on inspiration

i know that it may not seem it, because i've been blogging so infrequently lately, but i've felt the most creative and inspired over the past few weeks than i have in a long time.
maybe it's the season, my favourite, and the weather, which has been absolutely perfect in my opinion these past few weeks. maybe it's that i've been spending more down-time outdoors; between a little mini-vacation with my best girl friend on the delaware in beautiful bucks county, and few days at the shore with my family, i've been soaking it in and doing a pretty darned good job of leaving work at home. or perhaps that's just it -- that i've been more relaxed about the pressure of working and making enough to keep it all going.... i'm sure it's a combination of lots of things (including the fact that i cleaned my studio!!!), but i've been feeling good and happy in my creativity. and i haven't been stressing about photographing and documenting it all. which is a bummer, because i'd like to share it all with you. but then, maybe that's why it's felt easier....
i'll work on getting some snaps of some of the projects i've done recently. a lot of them are for upcoming projects and the fall and holiday markets, so you'll see at least some of them, sooner or later.
in the meantime, here are some photos i took this morning of some treasures that i found -- the luna moth wing at one of our local nature preserves and the blue berries on a walk through some woods last night. i don't know what those blue berries are... surely not edible, but the color of them is blowing me away. i have a pretty good feeling that these colors will work their way into my craft somewhere...

whoo-ee i've been a terrible blogger! sorry! in between making the most of the summer days, lots has been going on here with me and chez-sucre-chez, but i have been terrible about taking the time to take photos and post blog posts.... oops.
this may not be the most exciting, but here are some tea towels done recently. i've had a few orders for white tea towels with various color monograms. dang, stitching looks great on these crisp white towels.

come mid-late fall i'll be gearing up for the holiday gift-giving season and will have new photographs and listings for the monogram towels (and napkins!) in the most current colors.
i'm hoping to do another post or two this week -- until then, have a good one!

crusader

i've got a new item in the shop --- reusable produce bags.

another product created by my intense disgust of wasteful plastic use! as i said in my etsy listings for these, i've been using tote bags for many many years, and i'm pretty crazy about it. if there were a sound board of the ten things i say the most, "i don't need a bag; i can put it in my tote," would certainly be one of them. i'm such a freak about not taking/using plastic shopping bags that i'm that person who won't let friends who happen to be shopping with me get bags. i butt in and tell the cashier, "we don't need a bag, he/she can put it in my tote." or, on those days that i purchase more than what will fit in the tote(s) i brought, i might walk to my car with a pack of toilet paper or a box of tampons under my arm, a carton of eggs in one hand, and anything else i can possibly carry in the other.
but those plastic produce bags -- i often find that i don't plan well enough and end up needing one or two on a shopping trip. and i feel crazy guilty every time i take one, even though i always reuse them or recycle them.
so -- i'm working to correct that. i made up these reusable produce bags with the intention of just making a few for myself. not even half way into the project, though, i was so pleased with them that i decided to try them out in the shop. i really really like them and i want you to, too!

i made them in two different sizes. the one is small/medium, it's perfect for most produce shopping needs, fitting at least six large apples, or a bunch of lemons, or three or so average size zucchini or cucumbers. it's also great for herbs or delicate little lettuce mixes. and then i made a larger size one, which is great for bigger heads of lettuce like romaine, or for bunches of kale or collard greens, or beets or carrots with the greens still on them.

i gotta admit, i felt pretty darned cool walking out of the store with one of these bags full of lettuce and the other carrying apples and lemons.

each is embellished with a row of a machine-embroidered leaf pattern.

and the top is a drawstring of vintage ribbon that matches the embroidery. it's knotted so that you won't loose the string in the laundry machines.

what do you think? is this the kind of thing that you would use? or would you get them and then forget to bring them along when you went shopping? i'm certainly excited about them...
see the details in the shop, here. ciao!

new edit --- i made more - a lot more! yesterday i got on a kick and was having so much fun letting my sewing machine do all of the fancy stitchwork that i just kept going. here are some of the new colors and patterns:

yeah!

summer look book

Open publication - Free publishing - More craft

hey friends, (with a lot of help from B.) i created a little look book of some of my most recent projects and products. i love the way it looks all nicey-nice and pro. please check it out, share it if you so feel inclined, comment, etc. etc.
next up -- i'm working on a holiday look book. holiday?! already?! my thoughts exactly.

a good excuse for new fabric purchases

a couple of weeks ago, i was at "home" visiting mom and pop and i spent some time with my dear nani (grandmother) too. she'd seen the bowl cover that i made for my mama and thought it was just so clever (her words!) that she wanted a bunch as her go-to wedding gift for the season. i thought that was very sweet.

nani asked that i do them as sets of three; a small, medium, and large. i didn't have the heart to tell her that i really only did them as sets of two (medium and large), so i let this motivate me to make a pattern for a small size cover, too.

since i didn't have any bowl covers left in stock (they were the unexpected super-seller at renegade; i sold all but three on the first day!), i had to make them all and, rather than working from my fabric stash (oh my goodness, i have so much fabric), i treated myself to some new yardage for this project. new fabric is almost always more fun to work with, isn't it? a new joann fabrics just opened down the street from me and though i was in the mindset of thinking that their fabric selection was a little generic, i found some really sweet prints! i hadn't really looked at their selection in a long time and i was happily pleasantly surprised. with the store less than two miles away, i have a feeling i'll be going back for more sooner than later...
this way, too (using new fabric), i know that i can replicate a set if need be.. which makes me think, i should put these in the shop! hmmmm. i think i'll do that (soon).

they're on their way, nan!

he said the world was as soft as lace*

yesterday i designed a new pattern, and started stitching it up to be able to photograph it and list a new kit. it was partially finished by the evening and then b and i went for a walk in our local town park and discovered this:

i hadn't taken my phone with me, but went back first thing this morning for a little walk and a couple of instagram shots. it was only once i was back at the house that i saw the uncanny connection; i fell in love with this field of queen anne's lace, and i'd just made a lace-inspired pattern.
funny, eh?

i stitched the sample one up as white on black, but i'm putting these new kits together in a few different color options. i'm not sure how quickly i'll get to stitching samples of the other options, and i have a feeling i may add new color combos somewhere down the line, but currently, they can also be ordered in grey with ecru stitching:

and, in a really really limited quantity, white stitching on this beautiful lilac colored aida:

isn't that so pretty? i only have THREE pieces of this aida. not three big pieces; three kit-sized pieces. it was four, but one of them sold already! the new kit is in the shop here. if you'd like one of the few remaining lilac ones, hop to it! also, my dear blog readers, if there's some other color combo you'd like for this one, get in touch -- if i have the aida and the floss color, i'll put it together for you, because i like you and i know you'll come up with some good stuff. there are so many color combinations that would be great in this pattern. pink on white? white on blue? black on platinum? think about it. xo.

*i've always loved that line from the belle and sebastian song, "i don't love anyone."

summer sale!

more sale items are up in the shop!
i've been making progress towards cleaning up my studio and photographing some of the pieces that have been around for a while and that i really should have put in the shop long ago.
here's the batch that went up today:

more to come!

shine like a new pin

if you subscribe to my twitter, instagram, or the chez-sucre-chez facebook feeds, you may have already seen this. i was quite tickled with it when i finished and framed it up.(i still am completely tickled with it.) in all my busy-ness with renegade, though, i never got around to posting it here, and i just realized that today. oops!

so you know that i've been on the "stay gold" streak. i've long loved the quote (from the movie "the outsiders") and i've worked with these words before.

the first "stay gold" piece i did sold at my little exhibit at THIS gallery in los angeles.

the second was waiting forever to be framed. i finally finished it up just before renegade brooklyn this year and it went to a sweet guy who came back to my booth three times before he pulled the trigger. he put up an instagram of it later that day, but for some reason i couldn't access the page. boo.
here's that piece a few days before renegade:

it's framed in a custom-built whiskey and chocolate frame. (it was an odd size.)

and then the shiny metallic gold stitching on the beautiful blue-grey aida is my latest. i love love love love love it.

i love the way the colors and the style go perfectly with the vintage frame. this is one of these pieces that i love so much, i almost don't want to offer it up for sale. but, heheheh, i *do* happen to have another frame exactly like this one, so if i get to missing it too much, i could always recreate it for myself.

stay gold, friends, and have a great weekend!