Dear Friends,
A quick note here to let you know that the Let’s Celebrate Pennant Banner B is now available at the bottom of the home page and will remain there for free for approximately 1 week when I replace it with the letter C. I have moved the letter A to my Etsy shop.
Blessings everyone,
Nancy
Dear Friends,
I hope you are all doing well this summer. This morning it is a cool, rainy day here in Michigan but I am hopeful the sun will come out this afternoon. I’m trying to grab hold of all the summer days we have left as I know it will be only a few short weeks and the beautiful green leaves will be turning bright yellow orange and red.
Now that my travel is over with it is time for me to hit hard back with my weight loss journey. This past week I’ve been back to the gym every day. I went to Weight Watchers on Saturday and I am also following the Daniel Plan in conjunction with Weight Watchers. It is a Christian lifestyle program based on Faith, Food, Fitness, Focus and Friends.
From my original weight, I am only down 8 pounds now. At one point I was down 14 pounds. Oh how they can quickly come on when we are out of our routines. Anyway, now I know I will have a stretch here where I can focus on healthy eating and exercise and I am truly trying to turn some of this into good habits. Portion control and sweets are both my downfall.
If any of you have tried the Daniel Plan or are using it currently, shoot me an e-mail or leave a comment. I’d love to hear how you are doing.
Blessings everyone,
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Dear Friends,
I love to look at great inspiration on the web and yes, it is time to be thinking of our Christmas embroidery projects. This week Embroidery Library released a free Christmas Lookbook that I am happy to share it with you here. If you didn’t get a chance to see it or missed it in your mail, you can look at it right here on my blog. Just click the “Click to Read” button on the photo.
Yes they have some beautiful designs, but also take note in how they use them. The designs are on pillows, tote bags, tags, turned into ornaments and much more. Let this lookbook also be an inspiration to use your current designs in your stash in some new and fun ways. And of course, it is also fun to get a few new updated designs each year for the holidays.
Enjoy!
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Dear Friends,
Banners are so much fun and bring a smile to everyone’s face. They are a perfect decoration for any season or event. So I’m excited to share with you my newest alphabet design titled “Let’s Celebrate”.
“Let’s Celebrate” is an applique pennant banner alphabet designed for the 5 x 7 hoop. I have created a fun and whimsical alphabet that will be ideal for birthdays, baby and bridal showers, holidays, and other celebrations. Each letter has just a touch of applique that retain a raggy edge.
I’ve stitched my alphabet here on felt but fabric or burlap would also look great.
Each week I will release a new letter and then the previous letter will be for sale in my Etsy shop.
Please be sure to tell your embroidery friends to hop on over here so they can get started with this set here at the beginning.
Enjoy the letter A this week.
Blessings,
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Chili pepper design comes from Embroidery Library
It was a sad day for me as I had to say good bye to my dear friend Laura. I’m leaving on vacation and when I return she will be gone and getting settled in the great southwest state of Arizona. Laura is both my neighbor and also my gym buddy. Knowing we would meet at the gym is what would help keep me motivated to get up and go. I hate exercise.
Having lived in Arizona, twice, I know how southwest décor is very popular down there so I made a couple of hand towels with chili peppers to help her feel like she is fitting in. 🙂
I took some twine and tied it in a bow for an added embellishment and stitched it in place.
I will miss you Laura. Best wishes to you!
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Dear Friends,
A very quick note here to remind you to grab the letters U, V, W and X for free down at the bottom of my home page. They will be replaced with the letters Y and Z tomorrow. As always, you will be able to find them in the Embroidery It Etsy Shop.
Following that I am away with the family for two weeks. A new series will begin once I return.
I hope you are all having the very BEST of summers!
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Hi Friends,
I’ve returned from a visit to see my parents in Kansas this past week and I want to share a couple of quick pics I took.
I’m so happy to say that Dad is really holding his own now. His last PSA was 274 which was down from 276. Yes you read that right for those of you who know about this and that it should be ‘0’ in men. He has been taking the essential oil capsules I gave him which contain frankincense. Dad calls them his ‘Nancy vitamins’ and he takes one, twice a day. I think he gets his PSA levels taken again next month so it will be interesting to see if the frankincense has helped any more. I’ve been doing a lot of reading about this online and it is one of those things that can’t hurt him. Since he is not having any more chemo or other cancer treatments why not give it a try. There is a lot of research being done with frankincense and I’m sure in a few years we will know more about its uses. For those of you interested in what he is taking, it is called ‘Deep Blue’ and it is from the company DoTerra. I have no affiliation with this company nor do I endorse any of its products. It is just something we are trying as his prostate cancer is now in both his lymph nodes and bones.
I love this picture of my dad. I really love it. I think he looks strong in this photo and that is how I always remember my daddy as being a strong and good man. That is my mom behind him. This is the exercise room at the independent living apartments where they are now living. A nurse comes in twice a day to do some minor medical care for him. I’m so thankful there is someone who is around to keep an eye on them.
This is the last quilt top my mom has pieced. I love the colors in it and I hope one day I can quilt as good as she does. She has such a good eye for color and her piecing is perfect. Mom, in general, is doing well but bless her heart she has just come down with a case of shingles since I left. She had the shingles vaccine a couple of years ago so I’m hopeful it will only be a mild case and have no lasting effects.
As always, thank you for your prayers for them. They are appreciated more than you know.
With love to you all,
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Dear Friends,
I’m wishing each of you in the United States a very happy 4th of July. And for my friends outside the US a very happy day to each of you as well!
We will be spending the day at home as a family. I have bratwursts to grill along with corn on the cob, coleslaw and watermelon. We will even shoot off a few fireworks as well. With all the rain we get up here in Michigan we don’t have the worry of it being a fire hazard. We won’t do too many because our sweet old beagle gets frightened by the sound of them. Poor thing.
My machine embroidered Joyful Flags are a quick and easy decoration for the holiday. They are made entirely in the hoop and are done in just a few minutes. The raggy edge can be cut straight or use your pinking sheers for more country charm. All you need are wooden skewers found in your grocery store and a little ribbon finishes them off!
Put them in your potted plants, or in a small soda pop bottle and place on your picnic table tomorrow for a centerpiece. You can even put them in the ice buckets with the drinks.
Like I said, you can make a bunch lickety-split and use them to decorate all over the house.
The Joyful Flags can be found in my Etsy Store HERE.
One more quick note… As a reminder to what I wrote in my newsletter, this next week I will be visiting my parents in Kansas for about a week. The Rick Rack letters U, V, W and X will remain available until July 15th. Should any of you try to reach me, I will get back to you after I return home.
Happy 4th Everyone!!
Nancy
Be creative daily and live life beautifully!
Dear Friends,
Congratulate the new big sister or big brother in your life. So often all the attention is on the new beautiful baby that is being showered with gifts and the older sibling can feel left out. Now you can make something special just for them!
World’s Sweetest Big Sister and World’s Greatest Big Brother
Each design comes in two sizes, 4″ and 5″.
The 4″ fits the 4 x 4 hoop and the 5″ fits the 5 x 7 hoop.
Both are applique and then embellish with fun items like buttons or a bow.
How fun would these be on a shirt, tote bag, back pack and more!
Designs are available HERE in my Etsy store.
Happy Embroidering!
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Over this past month, losing weight has been very difficult for me. On May 16th I was down to my lowest that I had seen in some time. I could even tell in my face as well as my waistline that I had lost 14 solid pounds. I was almost half way to my 30 pound weight loss goal. Then came Tim’s graduation. We had lots of family visiting us for a week. The week after that was the week before our vacation so no motivation that week knowing what was ahead. Then came a week of vacation to a country I’d never visited before and I wanted to experience it all and that included food. I know I all I just gave you were excuses.
Since May 16th I watch the scale as it slowly crept up. The day after our vacation I was now up 6 pounds. Sigh. I worked so hard for those 14 pounds.
Now that I am home from vacation I’m trying very hard to get back into the groove of things. Mike and I went to Weight Watchers on Saturday. I’ve been back to the gym or walk/jogging 3 1/4 miles at home. Even though I’ve been back to Weight Watchers, I’m finding it difficult to stay on the program. Afternoons are so difficult for me and I’ve said it before I hate exercise. I wish I liked it but I just don’t. The thing is, I think it is probably the most important thing we can do for our bodies.
I’ve been giving this a lot of thought. You can agree or disagree with me, it is just my own opinion here. There are so many good things we can do for our bodies. Things like: eating right, exercise, stop smoking, decrease stress, getting plenty of sleep, and the list goes on.
All these things are important, but I feel like one item on this list trumps all the others by just a smidgen. That item is exercise.
The reason I think it trumps the rest is because if we exercise, that will help us lose weight. It will help us get better sleep. It decreases depression. It lowers our blood pressure, our cholesterol and in general re-sets our bodies hormones. It just does so many good things for our bodies.
When I say exercise, what I’m referring to is actually getting my heart rate up. I think it is that increase in heart rate is what does the re-setting our bodies need and releases all the right chemicals.
I was on the treadmill today. There is a place on each side of it for me to place a 5 pound hand weight so I use two of those. I walk for a while. Then I lift the 10 pounds, 5 in each hand, over my head up and down as I walk. That gets my heart rate up. I can do this for about a minute. Then I just walk for a while. Next I increase the speed. Normally up to 5 or 5.5 miles but today I went up to 7 miles an hour! Woo Hoo! I can barely do that for a minute. Then I walk again for a while. Over the course of 30 minutes I will alternate these things and I get in 3 weight liftings and 3 run/jogs. That is 6 times during my workout I get my heart rate really up there. I hate it.
But I feel great when I’ve finished. And that is why I force myself to do it. Friends, I just have to learn to like exercise. I feel like this is the real key to improving my overall health. Oh how I wish I liked exercise. What can I do to like it more?
Did you watch America’s Got Talent last week? Did you see that 96 year old lady dance? Wowsa! She looks younger than my parents who are 10 years younger than her. I bet that lady has moved her body all her life and I want to be like that, vibrant and fully alive till the day God calls me home.
Last year mom got me a Nutribullet for my birthday – Thanks Mom!! I love that thing and make myself a smoothie most every morning for breakfast. The recipe is the same each day except that I change out the fruit for whatever I have on hand.
Nancy’s Banana Blueberry Smoothie Recipe – Just blend all ingredients together
I’m so glad I can ramble here on my blog. Sometimes I just need to get my thoughts out of my head and if you’ve read this far then thanks for reading my friend.
Have a wonderful day everyone.
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Dear Friends,
Before vacation I started doing a quilt along called Farm Girl Fridays. We are piecing together the quilt from Lori Holt’s Book “Farm Girl Vintage.” These blocks just make me H-A-P-P-Y!
There are 42 different blocks but of course you can make as many or as few as you like and it is a great scrappy quilt so use up that fabric stash.
Use #FarmGirlFridays on Instagram and you can find me there @Embroidery_It.
Please feel free to join in and if you do so, leave me a comment so I can find you on Instagram too!
Blessings to each of you,
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Dear Friends,
This past week Mike and I celebrated our 27th anniversary. He had business overseas so he arranged to take a week of vacation before his meetings began and he brought me with him for the first week. When we lived in Germany for 4 years we never made it to Ireland so this has been one of our bucket list items that we now get to cross off. 
For one week we made a circle beginning in Dublin and circling through the center of Ireland and then going down south ending back in Dublin. I wish I could have packed each and every one of you sweet friends in my suitcase to come with me.
It was pure beauty and numerous times throughout the trip I said how I could live here–if it weren’t for driving on the left side of the road with very, v-e-r-y narrow roadways. We rented a car for the week and I was so thankful for Mike to do the driving. I was the extra pair of eyes watching for him and reminding stay left! It was cool temperatures 55 to 60 degrees. We were so blessed that there were only a couple of showers during our time there.
There were fields and fields of sheep everywhere. I don’t think I could ever get tired of looking at them. My souvenir from this trip was a knitted wool sweater.
And there were stone walls that bordered everything from roads to sheep pens. The stone walls made the countryside look like a beautiful patchwork quilt.
And the flowers were in all their glory now. Wild flowers everywhere.
Beautiful old and interesting architecture.
The town of Dingle was incredibly charming. Something I truly enjoyed about this trip is that Ireland is not overly crowded. We attended church on Sunday and it was sadly empty. Mostly an older generation with only a couple of children attending. The people we met were cheerful and friendly and they loved to talk your ear off.
Hearty meals everywhere we went. (next week an update on my weight loss)
We did a lot of hiking along the Cliffs of Moher.
Mike and I on our anniversary.
Blessings to each of you,
Nancy
Be Creative Daily and Live Life Beautifully
Dear Friends,
Our youngest has now graduated high school. Bitter sweet for this mama. What a joy it was to have Katie home and all the family together.
Hubby and I are celebrating our 27th anniversary and getting away for a week.
Please feel free to leave comments or questions and know that I will get back to you June 9th.
I hope you are all enjoying your summer!
Blessings,
Nancy
Friends, I am a headband girl. Every day I keep my hair pulled back from my face with headbands or clips and I’m just giddy over my new pattern for my Retro Reversible Headband and to personalize it I’ve included an alphabet monogram!
Here you have another great craft show seller. This is a great stash buster and best of all, the monogram is done in your 4 x 4 hoop!
These stitch up quickly and easily. I’ve included step-by-step instructions with lots of photos. It is an easy project for the beginning sewer. Just print the included downloadable sewing pattern.
Please note that there is machine sewing required to stitch the headband.
The Retro Reversible Headband is fun and fashionable and will put a smile on your face. You can stitch up one for every outfit in no time!
Have the best day ever everyone!
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Dear Friends,
I’ve had the pleasure this past week of working hand-in-hand with a mother whose precious daughter requires tube feedings. She uses feeding pads on her daughter because the pads protect delicate skin and can help prevent granulation which can be painful. Gauze and tape can be a skin irritant so we experimented for the best alternative.
We examined the feeding tube pads from all angles to create the perfect size and shape for absorbency, comfort and ease of use. Note the light stitching and the off set center. These both help to make this the perfect feeding tube pad. As an added plus they are fun and fashionable 🙂
Quickly and easily, you may now create a stack of super soft and absorbent pads in a snap for a loved one.
Step-by-step instructions included.
Made entirely in your 4 x 4 hoop.
Finished design is 2 3/8”.
You can find the machine embroidery pattern for the g-tube pad HERE in the Embroidery It Etsy Shop.
What a joy it was to use my machine embroidery to help in some small way bless the life of another. That was something I always hoped for with this business.
With love, hugs and blessings to each and every one of you.
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Dear Friends,
Just a note to let you know that the Rick Rack Letter S is now available here for free for one week. Be sure to grab it now!
Blessings,
Nancy
Be Creative Daily and Live Life Beautifully
Dear Friends,
Grab the letter Q today because tomorrow, the 20th, I will be replacing it with the letter R.
Embroidery Blessings!
Nancy
be creative daily and live life beautifully
Sometimes a gal just needs to sew a bit for herself.
I’ve been seeing these adorable retro headbands all over the place and have been wanting to make several for myself.
After a quick online search I found a pattern. HERE.
And I found this great YouTube tutorial for putting it together that has a couple of tricks to make turning it right side out even easier and look better when finished and I also liked stitching it first and then cutting it out. You will see what I mean by this on the video. The YouTube tutorial isn’t for this exact headband but the principles are the same.
This was my first attempt. It is a little tight on my head and I didn’t have the fold over elastic on hand so I used other elastic from my stash. Also from my stash, this used just over one strip from a jelly roll.
Also next time I plan to do a bit of embroidery on the tails of the headband.
One more thing…You can make the headband reversible by using a coordinating fabric on the other side.
This was a fun and easy, super cute just for me project.
As soon as I get to the store and get the correct elastic I will be making more!
Hugs Everyone,
Nancy
Be Creative Daily and Live Life Beautifully!
Wishing all you sweet wonderful women a very Happy Mother’s Day.
Love you all,
Nancy
Hi Friends,
What do you think about all this social media these days? There are so many social media hangouts that some days it is crazy and overwhelming for me. I have a girlfriend who reads Facebook like the morning newspaper. Are you like that?
I’ve tried a number of the different social media spaces and like some better than others and for different reasons.
If you are involved in social media, I want to let you know where to find me. I’m kind of sporadic on some of these places but here is either where I am or have been. You can click on the links in red below to take you to each of my social media sites.
Facebook – This is the link to Embroidery It’s page so all you will find here is Embroidery It info. I’m honestly kind of hit and miss with Facebook.
Pinterest – I started with Pinterest at its inception. I always considered it to be my own personal magazine where I could go to find inspiration. There is some machine embroidery here but there are recipes, crafts, home décor, health related items and so much more. Take a look at my Pinterest board and you will get a glimpse at all the things I love. Pinterest is a place I like to hang out.
Instagram – I’m really REALLY new with Instagram. I’ve been having my daughter teach me how to use it. It is mostly Embroidery It sprinkled with just a few additional photos of our family as well as pictures I take that I like. I’ve got to say though, I like Instagram a lot. You will see me more and more on Instagram. One of the things I like is that it is so quick and easy. I also like how I can see what people are up to just by a quick glance at a photograph.
YouTube – I used to do YouTube more than I do now. When I did basket weaving I did a lot of basket weaving videos. I have a few faith based videos on my channel and finally I have just a couple of lonely embroidery videos. I plan to create more at some point in the future but nothing immediately.
Twitter and Linked In – I have accounts but have never used them.
So Pinterest and Instagram are my top two. I think that seeing inspiration visually really appeals to me. Where are your favorite social media hangouts? I’d love to hear.
