Continued Foggy Greetings!

The season of fog continues. Although I think it's preferable to the scorching heat two of my Needlework Mafia buds have been having. Jean (Attic Needlework) was telling me it had cooled down to 104° from 114° - Yikes!!! Jeannine (Acorns and Threads) has been suffering with above 100° heat in Portland. And Pat at Lakeside said it was 104° at her house yesterday. Having lived in Seattle for 10 years I know how unusual that kind of weather is for the Northwest. Personally I melt at about 98° (kind of like chocolate) so I'm quite happy in my foggy world - no snide comments about that "foggy" part either :-).

Weekly Special

We still have a good supply of these items so we're continuing with our Weekly Special on The Victoria Sampler accessory packs and Just Nan WhimZi frames until they are gone. TVS packs are 20%-30% off and the WhimZi frames are 25% off. The newer TVS packs (100 and above) are not part of this sale. The Weekly Special is limited to stock on hand only for the items listed on our Sale page and these items do not earn Rewards points.

We also have cut down the remaining Heatherfield and Betsy Ross fabrics and those are now available in grab bags. You get 4 stitcher's eighths for $10 (Reg. $25). You'll find them on our Sale page as well.

Christmas in July - Last Weekend

Birds of a Feather Madonna & Child 6.5 x 9 - 18 mesh	Cheryl Schaeffer Designs Mini Christmas Lights - Peppermint Cherries 2.5x3 - 18 mesh
Maggie Co. - Mosey 'n Me Jolly St. Nick 4in round - 18 mesh	Rebecca Woods Designs Tree Presents 4in round - 18 mesh

This is our last weekend for our needlepoint Christmas in July celebration with designers Birds of a Feather, Cheryl Schaeffer Designs, Maggie Co. /Ewe & Eye and Rebecca Wood Designs. Be sure to stop by before August 2nd to see the canvases.

If you purchase one of the Trunkshow canvases or order one during the Trunkshow you will receive our Trunkshow discount on the canvas. And you earn Stitching Has Its Rewards points on your trunkshow purchases as well. Don't delay!!!

What's New & Updates

Here are some new items in the past week:

• Books - Cross Stitcher's Bible ($52), Abécédaire Botanique lettres à broder ($29.95)
• SANQ Magazine - Issue 56

Last month several thread vendors released new colors at market and we've gotten them all in the store now.

• Crescent Colours - Belle Soie: Foo Foo Flamingo, Hula Skirt & Laura Lilac
• The Gentle Art - Sampler Threads: Autumn Leaves, Chives, Raspberry Frost, Sunflower
• The Gentle Art - Ltd Ed colors: Driftwood, Water's Edge
• Week's Dye Works: Kris's Bon Bon, Watermelon Patch

Week's also has released 2 new colors of linen in 30 and 35 count (Kris's Bon Bon and Almond Bar) and dyed two colors in 20 count (Mocha and Putty). Lakeside Linens has also released a new color, Porcelain and Vintage Porcelain. It's orderable in all the counts. We're stocking more of the 45 count colors these days so you can come by the shop and see the lovely colors in person if you wish.

If you're looking for Green in Gilt Sylke Twist we just got a dozen spools as well as a few of Sable. These come in as they are available and if you've ordered one of these colors it'll go out to you shortly.

You can usually find most new charts through the Hoffman Merchant Mall and you can place orders for anything in the Hoffman on-line catalog. You're also welcome to check out our other 2 main distributors, Norden Crafts and Wichelt Imports to see what's new or what other fun things are available we've not mentioned.

Upcoming Releases

The 2009 issue of Just Cross Stitch Ornament issue is scheduled to be released in September. We are taking pre-orders for it now. You can give us a call or sign-up via the online catalog.

Blackbird Designs will be releasing a Halloween Stocking booklet in August that has 13 vintage Halloween stocking designs just in time for some fun Halloween stitching. We have pre-ordered it and you can give us a call if you'd like to be on the list for it. We don't currently have a price but expect to get that soon.

2009 Series

Just Another Button Company is continuing their fun series of designs for their button packs. 2008 was Teapots and 2009 is the Cup O'Tea series. We get a new design each month and you get the design with the purchase of the button pack. You can see all of the available Teapot or Teacup series in our on-line catalog.

Blackbird Designs - 2009 Loose Feathers Club -- The 2009 series is well underway. If you've not signed up for the 2009 Club you can do so by calling the shop or on-line.

Just Nan's Over The Top Tin Club is also in progress (4 tins during the entire year). We still have room on our sign-up list for the 2009 series so if you missed signing up earlier, you can still do so. Call us or go to the Over The Top Tin Club page.

Needleprint - Mary Wigham

Part 9 of Mary Wigham was posted Thursday so she is now complete. Jacqueline of Needleprint has done a marvelous job with this design and I hope that she's been able to raise quite a bit for the Ackworth School which owns the original. The 9 parts of the chart for Mary Wigham are available for free off the Needleprint blog. It is requested that you make a donation to the museum, which helps them in the continued efforts to conserve samplers in their collection.

I'm doing Mary on 40 count Lakeside Linens Vintage Green Slate. I have two hanks of Ltd. Ed. Gloriana silk from year's ago and the main one I'm using has a bit of green, blue, lavender and pale rose in it. I've gotten as far as the first motif but you can get some idea of the color.

We had a special visitor in the store on Tuesday afternoon. Linda Vinson of Needlemade Designs stopped by for a visit while she was on her way with her family to a reunion. Linda (who also works for Jean Lea) and I met at Jean's Attic Sampler Symposium last November and over lunch discovered that we attended the same small college in Seattle at the same time and lived in the same small dorm. I lived upstairs from her but we likely never met - she was a science major and at the time I was a textiles major. It just goes to show what a small world this is. While Linda was visiting she showed us some of her works in progress (including a new design) but the one that caught all our attention is her rendition of Mouline Rouge with Soie 100/3. To get the round thread to lay right she's doing it all in reversible cross-stitch! And the back is just as beautiful, if not more so, than the front. Here's a little portion of it - simply amazing. Thanks Linda for sharing all your lovely WIPs with us on your short visit. It was inspiring.

For the past several weeks I've been working on taking photos of the Rainbow Gallery threads. It's going to take me several months to finish them all but I'm making good progress. This week I took photos of Mandarin Floss, Very Velvet, Pebbly Perle, Wisper and Treasure Ribbon. Eventually I plan to photograph all of them, hence why it will take so much time. RG does an amazing range of threads so it's a lot of thread cards to photograph. Hopefully you will find it useful if you're not able to come into the store to see the colors in person.

Back to work on editing the RG photos. I should have this batch done Friday sometime. Then a little more stitching on Mary Wigham.

Happy Stitching,

Cathe
...and Debi, Leila, Jennifer, Mary, Ali, Caroline, Sherry, Susan and Margaret

510-522-0404 *  877-HAYSTAC *  877-429-7822
1533 Webster Street  *  Alameda, CA 94501

Shop Hours: Tuesday 11am - 8pm, Wed - Saturday 11am - 5pm
Sun 1pm - 4pm
Monday By Appointment

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