A decent set of photos today

The cat is super anxious, there are pigeons under the bird feeder. Several varieties of birds grace our backyard, but the pigeons are, apparently, scumbags.

I'm not sure if it is their size, the way they fly in or that they feed on the ground, but nobody has any peace of mind until the pigeons leave. And that means Cleo Belle is in and out of my lap, on and off the table, on and off the window sill and in moments of real stress, she climbs up my leg. Very Ow!




As I wrote this paragraph, we were visited by a yellow bellied Flicker. What a gorgeous bird. The last siting of him was about 10 years ago. Cleo Belle didn't notice. She is not a good birdwatcher.

Last Friday I was at a textile related event and a goody-bag containing beautiful old linens was being shared around. I galloped over and scooped as much as was socially acceptable.

These are two cotton table toppers, sweet but not too exciting.

A trio of a table topper, a circular polyester table cloth and a short table runner underneath with hand crocheted edge. Although polyester, the curved piece will give me good yardage whenever I need a curve somewhere.

Here is a closeup of the upper left table cloth. I am never sure what to do with crocheted bits, they can fray like billy-oh when cut. It might become a background for a larger piece and remain intact.

Now here is the real Scoop-de-Jour. It is a fantastic quality of linen and the crocheted inner border has been inserted by hand.

Look at how beautifully this lady turned that corner! This scrumptious piece is going in my private stash, never to be cut or modified by me. Some pieces are really just too fantastic to alter.

And speaking of altering and stitching, this sketch is about to be drawn onto the next sheer hanky.

This hanky has some staining from being too close to a damp cloth and is rather frail. Stitching will be a challenge, simply because the structure isn't too firm. The sketch itself is simple and opens up to some applique. I hope I have some good green silk ties in the stash.

Every so often I get a mad urge to cross stitch a pattern. This one from Threadworks Primitive (here). Her Etsy shop is where the action is, not her blog. This pattern is nicely simple until...... you see the cloth.

I have had the beige cloth for eons and it has taken me forever to finish this dragon. You can see how the slightly red cloth is about 50% smaller in weave. I needed to use a lighted magnifying lens. The simple "Let it Snow" has taken me 3 Decembers to complete. Once January comes, I tuck it away. Foolishly, I am searching for a new cross stitch for next December.

In other parts of the house, we are working away on getting this Ikea bed built and installed. It has a sliding trundle bed underneath and 3 large storage drawers.

Tomorrow, a friend and I are going to find a duvet, a lamp and maybe some curtains. The walls are a calm green and there is an old armchair with 1970's orange and green upholstery. A Quest.