Happy Thanksgiving!

Mr. Turkey is handsome, but he is also delicious. This is one of my very favorite holidays! This year we go down to Indiana to my brother's house for the big meal. They eat earlier in the day, so we'll be up bright and early in the morning to get there for the turkey feast.

We used to always go out to Iowa to visit with all my grandparents and I'll always fondly remember bonding with my grandma over her fabric collection and sewing plans. My Grandma N was usually very nervous at the holiday and going over all our crafty interests would calm her down. Sometimes she'd send me home with some of her collection, but that wasn't why I liked going through it all with her.

My husband and my dad LOVE watching hours and hours of high school football tournament games on the local TV stations. They both prefer these games because they are exciting and have no commercials.

I hope you will be making nice new memories this Thanksgiving with your friends and families.

Doggie hair clips

Someone suggested that I should make a doggie version of my hairclips so this is the result. They are pretty cute! I adapted a design from one of my Japanese felt craft books. The felt disc is about 2 inches across and the snap hairclip is sewn inside.



I've stitched up about 50 disc hairclips like this in various colors and styles. The thing that often happens when I show them to people is they say, "Oh you should make these into pins!" Or if I have a pin design, I hear, "This would be a great girl's barrette!"

This is so nice to hear, so I really have to think of a quick way to make these into either thing based on the preference of my customer.

That stack of 50 took me days and days to make, so I doubt I'll be able to get a similar stack of pins done for the craft show I'm doing at the end of next week. In fact I'm getting pretty nervous about that craft show. I've made a nice stack of these clips and I have a good pile of cute embroidered fabric pouches. I plan to crochet up some wool flowers over the weekend too. My offerings are so small! I hope I have a good enough selection of stuff.

I wanted to sew up some luggage tags and maybe some tissue paper holders too, but someone else in the show is a good sewer and I don't want to step on her game.

Birthday Fabric

Although it has been quiet here at the Susie Can Stitch blog, I have been hand stitching so much I have a crick in my neck and muscle fatigue in my leg because I sit with my leg curled up underneath my body and I get so focused on what I am doing that I forget to move around.

I hope to take some pictures of the pouches and hair pins I've been stitching, but in the meantime, here is some of the Birthday Booty I got a few weeks ago. My family totally gets me:


Mom got that big stack of fat quarters last year at a fabric store we visited together. She also gave me that challenging quilt pattern underneath that is gorgeous but is all curves. Curves freak me out. The stack is so lovely, I've been displaying it like sculpture since I received it. My niece and nephew picked out the bright fat quarters when my brother took them to their local JoAnns. They also picked out those tools which are pom-pom makers.

My SIL said that nephew asked "What does one do with a pom-pom maker?" Craft things with pom-poms! I think I'll use up some of my cheap yarn stash on the pom-poms and use them in my gift wrapping this year.

My husband fueled my video game addiction with a Nintendo DS of my very own. It is totally frivolous, but I love it. Mario totally rocks my world.

It is very strangely cold here in Chicagoland. We'll probably have a white Thanksgiving later this week. My children have the whole week off from school and the sun seems to be setting at like 4:00. It feels surreal, but just the type of weather that justifies my obsessive stitching.

New Tea Towel

My group is finished with round 4 of our Tea Towel Tour at Craftster. My towel has a woodland theme. I did the little birdie in the center from a free pattern by Andrea Zuill "Badbird".

This squirrel is by timpani~jax. So sweet. The leaves are incredibly finely stitched with only one strand of embroidery floss:


Bunny by UrsulaDiamond. Happy bunny is holding a bouquet of little flowers stitched with the lazy daisy stitch:


Sewphie stitched me this lovely fawn. I love the shading details under the belly and the white fur under the chin:


Sewsew-a-gogo stitched up this active squirrel. Can you see how she combined thread colors to do the fur?


Finally, Nannetta stitched up this busy mouse gathering up the beautiful bounty from the forest floor:



Didn't I have talented swap partners? I love my towel so much! What a fun swap!

New Fine Art

I have a wonderful new object in my home! I am very happy to be keeping this for a short time for some friends. It looks fantastic in my living room.


Many thanks to my friends who have loaned this to me for a time.

Hello Kitty Sewing Machine

I did a review of the Hello Kitty Sewing Machine for Craft Critique. This was a long- planned gift for my daughter who turned 8 this summer. She loves it and has made several little beginning projects. Check out my review HERE.

More Pouches

Giraffe Pouches:


Gnomes and Mushrooms:



Alien Invasion:


Do you need me to tell you to vote today? I didn't think so. Husband and I are all set to cancel each other out at the polls!

Edited to add: There were no lines at our polling place although they were processing a steady stream of people. Husband and I did agree on several local election questions and candidates. It took us less than 5 minutes to vote. I'm going to see if I can get that promised free coffee at Starbucks and the free ice cream at Ben and Jerry's although I'm also informed that this can be considered "buying votes" and may be a violation of federal law...

Tulip Embroidery

After reading THIS, I've decided enough is enough, I must have a Pot of my own.... maybe for my birthday or Christmas. I have always preferred rice over pasta. I'm not quite sure why. I use our slow cooker, but I think The Pot will be better for us since I don't usually like to start cooking dinner in the slow cooker right after breakfast.

Here is my last embroidery for Timpani-jax in our Tea Towel Tour 4. Her towel has a 1920's theme and already has three pretty ladies and a cool vintage car so I did these art deco tulips.



I adapted a free vintage pattern available at Needlecrafter.com HERE. I didn't photograph the whole towel so it can be a surprise for the recipient.

The Day After

We are in a sleepy sugar meltdown around here. It turns out that most of our neighbors give out chocolate candy, so my kid's haul from yesterday is really tempting me. I never go for the Skittles, Starburst, and Nerds, it's all about Kit-Kats, Reese's, and Butterfinger for me.

It was a really warm evening so my daughter was able to trick or treat in her sandals. this is amazing because on Monday we had snow flurries here. She was a mouse with red lipstick and glitter makeup. We got my son a funny clip on mustache at the costume store and he thought of going as Burt Reynolds, but decided to be a predatory home mortgage lender instead. He told homeowners in our neighborhood, "Give me candy or I'll take away your house!" Actually, I don't think he really said that at all the houses...



I had a yummy chicken pot pie cooking during the trick-or-treat hours and some of the later kids at the door really were begging me for the chicken soup instead of sugary treats because the house was smelling savory and delicious.