First Stitches on my boutis ....

First, meet Winston, our daughter's cat.  He came to spend the weekend with us,  he is beautiful and sweet, also a cat who likes quilts and helped me yesterday .....

All the fabric cutting was tiring, so he chose a piece to rest on .....

And finally, this afternoon I went outside and started stitching my beautiful boutis.  As you can see, it is a glorious day and perfect to start a big project.  I am sitting on our terrasse under the palms.

Et enfin, apres un long delai, j'ai fait les premiers points dans le grand boutis.  Aujourd'hui il fait un temps parfait, je suis assise au dehors sous les palmes.  Les points ne sont pas tres jolis, pas assez petits,  mais j'espere redecouvrir le rhythme - c'est bien longtemps depuis mon dernier boutis.

January 2013

A rather belated Happy New Year to everyone !  I hope you all have a good, healthy and happy year, with plenty of stitching time.
I have been setting up some new things to stitch, and have made a little progress on older projects.  I received some lovely gifts from afar which I want to show, and my new project for the year is a large boutis of an original design which I commissioned.  I have finished tracing it and basted it yesterday, and I even enjoyed doing that because I looked at the design more closely.
Hiromi send me a lovely gift of a silver sewing set from Ireland, plus some Japanese fabrics and beautiful little pins.  She bought herself and Lou the same, as she says the 3 boutis sisters !  I love that since I don't have a sister ......
Lou sent me an antique handkerchief with an elaborately and finely stitched monogram.  It is amazingly fine, and I am in awe of the ladies who stitched these fine pieces in candlelight or daylight, without the benefit of the superfine needles we have today.

Looks like I will have to post the photos later, blogger won't let me access the photos on my computer .....Update:  I am still not getting the option to upload photos from my computer - Monika told me that others have had this problem.  How did you solve it ?  For now, I made a Picasa album and uploaded from there.