NEW! NEW! NEW!

NEW designs are on the way to needlework shops!  We shoved them out the door yesterday and are SO relieved to have some space to work again. About a thousand leaves blew in the door as the boxes went out, so autumn has definitely arrived.

Ready, set, go...here are the new designs!

Above is Be Jolly, our 2011 Christmas Kit (K54). You can read about the "evolution" of this kit in earlier blog posts, but here is the finished model. It's colorful and fun, and has a sort of retro feel to it.  Kit includes 27/28 ct. tea linen, white crystal beads and exclusive design. Get this in your hands, and you'll feel jolly, too!

This is a new Quick-it called HoHoHo in a Row (Q10). I stitched it on frosty Morris blue linen from Weeks Dye Works, but you could put it on any little piece of neutral fabric from your stash. Quick-it includes 3 tiny red buttons. HOHOHO, baby!

Snow Fun 6 Fat Men Flip-it (F113)

 Let It Snow 6 Fat Men Flip-it (F114)

Snow Day! 6 Fat Men Flip-it (F115)

The last 3 parts of the 6 Fat Men Flip-its are finally HERE!  Yes, these guys have been anxious to join the other 3 chubby men. This batch includes my personal favorite of the designs...Snow Day!  Visit our website www.lizziekate.com to see the 1st three snowmen in this series (F110 Snowed In, F111 Snow House, F112 Snow Friends). 

Remember...if you want to stitch them all together (see photo on back of each design and on our website Home Page), there is a FREE template for this on our website. This also includes some free graphs for "Snowmen melt my heart" border and a cool birdhouse motif. Get SNOWY!

This is the 3rd design in our new Inspiration Boxer series, Not All of Us (B35). Your response to all 3 of these Inspiration designs has been...well, inspirational!  We couldn't be more pleased. We're working hard on a new set of Inspiration Boxers for 2012. This kit includes 32 ct. Flax linen, hand-dyed raspberry flower buttons and a FREE design for a darling little pin pillow (pictured on cover). We also included an antique-gold heart charm for the pin pillow.

Finally, here is the Winter Alphabet embellished chartpak (#151). This design completes our seasonal alpha series, and it is my favorite. Or maybe I just like whichever one is newest? I do really like the beautiful colors and fun wintry motifs on this one. Chartpak includes tiny red buttons and itsy-bitsy antique gold heart charm.

The goods have left the L*K world headquarters and we're left with a mess! Every single design in this release required assembly - putting snowflake buttons in all 3 Flip-its, gluing red buttons in HoHoHo in a Row, inserting embellishment packs in the Winter Alpha, and assembling the Christmas Kits and Boxer Kits. WHEW!  Now we're finding room on the shelves for the new designs and organizing the supplies, so we can keep track of them!

I feel the need for some extra energy, so it's off to our fave Mexi restaurant (El Paisa) for an infusion of salsa. I've have a #4 please, and a giant Diet Coke!

You call this work?

I just returned from a FAB weekend in El Paso! The fun gals from the Counted Thread invited me to their annual Camp Stitchmore event to be the guest designer, so it was a "working" weekend. But really...does this look like WORK?

Really...we DID work...but we also played...A LOT! Above photo shows the event hostesses Nancy and Libby (from the Counted Thread) and their angel helpers Terri and Bonnie. They were dressed for nighttime stitching in matching holiday nightshirts. Can you tell we had a Christmas theme?

We met at a beautiful hotel and the elves set up an amazing portable needlework shop. Boy...were the gals eager to shop! Above is the L*K area of the shop, but there were lots of trunk shows from other designers and all sorts of needlework goodies. 

In between all that stitching and chatting, we did a bit of eating! Above is a photo from our "English tea". We all wore hats and had a fun parade of hats, admiring each other and nearly laughing our hats right off our heads. Check out Libby's "fascinator" hat (second from left), inspired by the recent royal wedding!

This clever lady had a cross stitch themed hat complete with floss, scissors, needle and buttons. All she needs is an L*K Flip-it to complete her ensemble!

I left on Sunday morning, but the faithful gang stayed on to stitch through the day. Before I left for the airport, we posed for a group photo. I'm in the middle front, happily sitting between the camp hostesses.

A lot of these ladies have been coming to camp for many years, so camp wasn't only a chance to shop, stitch and get new projects. It was a time to catch up on each other's lives and tell (crazy) stories from past camps. Libby and Nancy weren't only hosting a needlework event, they were dispensing "extreme hospitality". Every one felt like they were special, and I was treated like Queen for a Day. (Does anyone remember that old TV show?)  

Now I'm back in Wichita and working like CRAZY to get our new releases shipped. We're shipping new designs on Wednesday to needlework shops all over the US and around the world. Alan is a wonderful shipping helper, and Carmen is here this AM to help with assembly, but once again...we need some elves!!!

Paint by number for adults!

Do you buy Groupons? I get them in my email every day, and sometimes those great deals get me to try new things.  The trick is...you gotta use your Groupons before they expire!

Many of my best friends are famously "un-crafty".  They almost have panic attacks at the thought of creating something with their hands. But my sweet friend Glenna is my "craft buddy". So when the Groupon for Paint the Town popped up several months ago in my email inbox, I thought of Glenna. Before I could call her, she called me to see if I'd like to do a painting class with her.  Of course!!!

Realizing our Groupons were about to expire, we chose a night in October for our 2 hour paint class. Paint the Town is a group painting class format. Everyone does the same painting...almost like paint by number!  It's also a BYOB paint class. At first I thought that meant "bring your own brush", but I learned it means "bring your own bottle". It seems that a little wine consumption helps reluctant painters get their brushes moving...or maybe it just adds to the general fun. And, conveniently, Paint the Town is located right next to a liquor store!  It's also located next to Cinnamon's, and that's where Glenna and I got our liquid refreshments. Glenna brought along some appropriate Halloween snacks she confiscated at her office party earlier that afternoon, and we got to work!

There were about 20 budding painters in class...all women. Lots of friends came in groups of 2 or 3, just like us. Everyone got a real canvas, and a paper plate already prepared with globs of acrylic paint. The teacher instructed us on the step-by-step creation of our Halloween witch. There is very little "drawing" required. We traced around cardboard cutouts for the cute witch shoes. It was a great way to spend a relaxing evening... painting, snacking, chatting and comparing our works in progress. 

At the end of the evening we posed with our witch masterpieces.  It's hard to tell from the photo, but I didn't "paint within the lines". It seemed a little too "neat" for me, so I took the messy approach with my brush - less stressful that way, too. I added some extra texture on the solid orange background and a few polka dots to the chubby witch's skirt. She sure has skinny legs for the size of the rest of her...hmmm...sounds menopausal.

Here's my painting resting on the ledge over the cooktop in my kitchen...hiding a much better painting done by my daughter Sarah.

Thanks to my witchy class, I realized something...I LOVE to paint!  I practically grew up with a paintbrush in my hand, since my family owned a sign business. Then in my school years, I was always the one that got to make the posters and banners. Later,  I did a couple watercolor classes in college...but that's been a long time! A couple years ago, my daughters gave me some canvases and tubes of acrylic paint for Christmas. I whipped out a couple folk art paintings, then got distracted with...work and LIFE!  I hope to spend some more quality time with "brush in hand" soon! Check out a painting class in your town and prepare for some (messy) FUN!

One football game = how many 6 Fat Men?

6 FAT MEN?  Which 6 guys am I talking about?

NO, not those guys on the football field filling out their stretchy pants almost to the bursting point. No, not those men parked in their favorite chairs all over the country...inhaling chips and swilling their favorite beverages. 

I'm talking about Lizzie*Kate's 6 FAT MEN Flip-it series!!! These 6 chubby guys get invited to lots of activities at our house, and a prime Saturday afternoon football game is no exception!  While our favorite team (Kansas State Wildcats) is lining up for the kickoff, we're lining up rows and rows of prepared Gludots, each with their own snowflake charm attached. The TV trays in our family room aren't just for eating, they're for stripping dots and Flip-ping!

Even with lots of breaks for excessive cheering (our team won!), snacking and concentrating on the game, we still matched A LOT of the 3 new snowmen with their charms.  The first 3 snowmen in the series were released in June, and now we're preparing to ship the final 3 snowmen in the now-infamous "6 FAT MEN" gang. If you haven't met these snowy men, check them out on our website at www.lizziekate.com. The first 3 (snow) men are pictured on our What's New page. If you click on the big photo of the whole gang, you will find the FREE border elements and instructions for combining the whole gang into a big SNOW FEST!

I forgot to take a photo of the messy room, which was surely a blessing. There were piles of empty GluDot strips scattered all over the floor, which we gathered into the trash when the game was over. Then we transported all of our finished products to the office, where they are resting on the floor until it's their time to "enter the game".

Meanwhile, today there's a pile building in the L*K office, just waiting to be transported into the house for some after-hours assembly.  On the way to the house, we pass our beloved (but woefully faded) purple Wildcat banner. I think it's time for a replacement! GO CATS!

About that kit...

Before my last "wildlife" post, I was chatting about the new Christmas kit (Sept. 22 post). Since I sorta "forgot" about this one, it is fast-tracking through the production process. Here's what's happened since the last post:

1. We are busy cutting fabric with the rotary cutter. Yes, it's dark outside. I was listening to Good Morning America, sipping tea (red mug on ironing board), and cutting fabric. Carmen (my part-time helper) arrived later to help.

2. After it's cut, we iron the wrinkly pieces. Thankfully, most of it is pretty smooth and escapes the iron. Then we fold the pieces, so kitting will go faster later. We're still expecting another shipment of fabric, but this batch is almost processed.

3. While I was in Colorado for my "moose" adventure, the frame arrived at my local needlework shop and Debbie framed it for me. I went straight to my photographer (he's in the same neighborhood) and shot it.  A professional photograph is expensive, but I really think it's worth it.  I don't have a great camera, lighting, or any of that. And the better the photo you begin with, the better the finished product!

4. I've also been working on the graphic design for the cover. Evidently you're not supposed to photograph your computer monitor, because it looks funky (see the strange texture that mysteriously appeared?!).  I really LOVE doing this part, playing around with colors, fonts and all that. I try to resist getting too many elements and busyness that will detract from the stitchery photo, but that's hard! 

I finalized this layout and emailed it to the printer. The next morning my husband Alan delivered the actual stitchery to the printer so they could match the colors more accurately. The printer will deliver a proof for our approval before we proceed with printing. That's when we can tweak the colors or anything else we're not happy with. We also delivered another file (the black and white stuff) to another printer. Different printers...different jobs!

Meanwhile, catch a sneak peek of the bottom of the design and ...BE JOLLY!

I met a moose!

We just returned from a long weekend in Colorado.  Is it worth the 10+ hour drive each way for 2 days in the mountains...definitely!  Especially when you're travelling with friends and car time is full of chatter and laughter.

We did a lot of hiking, because the weather was Colorado PERFECT...cold in the morning and gorgeous in the afternoons. Our friends were speedy hikers, so I didn't get as many pics as usual. I typically brake (and catch my breath) for photos of all sorts of plants, flowers, animals, whatever.

We were fortunate to see a bunch of cool mountain animals...elk, moose, deer, marmots, and a ton of cute chipmunks.  The best encounter on our hike was a pair of moose! Is "moose" the plural for "moose"? The male moose (bull) was keeping watch (see that wary look in his eye) while his happy partner (cow) chowed down on the aspen trees. You aren't supposed to get too close to moose, so I zoomed my camera to the max. All the hikers on the trail slowed to a stop to enjoy this lucky treat! They were HUGE!!

So we returned to our cabin, feeling fortunate for our experience, and guess what we found in our neighbor's yard?  More moose!!! There was a mother moose lounging in the grass while her youngsters munched nearby.   It's hard to tell the size from this pic, but the "baby" was bigger than a really big dog. 

Coincidentally, our neighbors had a decorative "moose" sign in their yard. Who knew moose could read road signs?

It was aspen season, so the aspen trees had turned a brilliant gold and glowed on the mountains. Check out that blue sky, too!

On the way home, we stopped at a historic little diner for sliders...yum!!  Hey, the drive is SO long, you have to keep up your energy. The Cozy Inn has been serving up sliders (baby burgers) for almost 100 years in the same tiny building. You have to make a decision when you get there...order from the outside window (for the feint of heart) or step inside and commit yourself to smelling like fried onions until your next shower. So, of course, we went inside and watched the young grill guy smushing those sliders with his spatula. When I got out the camera, the counter girl and the grill guy asked if they could join us!

Here's the L*K challenge of the day...where is Cozy Inn located? I know a lot of Kansans will know the answer, but how about the rest of you? I have seen articles about the Cozy Inn in several national magazines, and I'm pretty sure they've been on that "Diners, Driveins and Dives" show on the Food Network.  

Warning...if you're casually driving through Kansas (hint: it's not in Colorado) and stop in, don't ask for cheese!  Or anything else "custom". Cozy isn't a "have it your way" sort of place. Just take the pickle, ketchup, mustard and signature fried onions and enjoy it! And don't ask for one...order by the bag!

Sometimes I'm organized ...and sometimes I'm not!

Does this sound familiar? MOST of my life, personal and business, is pretty organized...I think. Then I completely forget about something important, and I start to wonder if I could be wrong about this "organization" thing. I'm in charge of a program at church that kicks off...TODAY!  Even though I had all summer to contemplate the first fall meeting, I pulled it together this week.

From the needlework biz perspective, I always release a special Christmas kit, or even two. And this year...I FORGOT!  But now that I have remembered, I'm just saying..."I delayed!". I'm not sure what happened. I've been SO busy and distracted with those 6 new men hanging out in my office...aka The 6 Fat (snow)men series. I also have a whole pile of other projects in "production" mode, in various stages of completion.

But no worry...the annual Christmas kit is on the way ASAP!! Last week I designed it and stitched furiously over the weekend. It's a L*K interpretation of a band sampler with lots of colorful bands of holiday fun.

Here's a little timeline of what happens when I create a new KIT. Developing a KIT is a bit different from other projects, because I have to think of materials during the creative process.

1. Sketch some design ideas with pencil (and eraser!)

2. Graph the design on my computer

3. Choose fabric and check on availability BEFORE beginning to stitch. On this kit, I knew I would need a lot of fabric, so I contacted several distributors to see what was available immediately. I didn't have time to order fabric...it had to be in stock!! I was fortunate to find a large quantity of a really cool fabric, at a price that would allow me to kit. (Sometimes the fabric is just too expensive to cut and kit). 

4. Order the fabric

5. Stitch the model (I already had a piece of the fabric in my stash, so I could start stitching).

6. Order the frame. I rushed out to my LNS as soon as I finished the model (actually it wasn't QUITE finished) and chose an awesome frame. I can't wait for it to arrive later this week, because it is so pretty.

7. Order embellishments. Once I finished stitching, I ordered the beads I had decided to use. As soon as they arrive, we'll put them in little zip bags.

That's where I'm at on the kit...so far...but I'm pleased. The fabric just arrived last night (those UPS guys work long hours), so I found it leaning on my office door this AM. I got 2 giant boxes of fabric, so I see a lot of quality time with the rotary cutter in our future.

Meanwhile, today I'm delivering the stitched model to my LNS so she can frame it for me. I had the frame shipped directly to her to arrive tomorrow. 

Oh yea...remember that church meeting I coordinated at the last minute? I've been baking for that this AM, and I'm off to spend the lunch hour with the English/Spanish language gang. We haven't met with our Spanish-speaking ladies since last May, so it will be fun to see them again and help them practice their English skills. See you soon...hasta pronto!