thank Yana (Яна) for passing me another award. I really appreciate this and traditionally pass it to all my readers: you are my source of inspiration and you are my support.
Thank you everyone for dropping by and leaving comments - I love to read them!

Happy Stitching!

Thank you!

My Dear Blog Friends,
I'd like to thank all of you who congratulated my mother on her 80-th anniversary, thank you for your warm wishes and your kind comments on her works.
We have been keeping this project secret from her as we want to make a pleasant surprise. This weekend my son is coming home from his business trip and we are going to show my mother the post about her and her works, and translate your comments for her. I will also tell her a few words about each of you. I am sure she will be thrilled that so many people congratulated her and saw her works. It is the first show, International show of her works - she will feel like a star! :-)
Thank you!
Спасибо всем моим друзьям по блогу за теплые поздравления моей мамочки с ее юбилеем и за ваши прекрасные, душевные слова о ее работах. Спасибо, девочки!
Now to the second part of this secret project...
To commemorate my mother's birthday and to thank you I created a design which I want to present to you. Probably, it will be an unusual design for most of you. It is based on my memories of the designs which my mother used to stitch years ago. I called the design "A Russian Motif, Spring".

If you would like to get the chart of the design, write an e-mail to me and I will send you the chart in PDF file. My e-mail address is in my Profile.

This offer will last till March, 13 2009!!!!

P.S. for those who are late and missed the offer:

You can purchase "A Russian Motif, Spring" design from me, it is included as the main design into "A Russian Motif, Spring" Biscornu Set. More information and pictures in the next post.

Tomorrow I will post about my new works. Stay tuned!

Happy Stitching to everyone!

Happy Birthday to My Dear Mother!!!

Today is my mother's 80-th birthday anniversary!
And today's post is devoted to my mother and her cross stitch. I hope it is interesting for you to see what kind of designs stitchers stitched many years ago, what materials and flosses they used.
As long as I remember my mother her hands have never been idle: all the time she was doing something: either sewing, knitting, crocheting, cross stitching or embroidering. When my mother was much younger, she did a lot of cross stitching and embroidery, and her pretty works created a special, very warm atmosphere in our home. Mother decorated our home with her pretty doilies, table cloths, curtains, pillows, oh, and lots of other pretty things . But I think most of all she enjoyed stitching pictures, I mean big pictures! Two of her cross stitched pictures are now hanging in our home.
This one is called "The Castle", it's my favorite. It was stitched three over three on the fabric which is usually used for bedding . If you look at the picture closely you will see how many blended colors were used here. At the time when my mother cross stitched, stitchers widely used two or three different colors for blending.

The other picture is called "Alyenushka", its pattern is based on the picture by a Russian painter V. Vasnetsov. I think the picture was stitched before I was born. Now stitchers "age" their fabric, this picture has aged in a natural way.

Here is one more picture which is older than me. At first mother made it into a newspaper holder, it was kind of a pocket hanging on the wall into which you could put a newspaper. When my son was born, mother made it into a lovely pillow for him. When I brought this piece here I made it into a pillow again. It is like a third life for this piece.

One more piece, the oldest one, it dates back to 1940-s . It is a table cloth which is already falling apart . But I love the pattern so much that I want to make a chart and reproduce this table cloth.

I hope you enjoyed seing my mothers' works.

С Днем Рождения, Мамочка!!!

Мы тебя любим!

St Valentine's Stitching

I hope everyone is having a wonderful St. Valentine's Day.

Today I will not write too much, I will just show you pictures of my new St. Valentine designs.

I made a sewing set called "Hearts" which includes: a pincusion, a triangle scissors case, a scissors fob, a scissors stand and last but not least a biscornu.

If you are interested in buying any of my designs, contact me, please. My address is in my Profile. Thank you.

And I'd like to show you some more pictures of my daffodils. I have a variety of them in colors, sized and forms and love them all!

Some more little flowers in St. Valentine's colors:

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In my previous post I showed a doll from my doll collection. My friend Passione vera, who is also interested in dolls, has a nice collection of lovely dolls, you can go and have a look at them here: http://passionevera.blogspot.com/2009/02/amici-per-sempre.html . Today one more doll, Irene or Irishka (Иришка) in Russian, is sending her hello and love to her little friends in Italy.

Unfortunately, I do not know anything about this doll. But I love her even if she does not have any papers, she is pretty , isn't she?
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I also want to thank Yana from http://lovekrestik.blogspot.com/ for giving me an award. I am so sorry that I can't pass it to 5 bloggers because I love much more blogs - look at my list of favorite blogs! It would be too stressful to choose only 5 of them, so I am passing it to everyone!

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I want to thank all my friends who left comments on my work, sent e-mails to me. Thank you very much for your kind words and precious advice. I really appreciate this!

I also want to say that in a few days my mother is having her 80-year anniversary, so the next post will be devoted to her. Stay tuned!

Happy Valentine's Day to everyone!