Plaid & blackwork checkbook cover: Marjorie B. Berleur, designer

This morning, I am feeling like a "Queen" with my new checkbook cover. It makes such a big difference with the plastic one I have been using so far.

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First photo, above, shows the front of the checkbook cover.


On this second photo, above, we see the back of the checkbook cover with all its beautiful blackwork patterns.

This is an additional photo taken with the new checkbook cover inside its plastic cover. I was reading in Marjorie's instructions that this could also be used with a two-year planner, which is also an excellent idea. In my case I only use the big 8½ x 11 weekly planning At-a-Glance ones. I just love them and have been using them forever. I just leave it on my desk and refer to it daily.

This last photo here was taken just after cutting the fabric around the checkbook cover.

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I also have the lovely credit card holder that I made a little while back. Here is the link for it. I still have the checkbook with same bargello design that remains to be stitched a bit later.

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Pierrette =^..^=

Plaid & blackwork checkbook cover: All stitched

Just finished adding my initials to my checkbook cover. Will now do the finishing and will soon be back with the last photos of this project.
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Pierrette =^..^=

Plaid & blackwork checkbook cover: Plaid all done

Moving along with my checkbook cover as I have just completed the plaid section. All that remains to be done now is work blanket stitches all around to prevent it from fraying as we sure don't want that to happen anytime soon and add my initials. Still need to decide on a design for those.
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On another note, the other day I saw something pretty cute on a blog that I was visiting. Vintage photographs about Pierrot & Pierrette. There is an article about those two here if you want to know a little bit more about them.
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Pierrette =^..^=

Plaid & blackwork checkbook cover: Plaid step 2

Well, I just did it again. Yesterday I was talking about all this catching up I have to do with Persian Fantasy before I could go back to my other projects and this morning I could not resist anymore, I just had to go back to my rotation so I put Persian Fantasy aside for just a little while, not for long, and got my plaid & blackwork checkbook cover out and started working step 2 for the plaid section.

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Photo above shows what has been done so far on it. The bottom section on the left has the plaid motif completed. I am moving from left to right, so have done a little less than half of it.

This second photo is a close-up showing only the plaid section. I must say that this second step is much more fun to do than step one as you can see the plaid materialize under your eyes as you keep adding rows after rows of different thread colors.

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To recapitulate on this plaid a bit, what I first did are rows after rows horizontally, making one 1/2 stitch in every other stitch and I am now doing the same thing but with vertical rows, using the same 4 selected colors. Sizes of rows varies as you can see but replicate themselves at certain intervals.

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The colors that I am using are all DMC floss threads: 224, 504, 932 and 3041.
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I have just installed and tried a new Google feature called "Search this blog". It is situated on the right upper side of my blog. For example if you are interested in looking at previous entries that I have made about this checkbook cover, you may enter in the "Search this blog" the word Blackwork and you will get the following results: April 09/09, April 23/09 and also May 02/09 with titles relating to Plaid & blackwork checkbook cover. All you have to do is click on them and you can read all about this particular project. You may be able to find it using other words too but have not tried it yet. That is pretty neat, I think.

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About rotation, I find it so interesting that I used to work on one single project at a time and now I just can't do it anymore no matter how much I love a project. This girl needs variety so I will also bring Hollyhock House back and start working a little bit on it. I know that Anne will be happy about this as it is one of her favorite current project of mine. I also enjoy it very much.

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I figure these projects will all get done in the end, so who really cares if I don't finish any of them by the official deadline. Not very important in the grand scheme of things, that is what I think :-)

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Pierrette =^..^=

Persian Fantasy: Lesson 2 completed

Finally, I have just completed lesson 2 and have also managed to take a decent photo with so much exposed canvas in the center. I tried different settings and now I can't remember which setting this one was. I must say that was not done in a very scientific fashion.

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I would have finished this section much earlier than this, but have been helping my husband doing some gardening work for the last several days and it was so hot outside, close to 90 degrees and at times rather humid too, so whenever I came back inside after working in the garden, there was no more energy left in me to stitch. Oh well, my part in this work is now done, so I will be able to enjoy the air conditioning inside and stitch to my heart's content :-)

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I now need to catch up with lesson 3. I just bet that by the time I am done with it, it will be time for lesson 4 as we get one every two weeks or so. Not good to get behind like this in a big project. What takes a lot of time is the laying of all those plies (5 of them to be exact). That really takes a lot of time, patience and manipulation, but it is pretty, got to say that about it.

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Better get back to it now or I will get burried under all this work. For those who have been waiting for me to continue working on Hollyhock House, I will get to it as soon as I am caught up with Persian Fantasy. I am starting to severely miss working on it and even worst as now the fun part has started. Same thing for my other projects, I am afraid. Life is tough (sad sad expression).

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Pierrette =^..^=

Persian Fantasy, Area 5: Three sides done

The last couple days, I spent time doing some gardening work with my husband so that has slowed me down a bit on my stitching. It has also tired me out as I have been using muscles that I do not normally use while stitching and I can feel the pain and I am afraid that we need to do more of it in the coming days, so .............

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Anyway, I have just added another photo showing the third side of area 5 that has been completed. One more and I will be ready to move on to lesson 3.

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For those of you who are wondering why the big pile of threads in the middle, I have got a very easy explanation for you. It is simply to cover the blank canvas as if I don't do that we will all be staring at wavy lines. I have never been able to photograph blank canvas without those nasty wavy lines. If someone knows how to do this, please take pity on me and let me know how you do it as I sure can't. Just in case someone would like to volunteer, here is my email address: Lovetostitch99@comcast.net :-)

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I will now start working on the fourth side until I hear my husband calling for me to go outside and do backbreaking work :-(

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Pierrette =^..^=

Persian Fantasy: Area 5, two out of 4 stitched

While I was stitching this morning, I was wondering why it seemed to me to have taken so long to stitch only one side yesterday and thought that perhaps it was because I took too many coffee breaks or in my case water or juice breaks or perhaps too many distractions. Distractions are so easy when you sit next to your computer and you don't even notice :-(
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Anyway, because of the little I managed to stitch yesterday, I decided to put more time into it today and as chance would have it, I woke up around 4:30 this morning and felt pretty good so decided to get up and after having breakfast I started stitching and managed to do the second one and I still have this afternoon to do more work on it, so by the end of the day I will probably have 3 sides completed, leaving one for tomorrow, at least those are the plans and you know what happens to the best of plans, don't you? Right! So, let's hope it works out as planned this time around :-)
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Back to my stitching now ...........
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Pierrette =^..^=

Persian Fantasy: Area 5

Well it seems that area 5 will take me quite a bit of time to complete as I have only been able to stitch one section of it and there are four of them and it took me a big chunk of the morning and a portion of the afternoon too. The thing is that there are 3 steps necessary in order to complete this design and I am using 5 ply which means that I am using my laying tool, which means "time". The effect though is really pretty. It almost looks like velour and with the metallic thread added to it, makes it look really rich.
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The photo above shows area 5 with areas 1 and 3. Hope I am not confusing you all too much with all those areas as I think that I am already starting to confuse myself and there are 15 areas total :-(
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I have taken a closer look of a section of area 5 for you with one of the flower.

At this speed, I still have three more days of work on area 5 before I can move on to my third lesson and I really can't see how I can move any faster as these things just takes lots of time in order to do them properly.

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I always say that it is not the destination that counts but the journey, so got to live it now (grinning).

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I wanted to make a nice coconut pie this morning but never got to it, so will leave my stitching for today and get to it. I think that is one of my very favorite pie next to chocolate and apple.

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Pierrette =^..^=

Persian Fantasy: Area 3

This morning I went back to Jane D. Zimmerman's current cyberclass class called Persian Fantasy that I am taking through the Shining Needle Society after not stitching on it at all for approximaely three weeks due to working exclusively on my pilot class. During that time Jane gave us two assignments which includes four different areas. The photo above shows area 3 which repeats itself in every corner.

This photo above shows you one side of the area 3 design. You can also see areas 1 & 2 on each side.
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If you feel like refreshing your memory about this project, you may go to my first blog entry and then continue on to my second blog entry and you will be all caught up with me on this project without actually having to do all the hard work. Actually how can I really call this hard work when it is such a lovely piece to stitch and I am enjoying it immensely. Why bother to stitch anything anyway if we are not having fun while doing it?

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When I think of all the beautiful projects that are available to us, I am so very thankful to all those wonderful designers out there. I don't think that I could design any decent project to save my own life. It is just not in me, but I do love to stitch lovely designs and we all have plenty out there to choose from.

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I will now proceed to work on area 5 which is part of my second assignment, skipping area 4 which will be in my third assignment together with area 6, so lots of catching up to do, but will get there eventually :-)

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Pierrette =^..^=

Flower Diamonds: Pilot class for Terry Dryden

Before writing this blog entry, I checked to see what date I had started working on Terry Dryden's pilot class called "Flower Diamonds" and it was May 10th, so this means that it took me approximately 3 weeks from start to finish. Not bad at all! Time does fly when we are having fun :-)
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Contrary to what I normally do, which is working on multiple projects in some sort of rotation system unknown to me as I pretty much stitch what I want to stitch when I feel like it, this time around I concentrated on this project alone as Terry needed to get our report back by mid June in order to get everything ready for the lucky ones who will be taking her class at the upcoming ANG seminar in Milwaukee and I am the worst person to evaluate how much time this or that will take me. I always always tend to underestimate my time, and I did not want to chance it with this one.
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Flower Diamonds has 3 panels which are yellow, lavender and orchid. Most of the design is the same in each panel except for colors and threads and of course Terry's 9 central flowers. I am including here 4 photographs, one of each panel and one that shows the whole project.
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This first photo here shows the "yellow" panel where you see the three diamonds in the middle with flowers inside.

(yellow panel)

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This second photo shows you the "lavender" panel with different flowers in the middle.

(lavender panel)

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Third photo shows the "orchid" panel with again different flowers and colors in the 3 central diamonds.

(orchid panel)

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And finally the last photo shows the entire project. Since this will be finished as a neck roll, then you have to imagine this as a round circle (round and round it goes) and once finished we will never ever be able to see all sides at the same time. I have already been researching patterns in order to find one that I really like as I intend to finish it myself.

Being a ghost stitcher for a pilot class was an entirely new experience for me and it has turned out to be a lot of fun, a lot of work too :-)

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Terry Dryden had given us lots of different threads, silk ribbons and beads to use in this project in order to entice us in making changes, which I did actually. My best friend Terry from England, (another Terry), will probably faint from astonishment when she reads this as she is always there telling me to change this and that. I sometimes do and often don't, though lately I must say that I do it more and more. My changes involve the 9 flowers in the middle diamonds. If you check my May 10 post, you may see some of the differences. To come back to threads, I think that we all have had bad experiences with kits, not having enough threads, but not this time around I am happy to say and it was a great feeling. I could then concentrate on stitching and not worrying if I am going to run short of this or that.
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I must also add that this project has given me the opportunity to acquaint myself with lots of new threads and ribbons, at least new to me, and that is something that I have been looking for to do in the past. It was also very interesting to find myself in a position to see how a particular color looks like when placed next to different colors. It is just so amazing how absolutely different they look. I normally do not stitch the same project twice. My reason for this is that there are so many beautiful projects out there, why would I want to stitch the same thing twice no matter how beautiful it is when I can use that time to stitch something else. In this case, I had no choice since there were 3 panels and I had to stitch each one of them if I wanted to end up with a beautiful neck roll (grinning).

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All around this was a wonderful learning experience and I am so very happy that Terry Dryden offered me this opportunity to stitch Flower Diamonds for her pilot class as a "ghost".

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Thanks, Terry Dryden :-)
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Pierrette =^..^=