October 2013 New Releases

I am so excited to share with you four new designs! The website is updated, orders are being shipped, and newsletters are going out, so I get to update the blog :-) The thread details are at www.MyBigToeDesigns.com , but here are the more interesting tidbits that go along with each one:

MBT-140 The Apostles' Creed

This design was encouraged by a lovely lady who emailed me a couple of years ago to see if it was something that I would design. After over a year of prayer and nothing coming of it, I was inspired to do it in a reproduction style. The creed has been used for centuries and is currently recited today in many churches. The design process was surprisingly smooth, with lines of words lining up perfectly at the end, and then I started pulling thread colors and stitching. I haven't fought so awfully with colors in a design in a long time! The end result is exactly what I saw in my head, and I love how it turned out, but I ripped out almost as much as I stitched. The chart comes with a little history lesson on the design, and a conversion for some of the wording.

MBT-141 Blessed Assurance

Hymn designs have become my new favorites. It is a joy to be able to sing along with my stitching! I've been back in a purple mood, and the new GAST color "Amethyst" was perfect for what I was feeling with the colors for this one.

MBT-142 To Stitch or Not to Stitch

There has to be a whimsical design in each batch, and I was feeling a bit pensive with this one. It is in the same design line as "Normal Family," same color families, and same attitude :-)

MBT-143 Joyful, Patient, Faithful

Romans 12:12 tells us to be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer. I need so much of all three of those each and every day! The border is a tangle of flowers, and it could easily be brightened up a bit for spring colors, or stitched in one color, OR add in more colors for the flowers!

Thank you for sharing in this stitchy journey with me. I appreciate all of the kind words, encouragement, feedback, and prayers.

Seeing spots!

I had the joy of a bead 'trunk show' a couple of weeks ago. One of my wholesalers sends around a big van, loaded with goodies, and I get to dig and dig and dig, to my heart's content. It's soooo much fun! I came away with a lot of new needle threader bead offerings, and here are a few of my favorites:

Lots of dots! The flower in the middle is a deep violet color. I wish I could get a backlit picture that could better show off the color, but it's beautiful. New designs will be coming out in a couple of weeks. There will be four new ones: one large reproduction style, one whimsical, and two inspirational. Keep an eye out for the next update!

This is usually the time of year when I'd be posting lots of yummy garden food updates, how the canning process is going, and what we're planning for winter seeds. A few weeks ago we had a bad storm come through, it had lots of hail and winds, and we sustained a lot of damage. If it was outside and green, it was shredded. The hail came down so hard that it went through the fruits and veggies, destroyed all of their leaves and vines, and left the grapes and berries looking like it was already December. It broke a skylight on the house, ruined some window screens, "textured" the aluminum trim on one side of the house, flooded the front and side of the property (including the hen house!), and worked down into one of the bathroom vents and made a wet mess. Our neighbor had hundreds of dents in his vehicle, and another one had the paint stripped off of his house! It is nothing compared to what some CO towns are experiencing, and they are all in our prayers. We still ache for the lost food, but I'm counting the blessing that God freed up a lot of my time this fall and I'm waiting to see what He is going to do with that time.