Chicken Scratch Mini Quilt

One thing I really liked about having a blog was I was able to keep track of links to things I wanted to make someday.  Or at least, think about making someday.  Now, I bookmark links and then forget all about them.  So, here's a cute little chicken scratch mini quilt from Love the Country that has been lost in the bookmark abyss.

Doing a little searching on the Love the Country web site led me to these chicken scratch ornaments.  

Apron Giveaway at Violette Crumble

There's a giveaway for a vintage chicken scratch apron over at Violette Crumble. You have until next Tuesday (Sept 16) to enter.

And, check out the adorable embroidered pillow in the same post!

Another Chicken Scratch Post

It's been awhile since I've linked to anything at Les chroniques de Frimousse but this "handkerchief case" caught my eye -- I think it's supposed to be for tissues -- because I'm obsessed with gingham these days. Google's English translation is here. (If the Google link doesn't work for you and you're using AOL, it's because your AOL adapter is damaged. At least, this is what an AOL techie told me. I followed his instructions to fix it and everything was ok for a day, but, once again, I can no longer get the translated pages to work so I just use Firefox instead.)

Also, on Frimousse, is a great tutorial on chicken scratch (in English) You really need to see the awesome bag she made.

That entry led me to the chicken scratch posts at Un bout de toile (the English version).

And, that one led me to this post on Betty Ninja with her pictures of some amazing chicken scratch. I guess I'm going to have to buy a book to learn how to do those larger stitches.

And, this lovely bag to hold eyeglasses or scissors.

This totally makes me want to go stitch something on some gingham now.

Click Us

Guess who won the 50th post giveaway at Lil Birdie Stitches? That would be me. Can you believe it?! The daylight was fading when I decided to take some pictures of my prizes so all I have so far is one of the cupcake scissors fob. Look how cute it is! I totally love it! And, click the photo so you can see how nicely and neatly Birdie stitches. I'll show you the other goodies as soon as I take more photos.


Felt cupcake scissors fob
Originally uploaded by PipStitch

And, now for stuff you can click:

Jennifer sent me a link to the Owls of Summer cross stitch freebie at Be-Stitched. They're all wearing bathing suits. I love the one in the bikini! (Thanks, Jenn!)

There's a cute embroidery pattern of a "happy boy" sitting on a toy horse (donkey?) on Cata's Craft [link via Stitch By Hand Flickr group]. This would be a good design to use for crayon tinting. By the way, Stitch By Hand is having an Old School Sewing Competition. Entries must be 100% hand sewn and contain fabric and thread. More info is here.

Claudia has posted a unicorn (hearts and a rainbow too!) embroidery pattern and another one with a set of dishware engaged in some athletic activities on her blog, Stitchado.

Jenna at CorgiPants posted the last of her chicken scratch patterns on Sunday. To recap, (and to help you search engine users out there), the patterns are a bird, a snowflake, a windmill with tulips, a butterfly, Autumn leaves, a flower and several borders including one with hearts, plus there were extras on Whip Up and Needlework News. Start here to see all of Jenna's free patterns.

Thanks to Denise at Needlework News for letting us know there's a cute x-stitch freebie of a happy hippo and her happy baby playing at the beach from The Chart Shop. And, that there's a terrific stash giveaway at Needle 'n Thread.

You can find a daily list of links to a bunch of projects from blogs, forums and crafty sites at One Pretty Thing. There are also links to contests and giveaways too.

Something that caught my eye on One Pretty Thing was a link to detailed instructions for making a crazy quilt pincushion that has a CD for a base over at Ivory Blush Roses I'm not usually a huge fan of crazy quilting but this is beautiful. Look at this second pincushion. So pretty!

That should keep you clicking for a while.

EDITED Chicken Scratch And Then Some

I forgot something earlier plus I found something else to link to, so I'm going to add both now. I don't want to wait since both links have an expiration date.

Patterns Online is having a cross stitch design contest. Every month, they offer a free chart and this is your chance to design September's freebie. You have until August 29th to submit a design and you can enter as many times as you like. More details are here. (Sorry I didn't post this sooner.) I've ordered from Patterns Online in the past and one thing I really like is you can download the chart after you pay for it. No waiting for it to be shipped to you.

Not only is Jenna sharing free chicken scratch patterns all this week on her CorgiPants blog (#3 is a snowflake and #4 is a windmill with tulips) but there's an extra one for you on Whip Up.

Speaking of Whip Up, they are taking submissions for articles and tutorials for the next few month's monthly themes:

September: knitting (experiments with freestyle knitting, knitting
clubs, knitting in public, knitting ideas, patterns and stories

October: hand stitching: embroidery, cross stitch, quilting …
contemporary and traditional

November: recycled: refashioning, re-using, up-cycling - recycling,
paper/cloth/yarn/plastic - tutorials, ideas, stories

More info is here.

And, in more chicken scratch news, on Lace 'n' Ribbon Roses, you will find patterns from an old Coats & Clark leaflet [link via Needlework News]. Actually, there are more more chicken scratch patterns on Lace 'n' Ribbon Roses, plus a bunch of other stuff I need to go look at when I have some more time. (aprons!)

Edited to add: Mollie at Wild Olive is offering some super cute embroidery patterns of sewing notions, including a tomato pincushion. But they're only available until the end of August. After that, you can buy them from her Etsy store. And, when you get chance, go poke around Mollie's blog. I just had my first visit and love it already.

My Wooden Spoon is giving away an apron from Rick Rack Attack (the Apron Queen's store). The contest ends on August 25th so head on over to this post to enter. (I'm being distracted by the recipes at My Wooden Spoon. I have a feeling I am going to spend the weekend reading several new-to-me blogs.)

Even More Chicken Scratch

After my chicken scratch post last week, I signed up for Google News to send me links to articles and blog entries that contain the keywords chicken scratch. (I also do this with Shih Tzu, cross stitch, and Johnny Depp embroidery pattern since some of you said you would enjoy such a thing.) Most of the links have had to do with posts about making chicken dishes from scratch or handwriting that no one can read, but there have been a few about chicken scratch embroidery, which is how I ended up at CorgiPants a little while ago. I've been there before because I can't resist clicking a link to a blog named CorgiPants, but for some dumb reason, I never added it to my favorites list so I could go back regularly. I probably would have missed this week's free chicken scratch patterns from Jenna at CorgiPants, if not for Google News.

Yes! I said free chicken scratch patterns! Boy howdy!

Pattern #1 is a bird and pattern #2 is a traditional border. This is the first free CS pattern I've seen for a border.

Jenna linked to an article on chicken scratch from West Virginia University Extension Service that has an eight pointed star pattern. Remember, the pdf from the University of Kentucky Cooperative Extension Service has a pattern for half a star, and I doubt I would have attempted that. I'd much rather see all eight points at once than try to figure out how to do the left half of the star in reverse to make the right half.

And, be sure to check out Jenna's new Etsy shop, Make-Do Mercantile, and her Pillowcase Pinnie Apron Pattern. (Note to self: become a Make-Do Marigold.)

Chicken Scratch For Brook

Thank you so much for all the nice comments about my Scottie dog! I guess I was disappointed that my cross stitches were so uneven. Let's blame the wacky gingham for it. (I think I read somewhere that it isn't always square.) I'm still going to finish it. I just won't take any more close-up shots when I'm done.

Brook asked if I knew of any patterns for chicken scratch. There are some free ones out there so I thought I'd link to all of them in one post.

Pegasus Originals has instructions and a heart pattern. You can also find books on chicken scratch for sale there.

You'll find half a star pattern (and more instructions) in this pdf from the University of Kentucky.

There's a tutorial for making a chicken scratch bookmark at Kerri Made.

About.com has patterns for a square, a heart (different than the heart at Pegasus Originals ) and a tree.

At Vick et pique et colle, you will find a link to a heart pattern, which is the same as the one at Pegasus Originals, but there's also a pattern for a flower made of four small hearts and a picture of another flower that is clear enough to figure out how to make it. Google's English translation of the page is here.

You'll find a small heart pattern and a tree at Crafttown (and more instructions).

Crafty Jan has an angel pattern.

Janet has posted photos of chicken scratch stitches at Primrose Design.

The first time I tried chicken scratch, I stitched several rows on the edge of a pillowcase. Since I only used one strand of floss, my design did not stand out at all. I ended up ripping out the stitches and had planned to start over with three strands of floss. Then I saw the pattern for an owl at Kissy-Cross so I decided to give that a shot.



See the puckering? That's because I pulled my threads too tight. I wish I had used a darker pink on the outline and on his eyes. And, even though I had read all of those instructions I linked to above, I screwed up when I did the woven circle stitch and only went around one time (you're supposed to go around twice oor go around once with double the strands of floss), so I later went back and did another circle on each stitch, which did not improve the look of some of my stitches. I should have just let them be.

Next, I did a heart on either side of the owl. Again, I have the puckering but I am happier with those stitches.

I will definitely do chicken scratch again -- I have another pillowcase and an entire flat sheet to play with -- and will remember not to pull my floss so tightly.

L'ane et le chien

I fell in love with antique embroidery booklets after seeing a bunch of them posted on some French blogs. I was excited to find one that had a cross stitch design with both a dog and donkey in it. I finished stitching it last week. It's way too big to turn into an ornament so I could make it into a pillow but that would involve using a sewing machine and we all know I haven't done that since junior high.


L'ane et al chien
Originally uploaded by PipStitch

Stitched on 18 ct Fiddlers with DMC 931. You can find the chart in Sajou 104 on this page (click the photo for the pdf of the entire booklet).

To see all of the embroidery books on Swappons, go here and then click each cover.

I would love to link to an English translation of the Swappons blog but both Google and Babel Fish are telling me "the requested URLs" are not available on their servers. Whatever. Funny how they have worked every other time I've used them. I'll try again later.

You can find more of these old booklets at les Passe-Temps de Flo (and again Google will not translate it into English). Most of these charts are for cross stitch but I know I've seen some with embroidery patterns. I don't know where they came from since I can't translate the entry but on this post at the same blog are three embroidery patterns with flowers and a pretty alphabet. And, this one has both embroidery and cross stitch flower patterns.

Another site with some of these old charts is Handmade Adelaide. You can find them here and here. (Thanks to Diane for those links!)

There's a new Stitch School post at Primrose Design on Chicken Scratch with some close-up photos of the stitches. And, The Sampler Girl is having a giveaway for a totebag with her Emily Dickinson x-stitch design printed on it.

Chicken Scratch Goes Global

Apparently, chicken scratch is sweeping Europe.

Kissy-Cross has a pattern for a chicken scratch owl on her blog. (There's a widget to translate her German blog into English or French at the top of the right sidebar.) She also made a chicken scratch biscornu (!!!) and a heart, and she shares the pattern for the heart.

Then I saw a link to Vick et pique et colle at LaGattaC and found more chicken scratch. A link takes you to this page (English version).

Have a great weekend!

Chicken Scratch Apron

I was bored so I went looking for aprons on Webshots and found a wonderful collection of vintage ones, including this chicken scratch apron. I am sooooo jealous of the lady who owns them. Click the photo so you can see it up close.




I feel weird because I'm writing this on June 12 and scheduling it to post tomorrow. I don't know why I need to share that.

Happy Friday the 13th!

Kerri's Chicken Scratch Bookmark

Kerri over at Kerri Made has written a tutorial on making a chicken scratch bookmark [link via Sew Mama Sew]. This is such a terrific idea!

Last month, I started doing some chicken scratch on a pillowcase and I enjoyed it but it's going to take me forever to finish so I've already put it aside.. (I'm not doing the entire pillowcase, just the border.) I'm sure I'll go back to it at some point but Kerri's bookmark is more my style. It won't take a year to do and I won't run out of white floss while stitching chicken scratch-ing it.

Be sure to also check out Kerri's pretty purple chicken scratch star and her crafty tool belt tutorial.

Apron Giveaways

There are a couple of apron giveaways this week. Over at Confessions of an Apron Queen, the prize is a vintage red & white gingham apron with some really pretty chicken scratch. Details are here. You have until Monday night to enter. Edited to Add: There are examples of several chicken scratch stitches there too.

And, Not Quite June Cleaver (another blog name that rocks), is giving away an apron made by not quite June herself (Susan).

Going Through My Saved Links

My project this month week is to go through my saved links to free charts and patterns, and post the ones that still work here.

Grilles et diagrammes is a French site with some free cross stitch charts. There are birds, alphabets, "Bienvenue" (that's Welcome, right?), a lighthouse, a windmill, and a couple with reindeer and trees. It's a great collection.

The Caron Collection has a bunch of kid's projects. I like the Sampler Bookmark. The instructions show you how to make fringe on the bottom of the bookmark too. I think this bookmark would be nice stitched all in one color, like red or blue. I might have to do that.

Hope Chest Legacy is an online store that sells books, embroidery patterns, paper dolls, and cookie cutters (and, other stuff as well). They have a page with a few free embroidery patterns (when you open the link, the pattern will be huge so use your arrow keys to see the entire thing), and instructions on making a pillowcase, a quilt block, and the one that got me all excited: how to do a snowflake stitch on gingham fabric. I have a pink gingham pillowcase that I planned to do some chicken scratch on. I really like how the snowflake stitch looks. (Chicken scratch is stitching on gingham. Read more about it at Pegasus Originals. There's a pattern for a chicken scratch heart there.)

Not something I had previously saved but just found via Write, Mama, Write: a knitting pattern for a mini mitten ornament. How cute is that?