Where did this name come from?

Fine Linen and Scarlet is the name I use to represent my service as a seamstress. This was born at a time of need and will stay with me forever. 

The craft of sewing and my love of the craft has carried me through many times of need, it is a way of life I learned at a very early age. It has followed me for many years, never goes away and sometimes wells up like the sun bursting over the horizon.

The name Fine Linen and Scarlet comes from my favorite passage in the Bible (Proverbs 31), it is the description of a woman of noble character. She makes linen garments and sells them. She is not afraid of the snow (winter; difficult times) because all in her household are clothed in scarlet.
This woman of Proverbs 31 has been a beautiful role model for many years.

Fresh from the oven!

I was so delighted when one of my etsy customers told me they used this Chef's Hat as a photo prop on their lovely baby boy!

Baby photo props are so much fun!

The Quilt Project

My friend Lisa sent me this quilt to finish. It's one of those projects so many of us have! Started when the kids were little, but raising children was just took priority over finishing the project. Working on these must do projects in the wee hours of the night takes a tole on the time we spend with the kiddos during the day...well Lisa has been one dedicated wife and mom! I I am happy she asked me to help her out with this special project.

 I love all the color! The quilt is for her son Devin so the theme is sports and very whimsical. It will be fun working on this and (ha) I'm glad it is whimsical because my quilting skills are kind of....a, whimsical :}

I'm going to use a cotton batting and a twin cotton sateen sheet with a 400 thread count, this will make the quilt seamless and the only joins I need to be concerned with are in the top itself.

Yesterday I had the afternoon to work on this sports whimsy quilt and it went well. There was enough backing fabric for a self binding.




I worked the center squares first and then used a free-hand design on the border blocks. When the quilting was finished the quilt batting was trimmed. For the binding I didn't want to cover too much of the polka dot border so the backing was trimmed to one inch to make a half inch binding.

And the finished quilt! front and back. Tomorrow morning I'll give it my final inspection, box it up and it will be on it's way back to Lisa.

I hope this information was useful to you

Happy Crafting, I'll see you next time.

Tunisian Crochet - Cast On and Simple Stitch

Good Tunisian tutorial. I just had a little detour in today's progress...

Lovely Saturday! Now it's play day with my finds

Here is the progress on my Ruched Tee! Once I got past the Shoulders the knitting got a lot easier.

Yesterday was such a beautiful, sunshiny day I decided to go for a drive and hunt down some fun crafting components. Of course this involved fabric, that's just a staple in my crafting/sewing room. I was on a bit of a hunt for 'stands' for dress form pincushions.....

I found these brass candlesticks at the Goodwill Store, they will work pretty good for stands and a sun-catching marble at the top would be pretty! The white votive holder will be a cute base for a pincushion too.
And the marbles? I just love them! I found these at the Magnolia House Antiques in Fayetteville, TN. The story is that there was a long established Hardware Store that finally (after years) closed their doors. The owner of Magnolia House offered to buy the hardware store inventory....in that inventory were tons of marbles!! SOo many that the owner of MGHouse had to reinforce the floor in his building to hold all these fabulous marbles!

View my current project on Ravelry

Just click on the link above to go there. My Ravelry page is now set to be viewed publicly whereas before it was for Ravelry users only. Thanks for looking!

I did finish that Christmas Sweater, also learned a lot! I haven't knitted a sweater for many years and forgot the things that could happen in the process; like you might have to rip out a couple rows because you miss an important couple of decreases, The sweater could shrink while blocking...if you don't block properly. The sleeves may be a little too short, etc...Aand, Vintage aluminum knitting needles are used, the cables are plastic and they have been in the case for so long...they just didn't co-operate. Also, for Tennessee a Wool/Alpaca sweater in a bulky yarn is quite warm.

That is all the negative.

The good part is my son loves the sweater and that I made it for him, he is anticipating his next one. I discovered how very much I liked knitting sweaters, which out weighs the negative parts! I shopped knitting needles, tried some different ones out and have decided on a brand that suits me well; they handle nicely and I can glide right through row after row without dropping, twisting or stretching stitches. They are nickle and the cables behave as you need them too! I still admire the Vintage needle set as the needles remind me of the hands that lovingly knitted with them, I can tell what size was used most and I am reminded of the women I learned to knit from as a girl.