WINNER ANNOUNCEMENT!!!!

Hi everyone! Genevieve here--


We have our winners for last week's Giveaway! We so enjoyed reading about your traditions and memories we decided to do a second prize!! We put together a sampling of some of our new Silk Thread Bundles and  Canvas available on Etsy starting today. Randomly chosen with the Google Random  Generator, this little gift should make a nice treat for our Second Place winner AMANDA from Ontario Canada. Have fun!!!

And as for our First Place Winner---MARY from Louisiana takes the Making Memories Needlepoint kit and Instruction Booklet.  Her memory of her Christmas Traditions are a perfect fit for such a special treat!!

If you are a winner---please be sure to email us your snail mail so that we get this to you ahead of the last minute holiday shipping!!! 

In other news, we have been getting great feedback from our Cyber-Squaredancer's!!! Everyone has been getting their kits and I would just like to say thank you for all your kind words. We really really worked hard to get those out as fast and as beautifully put together as was possible in the 2 weeks since we received the final count from ANG on November 15th. It has been just great to read the happy posts--this particular assistant is breathing a sigh of relief!

And lastly---we have been brainstorming new ideas for Cyber Classes and I thought I would just ask you all what kind of class you would like to see in our Cyberclass series over the next year. We are looking for innovative ideas, classes that go beyond the ordinary! 

Let us know if there has been a class you are dying to take and want to see worked up as Cyber class! Just think--you could be taking it this time next year from the coziness 

of your favorite chair!!

That's it for now--Thanks everyone for your wonderful Holiday Thoughts---and here's hoping that the Season has been a happy one for you!

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It's time for a giveaway!

It's that time of year and I just feel like giving!!  

It doesn't matter how old you get or what your family traditions are, this time of year you just have to get in a good mood.  It seems like the perfect time for an Extraordinary Giveaway!!!! 

 

Up for grabs is a "Making Memories" Needlepoint Kit. It comes complete with all the threads, supplies and instruction packet to make one book. The book is bound with blank pages and is suitable for photos, scrap booking, sketching, recipes---whatever you can think of.

So for this Giveaway, you can enter any or all of the ways below:

1. Comment on your very favorite holiday tradition.

2. Go to my blog : ornadesign.blogspot.com and start following me. It's a great way to learn about classes, workshops, new designs and really great sales!

3. And finally, visit ETSY and make my shop a Favorite! It's chock full of small kits, canvas, Ultrasuede, and equipment to help you with your Needlepoint! 

If you do all three you can consider yourself entered three times!

Please be sure to keep checking back--and if you win, send us your snail mail!!

(We promise not to use it for anything else).

The deadline for this contest is December 7th, 2010 @ noon.

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Here's what I've been doing!

This is the first batch of kits (over 50), going out tomorrow for Squaredance.

Should have more going out everyday this week. 

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Life deserves a very close look...

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving, my friends!

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Late night hours

I've always been a night person.  When I was young I could allow myself not to be a morning person.  I rarely spoke more than one syllable words before 10am.  That was many lifetimes ago.  

Now I'm still a night person but it has become harder because I get up early.  I'm at the computer with my first two cups of coffee long before getting Nina ready for school.  

The late nights when everyone is asleep, house chores rarely make me feel guilty.  I sit on the sofa, threads all around me, a re-run of Law and Order in front of me, (I usually just listen because my eyes are glued to my canvas), and it's beautifully quite.  

I've learned to enjoy my own company.  Not in a narcissistic kind of way, but in the way which we learn to do as we grow older.  We calm down a bit and begin to see ourselves as good friends.  It's just me, my hands working the threads, my mind wandering and exploring.  

I love the late night hours.

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Needlecase in a day!

I have 5 million things to do. That's usually when I decide to do something new.  Makes sense, doesn't it?  

So yesterday I decided to finally do something with some little button charms that I've had for years.  These are little Susan Clarke mini buttons or embellishments.  The needlepoint design couldn't be simpler but with the charm I think it works.  Then I took some felt, (the felt in the photo is actually dark gray, I couldn't adjust the image to show that).  I sewed a ribbon to the felt, folded it and attached the little needlepoint piece. With a few very easy steps I have a very functional and pretty needlecase. 

Of course I had to do it in two colorways...

I have a limited number of these charms but I will be kitting this little number after Thanksgiving and I'll send notice to my mailing list.  If you'd like to get notice of this, please sign up on this page,  to the left, so that you can join the list and find out when special items are available.  

What are your Thanksgiving plans?  Cooking?

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Have I become one of them?

Dog people used to drive me crazy! (WAIT till the end before you send any hate mail my way...).   Not all dog people, just the ones that talk and talk and talk to you about their dog and really don't care if you're interested.  The ones that when their dog comes and sniffs you all over, jumps on you, licks you-- they just smile at you. One of those proud parent smiles, those sweet smiles, as if to say, "awww, don't you just love my dog's nose and saliva all over you?".  

I don't want people to assume I'm interested in their dogs.  I don't assume they are interested in my loved ones.   I used to get so worked up about this kind of dog person. I'd grumble and squish my eyebrows together in anger.  I swore up and down that I would never, ever be a dog person!  Not THAT kind of dog person!

But then this came into my life...

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What do you think? Wasteful? Not?

Yesterday morning I went to pick up some mid-week groceries. You know, the kind that doesn't really fall under the: "OH MY, we have nothing to eat at home", but does fall under: "Are we out of milk and eggs already?".  So at the entrance to the store there were buckets and buckets of flowers. They weren't my favorite kinds (not Hydrangeas, or Peonies or other such varieties), but still, they were so abundant, singing to me as I entered the store. I could feel my mouth watering and I kept picking up packs of them and putting them back in the buckets, dreaming of combinations.  Finally I forced myself to move on and I packed my cart with the items I came for.

At the cash register things were going slow. Very slow. Yep, about five minutes into the wait I grabbed my bag, left my cart in line and dashed over to those buckets. I had already figured out combinations, so I knew exactly which packs to grab. Dripping water I ran back to my cart at the line just in time to unload and pay. 

I got home and spent the next half hour putzing with the flowers. I love putzing, especially with flowers.  These are a few of them.

 The tulips went in the bathroom. 

You would think that's the end of the story but here's the catch... I've been ridden with guilt about having spent all this money on flowers.  Did I really need them? In less than a week they'll be gone anyway.  And why did I buy more than one pack? On and on.  

So what do you think? Wasteful or not?

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Kit Utopia

It's Genevieve again:

If anyone is wondering about the best part of this job, let me just show you---I know that anyone who does Needle Art of any kind will appreciate this!!

After receiving the final count on our Squaredance Cyberclass today ( a whopping 114 of you signed up!!) Orna and I have begun putting together the Squaredance kits in two colorways: Veranda Views and Summertime Hills. 

The threads have been arriving, all these beautiful silks and colors.  I lined them all up to take inventory, and I had to snap some pictures when I saw this extraordinary array of colors!

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