Somedays...When You Least Expect It........

You get a nice surprise that takes you off guard.  Yesterday we kept getting orders for our Bindles, which are small bundles of various textures that reminded us of a hobo's pack...resulting in their name.  It wasn't until almost midnight when it dawned on Kristin that she had provided a Spicey Mustard Bindle to Quilting Arts last fall in Houston....hmmm....  Today her hunch was confirmed....  We got an awesome shout out from Quilting Arts in their April/May issue on our Bindles! Thanks to Scott Murkin for the photo....cause he had already received his issue.

Soon thereafter another order came in for Bindles and basically wiped us out and we thought we were so smart with how many we had prepared prior to our three shows.  Now mind you on our drive back from Florida we were pretty happy with the thought that we would not have any really heavy dyeing to do before Kristin leaves for New York City next week....hahaha...best laid plans, you know that old saying.  So guess what we are doing, you got it...we very quickly jumped into a heavy dyeing schedule so that we can fill those orders.  Thank you to everyone who reads Quilting Arts we really do appreciate you.

Now back to the couple of other embroidered pieces I managed to finish while in Florida. This landscape will have a few beads, rocks and such at the bottom; then possibly set into a small wall hanging.

This is one of our finished "stacked landscapes" finished off into a pillow...

Here's another one that I finished embroidering on in Florida that will become another pillow.  The first time I worked in this longer rectangular format it took a bit to adjust, but I think I'm becoming more comfortable with it.

These pieces are a collaboration between Kristin and I, she lays out the landscape, does some basic hand stitching and then passes them off to me.  I'm supposed to view it, add embroidery and create a scene or hopefully visually create something the viewer can connect with.  Yeah right....sometimes it's harder than you might imagine, sometimes a total surprise even to me.  We have found that we see colors differently, she sometimes sees something in the piece that I don't and she is usually surprised by what I finally come up with. Guess that is the nature of a collaboration.

I will try to remember to photograph and post all these "stacked landscapes" after they are totally complete, so stay tuned.