Grandgirls and Needlepoint

I’m home after a short trip to visit my three grandgirls – ages 9, 10, and 13. I arrived Thursday evening and we waited until Mom and Dad left for work early Friday morning to get busy on learning needlepoint.

I decided to start them with plastic canvas and knitting yarn. Easy for them to work with and they can handle it without stretcher bars, etc. I brought three sizes of squares that I had cut and packed for them and about 9 different colors of yarn – not full skeins since I wanted to see how they did before investing a lot of money. They each did a little square (15 stitches by 15) to learn how to do basketweave. They learned and stitched quickly, so we moved on to creating a simple design with triangles and squares. The photo below shows Ansley’s (age 10) design and Cohen’s (age 9) design.

From there, they created everything on their own. Letters became a big thing. Keaton (age 13) created a design of her and then made an E square for her best friend Erin.

We started running out of plastic canvas and yarn by lunchtime, so Daddy took us to a yarn store where the girls picked out 3 solid colors and 3 variegated colors. When I came downstairs Saturday morning, this is what I found.

All three girls were at work, two of them for over an hour by the time I got up. And Cohen was finishing an M for Mommy (it was done before breakfast).

While the girls were at the movies with their Uncle (my second son), Mommy and I went and found more yarn and plastic canvas. They loved that but didn’t have any time to start on the new colors because we went to a 4th of July party.

Sunday morning I taught them a couple more stitches, including Scotch Stitch which they all started working on. It’s perfect for making little dog collars for the chihuahuas. Later in the day, Ansley put on a fashion show so everyone could see the new dog collars. That’s Taco in pink and green and Pip on the right in turquoise and plum.

I took along a Christmas ornament of 3 little cats. I wanted them to see what they can do with basketweave and what they can work on soon, when Grandma buys them painted designs. While at the party Sat. night, I was stitching inside (too hot and humid for me outside). I stopped to talk with some of the people who came through to get snacks. When I looked down, Cohen had the ornament. “This is where I go next, right?” she asked with the needle in the canvas in the correct spot going up a row!

Sunday night, Keaton’s best friend Erin came over and spent the night. At 12:30 am Monday, Mommy checked on the girls and they were needlepointing away. So we now have 4 new members of the needlepoint community. Three and a half wonderful days. I came home tired (got up at 4:00 am California time) but very happy. Now back to designing a High Atlas rug. The girls got to see how I go about this and the threads that I will be using.