5-Otis the Cat

This is Otis the cat. He used to be Opal but much to our surprise when we took him to the vet to get shots and fixed the vet asked why we called the cat Opal. Thinking it was a strange thing to ask I replied "cause I like the name". The vet clarified by asking why a girls name and I answered cause it's a girl cat. "Well no it isn't" replied the vet! Seems that part of kitty's business had not quite dropped in place so we thought he was a she. Come to find out this is not all that uncommon. So we changed her name to Otis and she became he. He has one beautiful green eye and one blue one. He is a sweet cat who likes to lounge on our dog Angel like a pillow. In fact when Otis was still Opal and a kitten Angel used to carry her around in her mouth like the kitty was one of her pups. I think she really thinks she is the cats mom...but it works out because Otis thinks so too.

4- Wedding Date

This is the date my husband and I were married. Don't ask me why anyone would get married in the dead of February and not even on Valentines day. The only thing I remember about the date was that once he asked me to marry him I booked the church as soon as it was available just in case he changed his mind! We went to Nashville on our honeymoon because we were broke and a client of mine was a big wig at Opryland Corp so he gave us a nice suite for several days. It was sleeting and raining and we couldn't go anyplace......ahhh but we were in love so didn't seem to care :)

WOW! I can't believe the summer has gone by so fast. It seems like barely a month since I posted my last blessing and here it is 3 months. Not sure what happened to the time as I certainly do not have a pile of finished projects to show for it :) Does anyone else find they just get busy during the summer months, too busy for mom time? My "baby" started his senior year in high school and though I do miss him during the day I am glad to be back in a routine that the school year brings with it. So I have picked up my sampler and finished two squares this week. I am hoping to average at least two or more a week and maybe this time next year it will be ready to frame and hang. I have been checking on the flicker account and it looks like there are many beautiful new additions. Can't wait to see more of everyone else's.

Cheers,

Jude

3-Latte

Love my latte! I start the day every day with a nice homemade latte. If we are out of town the first thing my husband does when he wakes up is go to the nearest coffee place to get our morning coffee. We used to bring our cappacino machine with us on the road but now there is a Starbucks in many hotel lobbies so no need to lug the machine. One of my favorite moments of the day is sitting outside early in the morning if I should happen to be out of bed before anyone and drinking my latte while reading my daily inspirational books and getting ready for the day. Our backyard is surrounded by trees and sometimes the only sound I can hear are the birds and an occasional rustle of the trees if a breeze is in the air. It's so magical to be out of the city and living in the country without the sounds of traffic. I truly am blessed!

2-RWH

My second blessing represents my husband. I put his initials and plan to make a couple more blocks dedicated to him as well as several for my son. We have been married for 22 years and he is truly the love of my life. I can't imagine how or why I was so blessed to land such a catch! He is a great father to our son as well as a wonderful husband. He travels quite a bit and is in England right now which is probably why I am so gushy writing this because I miss him! He will be home on Monday.

One thing I am discovering while working on this project is that it is not as easy as I thought it was going to be. I was hoping my embroidery skills were better than they are :) The large weave linen would not be my choice again as it is difficult to draw a design on and stretches out of shape easily. I guess practice is what I need though and what better way to get it than committing to 100 squares. Hopefully there will be some improvement in my stitching before the end!

1st Blessing!

Well I haven't finished outlining all my squares but just couldn't wait to get started! My first blessing is the sunrise which I see outside my bedroom window every morning. Although I am not a morning person once I do get moving I love to sit outside and look out over the hills which surround our house and start the day with prayer, meditation and gratitude for all that is possible.

Still Stitching my grid!

Before

Now it will be easier to trace onto my square

Almost done, one more day and my grid will be all outlined. I am glad I stitched it first because the lines are already fading and they would really be difficult to see after a week or so but geeez, I thought I could knock it out in about 3 days. It has taken me over a week and lots more floss than I thought. I am so excited to get started stitching my blessings. I have been working on ideas and the first 2o or so are pretty easy to come up with but then it gets a little more difficult. I found a tutorial that shows how to take a photo and turn it into a line drawing so that way I can transfer it to my squares (from the transfer tutorial that Amy has on her site Early Bird Special. ) I don't draw well so this will be a big help. The first one I transformed is a pic of my dog, Angel. If anyone wants the instructions let me know as it is really easy.

Drawing and Outlining My Squares

I followed Amy's idea on her Counted Blessings Blog and drew the grid on my fabric with a ruler which was one inch wide. I used a transfer pencil that will come out with water in case I made a mistake. Now I am going to stitch all the squares in black using a back stitch. This way there is no worry that my squares will start to fade and I will loose the lines. I plan on finding an ornate old frame which I will paint black so thought the black floss would look nice.

Getting Started

This weekend was busy with a sewing class at our local quilt shop so I haven't done much on the sampler yet but did get my fabric ready. I was not sure if I needed to wash the linen first as I loved the feeling of the new crisp linen and was afraid I would loose some of that plus have some fading of the fabric. Since I plan on framing it and never washing it after stitching then I wasn't sure if a pre-wash was necessary. My quilt teacher Dea said definitely shrink it first. She made a good point in stating that sometime in future years after I am gone whoever ends up with it may need to wash and then it will shrink but the stitching won't so better to do it now than take a chance on it being ruined later. Makes sense but I still didn't want to do a whole load of wash for one piece of fabric.

While looking around the internet on embroidery sites I came upon the site Needle 'N Thread. It is filled with great info for beginners regarding buying and preparing your fabric to embroider. (There is also a video library of stitches.) They have a "recipe" for shrinking your linen with several boiling water/cold water baths in the sink. No soap or washing machine needed. It is a perfect and quick solution! If you go to the site scroll about half way down the page dated dated April 15, 2010 with the title Fabrics for Surface and Tips on Linen .

Thank you Mary Corbet for posting such valuable information!