I am always so happy at TNNA to go to Kathy Schenkel’s and Melissa Shirley’s booths. They are always full to bursting with great new ideas and canvases I just drool over.

I love Kathy’s bone-shaped ornaments for dogs and this year she has a delightful new set. These are “Things Dogs Do,” all done in a clever, easy-to-stitch style.

She also has mini-socks and ornament rounds for a number of different colleges and universities that aren’t just the usual logo style, often they have iconic buildings or other symbols of the campus.

She also has new dog and people tote bags and new North Woods designs. There are two new Christmas series, a nativity and a stars of Christmas, people associated with Christmas in stars.

A very clever idea is her animal alphabet, available both as a panel and as individual letters. The animals are creatively posed in and around the letters. An unusual ornament series would be to do a name or initials this way.

As always Melissa Shirley has tons of new stuff, so I’ll only hit the highlights.

If you like her pears, but have been wishing for designs that were less geometric, you’ll love her new series that has a different fruit in each pear. With gold backgrounds and fruits and blossoms vining up each shape, they are both elegant and timeless. There are 10 in the series.

She has expanded the selection of her popular crackers with a Thanksgiving series, a new Halloween series that features some of her vintage Halloween characters, pink or gold Christmas crackers, and a set of Christmas toy crackers. There is also a new series of candy canes, mostly stripes, in a modern palette of red, white, green, and light green.

Her newest series is 3-D needlepoint cupcakes. Each design is in two parts, a top and the sides. There are designs for Christmas and Valentine’s.

If you have been collecting Christmas canvases in particular colors, there are conical CHristmas trees in fabric-like patterns in both green and gold. Her acorns have been very popular and a set of Christmas acorns has been added. Her banners have been expanded with a series of pumpkins for Halloween.

There is lots of new stuff from her licensed designers. My favorite of these was Debbie Mumm’s “Trick or Treaters,” a haunted house background with twelve Halloween figures. Three of these are animals,a cat, a raccoon, and some mice, dressed up for Halloween.

There are lots more new canvases including some great seashore and insect pillow designs, and lots of new Christmas stockings. THere’s plenty to love and stitch here.

Related posts:

1. New Canvases from Melissa Shirley & Jelly Bean Stock
2. Kathy Schenkel – Designer Profile
3. Melissa Shirley Birds
4. Big Melissa Shirley Sale at The Needlepointer
5. Sneak Peek — Melissa Shirley Designs for Summer

Read the original post:
New Canvases from Kathy Schenkel and Melissa Shirley

It was only a matter of time before someone attempted the falafel waffle. And it actually makes sense. A waffle is typically lightly fried wheat dough, and falafel is fried chickpea dough. Dan Shumski of Waffleizer describes how he made it, along with how to achieve the best results when making the hummus to accompany.

Related:

• Waffle Croque-Madame

This recycled globe travel bank from Megan at Radmegan in Words and Pictures is such a great idea for upcycling an old or outdated globe into a secret place to stash your travel fund. Every time you put money in, you get to see the map and get excited about all of the adventures to come! Head on over to her site to see the full how-to.

I was so excited when I found the vintage canvas on eBay awhile ago. I like it because the stitches are already painted on, much as the wonderful designs of Barbara Bergsten are.

This type of needlepoint has the pattern of the stitch already there on the canvas, you pick your threads and follow along.

In the bottom left corner, you can see a patch I’ve already stitched, in Jacquard. The green line was painted on the canvas, I stitched that first and then filled in the cream.

The patch above will be Framed Scotch, I’m stitching the Scotch Stitches now and the white lines that frame the squares will be in Continental.

For some of the patches here, the stitch to use is quite clear, for others I’ll need to make some choices.

But if you are a beginner, or just want to expand your repertoire of stitches, look at Barbara’s great designs. She’s endlessly inventive and her painted stitches are just perfect and a joy to stitch.

With Painted Stitch canvases and a good stitch dictionary, you’ll learn tons of new stitches quickly.

P.S. In future posts, you’ll see this piece again because I’m using it to test three new threads.

Related posts:

1. Painted Canvas Stitches
2. Stitching a Painted Canvas – Virtual Book Tour
3. How to Approach a Hand Painted Canvas Needlepoint
4. Using Hand-dyes and Overdyes on Painted Canvas
5. Using Overdyed and Hand-dyed Threads on Painted Canvas

Excerpt from:
Exploring the Painted Stitch Canvas

3 Beautiful Bags
By Lisa Lam
F&W Media International

Fresh off the press! 3 Beautiful Bags, an e-book by Lisa Lam, just became available about an hour ago! The downloadable book is a hefty excerpt of her upcoming book, A Bag For All Reasons, coming out in May 2012. As the title states, her e-book has tutorials on 3 unique, very lovely bags: The Compact Groceries Tote, The 3-in-1 Convertible Backpack, and the Fashionista Baby Bag (which is stylish enough to use as a personal bag). She includes full-sized template PDFs for each bag. But more than just the bags, the first half of the book has wonderfully detailed instructions on all kinds of sewing techniques, from adding zippers and magnetic snaps to modifying patterns, adding straps, inserting linings, and so much more.

If you order the book today, you'll get a 20% discount (and 10% off tomorrow). To get a taste of the book, she's offered us a free sample: the adorable Fashionista baby changing mat that you can tuck inside the Fashionista Baby Bag (both shown below).

Make sure to also download the template PDF that follows the tutorial PDF.

Download the Fashionista Changing Mat PDF Right click to save the PDF to your desktop. Directions on downloading PDFs.

Download the Fashionista Changing Mat Template PDF Right click to save the PDF to your desktop. Directions on downloading PDFs.

Visit Lisa Lam's blog, U-handbag, to keep up on her latest sewing adventures!

Couching is an embroidery technique that produces smooth curves and textured lines, and is perfect for projects requiring bold lettering or crisp outlines. In this couching tutorial from Kari at The Craftinomicon, you'll learn the basic stitch and find expert tips on making the process go as smoothly as possible.

More:

• How-To: Stitch Embroidered Hearts @Craftzine.com blog
• How-To: Stitching Your Own Pattern onto Fabric @Craftzine.com blog
• How-To: Hand-Stitched Handwriting @Craftzine.com blog

If you're looking for a cozier, more stylish way to wear your camera around your neck, check out this tutorial from Stacie Grissom over on Photojojo. She shares how to transform a silk scarf into a gorgeous camera strap with just a few steps at the sewing machine.

This two-seam top from Casey at Elegant Musings is a little bit flirty, a little bit vintage-y, and a whole lot cute. As soon as I get home from CHA, it's definitely going to the top of my to-sew list. With just two seams, how could I resist?!

Let's see, I love 1) things that are wee, 2) things that are paper, and 3) typewriters. Yep, this project from Jacqueline Wagner covers all those things. Sign me up!