Glow-in-the-dark cross-stitch initials!

Have you had the pleasure of stitching with DMC's Light Effects Glow-in-the-Dark embroidery floss yet? I absolutely love this stuff and I have been incorporating it into my recent projects whenever I can. 

I shot the photo above with a super-long exposure after placing the floss under a light for a couple of minutes. Isn't it wild? But it's a simple white in normal light:

I think it was the Creatures of Light special exhibit that recently closed at the American Museum of Natural History that sparked my interest in things that glow. 

This fascinating show explored bioluminesence, the phenomena in which living things such as fireflies actually generate their own light.

We paid a visit to this exhibit in the fall with our dear friends G and J, so when I started thinking about making a little holiday gift for them, I decided to create something that might evoke the glowy magic of the Creatures of Light show.

With a graphic designer for a husband, it's no surprise that I went with something typographic, and cross-stitched their initials:

And here they are in their full bioluminescence:

I'm happy to report that this special embroidery floss is actually a true pleasure to stitch with. Unlike most of its sibling flosses in the sparkly category, which cause howls of frustration in embroiderers across the land as they knot and tangle at will, this stuff just glides through as you stitch.

But it can be hard to find! I went to several local craft shops and was surprised that nobody carried it. I finally hooked myself up at the Thread and Links Etsy shop, which carries a range of lovely needlework supplies. Treat yourself to a skein or two; I'd love to see what you stitch with it!

Mad Men Returns!

Today's the day: Mad Men is BACK! We have been counting the minutes in our house, and I am so excited to see what happens tonight in the premiere episode of season five.


I've stitched up a favorite Don Draper bon mot in honor of the occasion, from Season 1, Episode 7, The Hobo Code:




(Embedding of this clip is disabled, so you'll have to click through and watch on youtube; the quote comes in at 5:50 in the video.)

We're having a few friends over this evening for a little celebration of all things 1965-ish; I'll post some pics of our retro gathering soon!

Cross-stitch valentine card!

We're big Valentine's Day fans in our house; not only is it my birthday, but it was my mom's birthday too! I really enjoy having a birthday on a day when so many other people are in a sweet, loving, generous mood.


Steven is a graphic designer, and that means he appreciates nice paper goods more than the average Valentine. So I wanted to make sure that I deliver something really special for him this year. I started out by stitching up the sweet redwork and cross-stitch heart above. (I found this pattern here.)


I stitched the red cross-stitch border directly onto my cardstock by hand, and then I finished the edge with a little machine zig-zag stitch. This came out a little less even than I would have liked, but I thought it wasn't a bad result for my first time stitching on paper. Mom always taught me to keep the back of my work neat, and I actually succeeded on this piece:

I'm very excited to give this to Steven today! Happy Valentine's Day, sweethearts!

Leafy cross-stitch quartet, part 4: the ginkgo leaf!

Finally! The fourth installment in the leafy cross-stitch quartet: the ginkgo leaf!


The first three installments can be found here (maple), here (oak), and here (birch).


I'm really happy with all four of these pieces, but I think the ginkgo is my favorite, because of its significance to me and Steven. When we lived on the upper west side of Manhattan, we always admired the ginkgo trees in the neighborhood. Ginkgo trees are the oldest trees in the world and they are renowned for their resilience. They're able to survive harsh weather, urban pollution and in the case of Hiroshima, even exposure to the atom bomb. Their fan-shaped leaves are unique, and they possess both medicinal and culinary uses. 


(Lest you think these beautiful trees are perfect, you should try not smell them when they start dropping their seeds on the ground.)


We've collected a few other ginkgo-related items over the years. When he isn't wearing it, Steven stows his wedding band in this pretty dish that I picked up at Crate & Barrel:

(Note that the dish is layered on top of one of
our chic agate coasters from Zhush.com!)

I bought this ginkgo leaf necklace from Etsy shop Ginkgo and wore it on our wedding day:

Last year, Steven surprised me with this beautiful ginkgo leaf ring from the very talented Etsy seller tiderdesign:

And we still need to germinate the seeds from this ginkgo tree-to-be kit and find a nice spot to plant it in our yard:

So here's the final leaf again, this time in its little frame:

It took me nearly a year to get these designed, stitched, framed, hung, photographed, and blogged! Would you like to see how they look on the wall in our master bath?

Ta-da! I'm rather chuffed with the final result. I really enjoy bringing accents into our home that hint to the world outdoors, and it's especially nice to have a reminder of leaves during these cold, grey winter months!


I've actually been home on staycation for the last two weeks, and I made time to work on a TON of home improvement & craft projects. I'll make an effort to highlight some of them here in the coming weeks!

Happy Hanukkah!

A little cross-stitch button for the festival of lights! Happy Hanukkah!

Another free pattern download!

I recently posted that I was interested in making some of the simple patterns I dream up available to others here on the blog, and then the Free Downloads page was born.


One of the earliest projects I shared when I first started the blog was this little owl cross-stitch:

Guess whoo was added to the Free Downloads page this evening? Enjoy!

Leafy cross-stitch quartet, part 3: the birch leaf!

So we've seen the maple leaf, and the oak leaf, and now it's time for the third member of our leafy quartet: the birch leaf!


I have always loved birch trees. We had a big birch tree in our backyard while I was growing up. I've got to dig up some photos of that old tree, as it features in some of my most cherished childhood memories. My dad used to fuss over that tree more than any others in our yard, watching it for insects, watering it, giving it fertilizer. He always told me that birch trees were delicate, and you had to give them extra care to keep them healthy.


Each time that we travel in Vermont, I can't get enough of the beautiful birch trees there:

At the Dorset Quarry in Dorset, Vermont

At Hildene, The Lincoln Family Home (a must-see!)

More at Hildene

One the grounds of the Southern Vermont Arts Center (SVAC) (another must-see!)

Another lovely spot at SVAC

So it was with fond memories from the distant and recent past that led me to include the birch in our leafy quartet:

The fourth and final leaf in the quartet? Perhaps my favorite of all: the ginkgo — coming soon!

Leafy cross-stitch quartet, part 2: the oak leaf!

I recently shared a maple leaf cross-stitch here, the first in a series of four leafy embroideries. 


The second piece of work in this quartet is an oak leaf. As with my maple leaf, I had good reasons to pay homage to the oak. If you have been following along here for some time, you may remember that in February of 2010, our home had a close encounter with an oak tree following an especially fierce, Hudson Valley blizzard. Here's how our house looked when it was over:

Thank goodness for those power lines! If the tree hadn't landed on them, 
it would have dropped straight down -- onto our car!

To give you a sense of what the storm was like, we felt like it went like this:

OK, maybe that's a bit of an exaggeration, but it was a rough night.


Anyway, she was a beautiful old tree, and once I got over my annoyance at her uninvited visit (and the ensuing insurance company interactions that were needed to clean up her mess), I really was sad that she wasn't around anymore.


So here's my little memorial to the oak tree that mercifully did not crush our car and gave us a little excitement in our first winter in the country.

Fresh out of the hoop.

Close-up of the stitching.

All framed up and ready for hanging!

And the next leaf I'll share will be the birch leaf!


BUT FIRST -- there's still two chances left to get in on the Pay It Forward craft swap and receive a hand-crafted item made just for you by me! Interested? Have a gander over here and be one of the next two folks to comment and YOU'RE IN.

National HIV Testing Day -- June 27, 2011

I've mentioned before that I like to cross-stitch on my long daily commute into New York City, but I don't think I've ever said what it is that I do at the end of that trip each day. Since 1995, I've been working in human services and public health, and my work has been focused specifically on HIV/AIDS prevention, testing and treatment for the last five years.


Tomorrow is a big day for those of us who work in HIV, because it's National HIV Testing Day. 

On National HIV Testing Day, we make a special effort to make sure that EVERYONE knows how important it is to know their HIV status by getting tested. 

If you'd like to find a free HIV testing location near you, just stick your zip code in below and hit SEARCH:

I am fortunate enough to do this work with a pretty incredible team of people, so I have stitched up some red ribbons that I'll be giving out to my awesome colleagues tomorrow:

HIV testing is quick and easy! Even President and Mrs. Obama have done it:

Don't delay! Take the HIV test today.

Leafy cross-stitch quartet, part 1: the maple leaf!

I am so excited to share my latest cross-stitch project with you! For quite a while, I've been wanting to create a series of silhouette pieces, and in April, I finally sketched out some leaf silhouette patterns and got to stitching. 


Steven and I chose four different trees that we like for inclusion in our little quartet, and the first one I stitched was the maple. The maple made the cut because we have a maple tree in our yard, because the maple leaf has an interesting shape, and because everyone knows that they deserve it after being oppressed by the oaks for so long. 


Here's a snapshot of my original sketch along with some early stitching. Silhouette cross-stitches are ideal for a commuting stitcher like me; once the outline is done, it's so easy to sit on the train and fill it in without needing to count or consult a pattern any further!

And here's a progress pic that I captured on my ride to work one morning: 

As you can see in this image, I decided to experiment with stitching all the left to right stitches first... 

i.e., these stitches: / 

and then I went back over the whole thing and stitched my right to left stitches. 

i.e., these: \  

I WILL NEVER DO THIS AGAIN. This piece had a weird optical effect because it was stitched like this, and it gave me a wicked headache to look at it for the rest of the project!

But I persevered of course. And here's how it looked post-stitching, washing and steaming (I'm using a steamer on my work these days instead of an iron, and I much prefer it—I think it's gentler on the threads):

Here's a close-up:

And this morning in a fit of ambition, it was framed!

Up next: the maple's oppressor, the mighty oak!

Fourteen Countess turns one!

Today is my blog birthday! It's hard to believe that a whole year has passed since I wrote this. To celebrate, I'd like to share a special WIP that I'm working on.


It was Stitch in Public day on Saturday, and that motivated me to unearth a project that I've been meaning to finish forever. My mom started stitching this project over twenty years ago, and I've finally picked it back up:

When it's done, it will be the Serenity Prayer:

Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change;

Courage to change the things I can; and

Wisdom to know the difference.

I've been focusing more on stitching things that I designed myself in the last year, but it's kind of nice to work on something more traditional again, especially something with a message that I have found so helpful over the years. It will be even nicer to finish up a project that my mom once worked on. Is anybody else working on an especially meaningful project these days? Please feel free to leave a comment and share it with us!