Dear Friends,
So it is the first day of spring!

As I look outside my window I see a blanket of snow that is still a good 12″ deep.  The streets are clear though and under the trees where the branches protected the ground I am seeing grass!  🙂
The chipmunks, or ground squirrels, are out as of a few days ago and I watched six of them scamper back and forth over the snow.  The robins are showing up as well as more birds singing.  I know this winter won’t last forever.  As I walk our dog more life is showing.  Even when we had the coldest of winter days, God gave me some beauty to look at.  There were beautiful red cardinals and deer would walk right up to the house.  Poor things were hungry and I’d set out carrot peelings and cores of cauliflower and cabbage.  I’m sure now they are finding more food.  Oh, and I saw two swans in the river now that the river is not frozen over.  Beauty!

So in celebration of the first day of spring, I made myself a long sleeve t-shirt with a robin.  I hope you are enjoying spring in your neck of the woods.

Blessings,
Nancy

I have been working hard at digitizing and have put together these sweet applique quilt squares.  I’ve worked on getting the in’s and out’s just so and making sure the cover stitches cover like they should.

This was all done by me by hand.  I drew out the design and created the rick rack cover stitch by hand.  No auto digitizing here.  I wanted to make sure you would all get the best results!

Currently they are available only in PES format and the designs fit in the 4 x 4 hoop.  Can’t you just imagine these on an apron pocket or kitchen towel?  How about the pastel nine patch below on a baby blanket or burp cloth?

I have many more quilt squares planned that I am working on.  I must say, I have a new appreciation for digitizers and what goes on behind the scenes to enable the designs to get to you!

Most importantly though, I have been having fun.  We are still up to our knees in snow so digitizing has kept me busy this winter and I can’t describe the good feeling of satisfaction I’ve had in watching my very own designs go from imagination to stitching out.

I will let you in on a little secret.  I’m also working behind the scenes here in getting my very own website up.  Squeal!!!  It may be some time yet, but I’m working on it.

Thank you for letting me toot my horn here.  I look forward to sharing more of my creations with you.

Warm hugs and Embroidery blessings,
Nancy

I’ll have more of my digitizing to show you very soon!!

Finally, with all this crazy snow, and I think we have had about 120″ now, we have had some leaks in our basement since the snow is starting to thaw.  Unfortunately they have been in my sewing room.  🙁

I’ve set up a table in Emily’s bedroom, since she is away at college, and set up my embroidery shop there.  She has a large window that faces the front of the house so stitching in her room is really quite pleasant.

The leaks are thankfully slow, just a seepage, but still.  Frustrating.  Mike cut out some of the drywall in my sewing room and we have the floor trim pulled off and carpet pulled back.  Just as we were finishing the other work in the basement remodel this happens.  Always something.  The leaks should be sealed this next week then Mike can replace the drywall and trim.  We will put new carpet padding down and I’m hoping a professional carpet clean will do the trick and the existing can be replaced.

That’s it for today.  Here in Michigan the sun is shining and only a medium weight jacket is needed this afternoon.  Yeah!!

Embroidery Blessings Everyone,
Nancy

Dear Friends,

Today is an important day on the Christian calendar as it is Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent.  It is a time of preparation for Easter the highest of Holy Days. It is a time of repentance and prayer. Many people use this season to give up something as a sacrifice and to offer that sacrifice up to God. For many years, I have taught religion, this year to first graders, and I would speak to them about Lent and having a Lenten resolution. Those children can come up with some thoughtful answers. “I’m going to share my toys every day.” “I’m going to help my mother every day with chores.” “I’m going to pray every day.” Some I’m sure have heard their parents speak about what they are doing for lent and will say, “I’m not going to watch TV,” “I’m not going to eat candy,” and so on. I really stress to them, and to my own children that this is a time not just of sacrifice, but a time to keep Christ first and foremost in our thoughts and in our actions. It is a time to work on becoming closer to Christ and becoming a better person.
I’ve been giving prayerful consideration over the past few weeks as to what I would do this year for my Lenten resolution.  For the next 40 days I’ve decided to focus on surrendering.  Surrendering my day to Christ to let His will be done through me, surrendering that His will be done, not my will be done.

Jesus spent 40 days in the wilderness in preparation for what was to come.  May we use this season of Lent to prepare our hearts for Christ’s ultimate gift, his death and resurrection so that we may have eternal life with Him.  May Jesus remain at the forefront of my thoughts and may His light shine through me.

Our daughter Emily was his sponsor.  She flew in from New Mexico for three days to be with him during this holy event.

The wooden spoon cleverly holds the carrier together.  This idea was inspired by Janay.

Dear Friends,
I have learned a thread tip that I’m implementing right away and here it is…

Limit your thread selection.

What you see in the photo above is my thread collection.  Actually that isn’t even all of it, I have about another 40 spools that aren’t on the pegboard.  I guess I have a thread addiction and it needs to stop.  You can easily see in the photo that I have quite a few pinks and reds.  Why, oh why, do I need every shade.  I don’t.

I’m using up my thread and then I’m limiting the colors I purchase from here on out.  I’m limiting them to 50 colors – tops.  Four shades of one color is sufficient.  I don’t need 50 shades of gray!  I have my favorite colors I often reach for and many times, the other colors just sit and collect dust {not good for our sewing machines.}

There are several benefits to cutting back on all the color choices.  By limiting thread colors, this will save me time on thread selection.  I will easily know which colors I need to re-order.  When someone visits and wants something special done for them, fewer selections will make the selection process easier for them as well.  It will save $$$ by not buying willy-nilly and then just having the colors sit unused.

Have you ever considered limiting your thread selection?  I’ve heard of several people doing this with good results and I can really see the benefits of doing so.  Definitely something I am doing.

Embroidery Blessings,
Nancy

Happy Valentine’s Day Friends,

As a Valentine’s day gift for Mike I embroidered these towels.  Our old towels were at the point you could almost see through them.  Mike mentioned how we should get some new ones and he wanted some that were oversized.  I found these at Sam’s Club or Costco.  I’m sorry I don’t remember which as I bought them a month ago.  The towels are really large and called a bath sheet.  Oh they are so soft.  I couldn’t give them to him without a bit of machine embroidery bling!  🙂

The designs come from Anita Goodesign and the CD is titled Vintage Elegance.  The birds and parts of the flowers are applique and I chose some pretty scraps of fabric that remind me of spring.  The picture below was taken in our backyard yesterday.  I haven’t been complaining about the snow but this is getting a bit ridiculous.

For those of you who have been affected by the severe storms throughout the country, please know our family is praying for your safety and that you may have heat and electricity.

So, Mike was quite happy with his Valentine’s day gift.  I moved the dining table over in front of the fireplace and made him an extra yummy, romantic surf and turf supper and He gave me a box of chocolates and a card.  Sweet man.  He even helped me with the dishes.  I’ll keep him.  🙂  I hope you all were able to share Valentine’s day with the one you love.

With love and blessings to you all,
Won’t you please be my Valentine?
Nancy

Dear Friends,
I’ve been busy playing and learning my Generations digitizing software and making these fun word flowers and snowflakes.  Look closely at the picture above.  Can you read what word has been used to create the image?

In the coaster here I thought “Be Mine” was appropriate for Valentine’s Day.  I stitched both of these on felt and for the bottom one, I’ve attached some white rick-rack to the edge for a sweet look.

I’ve been busy doing a bit of custom work these days.  Font was built into my Brother machine.
Blessings,
Nancy

These designs are from  Michelle at Needle Little Embroidery.  I’m so pleased with how they turned out.

To get the heart centered on the flap, on this particular design, the outline of the heart stitches first.  (That is one of the nice things about Michelle’s designs.  This helps prevent puckering if you are stitching on fabric by doing the outline first.)  So I hooped my stabilizer and stitched the heart on just the stabilizer.  Then I held the stabilizer up to the window and placed the envelope flap right where I wanted it.  I used the light shining through the window to guide my placement.  Then I used just a small bit of masking tape to tape the envelope in place to the stabilizer.  I backed up my stitching and stitched the outline again along with the rest of the design on the envelope.

Much love to all of you and I want to thank each of you who leave comments or send me an e-mail.  So glad to have you reading.  Sending you a {{{hug}}}
Nancy

Embroidery It by Nancy JacobsSee On

I have had a love affair with Pinterest from the first day we met.  I’ve heard people say, “I just don’t get the whole Pinterest thing.” If that is you, let me describe how I view Pinterest.  Maybe you will see why I like it so much.

The way I look at Pinterest is that it is like my own personal magazine.  I buy a lot of magazines.  I love to read them, I love the inspiration I get from them.  I tear out articles, recipes and ideas from their pages and those torn out pages usually get moved from place to place in the house creating clutter.  Eventually they either get filed or thrown away.  Then it always happens, I can’t find the article or recipe when I want to lay my hands on it.

With Pinterest, I’m able to collect those inspirational tidbits from the web all in one place and I can easily locate them when needed.  I just create a board for each subject that I’m interested in.  When I want to be inspired, I flip through my Pinterest boards and there is always something to spark my creativity.  By the way, I’ve got plenty of machine embroidery inspiration on my Pinterest boards.

Have you tried Pinterest yet?  It’s free and it’s fun!

Click on the Pinterest logo above or click HERE and it will link you to my Pinterest site, follow me if you like, and you can see what inspires me around the big wide web.  It just might inspire you too!

Blessings,
Nancy

The above shirt says “PILOT.”

Quick post here.  I embroidered several items for Emily.  Unfortunately I didn’t get pictures of them all and these are just a couple of quick shots.  She got pajamas for Christmas and wanted her initial on the pocket.  The only way for me to get it on the pocket and still keep it as a usable pocket was to remove the stitching on one side and across the bottom.  This allowed the pocket to be placed flat on the embroidery hoop.  Once the “E” was stitched out I then re-sewed the pocket to the pajamas.  I was really pleased with how well the pocket looked as I don’t think you could ever tell I took some of the stitching out.  The pajamas have some silver metallic thread stripes in the fabric so I stitched her initial in silver metallic.

The letter “E” was one that was built into my machine.  The pajamas had been through the wash and not pressed for this picture.  Sorry for the wrinkles but take my word it looks good.

Dear Friends,
I did this towel as a special gift.  The heart with dog tags is from Lynnie Pinnie.  I purchased the blank heart with dog tags design and then I digitized the lettering and added it.  It reads, “Some Heroes Wear Capes, My Hero Wears Combat Boots.”  Then I added the name to the dog tag. The inspiration for this design comes from Stitched By Janay.

With the move to Michigan and all the activity around here, I had set my Generations software aside.  It was so much fun to get it out and create.  You will probably soon be seeing more of my work having digitizing added to it.  🙂

Embroidery Blessings,
Nancy

First from my dear Mother-In-Law Ann, I received these Anita Goodesign Holiday Packs!  It’s a total of 9 collections in these two packs.  I’m so excited to stitch these out.  Actually I already started on one of them.

Next from one of my closest friends Vicki, I received an JoAnn’s gift card.  I went a little crazy at JoAnn’s getting their Christmas fabric while it was on clearance.  There are holiday placemats fabric panels, a stitched advent calendar panel and just some super cute fabric in here.  Remember that quilt class I signed up for?  I went to it the other night and started using some of the fabric you see here.  I can’t wait to show you my finished quilt in a few weeks.

Finally, a dear friend, Martha Ann, who I met this past year through my blog here sent me some wonderful items to decorate my home.  I opened up the package to see a lovely stitched bag and inside the bag were these lace goodies.  They are Anita Goodesign – Love their stuff!  Martha blogs over at Just Another Thread so you can pop over and see what she is currently creating.  The internet is a wonderful thing to allow me to meet such wonderful women who enjoy machine embroidery and creativity.