Two Pet Guardian Angels Are Finished

Now that the glue has finally dried on the parts of my pet guardian angels, I am starting to assemble them. My goal is to finish one a night until all six are made up as ornaments and ready to head off to the ANG Auction at their Milwaukee Seminar this fall. I'm putting them together in the order in which they were published so I'll show them off in the same order. Above is the Medieval Cat whose lovely patterned skirt is just as lovely as when I stitched it last November and whose green eye and head shape I love above all the others, except maybe the rabbit's.

The Renasissance Rat is next--I added whiskers to her little face before I made her up. I love her braided halo and the red wings but the best part of this angel is the bargello pattern on her skirt and the flying ends of her Kreink braid belt.



The back side of each angel is black felt. Here's the Medieval Cat from the back.

I wrote up instructions on how to assemble the angels as I went through making the Medieval Cat into an ornament. I took more photographs and edited my instructions as I worked through the Renaissance Rat. After I finish the editing I'll check the instructions against tonight's angel, the Tudor Dog. My goal is to have a complete set of instructions ready to send out this week to all the other pet guardian angel stitchers so we can make up our angels and get them all to me by the last week in June. Tight deadline but these are pretty easy to do. I think it takes me about 4-5 hours per angel and that's only because I am doing six and making a lot of trim for the edges.

Stay tuned for more angels.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Needlepoint in the 21st Century

I had a lousy weekend. I glared at Yahoo 360 which has pushed me into dropping their blog entirely since it is no longer functional and which can't be moved anywhere to be functional again. It wasn't fun trying to learn new systems, either.

I finished my first pet guardian angel into an ornament. Guess I should be pleased that I didn't glue my hair to it or to the kitchen counter but finishing makes me grumpy.

I ran out of my favorite coffee beans and had to fall back on my second favorite.

My husband ran over my favorite rose bush with the mower. Grrrrrrr.

Then things looked better--I discovered New Needlepoint.com which is subtitled Needlepoint in the 21st Century. It's an unusual store--you buy the outlined patterns (many of them graphic lettering or bargello or repeat designs) and choose your own colors. Color is the emphasis, not fancy stitches. Some of the things there are from Patt & Lee, the Gossipping Geishas canvas designers. So not everything is from Marianne Herself but they all follow the newest trend which is personal choice for the stitcher.
http://www.newneedlepoint.com/

I have been happily reading Marianne's blog. I'll start you out on her essay on color, which for once actually makes sense. Color theory usually doesn't really seem clear when I read about it, but Marianne has a way of explaining it that is plain talking and I think I know what she means. And like all good blogs, she gives you glimpses of her personality. I'll be back there to keep an eye on what she's up to.
http://needlepoint.storeblogs.com/2009/05/31/my-best-renovations

Wonder what 64 Hearts would look like in shades of purple with metallics...?
http://www.newneedlepoint.com/content-index/store_id-1121/manufacturer_id-0/featured_prod_page-2#featured_products

Jane, looking at the Mae West quote above and suddenly feeling better!

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Archived Yahoo 360 postings at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Important Announcement

With Yahoo 360 closing their blog system, I've tested several options yesterday and today.

1) I've moved all the original Yahoo 360 postings to the new Yahoo Profile page. However, this is not really functional as a blog. It is not searchable, there are no keywords left, some of the photos were lost in the transition in blog entries that had multiple photos, and it is not easy to navigate to older postings. There doesn't seem to be a way to get straight to the blog either. I will leave everything here as an archive but I will not post new blog entries here.
http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

2) Yahoo 360 allows one to move the 360 blog to other systems. I tried Wordpress but it doesn't allow me to move all the old posts. I have too much old information so I can't move everything. I'm also having trouble with the download/upload which isn't working properly. I will delete the Wordpress blog I started. It has nice features but it isn't going to be a good replacement for Yahoo 360 due to the size limits. So that's not an option.

3) I'm going to try to download the old Yahoo 360 material to Blogspot. So far I'm not having any luck with this. I uploaded to Yahoo Profile ok but it looks as if Blogspot only will upload .xml files and Yahoo 360 downloads material as txt files. The incompatable formats are a problem, but I'll continue to attempt this.

4) It looks like the best option for now is to just have one blog at Blogspot. So effective tomorrow I will no longer post messages to Yahoo 360 and my only blog will be the one located at http://chillyhollownp.blogspot.com

I am very sorry for the problems this will cause Blog readers but I can't make anything else work except Blogspot. We'll have the old material archived at Yahoo Profiles but Blogspot will be the only blog from now on.

Jane/Chilly Hollow

Old Yahoo 360 blog archived at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

While I'm Busy Switching Blogs

I'm wrestling with Wordpress this morning, trying to see if I can import the Yahoo 360 blog material into it. If I can make that work, I may consolidate everything there and abandon both Yahoo and Blogspot. Stay tuned....

While I tear out all my hair, I do have some things for you to enjoy. No need for all of us to go nuts, right?

The Needlepointer has their monthly clubs for 2009 up on their website. I can't believe I didn't notice the candy cane, lollypops, sheep and tree/wreath clubs before now!
http://www.theneedlepointer.com/needlepoint-clubs.htm

The French Knot has their late spring newsletter up. It announces several fun classes and that they have added a "blog" link to their home page.
http://www.thefrenchknot.com/newsletter.html

http://www.thefrenchknot.com/blog.html

Have fun browsing. I'm off to wrestle with templates and downloads/uploads. Sigh.

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Main blog at http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow
New Yahoo blog at http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow and second new one at
http://chillyhollowneedlepoint.wordpress.com/

Transfer from Yahoo 360 to Yahoo Profile

This seems to be the new address of my Chillyhollow Needlepoint Yahoo Profile. This doesn't take you straight to the blog--you have to click on a link on the right side of the page. Sorry, I can't find a direct URL for the blog yet. Everything has transferred except keywords (HOW THE HECK CAN WE FIND ANYTHING WITHOUT KEYWORDS??!!!?!?!?!) and the slide shows (but I think if you click View All you can still see them) and second photos in blog entries that had more than one photo.
http://profiles.yahoo.com/chillyhollow

Could some folks test this please? Thanks!
Jane, exasperated in CH

Jane/Chilly Hollow
Main blog at http://blog.360.yahoo.com/chillyhollow