Winter Whimsy Sale

Tuesday night I'm doing a fun craft show with my friend's neighborhood in Evanston, Illinois. This is a group of very talented women and the show is busy!


Usually it is held it at one of the neighbors houses, but the show has outgrown that space! This year Winter Whimsy is Tuesday, December 1 from 7-9pm at the Robert Gold Salon, 2942 Central Street, Evanston, Illinois.

I'll be selling my embroidered pouches:



Hand Dyed Crochet Flowers including red poinsettias



And a big selection of cute embroidered felt hairclips:


Come on by and say hello if you are in the area! I'm baking butterscotch brownies and there will be other refreshments too.

Flirty Taco Chips

These are the flirty taco chips I stitched up for ritapizza in our Tea Towel Tour on Craftster. This is a pattern by Jacque Davis that she made available free in the Hoop Love group on Flickr. Get it HERE.



They are bathing in guacamole. I decided that if Rita doesn't like guacamole, then it is spinach dip. Rita reports that she does like guacamole so all is good! I used chain stitch throughout, except on the eyes and boys' faces. The chain stitch gives the ladies puffed up collagen lips which I like (in stitching, not in real life..)

Here in Chicagoland we have the best, most delicious corn chips ever in the history of taco chips. If you eat Tostitos, I am sorry for you. These are in every store in Chicagoland in big displays. They are so fresh they taste like they are right out of the fryer. They only have four ingredients: corn, lime, corn oil, and salt. They are made locally by El Ranchero. We call them "Chips-in-a-Green-Bag" at our house. I don't know if other people call them that, but it seems like when I say that everyone around here knows exactly the chips I refer to.


Interestingly, their price seems to fluctuate with the price of corn, but they are always a better price than commercial brands. My son is one of those kids who really likes very crunchy snacks. If we don't have green apples and Chips-in-a-Green-Bag in the house, I better get to the store quick!

Craft Social

Last Friday I went to Craft Social in Chicago. (Actually, it was in Evanston, but nevermind...) There were many crafts to choose from including Embellished Dinner Napkins, Advanced Paper Airplanes, Fabric Coil Bowls, Paper Greeting Cards, and many more. The cost was only $5 and it was really fun!



Since I haven't been stitching, I chose a craft that was familiar to me: Felt and Button Flowers. These are really funky and our teacher had a box of lovely vintage glittery things to use as embellishments.



We noted that the felt was sort of floppy and flimsey, so I stitched together two layers for stability.

I don't like to make a big thing about men crafting because I think that men are just as creative as women, but here is a man spotted next to me learning to stitch. His creation has a superhero medallion look to it.

The stitcher next to me used velvet ribbon as one of her layers. It looked very sophisticated, but I didn't get a picture!

It was fun! I hope they have another Craft Social really soon! I could teach embroidered felt mascots!

Chicago 2016

It would be awesome if the 2016 Olympics comes to Chicago. Last week the IOC was here sizing up our beautiful city as a venue. This video features Chicagoland Olympians including Michael Jordan and my childhood next-door neighbor Paul Moran who has competed in 5 (!) Paralympics in sitting volleyball and tennis.

EDIT: They are here right now! Unfortunately, we are having very chilly weather and a chance of snow.

Back to the Art Institute of Chicago

I tried to see the Edward Hopper and Winslow Homer exhibition at the Art Institute of Chicago, but when I went with my mom, it was WAY too crowded. Alas... now it is gone... Mom saw it three times and I guess it was hugely popular, probably because people really like to see realism in paintings. I don't happen to care that much about realism in art, I like all the periods... It was disappointing to miss this popular show, but we didn't count on the crowds!

We took the time to go through the modern section of the museum and looked at a couple of our favorite periods. Last time we went, we saw the impressionists, so we skipped them this time. I only took a couple of photos. I love the fauvists. This fauve painting is by Vasily Kandinsky:


My favorite is Matisse. I think he liked fabric patterns just like me:


This playful one is Paul Klee:


This one interested us. It's by Marc Chagall whose work is full of exuberant storytelling. This one is called Birth, but I don't think it was a happy day for this family:



Finally, these two beauties are by Pierre Bonnard. You must make a trip to Chicago to see these paintings in person. My photos don't capture their beautiful, intense, deep color.


My mom always tells the story of her first year of teaching second grade back in the early sixties and she had a lovely modern art poster up in her classroom. I think she said it was by Kandinsky... Anyway, she enjoyed the painting for awhile until it suddenly occurred to her that it was a big painting of a naked woman. No one ever said anything to her about it and she quietly took it down. Whoops!

Go Bears!

The Bears beat the Green Bay Packers yesterday. I'm the bandwagon sort, so I'm pleased that they won, but not so interested that I actually watched the game. Last year when the Bears were in the Superbowl, I was unhappy with the t-shirt choices for girls. We also purchased a cheap t-shirt that was the wrong size for every person in our family . I decided to cut out some of the elements of that bad shirt and applique them onto this orange shirt for my daughter.


Working on t-shirts is tricky. You have to be very gentle and keep a looser tension on the thread to accommodate the stretchiness of the t-shirt fabric. I think it would be a good idea to use a hoop. I didn't, but I cross stitched for years and years with no hoop and, well.. old habits die hard...


Here's Toothless! She has been "Cutie Snaggletooth" for a couple of weeks while she had one front tooth that refused to fall out. It finally came out just as our pew was getting ready to go up to the altar for communion on Sunday. She's been leaving the Tooth Fairy notes asking for more money for her teeth, but the Tooth Fairy is not budging. She actually knows the truth about the Tooth Fairy, but she's playing along because she really wants the $1.

FInally, I'm doing the craft in a few weeks with the Chicagoland Craft Collective. We'll be making these ghost mascots (not the felt envelopes)

and this acorn which I made into a barrette for Toothless:


I'll provide little kits that will be $1.00 each. If you plan to come, bring some scissors if you can. The lighting is terrible at our meeting place, but the food is delicious!

Sweet Home Chicago

I edited the title from "My City is Better Than Yours". I still think it is, but I just finished watching the most inspired musical ever, The Blues Brothers.

Ahh.. Chicago.. Nevermind that I almost live closer to Milwaukee where it's an even mix of Chicago Bears and Green Bay Packer fans. We only have a few days until school starts so I took my kids downtown to the Art Institute of Chicago and Millennium Park. Millennium Park was something of a debacle that cost nearly half a billion dollars, but it sure is a nice showcase of a park.

This is the faces splash fountain. My son says this is the best splash park ever! It is really great. The faces are always changing and are quite mesmerizing.
Periodically, they "Blow" water onto the wet kids underneath. A friend of my parents is one of the faces. I think it's on a several day randomized cycle, so it isn't as though you can just sit there and wait for a particular person to come up.

Millennium Park also has Cloud Gate, but no one really calls it that, it's "The Bean". I love the way the features at the park have the backdrop of stunning Chicago skyline. Our fair city is the birthplace of the skyscraper and citizens of Chicago take a big interest in her architecture.

Also at Millennium Park are many gardens including this lovely prairie garden. You can see a glimpse of the Sears Tower in the background. For a longtime, the Sears Tower was the tallest building in the world. now it's like second or third.


Prior to our visit to Millennium Park, we'd been in the Art Institute of Chicago. My son, at age 10 is kind of interested in the nudes. "Artists are always interested in the human form." is what we said. Anyway, The Art Institute has the best collection of impressionists in the world.
I love the beautiful ladies by Renoir. Probably because they share the same hobbies as me:
Here are a few other iconic paintings at the Art Institute. We barely had time to scratch the surface. I didn't photograph any Picassos, or Mary Cassatts, or Matisse, or Gauguin and we didn't see much outside of this period. Click the pictures to enlarge and see the artists names. Sorry they are wonky.. I'm really an amateur:


Remember when Ferris Beuller went to the Art Institute on his famous Day Off? click HERE for the clip.

My children were great at the museum although it does get to be visual overload. They brought along their sketch pads and did some drawings, but they were pretty anxious to get out to the splash park. There are dozens of other worthy things to do to enjoy Chicago. Maybe we'll even get to have the Olympics here. It's a long shot, but we are in the running!

My blog is really not for dialup is it? Sorry! I love big pictures...