Why I do what I do

For those of you who've been reading my blog for awhile, you know I do a lot of charity stitching.  Well, I thought it might be fun to show off some of the quilts that were recently finished with my contributed squares.

By the way, both charity organizations I stitch for are always looking for new stitchers and always have new themes coming up, so if you think you'd like to donate a square or two, check out their linked websites from this link.  The quilts go to such good causes (sick children and needy seniors) and it's kind of addicting searching for the right pattern to stitch for an active theme.

First up is a quilt featuring my Rainbow Mandala pattern and finished by World Of Charity Stitching.
This quilt featured the same pattern done in many color palettes by each stitcher. My block was a neon rainbow contribution, and you can see it here in the finished quilt top outlined in red.

Next up is another WOCS quilt.  This one featured the same mitten outline with different fill patterns.  (Incidentally, WOCS is currently doing another quilt along these lines, this time with butterflies.)  I contributed two squares to this one, Leopard Print Mitten and Giraffe Print Mitten .  These were actually my very first finishes for 2015.  Both of them made it into a single finished quilt, and you can see both here in red.

The other organization I usually send squares to is Love Quilts (the USA branch).  Unlike WOCS, which stitches by theme and then finds a recipient, Love Quilts takes signups for individual children whose parents have chosen a theme for the squares of their quilt.

That Baby Tinkerbell pattern I worked so hard on showed up nicely in this Disney princess themed quilt.  This is going to a 7-year-old girl who has already gone through surgery and chemo for a rare type of tumor 3 years ago, and is currently undergoing a second round of treatment for a baseball sized tumor in another area of her body.

The last quilt I have to show you today was the one I finished my Friends for Life square for.  The theme was realistic cats and dogs, and I admit my square is a little small next to a lot of the other contributions, but it ended up being a necessary evil due to time.  This is going to a teenage girl who has quadriplegic cerebral palsy.

By the way, you can click on all of the quilt pictures to see them larger if you wish.  

If you take a gander at my Finishes page you'll see several more finished squares for both organizations that have been sent in, but they haven't been made into finished quilts yet.  If you enjoyed reading this post though, I'll do another one when a few more quilts have popped up.

I've made a bit of progress on my newest WOCS stitching project too.  Here's where Sunshine by Satsuma Street is currently at:

It's coming along nicely.  The main sun is almost done, except for I still need to get more of the yellow I ran out of.  Once I finish the inner ring (that's what all the gaps in the rays is for) I'll start on the larger outer ring, and it will be ready to send off.

And I made a pitful bit of progress on my latest square for the Frosted Pumpkin Round Robin.  Still now tower for Rapunzel yet, but the forest below her is finished...

April Finishes

So as promised, here's a round up of the finishes I mentioned in my Stitch From Stash check in yesterday. 

First off, Friends for Life which is from an old issue of CrossStitcher magazine. This is the one I posted about at the end of last week, frantic because I needed to finish it no later than Monday.  I spent Thursday and Friday nights furiously stitching, got up super early Saturday to work on it some more, and then had a brainstorm.  The pattern originally called for some grass and sky detailing around the cat and dog, but by eliminating that it was still big enough for what I needed it for, and I was able to get it done much quicker.

This is definitely a pattern that benefitted greatly from the backstitch.  Here's where it was on Sunday night after all the main stitching and just a little backstitch was done:

 And here's where it ended up Monday after being completed:

Stitching details are 61 x 41 stitches (modified size) with charted DMC colors, done on 14 count aida, 3 over 1.  Stitched for a Love Quilts project (and I really hope it arrives in time, because it was down to the wire).   I started this on April 17th and finished in record time on April 27th. 

This was definitely one of those most challenging pieces I've done in a long time.  So. Many. Color. Changes.   So many fractionals (which are challenging at best on Aida).   Several french knots (which I'm terrible at).  And I made a TON of mistakes.  Hopefully despite all that it turned out okay.  I think if I had known starting at the beginning I was going to leave off the background, I would have stitched it with 2 strands instead of 3.  The pattern calls for 3 because some of the sky/grass are stitched with 1 strand to give it a varying thickness/shading effect, but it was a moot point since I didn't stitch those parts in the end. 

Anyway, I also finished up my latest WOCS piece last weekend, the one I'm calling Egg Topiary:

The green egg has pink dots in it, although the photo on my phone was a little funky and didn't pick them up very well.  This was stitched on 14 count white aida as a project for a spring quilt for World of Charity Stitching.  It was stitched with the recommended DMC threads, and is a free pattern from Stickeule.  I can't find the link at the moment, but I will post it later if I come across it. 

So now those are over, I need to work on my latest round of the Frosted Pumpkin Round Robin I'm participating in through Facebook, as this will be due at the end of next week.  Here's my latest start:

This is Woodland Sampler again, but I'm working on the October block this time (and owl).  Working with linen again, yikes...

Watching for Catterflies (and updates)

I haven't done a stitching update in a while since the A to Z Blogging Challenge has been taking up most of my attention this month.  So I figure it was an update. 

I hope all of you are enjoying the spring weather.  Here in Mississippi it's been almost perfect the past few days.  I'm just sad when the nice weather will end and it will start getting humid again.  Because if there's one thing I've learned since moving here from California last June is that the humidity in the summer NEVER ENDS. 

But right now everything is green and pretty, and we've even been able to keep the windows open and the air off the past week or so.  And of course, with spring you need to be on the lookout for Catterflies...

For those of you who've started following recently, this is Brownie, my mascot and namesake of Brownie's Chair.  This is a pic of him in his Catterfly outfit (it's really just a headband around his middle) that I took during a past spring.  He actually stood still long enough for me to snap this picture before tossing it off.  Little darling. 

But now for the stitching updates.  Egg Topiary is sadly still not done.  I just have to finish up the green egg (the purple pot has been finished since this pic was taken).  As you can see, I didn't get nearly as much done on this last weekend as I wanted to. 

Friends for Life is also coming along.  The dog has several colors on him now, and you can even start to see the outline of his head and nose (sort of).  This is definitely a piece that will greatly benefit from the backstitching.  I am starting to worry quite a bit though, since I need to mail this off Monday and obviously the stitching is going much, much slower than I originally hoped for!  INITIATE PANIC MODE NOW!!!!!!

I feel a cold coming on today too.  Sore throat and wheezing in my chest, with a little bit of a rattling chest cough.  Maybe I'll get lucky and it will turn out to just be allergies.  Either way, I just need to get through the week...

Stitching Updates

You know, the A to Z blogging challenge has been killing me.  Not so much the blogging part, that has been fine.  But I've had so many more wonderful blog posts to read this month with everyone posting once per day that I'm super behind on reading/commenting on everyone's blogs.  Just when I was getting caught up too!

Anyway, on to the world of stitching progress.  I was able to get a bit of progress done on my spring Egg Topiary square while I took that unexpected road trip last week:

I ran out of green while on the road, so that's why the green egg on the left is only partially complete.  Sadly, I didn't get as much done as I was hoping to.  But with one more big push this weekend I think I might have a finish to show you on Monday. 

I've also started a new pattern yesterday called Friends for Life from an old issue of CrossStitcher.  Here's what it will look like when finished:

And here's where I am now:

Doesn't look like much yet, since I've only done 2 shades of yellow in the dog's face so far.  This will eventually being going to Love Quilts for a quilt, provided I'm able to finish it before the end of the month.  I kind of forgot about it until recently organizing my stash.  Oops!