Snowpocalypse Stitch-a-Thon - and a Free Snowflake Pattern!

Brrrr, readers!

Here in the blustery Northeast, we are battening down the hatches for a good old snowstorm.  The snow started coming down at about 11:00 this morning, and it is already starting to accumulate on the ground!  The weather forecast says we should get about a foot of snow by tomorrow morning, with more to come tomorrow.  Gov. Patrick has declared a statewide emergency, there is a run on bottled water and batteries at the local Stop & Shop, cars are sliding all over the roads, and Beantown is in a general state of chaos.

So what does this mean for you, my loyal readers?

Well, my office is closed for the day, and the MBTA will shut down at 3:30 this afternoon, so I am officially snowbound!  That means... STITCH-A-THON!!!!!  I am quite excited, because I am building up half-finished projects more quickly than snow is piling on the sidewalks below.  So, I will be spending the weekend happily stitching away, by candlelight if need be.  I want to finish the owl and finish my current quadrant of Celestial Dragon, as well as finish the last (pink) brain hat in my order queue.

So, in the middle of this winter storm, if you need a new project, or if you are looking for an excuse to start something fresh, I have even put together a little free snowflake pattern to help you on your quest.  :)  Here it is!

Free Snowflake Pattern

Free snowflake pattern.  (c) Erin E. Turowski, 2013.  For personal use only.

Dimensions:
30 squares wide x 30 squares tall
14-count: 2.1" x 2.1" (5.4 cm x 5.4 cm)
16-count: 1.9" x 1.9" (4.8 cm x 4.8 cm)
18-count: 1.7" x 1.7" (4.2 cm x 4.2 cm)

You can stitch this in any color you would like, although I think whitework would look quite nice.  For the "dots" in the pattern, you can either use French knots or seed beads for a bit of shimmer.  You could also add some blending filament (try Kreinik #032 in Pearl!) for a bit of extra sparkle.

So... stay safe, stay warm, and happy stitching!  If anyone else is stuck in this wonderful winter weather, please feel free to link to your own stitch-a-thon below!

Cheers,
-Erin

"Grow Your Blog" event - hosted by Vicki at 2 Bags Full

"Grow Your Blog" hosted by Vicki at 2 Bags Full

Hello, readers!  Today, I am blogging about something a bit different.  I am participating in an event called "Grow Your Blog," hosted by Vicki over at 2 Bags Full.  It is a way for bloggers to reach out and meet other bloggers and other readers.  So, to start with, since I (hopefully?) have some first-time readers here, let me tell you about myself and my blog!

My name is Erin.  I am a twenty-eight year old veterinarian living in Boston.  I work at a research institution in Cambridge.  My official title is a veterinary postdoctoral fellow, which means that I spend my days reading through research protocols and journals, writing papers, and performing benchtop experiments in our lab.  I am also working on a PhD, and I am in my third year of both programs.

That's the boring stuff.  The fun stuff is, I also love crafting!  My great-grandmother (who has since passed away) taught me how to cross stitch when I was about ten years old.  I remember going through her stash at her house in Green Valley, Arizona, and picking out floss colors for my first sampler - it was two anthropomorphized rabbits standing in a field, à la "American Gothic."

Since then, I have continued to stitch all sorts of things under the sun!  In college and in vet school, I used cross stitching as a way to relax after hours and hours of studying, but over the past year or so, my hobby has really kicked into high gear.  I made my favorite finish to date, Teresa Wentzler's "Egyptian Sampler," and I have branched out into designing my own patterns, such as this Byzantine-inspired Christmas ornament.  I have sent handmade items all over the place: to Boston, to Kansas, to Minnesota, and to Italy!  I have also spent a lot of time working on my knitting skills, and I have no qualms about taking out my needles and working on a hat in the middle of rush hour on a busy subway train.

This blog details my crafting life.  Here, I write about my works in progress and my finishes, and I throw in the occasional free pattern and photo shoot.  If you want to see some pretty stitching, take a minute and browse through my 2012 finishes!

To thank you for browsing through my site, I am also offering a free giveaway!  I will send a free cross stitched cupcake keychain to one lucky reader who comments on this post.  So, if you like what you read here, please let me know, and you could receive a little gift for your trouble!

Cupcake keychain - free to one lucky commenter!

And, finally, because I am a veterinarian, yes, I have to include an obligatory word about my cat, Orange "Julius" Caesar.  He is an eight-year-old male (neutered) domestic shorthair - and he is an orange kitty, and yes, they are the best kitties.  :)  Keeping him away from my needlework is a never ending battle.

Orange "Julius" Caesar - my orange kitty!

So, thanks for stopping by and checking out my little corner of the blogosphere.  I hope you enjoyed it!

Have a great day!

Cheers,
-Erin

Finished - First Christmas Ornament of 2012! Scarlet and Gray Christmas Ornament

Well, readers, I have been busy, busy, busy!

I have stitched Teresa Wentzler's Byzantine Ornaments in the past before, but I wanted to be able to sell Christmas ornaments this year, so I decided to make my own design.  I made up a little pattern that is inspired by TW's designs, but I used a completely different shape, added some new stitches, changed the colors, and added more sparkly beads!  I wanted to stitch something in scarlet and gray/silver, because my tree is all decorated in red and silver, and because I am a double-degree graduate and HUGE fan of The Ohio State University (Go Bucks!).  TW's ornaments are all gold, so that really isn't the best option for my tree.  So... here is the result!

Scarlet and Gray Christmas Ornament, designed and stitched by Erin Turowski

Close-up of center motif - squares edged with buttonhole stitching

Close-up of border motif - satin-stitched diamonds

Scarlet and Gray Christmas Ornament (reverse) - backed with gray felt

Scarlet and Gray Christmas Ornament, hanging on my Christmas tree!

 I am quite happy with how this turned out!  It is a very sparkly and shiny little ornament.  It measures 3" x 3" (7.6 cm x 7.6 cm) square.  I stitched it using DMC embroidery floss and accented it with Kreinik silver cording and Mill Hill seed beads.  It is stitched on white 28-count Monaco fabric, and I covered the back with gray felt and trimmed the sides with shiny silver polyester/nylon cord trim.  It is stuffed with a few pieces of polyester fiberfill.  To make the ornament, I used the technique I explained in my Pillow Ornament Tutorial a few months ago.

I also want to stitch these ornaments in different colors (purple and silver, blue and silver, and a few variations of gold), but I just wanted to finish one so I could see how this pattern turns out.  I will probably still stitch a few of TW's Byzantine ornaments this year for gifts, too, but I am really proud of my creation.  :)  If you want to bring one home for your tree or give one as a gift, check out my Etsy shop!  I take custom color requests, too.

I have also been working on Celestial Dragon - here is a photo update!

"Celestial Dragon" by Teresa Wentzler

It is really slow going, but this piece is gorgeous, so it's worth it.  (As you may be able to tell, I am a sucker for sparkly things.)

I also FINALLY found some white frames for a couple of un-framed Christmas cross stitch pieces I have laying around, so I will be mounting and framing those soon.

So... does anyone else have any fun Christmas projects they are working on?  If you do, please comment below and leave a link to your blog/Flickr/Etsy/whatever - I would love to see what my readers are up to!

Cheers - and have an awesome day!

-Erin

Finished - "All Things Bright and Beautiful"

Good morning, readers!  I promised you I would have some stitching done this weekend, and I am not letting you down!  I am typing this Sunday morning, and I have already finished a project that was kicking around for awhile.  Here is "All Things Bright and Beautiful!"

"All Things Bright and Beautiful."  Designed and stitched by Erin E. Turowski

I designed this piece because I am a veterinarian, and there is a lack of veterinary-themed pieces in the cross stitch world.  I wanted to be able to make something that shows why I love my profession.  The central verses are inspired by a 19th century Anglican hymn - they were adopted later by James Herriot as the titles for his autobiographies.  Stitched around the border are six embroidered animals.  I selected them because they are all likely to be encountered in veterinary practice, and I designed the motifs myself.  Here is a close-up of each of the little critters:

Little orange kitty

Chocolate Labrador retriever

Blue bird

Black stethoscope

Tan Jersey cow

Black horse

Pink pig (Landrace, maybe?)

I like the orange kitty the best, but I am partial.  :)  I didn't do anything fancy to design these - I just sketched them out as line drawings using KG Chart and tweaked the stitches until the shapes looked right.  I also stitched certain words in the text in scarlet and gray to represent my alma mater (Go Bucks - although they looked pretty terrible playing Cal in football yesterday).

Scarlet and gray accent words in each line - Go Bucks!

I am going to list this in my Etsy shop and offer custom embroidery to include the buyer's selected name, vet school, and graduation year, along with embroider in school colors for the "bright," "beautiful," etc.

Now, I am off to Michael's to pick up some floss - now that I have finished this project, of course, I have permission to start another!  :)

Have a great weekend, readers.  Thanks for taking some time out of your busy day to visit my little blog!

-Erin

A new James Herriot-inspired veterinary embroidery project!

Well, my last post - the free squirrel monkey pattern - was a rollicking success!  My blog had been averaging anywhere from 20 to 40 page views per day, but on both yesterday and today, I got over 150 page views each day!  A couple of sites, including Ellen Maurer-Stroh's cross stitch forum, picked up the pattern and listed it for their readers, so I got a lot of traffic through those avenues.  Hooray!

So, where does that leave me now?  I think it's time for an update!  I designed a new embroidery pattern inspired by the Anglican hymn "All Things Bright and Beautiful," the lyrics of which were made popular by the James Herriot veterinary books.  It is stitching up pretty quickly, so here is a picture of how it looks right now:

"All Things Bright and Beautiful" embroidery piece.  (c) Erin E. Turowski, 2012.

The finished size will be about 8" x 10" (20.3 cm x 25.4 cm).  It is stitched on 28-count white Monaco fabric.  The little orange kitty on the right is the first of six animals surrounding the poem.  Here is a close-up of him.  He was inspired by my own orange kitty, Julius!

The orange kitty from "All Things Bright and Beautiful."  (c) Erin E. Turowski, 2012.

The other animals will include a brown Laborador-type dog, a blue bird, a light brown Jersey cow, a black horse, and a pink pig.  I can't wait to finish it!  It is really hard to find veterinary-themed needlework, so I am glad to finally be making my own.  :)

Naturally, because I have been busy with this piece, I haven't made a terrific amount of progress on "Celestial Dragon."  Nonetheless, I have made some headway - I filled in some dark blue and gold on the dragon's body, and I (mostly) finished his feet and gave him talons.

"Celestial Dragon" by Teresa Wentzler

I had to keep my needlework away from my very delicious and saucy dinner tonight.  I tried a new recipe for cauliflower pizza crust (you know, the one that's all over Pinterest).  The appeal of this recipe is that the whole personal-sized pizza crust has under 150 calories!  I topped mine with red pizza sauce, fresh mozzarella, sliced Roma tomatoes, and fresh basil.  It was delicious!  Here is a picture to whet your appetites.

Cauliflower pizza crust, margherita style!

Now, next week may be a bit slower for my blog.  I am traveling to the Outer Banks with my fiancé, my sisters, their husbands, and my parents.  We are going to spend a whole week with each other - I can't wait! I love my family very much, and as time goes by, we all just get closer and closer.  I am very thankful to have a great relationship with them all.  :)  So, I will try to hijack my fiancé's laptop and post an update or two (maybe some beach pictures!), but if I am a little quiet, please pardon my absence.

Oh, and after reviewing the feedback from my previous entry, I will maintain the current frequency of my e-mail updates for all of you who are subscribed (approximately 2-3 e-mails per week).  Thank you for your subscriptions, including the new readers who joined this week!

I will leave you today with this lovely little piece, "A Day at the Beach" by Nikki Leeman.  I bought it to stitch while I am on the beach!  I am hoping to have it finished by the time I am back in Boston.

"A Day at the Beach" by Nikki Leeman

Thank you all for reading and for your thoughtful comments!  Have a fantastic day!

Free Cross Stitch Monkey Pattern! (a.k.a., Paying Attention to Google Queries!)

Hello, dear readers,

Out here in the blog-o-sphere, it can be tough to attract attention from people surfing the Internet.  To help in your quest for blog fame, Blogger offers a bevy of information about the people who browse your blog.  One of these data points is a list of queries that people have typed into a search engine to find your blog.

Well, I monitor these things pretty regularly, and I noticed that I was getting a lot of hits from people looking for "free monkey cross stitch patterns."  Unfortunately, while I do have "free cross stitch patterns" and a "monkey cross stitch" on my blog, I do not have a "free monkey cross stitch pattern" to share with my readers.

So, in response to all of these Internet views from people who surely are not finding what they are looking for, I decided to design a "free monkey cross stitch pattern" for you to use!  Please note: this pattern is for personal use only; no commercial use is allowed without written permission.

Free squirrel monkey cross stitch pattern.  For personal use only.  (c) Erin E. Turowski, 2012.

Key (DMC colors):

+     645

|     ecru

=     black

*     white

Z     648

X     225

Dimensions:

26 squares wide x 22 squares tall

14-count: 1.9" x 1.6"

16-count: 1.6" x 1.4"

18-count: 1.4" x 1.2"


Here is what it looks like stitched up (more or less, computer-generated image):

Free squirrel monkey cross stitch pattern.  For personal use only.  (c) Erin E. Turowski, 2012.

This is a common squirrel monkey (Saimiri sciureus).  Here is a picture of what one looks like in the wild, for comparison:

Common squirrel monkey, from http://pin.primate.wisc.edu/fs/sheets/images/124med.jpg

The veterinarian in me opted for a more true-to-life rendition, rather than a cartoon-ish monkey or a sock monkey, but if I see enough search hits for a "free sock monkey cross stitch pattern" in the future, maybe I will add one of those as well!

Before you go - a question for my current e-mail subscribers (please respond!):

I realize that you are all busy people and that you may or may not appreciate having e-mails every few days when I update my blog.  I really appreciate your readership, and I want to hear your preferences!  So, would you rather:

A) continue to receive e-mails at 7:00 a.m. EST the day after I make a new post (approximately 3 e-mails per week), OR

B) receive a weekly update (only 1 e-mail per week) as a digest-style compilation of my new posts for that week?

If you could just take a minute to respond, I would like to hear your opinion so I can tailor my e-mail updates to fit your needs!  A comment at the end of this blog post with your preference (A or B) would be sufficient.  If I do not receive a clear preference from my subscribers for either frequency, then I will keep the e-mails on the current schedule (an update the day after each new post).

Thank you - and thanks so much for reading and for your very thoughtful and kind comments!

Until next time...

-Erin
Less Bitching, More Stitching!


If you like what you saw here, subscribe to my e-mail updates!  No personal information will be shared or sold.

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Etsy NEAT Entry - "Sparkles under the Sea"

Happy Hump Day, readers! I have been a busy little bee this week - my parents and fiancé visited for the holiday and we were all super busy playing tourists around Boston, but I made time and finally finished this little beauty! Here is "Sparkles under the Sea," my entry for the May/June Etsy NEAT Creative Challenge.  The theme for this round is "Water/The Ocean," so this should pretty much fit the bill.  :)

"Sparkles under the Sea," designed and stitched by Erin Turowski

This piece is actually quite small and detailed, measuring about 3" x 4" framed.  Here it is next to a credit-card-sized card for comparison:

"Sparkles under the Sea" is about the size of a credit card.

This piece consists entirely of specialty stitches and embroidery (no true cross stitches).  The following pictures are close-ups of each area and descriptions of the stitches used to create each piece of sea life.

All of the sea creatures are stitched with two strands of cotton embroidery floss and one strand of Kreinik blending filament in Pearl.

"Sparkles under the Sea" - Seaweed, angelfish, and ocean background

The seaweed is a modified fly stitch in green and yellow.

The angelfish is a series of satin stitches in black and white, with a French knot for the eye.

The water in the background is a slanted straight stitch, in progressively darker shades of teal as the water gets deeper.

A school of white fish and detail of the coral stitch used for the waves

This school of fish is a simple back-stitched fish shape in white.

The waves at the top are a specialty stitch called a coral stitch in pale blue, which produces a lovely scrolling effect.

Sand, a pink and white scallop shell, and two purple sea anemones

The sand is rows and rows of half-cross-stitches in a light gold color.

The scallop shell (left) is stitched in coral and white in a simple straight stitch pattern.

The bodies of the two sea anemones (right) are straight-stitched in purple, and their tentacles are a short turkey work stitch (kind of like a fringe, but with loops instead of loose threads).

Treasure chest and starfish

The treasure chest is straight-stitched in dark brown with two rows of gold chain stitching.

And, finally, the starfish is stitched in rows of straight stitches radiating outward from a body consisting of five French knots, all stitched in orange and white.

The frame was a Goodwill find that set me back about fifty cents.  :)

I am really happy with how this piece turned out!  It was a lot of intricate stitching, but I really enjoyed creating it.  I hope you all like the final product - maybe the specialty stitches will inspire you to create some wonderful under-the-sea embroidery, too!

Free Mini Cross Stitch Pattern - Teal, Brown, and Gold Plaid Square

I decided I wanted to cross stitch something small and brightly-colored, so I made a pattern that I am sharing with my blog readers!  Please note: this pattern is for personal use only; no commercial use permitted without written permission.

Free plaid square cross stitch pattern.  For personal use only. (c) Erin E. Turowski, 2012.

Key:
X  --  DMC S995 (3 strands)
•   --  DMC 838 (3 strands)
=   --  DMC 422 (3 strands)
Thick black lines  --  DMC E3821 (1 strand)

I stitched this over one thread on 14-count Aida cloth.  It measures 1.1" x 1.1" (2.7 cm x 2.7 cm) square.  It fits perfectly in a 1.5" (3.8 cm) square acrylic keychain.  I buy my keychains from Joann Fabrics as part of a children's scratch-off art kit - I throw away the scratch-off paper, and I get two keychains for $1.49.  Here are some pictures of the finished product!

Teal, brown, and gold plaid cross stitched keychain

Teal, brown, and gold plaid cross stitched keychain (close up)

Enjoy, and happy stitching - Celestial Dragon update tomorrow!

My first original cross stitch chart - Quincy Bay in the Sun

I decided that I wanted to create an original chart, so I downloaded a free program from the internet - KG-Chart.  Then, I uploaded my own photo.  This is a shot of Quincy Bay as seen from Wollaston Beach, a few miles south of Boston.  The railing in the foreground is a walkway out to the Squantum Yacht Club, which is perched on stilts out by the water.

Quincy Bay - Wollaston, MA

Next, I selected the fabric and final size (12.5" x 7" when stitched on 16-count Aida) as well as the number of colors to be used.  Because this is a fairly limited-color picture, 14 colors was sufficient (I tried 24 at first, but the pattern was pretty near impossible to read).  I also edited out the people sitting on the beach because they were just a black blob in the chart after it pixellated.  The program then lets you export a computer-generated image of what the picture will look like stitched:

Quincy Bay in cross stitches (computer-generated)

And here is a detail of the chart:

Quincy Bay - detail of cross stitch pattern

I think I might actually try stitching this!  I have always loved this photo, and it seems like a good excuse for a new project.  :)  I will use this program to create sampler-type projects, too; I like that it has the complete line of DMC floss and lets you create a color chart.  You can also upgrade to the pay version for extra features (larger chart size and no "KG Chart" byline when printing), but the free version appears totally adequate for me right now.  Two thumbs up!