More Stitchy Goodness from Dallas

Shelly Tribbey has what must be the cleverest series at the show. She has canvases for Halloween that you can finish yourself into caskets. The caskets are hinged so you see the needlepoint “body” when they are opened. The inside of the lid is decorated as well. They come packaged with canvas, coffin, and stitch guide. Appropriately enough there’s Frankenstein, Dracula, and a witch.

I just love Little Shoppe’s Crayon Quilt canvas. I have been wanting to do a needlepoint like this for ages, so I am so glad they made this. The rectangular blocks are great painted versions of different fabrics. They also have a wonderful new 3-D treat bowl, perfect for an indoor Halloween party. Little Shoppe also has a half dozen new sea creature squares. There are cartoony animals in front of a wavy stripe background. These would be easy to stitch and wonderful for a child’s room.

Funda Scully has two great new hinged boxes. A pretty pink one has Chanel interlocking C’s. Another one has very silly but cute Christmas birds. The Point of It All has a lovely new fox hunting scene. Adding to their line of liquor bottles is one for Ketel One vodka. Speaking of bottles, Kirk & Bradley has new Halloween poison bottles.

JulieMar’s new designer has colorful canvases of a giraffe a wolf, and a lion. They also have a wonderful hippie rainbow hamsa hand, complete with a peace sign. It’s on a wonderful painted stitch background in a pastel rainbow of colors. Other canvases from the company include some geometrics that remind me of Chagall and Picasso collages. There are also lovely landscapes in a larger size. Also of note are new nasturtium and poppy canvases that remind me of Seventies prints and a wine terrace landscape.

Patti Mann has some canvases that have a series of rectangular panels, each different. These were finished around the sides of bucket bags. The bags were quite unusual as their tops were like handkerchief hems. I really liked the look! Melissa Prince has a new series of destination squares that are the same size as her popular movie squares. Among other cities I saw Nashville, Chicago, and Seattle. She has also added countries in the same size. My favorite of these is the kangaroo crossing for Australia. These travel series are starting with 24 designs. There are new movies as well, four of them, and a new “Go Red with Thread” canvas.

Unique NZ Designs has new canvases in their Lichtenstein-inspired heroines series with humorous word bubbles. They also have several new canvases inspired by Talavera Tiles. New Tapestry Fair canvases include a series of three vintage Christmas figures (Santa, snowman, and polar bear). They also have a series of retro-looking birds on bright patterned backgrounds. I loved the two cats who had bodies that were cauliflower and an avocado. Given that I love cauliflower and my DH loves avocados perhaps we should get them for our kitchen. There is also a swimming hippo that is a riot!

Ruth Schmuff has added three new canvases by Eleanor Grosch: a tiger, a cardinal, and a magpie. Another licensed artist is Sharon Hendy-Moman. Her canvases are of animals full of delightful patterns. She has a fox as well as dogs and cats.One of my favorite designers, Eye Candy, has a new series called Mod Birds. These are mid-Century folk art birds in the bright contemporary style typical of her designs.

Sew Much Fun has two new couples in their shelf sitters series. You can now get a boy or girl graduate owl, complete with a place for the class year and a mortarboard, or you can get a cowboy and cowgirl. Alice Peterson has tons of new canvas. Their biggest number of additions is their Judaic line. There are lots of lovely Tallit bags in geometric patterns. Some of them just have wide borders with open centers that are perfect for personalization. There is also a really lovely Hebrew alphabet canvas where each large letter has a scene inside it.

I really loved a new Zecca canvas of a Siamese cat that used for an accent color the lovely Sapphire Blue of the cat’s eyes. They have also added several designs to their coloring book for needlepoint line-drawn canvas series. The new designs include six 3″ rounds for ornaments and a Baby sign. Kate Dickerson has two new Keep Calm canvases, one each for bridge and mahjong players.

Tango and Chocolate has lots of new canvases. One series has colorful cats and dogs in a simple picture book style. On 13 mesh, these make great easy projects. My favorite is the cat apartment house that has a Dalmatian on the roof, howling at the moon. The other series has lots of flowers as well as some sayings in a more realistic style. Raymond Crawford has new Halloween silhouettes plus two new goats, a boy and a girl that remind me of the marionettes by Bill Baird. I just love them!

Raymond also has a series of 12 Days canvases inside his stars. There are also new sayings and a new vintage Halloween girl. I’m in love with his serene Our Lady of Guadalupe. He also has a delightful set of big-eyed pilgrim owls for Thanksgiving as well as a whole bunch of new Texas ornaments.

Rebecca Wood has a wonderful new multi-layer Texas landscape. Familiar Texas icons include the Alamo, long horn cattle, and cacti. Robbyn’s Nest has several really lovely new hamsa hands. One of them has a stunning tree of life design inside it. She has also extended her shapes with landscapes inside to include a starfish with a tropical sunset, a paw print with a lynx, and a heron in a maple leaf.

Penny Macleod has charming new ornament-sized birds that are a patchwork of patterns. Denise DeRusha is adding to her postcard series with postcards of two National Parks, the Grand Canyon and the Great Smoky Mountains.

In thread news, Rainbow Gallery has plenty of new colors beyond the new shades of Rainbow Persian. There is one new shade of Neon Rays along with five new shades of Neon Rays +. Capri has four new shades, while Entice has a dozen new colors.

We’ll end today with something a little different. Debbie Woodward’s (Painted Pony) daughter took some videos at the show and I wanted to share them with you. First up is a video interview with Jenny Huff. She’s the wonderful math teacher from Southern California who has started a needlepoint club at her high school. It’s very inspiring.

Debbie also has a view of what the show looks like as you walk around. Debbie hasn’t been doing this long, but you’ll get a great idea of what it looks like to walk around. She also has a video of the banquet (it’s long).

Links to the Coverage

This is just one of the many posts I have on the show both before and after. Here’s the comprehensive list:

• Market Preview 1
• Market Preview 2
• Market Preview 3
• Coverage 1
• Coverage 2 (today)
• Coverage 3 (Thursday)
• Market Trends (Friday)