New Designs and Products UPDATED

The Internet is full of new products and news from the online world of needlepoint this week.  Lots of folks have photos of new designs or new products that have arrived at their shops.  Working more or less alphabetically, let's start with Patt and Lee's new dog canvas (shown above).  They are known for their cats so this is a welcome addition to their design portfolio.
http://pattandleedesigns.blogspot.com/2010/05/dog-just-finished.html

Squiggee is showing off her button faces that are paired with some of her new canvases.  It is a new and different way to embellish a painted canvas that I think will be very popular.
http://squiggeedesigns.blogspot.com/2010/05/heads.html

Nimble Needle has some neat new items in their shop.  I've never seen a pocket flask with a needlepoint panel before.  It would look great with a monograph on a plaid background!  They also have great photos of some of the watch band kits from L'Esprit de France.
http://thenimbleneedle.blogspot.com/

UPDATE:  Here's a second version of the pocket flask for your viewing pleasure.
http://blog.thepointofitallonline.com/2010/05/sip-and-stitch.html

Pocket Full of Stitches has posted many photos of new designs and new products in the last 3-4 entries of their blog.  Don't miss the needle tins, the new Elizabeth Bradley kits, photos of the threads that come with the Kelly Clark monthly pear club, and of course a sneak peak at the Ruth Schmuff hearts canvas that will be featured in the May Needlepoint Now magazine.  The Needle Index Book is just plain useful, too.
http://pocketfullofstitches.blogspot.com/

Finally, Ridgewood has posted photos of the Stitch n Zip Kindle covers. I've been dying to see these!
http://ridgewoodneedlepoint.blogspot.com/2010/05/kindle-covers.html

Truly, we are lucky to have such a huge number of needlepoint treats available to us.

Written by Jane/Chilly Hollow Blogging at http://chillyhollownp.blogspot.com Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Stars: Marlon's Wings

The four little pairs of triangles around the center are the next to last step for this quilt block.  They don't look like much, but they were a struggle for me because the thread choices Tony wanted used in this step didn't work for me.

The wings are made up of five horizontal lines covered by a series of short vertical lines arranged in a stitch one/skip one pattern.  You are supposed to use C8 (which is Flair for me) as your horizontal lines and top them with C5 (which is Impressions). C in my color scheme is terracotta.  You'll notice that my wings are violet instead and they are all in my A10 color of Wildflowers 6042.  I decided I wanted to tone down the Frosty Rays bow tie shapes which are very raised in my version of Stars by using another color than their terracotta.  My wings are textured and match the center light violet arrowhead shapes.

The last step is rice stitches around the perimeter of the design but the threads and color pattern seems to be different according to the shape the rice stitches fill (either little triangles or the corner squares). I expect to conquer most of this tonight and then work on finishing the two sashing sections underneath and to the right of Marlon Brando.  I probably will not work the outside black border until after the sashing is finished.

Written by Jane/Chilly Hollow Blogging at http://chillyhollownp.blogspot.com Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow