New homemade stitching musts and my current project.

I have been gone for quite a while.  I hadn't realized it is nearly 5 months.  I was working recently on an evening shift from 3:30pm to midnight.  It was very hard for me, I am by nature a morning person.  I transferred to days 2 weeks ago and already am getting my sleep patterns switched.

It is getting cooler out and so there is no stitching in the sunroom now.  All stitching is done in my Happy Room.  I have so many projects in the works that I can't count that high.  Periodically I work on my picture of Orin and I.  Right now I am working on a pattern I bought on Etsy from "Nonstop Stitch".  Her designs are incredibly shaded and I am enjoying working on a design named "Autumn Still Life."  Here is a photo of the design and also my progress.

I am stitching it on a 28 count Lugana in Burnt Peach, I believe is the name.  It is lovely to work on and enhances the autumn colors of the design.  It calls for 26 DMC colors and there are some blended thread stitches which I love.  The back stitching is what really makes the design.  The chart she provides is lovely.  One chart is black and white symbols and if you prefer the colored squares with symbols as your chart to work with, it is provided.  There is a third chart which has all the back stitching. I highly recommend her charts, large and easy to read.

I have also made myself a couple of tools for my stitching pleasure.  The first is a lazy susan.  

It is 2 cake pans purchased at Dollar Tree and the round glass marbles from the floral department also from Dollar Tree.  You dump some of the marbles the bottom pan and place the second on top of that.  The top pan spins round very easily.  I hot glued magnets on the bottoms of some of the things, like the Thread Heaven box and it sits nicely on the lip.  I also wanted some sort of a glass or container to stand my tools in.  A plastic dixie cup from the bathroom was perfect but it would easily fall over so...

I hot glued a magnet to the bottom of it and now it will never tip over!  I also hang my scissors from a magnetic clip on the side of the pan that hangs over the edge of the desk.  I love it and I spent only $3.00 for the items I didn't have.

All of my DMC floss was all dumped in 3 small drawers of a plastic storage tower.  I wanted to organize it so I could easily find floss and not run out and buy a skein only to end up with tons of duplicates.  The price is going up and up and up and I am trying to be more wise and frugal in my pocket.  I work too darn hard to waste it so carelessly.  I had bought some rectangular plastic baskets to organize a lower cabinet in the kitchen and I got to measuring and thinking.  I had foam core board and this is what I came up with. 

I cut the foam core board into thin strips and poked a hole near the top so I could use a pipe cleaner to tie it to the basket with a couple of twists.  I did the at the front and back of the of the basket.  I have 4 rows in each basket to stand the baggies with the floss.  So each basket holds about 100 different colors of floss.  I did not want the floss to fall out should the basket tip over so I cut the foam core board to place over the top again anchoring with pipe cleaner hinges at the back of the basket.  I also wanted to have a latch at the front, so again I used the pipe cleaner.  With the lids they stack nicely also.  

You could use different colored baskets for each brand of floss and organize all of it this way.  One could get all fancy with it but I was looking for function and I am thrilled with the result.

I have some new free design links I will try to add this week.  I use this blog as my go to site for all that is free cross stitch designs.  Life is good and I am blessed.