Yo! Is It Time For a Giveaway?! YES, it is!

 

IT’S GIVEAWAY TIME!

I know that it’s a little past Blueberry season.  But even so, I’m sure someone out there would like to win this cute little “Blueberry Tart” pin cushion.

 

I had some little wool blueberries left over from an order that I just finished, so not wanting them to go to waste, I made this.

Isn’t it cute? I even made 3 little blueberry straight pins to go with it.  It’s tiny .. measuring only about 1 1/2” high and about 2” across.

 

It’s  in a little black tart tin and made with my hand-dyed wools.

The blueberries are stuffed with wool roving and the tart itself is stuffed with tiny wool clippings.  (wool clippings give it a little more weight than poly fiber fill)

I’ll make this giveaway simple and easy…..

Just make a comment in this post for an entry.

Thursday night at 10pm, my time, (Eastern Standard Time) I will draw a name from those who have entered.  I will announce the winner Friday morning.

The only rule is that the entry MUST be in THIS POST ONLY.

AND

If you have a blog, you MUST be a “Follower”.  Join up to win!

If you don’t have a blog but are a regular reader, you’re welcome to enter also.  Just post as “anonymous” but please leave your name or some way that I may identify you if your entry is selected.

I can’t leave out my lovely Canadian/international readers so this is open to all of you too. 

 

I also have a larger Blueberry Tart Pin Cushion listed on Ebay.

It’s listed at the starting price of only .99 so if you don’t win the little one and would like to purchase one, go HERE to visit the one on EBAY.

It’s just a little larger than the Giveaway but it has lots more blueberries along with 5 blueberry stick pins.

I’ve said this before, I love LOVE doing auctions that start out as just .99.

It’s so much fun to watch the bidding throughout the week.   I hope it’s fun for the bidders too.  I know that thrill of winning something at a bargain price and even if I don’t get the price that I hope to get for it, the fun of hearing how thrilled the winner is to get it at such a great price, is worth it.

 

Happy Day Everyone!

Overdyeing That Bright Wool (Quick and Easy)

If you’re a wool collector, then you should already know this easy way to tone down those brightly colored wools. 

But there are quite a few readers who are just starting out and learning to use wool so I’ll share how I used to darken those bright colors.  Coffee staining!

Here, I have a beautiful piece of red wool….

Let’s overdye with COFFEE  to get that bright red turned into a dark red!

To do that, you need a dye pot.  You shouldn’t use your everyday pots and pans for any kind of dyeing so if you don’t have an old pot, just take a visit to your local thrift store and buy one for a few bucks.

 

It doesn’t have to be a white enamel pot like this one, but white enamel is nice because when dyeing, it’s easier to see the dye color in the pot.  If you see a white enamel pot grab it up though!

So, brew yourself a pot of strong coffee … or tea works too. 

Pour the coffee into the dye pot and heat it until it’s simmering.

Turn down the heat and drop in your bright wool.

If you don’t have enough coffee in the pot, just add some water or more coffee to cover the wool completely.

Let it simmer for … hmm … maybe 20-30 min or so.  Make sure it’s a low simmer … don’t boil the wool.

Stir it often so that the coffee will be evenly distributed thoughout the wool.  If you want a lot of mottling in the wool, don’t stir it.

For this wool, since it’s so bright, I’m going to stir often so that it’s all one color.   I can always mottle it later.

It’ll be about this point that people will start walking into the kitchen, thinking that they will be able to get a cup of freshly brewed coffee, so be prepared to disappoint.

Once it’s done, take the wool out and rinse it with COLD water. 

Squeeze it gently to get the water out and then throw it in the dryer with a pair of old jeans or a couple old towels. 

The heat from the dryer will set the dye in.

And here we have the darker, overdyed wool!

I don’t think you can tell from the pic, but it does have a nice subtle mottle. 

Coffee  and/or tea staining gives such nice results, but just know that there might be some fading over time.  If you coffee stain white/natural colored wool, in about 5 years, the color will be faded out.

But for darker wools like this, coffee staining is great, and the fading is less noticeable. 

I think I’m going to mottle this a bit more so if I get a chance today to do it, I’ll be back tomorrow to show how I’ve done that.

Happy day everyone!

New Design! New Pattern! Friendly “Jacks and Cats” !

This is my newest design called “Jacks and Cats”

This one is a smaller size measuring 12 1/2” across but it still has plenty of space in the center for a large candle, vase or bowl of candy.

Quite often I have emails from readers who either request or suggest different ideas for designs.

One request that has come up quite a few times is to make a “friendly” Halloween candle mat…one with friendly faces instead of those scary big tooth primitive pumpkins and cats.

You know the ones, don’t you?

Now these are really cute … (this is a picture taken from Google images) and I’ve nothing against the cute, scary faces, but as some have suggested to me, we need some normal looking faces!

This design is great for the beginner stitchers too because it’s pretty easy to make and just uses basic stitches and not a lot of detailed embroidery work.

The cat’s eyes are what I like most about this. The shiny white buttons make the eyes glow. I remember my husband used to have laying around here an old stuffed cat that he played with when he was little. It had button eyes and a friendly face just like this.

I need to look for that cat just to see how close this face comes to my memory of it.

I did my best to keep this candle mat simple and resisted the urge to add details.

I’ll have the pattern for sale starting today at the special presale price of $8.00 which includes shipping. (this price is for everyone, even my international customers!)

If you wish to pay by check instead of Paypal, just email me and I’ll send you the mailing info. cathspennies@gmail.com

Wool kits are available for this too. $32.00 which includes all 100% wool, including the backing, the pattern and shipping cost (for US customers only, international customers will pay a small additional shipping charge) Email me if you're interested in purchasing the kit.

The pattern is being printed today so I hope to have orders filled and mailed out tomorrow, if all goes well with the printing.

The Men and Their Toys

So hubby was on vacation last week.  He started back to work today so my daily routines will go back to normal now. 

When he’s home, I spend much less time stitching and at the computer but we get a lot done around the house.

At my suggestions a while ago, he decided to buy a power washer.

We really do have a lot of things to use it on so he went online to find the best prices to go along with the best reviews.

He decided on the one that he wanted but …

Naturally it was the most expensive one.

So he decided that he really didn’t need a power washer after all because once he saw the best, there was no settling for the lower rated ones.  He told me that he would just borrow the neighbors to get the job done.

But then …

Saturday morning, he woke up and told me that we’re going to Home Depot to buy his power washer.

This is what he brought home.  Notice how well it blends with my marigolds!

Gosh, it was like Christmas.  The man was so excited to play with this. He even called up a couple of his friends and invited them to come over to see it.

And they came!

Men watching other men using power tools must be something that only men will understand.

So the guys stood around and admired it for a while and exchanged stories and ideas and tips about the hows and wheres to use it along with the “whats” to use it on.  They talked about the different soap solutions to use for extra cleaning powers. They admired it’s spraying capabilities and compared their own power washer PSI’s to hubby’s PSI’s.

I offered up the beers and then went inside to do some stitching.  I’d been around testosterone for long enough, I needed a break.

Maybe this is the secret to a good marriage. 

Allow your hubby to purchase an expensive, gasoline powered power tool/equipment every once in while.  It keeps him happy and content.

I always joked about his mid-life crisis when he was in his 40s’.  Some men get little sports cars in their mid-life crisis.  Hubby bought himself a wood chipper.  And he was happy.

The new power washer will be stored right with the wood chipper, the air compressor, the leaf blower, the chain saw, the WeedWacker, and the Bobcat.  

He’s wants a generator next … “in case our power goes out”, he says.  We have well water here so if the power goes out, we have no running water and I admit it is pretty inconvenient.  But in all the years that we’ve lived here, our power has never been out for more than half a day or so.

I told him that if our power goes out for so long that we’d need a generator to live here, I’m going to a hotel. 

I’m pretty sure though that in a few years, I’m going to be showing a picture of his new generator in my blog.

 

In stitching news, tomorrow I’m hoping to show a brand new pattern. :)

Happy Day everyone!

Turkeys are (almost) Here!

Well, I did say earlier in the week that I was hoping to get the new Turkey candle mat finished and shown by the end of the week. 

Here it is, the end of the week already and I’m not finished with it yet.

I’ll show the almost finished one though, just so all of you can see what’s coming soon.

I still need to attach the leaves in the center and then stitch on the larger scalloped backing.  I’ll show better pictures once it’s finished.

I’m making this one to sell as finished, I think.  I’ll make another one in lighter colors for the pattern to sell

I really love the darker colors in the turkey, but it’s going to be difficult for customers to find the wools for it shown this way so I’ll do another version with easier to find colors, I think. 

 

Hubby is on vacation this week so it’s a bit harder to get the time to stitch when he’s around all the time.

The house ….

Is coming along quite nicely.  The new siding is almost done and the workers are hoping to finish up by either Monday or Tuesday. 

I wanted the windows to be framed so that took extra time but I’m so happy with how nice it looks.

The only problem now is that the original shutters that we had for the windows are now too small so we’re going to have to purchase new ones which amounts to quite a bit more $$.

I wanted hubby to ask John, our Amish worker to make us new shutters but hubby scoffed at the idea.  I get my ideas scoffed a lot but it’s always worth a try.  Sometimes I’m right …. like my idea to frame the windows.  So it might be a scoffable idea to have our shutters custom made simply because the cost would be outrageous, but they sure would look fabulous.

We have been so fortunate to finally find someone to do work for us that we’re happy with … that is comparable to hubby doing it himself.

John is so careful and such a conscientious worker that  we’re going to use him for everything, as $$ permits.

Anyone who might live in the western Pa area and needs any kind of work down on or in their home, I highly recommend John.  He’s from  Harrisville, Pa, which is a little over an hour north of us but he’s willing to travel. 

 

Ok, it’s going to be a hot one today.  Thank you air conditioning for making my life pleasant!

Happy day and Have a great weekend!