I started to stitch on my jean jacket after seeing some posts in Pinterest. I started with a heart on one of the pockets. This is a massive number of French knots.

then I added a little lizard/gecko

But the really fun part was doing the back! I saw a quilt made completely of houses. That one was done all in denim. But I wanted to do something a bit different. I really love the way it came out. All the light in the windows, the sky…. Well, just everything.

Liz Kettle is a creative artist using fiber. She shares a theme each week and invites others to create a stitch meditation around that theme. Today was interconnection. This is the stitch meditation I did.

Here are other SM (stitch meditations) I’ve done.

Another Facebook group I belong to is called Fabulous Scrappy Balls. One of the stitchers has been making scrappy balls ( ball made out of all kinds of things) and decorated. So addicting! Great meditation source. I tend to do one every week day morning. Some take more than a day but they are a great way to make beautiful use of things that would tend to get thrown away.

Not sure I remember how I bumped into this group but evidently someone, who was down and out, found a quilted heart left somewhere and on it it said, “I need a home.” So this person started a group that asks people to make hearts and leave them in public places with a note saying “I need a home” and a website where people can report finding them. Then they post hearts that have been found. Only around 5 percent get reported so it’s not about getting validation but a free giving that might lift someone’s heart when they need it most.

I ‘ve done a few and even had one reported.

I saw a pattern for a Hanten jacket in The Book of Boro and was smitten. I wanted to wear it in the fall so I added a wool batting inbetween the outer and inner layers. I didn’t do it exactly like the pattern but was happy nonetheless. But what I really loved doing was the lining. As I worked on it, it became a metaphor of a life lived. The outside was like what we show the world. Calm, serviceable… nothing stunning, But the inside…. ah the inside represented the path the life. Embroidering chain stitich like limbs of a tree or roads taken. Mottos that meant something to me. Groups I participated in and people in my life that have touched me and I them. I’m sure it is a work in progress and will be for the rest of my life!

During the Going Round in Circles squares I did odd things. Some projects were bigger… some just small but all fun.

One larger project I took on was a wall hanging for my son and soon to be daughter-in-law. She’s crazy about the ocean and it started out as a needlepunch project. But it was way too big to finish as needlepunch without putting my arm in a sling! So I turned to needlepoing and felting to finsih. They were very happy to get it.

One of my early projects were dolls. A friend had said that a charity she was a part of was looking for pocket dolls for refuges in the middle east… something small that a child could put in their pocket. Easy to carry if they had to relocate. Soooo after finishing the dolls for my tiny house, I started making some dolls to donate. Also to give to my son’s friends who had just had babies.

The blonde baby was my favorite. At that time I was suffering from a very painful hip. When I went to the doctors, the nurse there and I got into a conversation and she shared how her mother had died suddently. Her daughter was suffering from the loss. As I was making dolls, I suggested maybe a doll that maybe looked like her mother might help. She told me her mother had blonde hair. Really? I pulled out my phone and showed her a picture of this blonde doll I’d made. “That’s her. That’s Mimi!” she said. Ok…. I put Mimi on the heart, made her a blanket and dropped it off at the office the next day. Awesome!

After doing those smaller squares, inspired by anothe stitcher on the Facebook group I joined – Maggie, I started larger pieces. I really enjoyed the larger pieces as I could pick them up any time of day and stitch a little.

I also found that there was a reason it was called Stitich meditations. The repetitive in and out of the needle through the cloth is so soothing. Truly, hours fly by before I lift my head!

So I began morning meditations as developed by Liz Kettle. Which quickly morphed into stitching in circles as developed by Herme De Reuter. Here is the 42 I did and made into a wall hanging.

Entered it into the local County Fair and got second place.