Nuts about Needlepoint » candy

New Canvases from Kathy Schenkel and Melissa Shirley

Janet Perry — Fri, 03 Feb 2012 15:38:06 +0000

I am always so happy at TNNA to go to Kathy Schenkel’s and Melissa Shirley’s booths. They are always full to bursting with great new ideas and canvases I just drool over.

I love Kathy’s bone-shaped ornaments for dogs and this year she has a delightful new set. These are “Things Dogs Do,” all done in a clever, easy-to-stitch style.

She also has mini-socks and ornament rounds for a number of different colleges and universities that aren’t just the usual logo style, often they have iconic buildings or other symbols of the campus.

She also has new dog and people tote bags and new North Woods designs. There are two new Christmas series, a nativity and a stars of Christmas, people associated with Christmas in stars.

A very clever idea is her animal alphabet, available both as a panel and as individual letters. The animals are creatively posed in and around the letters. An unusual ornament series would be to do a name or initials this way.

As always Melissa Shirley has tons of new stuff, so I’ll only hit the highlights.

If you like her pears, but have been wishing for designs that were less geometric, you’ll love her new series that has a different fruit in each pear. With gold backgrounds and fruits and blossoms vining up each shape, they are both elegant and timeless. There are 10 in the series.

She has expanded the selection of her popular crackers with a Thanksgiving series, a new Halloween series that features some of her vintage Halloween characters, pink or gold Christmas crackers, and a set of Christmas toy crackers. There is also a new series of candy canes, mostly stripes, in a modern palette of red, white, green, and light green.

Her newest series is 3-D needlepoint cupcakes. Each design is in two parts, a top and the sides. There are designs for Christmas and Valentine’s.

If you have been collecting Christmas canvases in particular colors, there are conical CHristmas trees in fabric-like patterns in both green and gold. Her acorns have been very popular and a set of Christmas acorns has been added. Her banners have been expanded with a series of pumpkins for Halloween.

There is lots of new stuff from her licensed designers. My favorite of these was Debbie Mumm’s “Trick or Treaters,” a haunted house background with twelve Halloween figures. Three of these are animals,a cat, a raccoon, and some mice, dressed up for Halloween.

There are lots more new canvases including some great seashore and insect pillow designs, and lots of new Christmas stockings. THere’s plenty to love and stitch here.

All Those Lovely Canvases!

Janet Perry — Sat, 18 Dec 2010 14:50:49 +0000

Originally posted 2008-01-29 07:05:16. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

I’m not generally a one to have fits and fits about wanting tons of canvases. So much needlepoint has passed through my hands (I’ve been stitching since 1970 after all), that I almost never go nuts wanting more and more needlepoint.

But last week I visited the long page Melissa Shirley Designs has of their new canvases which debuted at TNNA earlier this month. There was so much great stuff I hardly know where to begin. You can see the whole page here, but I’ll have links to individual canvases throughout the article.

And I really want to share it with you.

They are simple but I really loved the two sets of a dozen needlepoint “lollipops,” two for Halloween (here and here) and two for Christmas (here and here. If you’re a beginning stitcher, try a few of the geometrical designs, more experienced stitchers might want to go crazy with threads and embellishments on the pictoral ones.

I also loved the two canvases with black cats (here’s one of them) which looked like vintage Halloween decorations.

There are also two series of small canvases with a wonderful, but very stitchable Victorian look about them. There is a series of eight charming little girlswith either Jack o’Lanterns or pumpkins. There are also more than 30 new small Santas in a similar style, for everything from a stitching Santa (love his “handknit sweater”) to a traditional bishop to an unusual Asian Santa.

Melissa has become known for her needlepoint bracelets and headbands. This Winter many of her new designs have versions which include these. There is a lovely series with butterflies and a floral ornament. Another just has butterflies by themselves. There is also one with jewel-like beetles and several with shells. There are lots more, in all kinds of styles. All are available as bracelets or headbands.

Many of these coordinate with her larger, realistic canvases. So many of these are so glorious, it’s hard to single them out but here are some of my favorites. My youngest loves mushrooms and she would go nuts over these two canvases. There are also a set of magnificent whales which have the charming qualities of vintage folk art from New England which is so compelling. I also loved the three cat canvases, also in a vintage style. Licensed from Mary LakeThompson is a charming chickadee canvas which really captures the spirit of these little birds.

Melissa also has dress canvases, four in all. They come in two sizes and several styles. There are fantastic nutcrackers (also from Mary Lake-Thompson), new Christmas stockings in many styles, two glorious tree skirts (two choices for background color), and several wonderful folk art cats.

I could go on and on, but go take a look for yourself, I guarantee you’ll find something you want to stitch.

Needlepoint Stitch Guides Site Now Open!

Janet Perry — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 13:28:53 +0000

Order stitch guides like this from my new site.

There’s no doubt about it, stitchers love stitch guides. Our appetite for them is almost insatiable. Talk to any designer and they will tell you shopowners ask about stitch guides all the time.

If a designer has none, they wonder why not. If a designer has some, they want more. And we, as stitchers want them and want them at an affordable price.

Today marks the opening of my new on-line shop, Needlepoint Stitch Guides. Here you will find stitch guides for many popular designers, available both as PDFs (for you to print) or as printed guides). You can order directly from the shop and have your guides as soon as the same day. Talk about immediate stitchy gratification.

It’s the largest on-line shop dedicated to needlepoint stitch guides and related products.

There’s lots more to the site. You’ll find reference information about stitch guides and using them, order forms for my popular custom stitch guides and quick stitch help, and lots more. The site is easy to navigate with guides classified by designer and by subject.

Guides are available for canvases by some of today’s most popular designers including, Melissa Shirley, Kelly Clark, and Raymond Crawford. And for one stop shopping, some designers will allow you to order the canvas at the same time.

There are special products designed to help you make the most of your needlepoint. Background Stitch Guides are stitch and thread suggestions to make your needlepoint shine. Custom versions of them are available at the same low price. Thread Maps help you with a complete listing of threads and areas. Some shops charge up to $50 to pull threads, but with this service you get my expert eye at a low cost. Technique Sheets are specialized sheets (not canvas specific) showing you how to create an effect or do a technique on painted canvas.

I’m committed to sharing my knowledge with you so that your needlepoint can be exciting and beautiful. More products will be added just as fast as I can get them written, so stop back often to see what’s new.

Visit Needlepoint Stitch Guides today and keep stitching!

Wonderful Resource for Free Patterns – About.com

Janet Perry — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 14:37:11 +0000

Earlier this week I spent a happy morning poking around Cheryl Fall’s Needlepoint site at About.com. One of the things I love about the site is that, as a professional designer, Cheryl has a wealth of patterns she is sharing with us, for free.

Before we explore some of the great patterns there, she has a page describing how to use the patterns. This is particularly helpful because it includes instructions on how to print and enlarge the patterns.

Her patterns are designed for beginning and internediate stitchers. The index page for them is organized by category.

Scrap Bag projects are among my favorites and French Braid is a delightful quilt-inspired piece that could be done as a row or two for napkin rings or expanded to make a pillow top. There are also larger projects, such as Asian Maple (a favorite).

While many of the patterns work great for first projects with limited color palettes and all Tent Stitches, some, like Pear Trio, use a variety of stitches.

I’d particularly like to highlight some of the holiday patterns here. Winterscapes is six separate small design that can be used separately or together. I love Holiday Stars which has shaded stars in three colors. You could change the colors or background to make this a great piece for other holidays.

There are also three holiday petit fours. There are ones for Halloween, Hannukah, Easter, birthdays, and the newest one is a pine tree for Christmas.

With so many great patterns and projects, this site should be on your must read list.

A Box of Chocolates

Janet Perry — Mon, 10 Jul 2006 13:59:54 +0000

Here’s a sneak peek at the next stitch guide. It will be for six of Melissa Shirley’s candies (four are pictured above).

Called A Box of Chocolates, I’m writing it with my friend Holly McGuinness of Golden Touch Crafts (http://www.goldentouchcrafts.com). The guide will be available at shops and directly from Golden Touch.

These candies are completely addictive to stitch and I’m sure we won’t be able to resist doing more.

I expect the guide will be available in late August, but check Melissa’s site (http://www.melissashirleydesigns.com) under stitch guides for availability.

Now back to work!