Feeling Stitchy Stitch Along

Hi Feeling Stitchy visitors!

This month I am honored to be the guest artist for the Stitch Along.
When my awesome friend Pam, aka Kittykill, asked me if I would be interested in drawing up a design for April, I jumped at the chance! I had previously drawn a young woman dancing in the rain for the Hoop Up swap on Flickr, but I wanted something a bit more whimsical for the season. I changed my design by making the girl younger, changed her clothes, and added details like cute polkadot wellies and daffodil flowers. I left the dress blank so you can use the decorative stitches of your choice (I think some plaid would be fun!)

This is what my new design looks like, but if you want to download it, you have to go over to the Feeling Stitchy blog post where you can click to get the full size image.


Remember to post pics to the Feeling Stitchy Embroidery Group on Flickr. If you do not have a Flickr account, you can email a pic to me (address on sidebar) and I will post it here on my blog. I would love to see how you interpret my design.

Big hugs and Happy Spring to everyone!

Heidi aka Digital Misfit

New Computer At Last!

Hi peoples!
I am blogging today for the first time from my brand shiny new desktop computer. It is the first NEW computer I have ever had (I am the queen of the second hand PCs, but I keep those babies running as long as possible!).
My old gal was still running (albeit sluggishly), but my totally awesome older sis, Shari, surprised me with this unbelievable gift. I even have a nice new widescreen monitor.
I had some issues with setting it up.
First I could not do a damn thing because the OS was not installed, and the DVD-RW drive was not working. The PC is under full warranty for 2 years, but the catch is that it has to be serviced IN-STORE! Well the nearest location is a 7 hr drive away (my sis bought it from her usual PC shop near her home and shipped it here). The shipping would cost an arm and a leg for me. Opening the PC would void the warranty, and the company refused to allow me to take it to a local repair shop, even if I paid for it (well, I COULD take it, but once again, it would void the warranty). After being ignored by the company on Twitter, Facebook, email and by phone (I was transferred 3x to different departments, each saying they could not do anything and I have to bring it in), I said EFF THIS!
I had an awesome help partner by the name of Rick (@oatmeal_25) who walked me through some troubleshooting first. So sweet, since I had never spoken to this Twitter dude before. When nothing worked, I popped the case and noticed the problem right away - the DVD RW drive power cable was loose. A quick tap into the pins and it was ready to go! Can you imagine spending $80 on shipping (each way!) just to have a tech TAP a cable and send it back?! WTF?!
Warranty is shot for the PC, but I have a lovely working computer.
It took a couple of days to install all the drivers and software and stuff, and I still have a zillion files on my old PC that I will have to retrieve one day, but I am still thrilled.
I had no idea a PC could run this fast! With a terabyte of storage, I can save every tutorial and pattern I have ever admired and then some (not that this will make me actually CREATE more art/crafts, but hey, it is a start!)

Also, I noted today that my humble wee blog has reached 300 Google Friend Connect followers! How freakin' awesome are each and every one of you? Big huge hugs! I will have to have a giveaway next month to celebrate. What should the prize be? I am open to suggestions.

Bloglovin' and Lovin' Blogs!

Follow my blog with bloglovin

I have just signed up on BlogLovin' since it seems to be the thing to do these days. I like it so far - if you have Bloglovin' click to follow mine, and leave a comment so I can follow yours too.
It seems to be SO much easier to navigate that Google Friend Connect. I love my GFC followers (almost 300 of you! WOW! I may have to do a special follower giveaway soon!), and I love the blogs I follow, but it is hard to get around to them all (I really need to weed out old blogs that are no longer updated or have moved!).
With Bloglovin, I can search out the ones I want to check up on. It is free, no hassle, and come on - everyone is doin' it!
I also have the Networked Blogs gadget through Facebook here. I think I have too many gadgets.
Go ahead and follow me anyway - I am a lazy blogger and do not post nearly as often as I should, so I won't take up much of your time LOL!

I also wanted to send much love out to all of the participants of the 5th and final annual One World One Heart blog event (see 2 previous posts).
I had such a great time, and I was even lucky enough to win a LOT of awesome goodies from many beautiful bloggers. I am anxiously awaiting for my mailbox to hold such treasures as art & art prints, cards, gorgeous jewelry, art box, mini quilt, plush bear, cute bunnies, cloth art doll, and even the BJD. I do not want to accidentally forget anybody, so I won't list them all now, but instead blog them when they come in.

OWOH Winner Announcement! (and OWOA news!)

One World One Heart has come to a close.

I have so enjoyed this year's event, with hundreds of familiar faces, and even more new talented bloggers to meet. I tried my very best to make it to all 850+ blogs participating this year. I think I at least came close!
I am very impressed with the turnout, and humbled by the lovely comments so many of you left here on my blog. I had no idea so many people would be interested in my little artwork and gnome!

For the past three years, OWOH has been my favorite blog event, one I looked forward to all year. I was very sad to learn that this was to be the final year.
Until, that is, the ocean dreamer herself, Ms Lisa Swifka of A Whimsical Bohemian, and the mastermind of OWOH announced that she would be heading up a brand new blog event next year!
Our World Our Art looks like it is going to be even more spectacular! Artists from all over the globe coming together to share their work with each other. I am getting inspired already!
I do hope that all of you will consider hopping aboard this new blog journey and sign up for the reminder newsletter on Lisa's blog.

Now for the news everyone is waiting to hear.

I have drawn the winner of my OWOH giveaway.
The honor was done by my trusty assistant, random.org

The winner of BOTH my canvas art piece and the gnome pincushion is ...
Drumroll please...

the beautiful and talented Kristin of Twinkle Twinkle

Kristin, I will be emailing you very soon for your mailing address. I do hope you like your gifts.

I want to thank you all for participating in One World One Heart, and for visiting my little hiding place in cyberspace! I hope you come by again. I know I will be visiting many of you again very soon.

Big hugs,
Heidi
aka Digital Misfit

One World One Heart 2011 - Giveaway Closed! Thanks for visiting!

To enter, 

Welcome to my little hiding place in cyberspace!

This is my third year as a participant in the One World One Heart event hosted by Lisa Swifka of A Whimsical Bohemian.  This is the 5th and final year of the event, so it is a bit bittersweet.
I have enjoyed meeting so many beautiful bloggers and "discovering" countless talented artists during these events.
A bit about me:
My name is Heidi, though I am more commonly known around thius land of bits and bytes as Digital Misfit.
I am a 35 (patooey!) year old woman freezing my ample posterior off up here in northern Ontario, Canada.. During my childhood, I was never without a crayon or pencil in my hand.  I loved to draw, play with clay, pretty much anything artsy.
Then for years I put away the toys, focusing on work and other mundane stuff.
A few years ago, when I became ill and unable to work, I stumbled upon a crafty website called Craftster (heyyyy to all my Craftster friends who are visiting!).  I was so inspired that I bought a sewing machine, stocked up on craft supplies from every genre and got my hands dirty again.  I have been experimenting with everything from doll making to mixed media art, hand embroidery to polymer clay.  I love it all!  This year I plan to take up crochet (I am DETERMINED to learn, dammit!) , purse making, and small scale quilting.  My current main crafts include felt, embroidery and embroidery design, and painting.

Now for the stuff you are all here for: the giveaway!
Today I am giving away 2 completely unrelated items that I made especially for this event.
First up is a mixed media painting on wrapped canvas entitled One World.

This goddess is painted with watercolor crayon, progresso pencils, graphite pencil, acrylics, and ink with decoupage bits from a vintage Dutch copy of Jane Eyre. The sides are painted so she is ready to hang as-is.

Secondly I have Gnome on a Knoll.  This lil guy and his mushroom pal are handsewn from felt and perch upon a felt pincushion.  Even if you are not an avid sewist, you should have a safe place to keep a needle or two handy for those emergency button-repairs.  I just love gnomes and toadstools, don't you?

To enter, simply leave a comment in the section below.  I would love to know where you are visiting from, since this is such a fantastic international event.
BOTH of these items will go to ONE winner, which will be drawn from the comments below using random.org on February 17th.   The last day to enter will be February 16th at 11:59 pm EST (GMT -5h).
This giveaway is open to bloggers worldwide.  You do not have to be a participant of One World One Heart to enter, but you MUST have an active blog (ie: not a blog you created this morning to enter the giveaways).
If your blog does not have contact information on it, please leave your email address in your comment so that I can reach you in the event that you win.  To avoid spam, you can write it as myemailaddy (at) emailprovider (dot) com
If you want to participate in One World One Heart, you can still jump right in! Just visit the website to find out how.  I look forward to visiting all of the OWOH 2011 participants over the next 2 weeks. Big hugs to all of you!

heidi
aka Digital Misfit