Sew Dance

I finished page 5 of The Arab Tent last night. Three more full pages and one page of 5 stitches to complete the first row. I don't have much more of an update this week.

Yay! Dancing With the Stars is back again. The cast has been announced, time for my opinions and my thoughts on who the pro partners will be. Although the DWTS site has 12 pros listed, they won't announce the partnerships until August especially since there's still one more celebrity that will cause one more pro to be needed. Apolo Ohno. I like him. He was the best of his season but it's been several years since he was on and now he has some competition. Original partner: Julianne Most likely to be with: Julianne (if she comes back this season, probably not and maybe only if Lacey doesn't dance with Kyle should he be voted in.) Alternate: Chelsea Bristol Palin. Why? Yes she got far, but she couldn't dance, wasn't very entertaining, and I'm not sure who actually liked her. Original partner: Mark Most likely: Alternate: Drew Lachey. Very likable. Will he still have the same chemistry with Cheryl? Well he have a different partner as she also danced...

It has the makings of one of those closets you see in cartoons that they open and are soon buried under an avalanche of stuff that falls out. The bottom would be there soon if I keep piling stuff on it. The bags are filled with yarn, one nearly finished crocheted skirt, and fabric. The cabinet on the right has most of my cross stitch (except the projects that I have out, some more yarn from finished projects, and some sewing patterns. The bag on top contains my crochet hooks, and 'thread' for that type of crochet and a few crochet books. Maybe there's a knitting needle or two, who knows. In addition to this nightmare of a mess, I have an unfinished latch hook and a midway or better finished crochet afghan in another closet. I have a box of fabric on my floor and more patterns in the leopard bench. Not to mention the have yet to arrive fabric and the have yet to buy fabric. I went to walmart the other day to buy cheap storage drawers. I have only set foot in...

Monday night I picked out of my closet for different projects I could work on. Peacock Tapestry, The Accolade, The Arab Tent, and my insanity piece. On Peacock Tapestry, I didn't feel like ripping out the mistake I made 9 years ago last night. (Eek, is it really that long since I was a freshman in college?) On my insanity piece, I wanted to cut the dangling threads from the old fabric to reuse with my new fabric, but I didn't feel like doing that either. And for some reason, I couldn't find the thread and chart to The Accolade. I had one page which was not with the rest of it. So Arab Tent it was. It probably won't keep my attention that long since it's mainly brown. I also decided to try out one of the gold plated needles I bought. Let's see how long it takes before these wear down. I remember using a new needle for every page or so. Here's the before and after picture of a week of stitching, I'm working on page 5. Can anyone spot the monkey? ...

I broke down and ordered more fabric for my stash. It's a bit on the expensive side but I think it'll be worth it when it arrives. There's a European ballroom dress designer that I found while searching dress designs for inspiration (more on that a bit later). Farale sells one-off fabric sets with a design. I gave in and bought this design with all the fabric needed: I know it's not a picture of the actual fabric but I really like the design and it'll be one of a kind fabric. It's also called 'animal print' and given my favorite pattern is leopard... I also got the following fabrics from them as I found the pretty/intriguing. The last fabric (stretch satin) is going to be used for godets in a smooth gown. I just need to buy coordinating fabrics later. I also signed up for a 'speakeasy tour' of NYC's garment district to be held in late September. This tour is given by Mimi of Shop The Garment District . I believe this will help...

As the title says, Dew Drop Fairy is completed. While waiting for my replacement purple to arrive, I started making friendship bracelets. Possibly to sell. Anyone interested? I can do other colors and patterns. Now to figure out my next project. I'm probably going to pull one that I've already started, leaning towards my golden kites.

Sunday, I order items to add to my stash. I needed another spool of Kreinik #4 braid in Purple Passion to finish Dew Drop Fairy so I added a chart to my order since shipping was half the price of the spool. Fire Dance by Kustom Krafts. In addition, I had started off the day by holding up the pattern pieces for an existing pattern to my dress form to see if there were any major alterations needed. Thankfully, I saw none. Of course this led to me looking at patterns online. Which led to the last day of a 4.99 sale of vogue patterns which led me to getting the following: The stuffed animals were too cute to pass up. Now patterns led to looking through fabric as I do have a black satin which at the moment is to be used as godets on a smooth gown. Of course I don't know if I should pair it with a solid color, a floral print, or something else. I may have black velvet left over from the latin dress I really should start making. I ended coming across these fabrics: ...

I'm having a really bad day. I woke up to an e-mail about a purchase from my paypal account that I didn't make (I was sleeping how could I?) I somehow got a mosquito bite on the palm of my right hand. I then hit traffic going to my dance lesson and was almost late. And now, I realize I forgot some stitches in my sparkly purple so I need to order some. It's on the upper right of the wing, I missed it for whatever reason.    I've included a close up of the dew drops.  Given the nature of my day, I'm stopping work on this for a while and moving to something else.

I've completed all cross-stitching and backstitching on Dew Drop Fairy. I've started beading it and have 1/8 of the border done already. Oh, and after being very frugal with my last bit of sparkly purple, I had just enough. Phew. If anyone decides to stitch this design, best to buy two spools as precaution. I discovered a while ago while working on a Chatelaine, that the cases the SD cards come in are very good for beads. The pop mechanism allows me to open it minimally in my hand without worrying the beads will go flying. My old job got tons of them and we ended up throwing most of them away. I kept a bunch.