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New Things
& News
 For those
who've been following Just
Nan's Mouse
In A House series,
the last one - Frosty
Snow Mouse In A House
has arrived. This one uses
Belfast Opalescent and
Steel Grey for the fabrics
and many of the same DMC
colors as the previous
entries in the series.
You'll find Frosty
Snow Mouse In A House
in our online
catalog as well as
links to the previous
entries in the Related
Items links.
Nan has teased us that the
next series will feature a
cottage - can't wait!
 We blew
through our first shipment
of the DMC tins in
December and more are
expected sometime in
February. I don't think
they had any idea how
popular they would be so
my guess is they didn't
produce enough the first
go-round. We have notified
everyone of the delay that
had ordered one from us,
but if you are still
wanting to get one we're
happy to put you on the
waiting list.
While we
have not been officially
notified of this by DMC,
we understand they are
planning to do a new color
card with the 35 new
colors on it. It is
showing up on DMC USA's
website with no release
date. DMC doesn't do a
great job of keeping
retailers informed of new
things so it might be
awhile before they get
around to telling us about
this. If you want to be on
the interest list for
this, drop us an e-mail.
You'll
find a way to order the
new colors and/or the tin
in the online
catalog. If you want
just a few of colors you
can find them in the DMC
Floss page.
Product
Updates
We still
don't have an ETA for when
we'll be starting our Au
ver a Soie
metallics club so if you
have asked to be on the
interest list don't panic
and think we've sold
thread without you. My
guess is it'll be at least
spring before we get the
first production
runs. If you're
not already on the
interest list you can e-mail us,
or we'll do a announcement
on our blog, in the
newsletter and on Facebook
it is finally read to be
released. As with many new
ventures, it's not
something that can be
rushed.
Norden
Crafts closed
the end of December, as I
had mentioned in the
previous newsletter. It
means that a few of the
items we regularly purchased
we do not have a source for
at the moment. Many products
were already available
through other distributors
but it does mean that those
distributors are also seeing
an increase in orders. Good
for them, but it can mean
longer wait times for our
orders. So we request that
you please be patient over
the next few months as all
of this settles out. It also
hasn't helped that in
January several of our
vendors have seen the flu go
around their staff.
In working with Access
Commodities (our
supplier for Au ver
a Soie threads)
we were able to get the
Northern Cross brought into
the US again. It is now
called Studio
Line and
if you are a follower of
Diane's at Little
House Needlework
you might have a seen a note
on this. What used to be
called Northern Cross
30 count Natural is
now Studio Line
Portobello (which is
the name for the 30 count
natural). We are getting it
without the sizing now,
which makes it a much nicer
fabric to work with.
Sometimes the mill sends the
sized version, sometimes the
un-sized, but we're happy to
get it either way! You'll
find it in the online
catalog.
Access is also our source
for Legacy Linen - Alba
Maxima, which Mary Corbet
uses for many of her
embroidery projects. We are
expecting another shipment
this month as our January
shipment sold out once Mary
used it for a stitch-along.
What you may not know is
that Alba Maxima and Old
White are the same base
fabric, just two different
shades of white. Alba Maxima
is Bright White and Old
White is an Antique White,
which Trish @ Thistle
Threads uses for many of her
needlework Casket related
projects (I'm using it for
Harmony with Nature). Mary
picked Alba Maxima as it
went the best with the
colors she chose for her
Kaleidoscope designs. If you
are changing colors the Old
White might work as well.
Since Mary
Corbet uses a backing on
many of her embroidery
projects we now carry Southern
Belle white quilting
cotton. We also sell Kona
Cotton in a cream
color so depending upon your
embroidery fabric one or the
other should work as a
backing if you need it.
Harbor
Haven Is Here
Donna at By The Bay
Needleart has
released parts 1 & 2 and
we expect part 3 in the next
few days. I did create
another silk conversion for
this one and about 60% of
the colors are shared with
Serenity Harbor. There are
several fabric options but
it does require a pretty big
piece if you're stitching it
over 2 fabric threads. If
you have threads left over
from Serenity Harbor you can
purchase just the new silks
as a thread pack. You'll
find the order page in our online
catalog and you can see
more about the entire
project on Donna's blog.
I've not
been stitching that much the
past several weeks. I'm
still trying to give my
wrist a bit of a rest but
it's also because I got
captured by a new craft - my
Cricut
machine. I happy to give
the blame to Priscilla
and Chelsea as their
mentions of it made me look
at finally taking the
plunge. I have made several
things with it including
lettering for 2 new A-Frame
signs we now use outside the
shop. Learning a new
software tool to do the
designing has been fun (it
appeals to the geek in me)
and creating something fun
appeals to the crafter in
me. There is a vine border
along the outside edge of
the black sign that took me
an hour to apply since it
was cut into 20 separate
pieces, 10 per side. I've
been having fun doing
iron-on vinyl on some bags
and I'll show those next
time.
We had a
good view of the lunar
eclipse this week so I got
up early Wednesday morning
to watch a bit of it. It was
crystal clear night so the
viewing was great and it was
definitely a red moon.
 I'm off
to Nashville the first
weekend of March for our
annual cross-stitch
wholesale market there.
We've already been getting
sneak peeks of new designs
and I hope to post some of
them this next week. There
are a ton of new samplers
from Nicola at Hands
Across the Sea that look
very tempting.
And in a related note, I
have ordered lots of
copies of a new Monogram
book from Elisabetta
Sforza called A
Flower Alphabet, in
Italy that should be
arriving in mid-February
as they shipped to us
today. I'll add it to the
online in the next few
days. Mary Corbet will be
doing a review in the next
few weeks of it - just the
photos of I've seen of it
made me want to carry it
and Elisabetta has been
doing monograms in
embroidery as custom work
for many, many years.
Lots of
fun things to look forward
to!
And my
last bit of really late
news, I created a YouTube
channel for the
shop on Thursday and moved
my stretcher bar videos
I'd been hosting privately
there. I did fix the
volume which for some
reason ended up much
softer in the final edits
I did eons ago than I
thought. I will be adding
more new short videos
there ranging from
how-to's to product
information. I have tagged
them for FlossTube so if
you get notifications of
new FlossTube tagged
videos you might have
already seen this. For
those of you who don't
know what FlossTube is,
it's a subset of YouTube
videos stitchers tag with
that name so it's easier
to find needlework related
videos. There is a wealth
of information there from
a wide variety of sources.
Happy
Stitching!
Cathe
...and
Jennifer, Debi, Cymone,
Marissa
cathe@needlestack.com
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