The Attic

Yesterday I got a chance to go to The Attic in Mesa, Arizona. That store is amazing! The walls are full of models with exquisite stitching, all of it on very fine linen, and a lot of it over one. There was a display case with temari (!) and every brand of floss and fiber you could imagine. They had a lot of Southwestern patterns I had never seen before. They had racks of dyed fabric, displayed in a way you could see. There was a Christmas corner, and a Halloween shelf, and a whole area full of samplers.

DH even gave it a rating: "One of the best he's seen." (He's seen a lot of them!)

I went over my budget (of course). I picked up "Christmas in Hawk Run Hollow" (which I have been falling in love with since it was published). I picked up 1/2 a dozen balls of size 12 pearl cotton to make larger thimble rings. (Laura gave me a bangle bracelet to use as a base.) I also picked up a bunch of Au Ver A Soie to use for regular size thimbles, and I picked up some roving to use to pad thimble bases.

I've been admiring "Inspiration" by Rosewood Manor for a long time. There was a stitched model in the shop, and my jaw dropped when I saw it. The people in the center medallion are all over one. There's a farm, complete with barn and sheep, a church, and several houses. The border is so delicate and intricate that I could look at it forever. I did resist the temptation, but I can feel myself weakening. I would have bought it in a minute if my cross stitch production wasn't so meager lately.

I think I need new glasses.

Train spotting?

Last year, when we came to Arizona, we came on the train. So this year, the whole time we were in New Mexico, when we were within sight of the railroad tracks, we watched very carefully to see if we could spot the passenger train.

We saw lots of trains. Some with two engines on the front, and two "helper" engines on the back, puffing their way up the grades.



This one had 5 engines! You can see from the smoke how hard these were working.



The tracks were at times south of the express-way, and at times north. They would be a stone's throw away, and a mile away. The trains would be container trains, or hopper trains, or tankers; but we didn't see any passenger trains.



It was fun watching them, though, and watching out for them. Those tracks were busy!

Visit with Laura

We had such a nice visit with Laura! We met her family, including Freckles and Shadow, and had a very nice breakfast with her. Her temari are all over, and she had some very nice ways of displaying them. This basket arrangement holds a lot of temari, and I think I will try to find something similar. The colors are wonderful!



This shadowbox is filled with temari, and with beaded figurines from Mexico, which are also amazing.



We had so much fun it was hard to tear ourselves away, but we wanted to get to Phoenix that evening, so we had to get going.

Thank you so much for your hospitality, Laura, and I hope to see you again when we drive through Grants in the future.

On the Road

We are in Grants, NM, and there is a free computer in the lobby of the motel, so I thought I would log on and say Hi. We are waiting to meet up with Laura this morning, and talk temari, so I'm excited. This area is absolutely beautiful, but I don't have a way to get any pictures off my camera. The sky last night was amazing!



Our trip has been very routine. Last night we stayed in Oklahoma City, and we talked about stopping to see the memorial. Today we realize that it is 15 years ago that the bombing took place. That hardly seems possible. We haven't stopped to do any sight-seeing. We hope to see some beauty on the way home next week.

Yesterday we took refuge, for a couple of minutes, under an overpass during a hail storm. The ground was white after those 5 minutes, but 5 minutes after that the road was dry again. Tonight the plan is to reach my folks in Arizona.



Talk to you later!

Show and Tell

Please check out the "Show and Tell" posts from Homewood Embroiderers' Guild. They always have beautiful things, and a huge variety of needlework skills. (Disclaimer: I'm a member there too.) Everyone has different interests, but we all love looking at what everyone has made.

Two more sleeps until we leave! I may get a chance to post something while we are away, but if I don't, see you all in May!

Thimble Tuesday

Well, I finished this thimble last night. It is a new pattern, that I haven't made before. I think it turned out absolutely gorgeous, but of course, I can't take a good picture of it. The pattern would have shown up better if I had used colors with more contrast, but the rust, red, and orange make it look very rich.



I've been looking through my thimble book, and there's a lot more in there than I realized. It's in Japanese, but I can figure out a lot from the pictures. They show a method of making the exact size mold you want. You measure your finger, and then you can make a mold in that exact size... I'm thinking of making one so I could wear the thimble as a ring. You can't get it wet, so it would probably be a temporary one, but Chloe Patricia says originally they were made to be used as a thimble for one project, and then they would be discarded, so a temporary ring would not be out of character.

The book also has a very cool method of measuring/marking your divisions. I'll try to get a picture of that too.

Four more sleeps until vacation!

No Stitching!

I have no stitching to report on after this weekend. I did stitch, but these are the results:



The green represents the stitching I took out of a temari, and the blue the stitching I took out of a thimble. The temari was too far from symmetrical to keep going, and the blue thread (from my grandma M) was rotten. When I gave it a tug, it would break. So I started over with red, but the colors are not contrasty enough. So yesterday I read blogs and played a game.

I'm also getting ready to go on vacation. Here's the start of several temari. I would love to have several bases wrapped and marked before we leave to take along.



These need to be wrapped with yarn, then thread, and then marked. They are a little bigger than usual because I have some intricate patterns I want to try on them.

I feel like a kid, but I'm so excited! Five more sleeps until we leave!