A Fall Garden Walk and Autumn at Hawk Run Hollow

Thanks to all of you who looked at my blog.  I really appreciate all the very nice things you said about my Halloween decorating and the pansies! We finally are getting some much needed rain.  However, we had a nice break this morning and we got out to the garden to take a few pictures.  Our natural fall color is only fair out here.  We have so many evergreens.  The most common tree in our yard(natural that is) is the big leaf maple.  It turns yellow but that's about it.  So we planted lots of fall color as we landscaped our yard.  I hope you enjoy this walk!

 This pretty little fuchsia is called Santa Claus.  It is considered a hardy fuchsia so should come back every year.

 Little lime hydrangea

Lead-wort ground cover.  It has pretty blue flowers in late summer then turns this pretty red.

 Blushing Bride hydrangea,  white all summer then in the fall turns into this!

 Just a little surprise for the SBA!

This tree is called the parrot tree because of the color.

 A blueberry bush

 A pretty red barberry

The last of the dahlias.

This is one of the biggest designs I have done! Autumn At Hawk Run Hollow.  I like it because it goes from Sept. through Nov. and Thanksgiving.  I have the pattern for Shores so someday I'll get that one started.I took about a year to do this with breaks after each row! The frame looks great with it.  I purchased it from Valley House Primitives.  I do love their frames!

I hope you are all having a good week and thanks so much for taking a look!

More Halloween and a few cross stitch!

Thank you so much for all those nice things you said about my Halloween decorating.  I look forward to doing it each year.  Autumn has always been my favorite season.  I have so many happy memories of Halloween as a child!(Way back in the 50"s)!!!!! We could trick-or-treat alone and eat home made candies with no worries. Oh well, I think I'm sounding old!! Today I have included pictures of the rest of the front yard and porch, as well as the dining room and a few more cross stitch.  Thanks again for joining me!

 I showed these orange whisker pansies before.  Here they are planted with my black pansies.

 That's a better view of the black one.

 I have had this witch for many years.  She does need a new hat!

 This is on the porch between the two wicker chairs.(Notice the little coffee cup).

 This is the SBA's(Super Blog Assistant-he adds the photos) specialty-a very large spider web between the porch posts.

 Welcome to the dining room.  The girls are ready for the big day!(A Folkmanis puppet given to me for Christmas by my DD and SIL).

 My DH bought this for me at a craft fair many years ago in Ohio. She sits in my wonderful antique high chair. I love this chair because it is so well worn.  You can just imagine all the little ones who sat in this chair.

 A recent gift from the SBA's sister in law and brother.

 The dining room table.

 A PS I did many years ago. I probably used the recommended floss and linen for both of the PS designs.

 I love the little old rhyme on this PS.  It hangs in the Powder room.(Sorry it is a bit blurry).

I hope all of you have a wonderful week-end.  We are supposedly getting much needed rain!  Today really feels like fall!

More Halloween Suff!

Thank you for all those very nice comments you  made about the Halloween things on my last post.  I always read and appreciate them so much.  And also thanks to all the readers! I decided to continue with the theme of Halloween.  I hope you all are having a good week and will enjoy these pictures.

Here is the Lizzie Kate all framed up.  The frame is sort of mottled black.  I love the way Amy over at Sew Amy finished her mystery sampler.

I have had this wool picture for a long time.  We got it at a sort of primitive/antique shop in Scottsburg, IN when we lived in Louisville.

Here is my antique die-cut witch made in Germany.  You can't tell but it is framed in a sort of 3-D way.

Here is Witchy by The Primitive Needle.  It is framed in a very old frame we found. It is over the desk in the foyer.

My first cross stitch!! I had been piecing a quilt and complained to a friend that I had nothing to do in the car.  She suggested this and I was hooked!!

My first piece done on linen ,25 ct. I think. 

This is my idea of the perfect Halloween front porch!!!!!!

My work in progress.  I am looking for some of those paper balls.The problem is, I need them to be plastic coated to hold up to our moisture.  The paper ones just wilt, I have tried them.

I do love my wreath!

Left side of doorway.

Right side of doorway.

Thanks so much for joining me!

Just Some Halloween Things!

Thank you all so much for the kind things you said about the owls.  I told my daughter to be sure and read that blog so she can read the wonderful things you said about her work! Thanks to all of you who take time to read the blog!  I don't have much new to show on the Christmas Garden, working around with all those berries just takes time. So I decided to show you a few of my Halloween decorations.  Because I want them up all month(maybe even longer) I put them up before we left. Oh, and thanks for your well wishes regarding the horrid cold.  Good and bad news!! I am much better but the poor SBA has come down with it.  I tried to be so careful -this must be a very contagious bugger!!

 I did this quite a long time ago.  It was a frogging wonder.  I messed up the whole roof up to the peak.  I was teaching full time and it took me a week to pull out all the stitches!! I even had to go to the LNS where I had purchased everything and buy more floss!  I still love it.  The reason for all the bats and ravens- this is a spot that usually holds a big rack with the SBA's mugs and a coverlet.  There are lots of marks and holes. So the bats and ravens cover them up.  They peal right off after Halloween.

 I do love that little iron fence and the broom closet!

I have one of these at each end of our sofa!

 This is the quilt on the back of the sofa.  It was a Thimbleberries design and fabric.

 A very talented quilter(NOT ME) did the long arm quilting.

The entire border is quilted with these pumpkins.

I hope this has been a good week-end for all of you.  It has been beautiful here.  That's not really good, we are getting quite desperate for rain-would you believe that in the Pacific NW???!!! Have a great week!

Owls and Stash

Thanks to all of you who looked at my trip photos!  This morning I had coffee with my DD and she presented me with two adorable owls that she made.  Her business, "Woolpets" has a kit for the owls but she made these especially for me.  I'm a very lucky Mom!  I have also added pictures of the things I bought to add to my stash when we were on the trip. The shop was called Country Cupboard. It is located in Orland Park , Il. The ladies who work there were very nice.  I couldn't resist buying some goodies!

 This is a snowy owl.

 I think they are both adorable! Plus they look great with my Halloween things!

 Here are three of the charts I bought.  First, Bell Flower Quaker Sampler by Little by Little, Quaker Pocket Needfuls by Primitive Traditions, and finally Three Pumpkins Chart #44 by Prairie Grove Peddler.  I thought the last one will be a challenge to me as I'm not the worlds best finisher. My motto has been stitch and frame!

 Here is the one I'm doing for Thanksgiving.  I love the rich fall colors used in the Word Play by With Thy Needle and Thread.

 Here's the current project, The Christmas Garden by BBD.  It doesn't look much like a Christmas Garden yet, but I usually do the border first.  Then I do a happy dance when it matches up correctly.I hope to get this done tonight. Sorry for the dark color of the linen.  I'm using 32ct. antique ivory linen.  It's not that dark at all.

 The floss is GA Endive. I have seen a few of these finished and I think they are lovely.  I'm not going to stitch the words Christmas Garden at the bottom.  I'm going to put in an alphabet.  I have seen that on other sites and then I'll be able to keep it out all year.  It's big and I don't want to do all that work for a short holiday season.

Thanks for joining me . The rotten cold is still plaguing me! I won't be at all sad when I loose that little souvenir of my trip! Have a great Friday!!!

Illinois Trip and Back Home!

We are back from the week trip and I'm back to the blogs.  I tried to keep up a bit but for the most part it was not very convenient. So if I have failed to comment on your great blogs, I'm sorry! The folks we visited were having problems with their computer and we were very busy! At the end we visited the SBA's Granddaughter at college and the hotel was also having problems with their system.  So I was only able to do a little blogging. The only bad part of the trip is I came home with the cold from h___ ! I thought I'd show just a few photos and tomorrow, I'll show you my purchases.  I found a great cross stitch shop in a community called Orland Park.  But for today, it's Chicago and university shots.

This is called "The Bean" because of it's shape.  The weather was fantastic so it was the perfect day for pictures. My friend Carlynn, gave me a wonderful tour of the city!This is located in a beautiful park along Michigan Avenue.

The reflection of the buildings was amazing!

Our good friends have a condo in the city and this was the view from the sun room at the top of their building!  Just beautiful!!!

I love the contrast between new and old buildings!

Another view of sculpture in the park.

We had a great visit with the SBA's family.  Here is his lovely Granddaughter.

She took us to a wonderful book store and this was a little black cat resting in a box with antique maps!

Thanks so much for joining me!

A Finish!

I was so pleased that many of you seemed to enjoy my spider web!! Either that or you were just being very polite. Thanks also for the kind comments about the mystery sampler.  Well, I finished it Sat. night and even got the frame ordered! That means that when we get back from our trip , the SBA will be able to get it framed.  We also picked up Halloween Town and got that mailed to our Grandson.  I'm just hoping he won't be too sad that it isn't a toy.  Usually a package from us means a toy! At 7 I think toys probably still mean more than Grandma's stitching! I was very happy with the way the frame turned out but we had to get it in the mail so I didn't take time to get a picture.  Here are a few of the highlights from the Lizzie Kate Mystery Halloween Sampler.

 This one is long and skinny.  It would probably make a good bell pull.

 I (along with a few others) did not like the choice of a blue-green color for the first level of grass.  I chose to do WDW bullfrog.  The level near the house was done with GA English ivy. I also did a backstitch between the two colors.  This was not called for but no matter how careful I was not to pull, you could see the linen.  I'm hoping it just looks like a different level of grass.

 A cute charm was included.

 The black button star was used in two places.

 

Again by the owl.

We leave on a short trip tomorrow.  We will be visiting one of my dearest friends and her husband and we'll be visiting the SBA' Granddaughter at her college.  We're looking forward to seeing all those people! I will post when I can but I'll try to check your blogs each evening.  I'll be back in about a week. Enjoy the beautiful autumn!