week 27 ~ week 30 TAST and the 15 minute challenge

a few weeks ago i put together a basket of preserves and home baked scones for a local fundraiser/silent auction.

the preserves were some that my daughter put up and without them the basket wouldn't have been nearly as tempting.

i had a great time making  and adding tags, napkins and fancy jar lids with that bunny fabric that i love so much~!

i was unable to attend but word has it that the basket went for a very nice amount/donation for the cause (my local family resource center) which makes me happy.

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and now for some TAST stitch sharing.


week 27 ~ bonnet stitch: 
i had trouble with this stitch but i'm not sure just why. once i thought that i had a handle on it i decided to place it on a postcard seam using an aqua pearl cotton (size 8). i added a fly stitch to the "top" part of the stitch and a colonial knot settled nicely between these stitches. both the fly stitch and the colonial knot are worked in a raspberry colored floss (one strand for the fly stitch and three strands for the colonial knot.


week 28 ~ up and down buttonhole: i really liked this stitch and have worked it into my stocking in a double row along the top of a piece of lacy vintage cuff. the row on top is worked with a shallower stitch length than the row on the bottom. i've used pearl cotton 12 in red. 

week 29 ~ basque stitch:

i used two strands of metallic thread (one in red and one in a brass color) for this stitch and added a small pearly bead to the catch part of each one. metallic thread can be a bear to work with but i ran both of these threads through some bees wax which helped enormously. the bees wax also gave the threads a bit more body which made the curves within this stitch stand out nicely.

i also worked this one into a section of my own stocking.


week 30 ~ oyster stitch:
this is another stitch that i really liked.
i worked it into a different section of the lacy vintage cuff that is on my own stocking and once again used pearl cotton 12 in red.

the really nice thing about stitching around lace bits is that it's possible to use the various lace elements to naturally dictate and control the spacing of stitches.





there are more stitches that have been worked but i'm going to save those for another post.

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i've been able to meet my goals with Kate for the fifteen minute challenge on all but two days this summer which makes me feel good. some days i would like to be able to do more than that but winter's coming and those days won't be filled with the gardening/outdoors work so i can snuggle in and stitch for hours if i want to (i hope).

 

 

 

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recent gifts include:

• the comfort that my blog readers have made me feel in regards to my irregular posts ~THANK YOU ALL~!
• a visit from my daughter and a friend of hers that helped catch me up on a few things as well as gave us some time to share a few pleasant meals and some good conversation
• the smell of the freshly cut lawn