love and marriage

I wanted to make a little something for a sweet couple who recently were married in Mexico.  It had been awhile since I had played with my hoops (you can see some of my faves here, here, here and here) and I was itching to be stitching, so embroidery it was.

Unfortunately, it seems I only took this one crappy iPad photo, but you get the idea.

I used this pattern - and I used her pattern transfer tutorial, too.  I happened to have one of those Frixion pens and it worked FANTASTIC!!  I shrunk the pattern down to 70% to fit my hoop, then added my own personalization in the centre.

I am really happy with how the floral part came out, it was my first time doing something like this, but I used too many strands for the lettering, so those are not as perfect as I would have liked.  But, overall, I am really happy with the quaint feel of this.  I must get back to more needlework!  So relaxing.

Birth announcement hoop

Since the wedding announcement hoop I made for Kelli turned out so well, I decided to give the concept another go! This time, it is for a sweet baby girl of old friends of ours. As they live out of town, I hadn't had the chance to meet Julianna yet, but will be seeing her over the holidays so I wanted to make a little something special.

I was inspired by this mini quilt on Flickr. I used some scraps for the clothes on the line and for the little birdy, then outlined them all by machine in black thread to make them pop. I included a red polka dot dress on the clothesline, as I also bought Julianna one of those from the Gap!


I did some hand stitching as well, for the clothes pins, the bird's beak, and for the sunshine.

Used 2 layers of fabric for the sun, and my pinking shears were perfect edging! Added some orange along with yellow for some contrast.


All stitched onto some crisp white linen, the stuff that I picked up at the thrift store for under a dollar for a yard (just had to brag about that again). I ink stamped Julianna's name and birth date onto the linen with black ink, though this linen didn't absorb it quite as well as the natural linen had, and therefore is a bit lighter than I would like, but I still like the fun informal look of this addition! A little blue bow to finish it off, as opposed to the typical pink, and voila! A sweet little keepsake to hang on the wall. Almost makes me want another baby.......HA!