Happy Sunday to you all! How are you? It is SO COLD!!! here in northern Illinois! Our wind chill right now is -20°F (-28°C). Is anyone else this cold, or colder? I am very thankful for my cozy and warm home. 🥰
I mentioned in my last post that I had completed Rose’s ensemble. She is so thrilled with how it turned out! After being neglected for so long Rose is one happy little girl, and has forgiven me. She’s such an angel.
Rose arrived in December of 2017. I made a couple of holiday ensembles that she happily modeled for other little girls to wear, then she went into hibernation. Until now that is! And this one she is keeping for herself. I hope to give her another very soon.
Rose’s dress is made with the fabric that you all voted on. Do you remember? Here is that blog post in case you missed it. This dress really does look sweet on her, and it’s extra special because you all helped with the creation of it. Even if you picked something else–that’s okay, too–you all helped! Thank you! Secretly, I liked all the fabric equally.
Rose is a 10″ Boneka vinyl doll who was sculpted by Dianna Effner. The good news is that these dolls are in stock and available at Happily Ever After, or at Boneka directly. You can change their wigs to give them a different look too. Rose is a Tuesday’s Child. I think they make cute little sisters to the Little Darlings.
Oh, I think I forgot to mention I published a new video on YouTube. It shows my progress on this ensemble and on Didi’s cardigan.
I hope you are all having a wonderful weekend. Stay warm… or cool, if you are south. Bye for now, my friends. 🤗💕
Happy New Week to you! Do you remember that song “Rainy Days and Mondays” by the Carpenters? Yep, that’s us today here in northern Illinois. I am not expecting much sun and warmth this week…
Anyway… in progress over here is a second apple themed dress. I made the bodice last week and recorded the process. Does it sound interesting to come along with me as I make a bodice for a Little Darlings dress? If its something you’d like to see I will edit it into a viewable piece.
Below is a little video clip of the bodice all sewn and being pressed. Even though there will be audio in a full movie, it has been removed here. The regular steam on my iron stopped working, so all you’d hear are the burst of steam. I can make that quieter during editing.
Pressing the bodice’s side seams
This morning I wove in all the ends and sewed up the sleeves on the cardigan. I think Alice likes it so far.
I’ve been practicing again using the iMovie application. On the last day of summer I walked the path around the lake at one of our forest preserves. A couple of trees had started changing, the late summer wildflowers were in full bloom, and I even saw a family of swans. Please have a look and ‘like’ the video, if you do like it that is. It is my first public video on You Tube. If you subscribe to my You Tube channel it will be easier for you to see when I have new videos. I have tons to learn, but I am totally loving working with video and turning video into little movies.
Hello! How are you? I hope you are doing well. All is well here with the days flying by at the speed of light.
I have started a couple of new ensembles for the Little Darlings–apple themed. I only have a small stash of apple fabrics, so had to pick from what I have used before, which is fine. I don’t mind using up what I have.
Progress from two weeks ago.
I am making a red sweater coat for the blue fabric and a mohair cardigan in blue (to match those cute little flowers) for the pink. I finished the red first and am glad I tried it on before sewing up the underarm seams and weaving in the ends. Look at how big it is on Alice! Is she shrinking? lol
I’ve heard this happening to knitters–your gauge changes over time. I guess mine did just that. I thought I noticed in my last two cardigans that they seemed a little roomier, but they still fit nice, so I didn’t think twice about it. It really shows up in this style though, and with this type of yarn. I first thought I’d need to find a bigger doll to wear the sweater coat, but then I thought I could save it by ripping out rows. It seems like the biggest size problem is in the length and not so much in the width. I’d think it’d be both. Anyone know why that is?
I’ll be working on these two ensembles this week and hope to have more progress to show you soon.
Other news… I received a couple of embroidery books for my birthday in July. They are both beautiful additions to my library! I love looking at floral embroidery–such beautiful hand made gems that make my heart sing.
If you need bullion stitch inspiration then “A-Z of Embroidered Motifs” is for you. It’s chock full of motifs created with this stitch. This is the stitch I use to create the roses on my cardigans. I have an album created on Flickr that contains all of my floral embroidered pieces in case you’d like to see them.
by Country Bumpkin
There are 28 pages dedicated to bullion roses in this book! In addition to detailed visual instructions for creating bullion stitches there are instructions for other flowers, foods, nursery motifs, animals, and Christmas motifs.
This book is dedicated to flower gardens using a multitude of embroidery stitches. She also includes instructions for garden gates, archways, baskets, birds, bird feeders, a birdbath, insects, gardening tools, watering can, old-fashioned lady gardener. She has a dozen projects as well as showing you how to build your own embroidered garden. If you love gardens you will find this book inspiring.
We visited the Chicago Botanic Gardens last weekend. It’s so wonderful to be able to visit again. We went once in July and again in August (last weekend). I took a ton of video on this visit and made a little movie in iMovie showcasing the sounds of water there. It’s not complete as we didn’t get to every garden, but it shows some of the water gardens and the relaxing sound found there. If I can figure out how to get it on You Tube I can share it with you. I will let you know.
Did you have a nice weekend? I hope so! It’s hard to believe it’s September! Thank you for visiting.
WordPress has changed their editor, so I apologize in advance for any weird things going on in this post. I have just now learned the bare minimum to get this post made. It’s so hard learning new things…*sigh*
Cindy Rice Designs 