I wish we could have a big celebration for Will’s 16th birthday but that is out of the question. At least he was in school today so he was able to receive birthday wishes from his friends.

There were way too many pieces in this small card. Do the designers do it on purpose just to make us struggle? It was paper pieced and should have been easier but when the fabric and paper are so small it is still hard.

I’ve been waiting a long time to make this card. It is the last one from the Splendid Sampler book but it had to go to a grandchild and it seemed more suited to a granddaughter. But because there was a lot of embroidery on the pattern I shied away from it. But when the reminder of Taylor’s birthday came up it was time to get at it.

I decided that rather than do some of the embroidery I would do appliqué instead. My appliqué skills aren’t that much better than my embroidery but I thought I had a better chance of getting it right. I found enough of Taylor’s favourite fabric for the backing.

I even found some tiny buttons to add to the jar!

January 4, 2020

I have tried my hand at embroidery once or twice and some of the projects have turned out. I do better if I’m working on a larger canvas and right from the start I knew this was going to be difficult. But after doing a bit of embroidery on another card and not doing so well I knew this one would be impossible.

So, in the spirit that a pattern is just a guideline, I used my gel pens to do the embroidery!

Saturday, December 26, 2020

I was prepared with my cards this year because I started them in October. I made 32 cards and thought I’d have some left to use around the house and as a reminder of the patterns I made. Aren’t I lucky that I have 32 friends!

I started with four different quilt block patterns. Rather than do the embroidery or appliqué in the centre of each I picked a simple cross stitch pattern to use.

I’ve already got my patterns picked out for next year.