When I was a child, my favorite toy was a little lamb that played "Jesus Loves Me" when it was wound up. I loved that lamb to death - I mean it literally fell apart. I had the classic speech difficulty of saying W sounds for L sounds. So I was always talking about my "Wittwe Wamb" My mom would practice with me - Lollipop over and over again. I would say Lollipop perfectly but continued to say "Wittwe Wamb" I think she didn't understand that "Wittwe Wamb" was his name!

When I saw Lesley Shepherd's miniature lamb needlework pattern, it took me back to my childhood. You may work the Miniature Lamb needlework pattern in cross stitches and fill it in with French knots to make it look woolly as shown here or just work the pattern entirely in cross stitches. If you want a gray or brown lamb alter the colors as you like.

More Free Needlework Patterns:

• Miniature Needlework Charts
• Free Cross Stitch Patterns A-Z Index
• Free Candlewicking Patterns
• Free Hardanger Patterns
• Free Hand Embroidery Patterns

Are you looking for great projects and interesting articles about crafting. The Crafty Bloggers are here to save the day. Here is what some of my favorite crafty bloggers have been up to this week:

• Mixed Media Artist Would you ever do an art show where you knew you wouldn't sell anything?
• The Impatient Crafter
  Madge makes a festive Patchwork Paper decoupaged letter for your teen's bedroom door in this week's post for iLoveToCreate.
• Cathie Filian
  Cathie shows you how to make a kids felt book. The book are perfect for airplane trips, car rides and rainy days. They make great gifts!
• Craftside
  Over on the Craftside blog there are how-to ideas for casting and making a silver metal clay wing necklace and a recycled wool sweater Christmas needle book. There's an Mail Art Call Out to commemorate the 20th Anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, tips for making a vintage rosary style necklace and a little Jimi Hendrix thrown in.
• Crafty Princess Diaries
  Tammy reviews a new book full of unique and earth-friendly ways to wrap your gifts this holiday season using scarves.
• About.com Family Crafts
  Come play along with this Make-It-Over craft challenge! What can you make out of candy? This is a great way to use up any left over Halloween candy.
• Farm Girl Roots, City Girl Style
  How did you get introduced to your hobby? Linda shares the story on how she learned to quilt and where those skills have gotten her.
• Stefanie Girard's Sweater Surgery
  How to make a Sweater Surgery Light up Christmas tree inspired by The Lampshade Lady's Guide to Lighting Up Your Life
• Aileen's Musings
  Aileen's on a mission to win a trip to NYC and to see the Martha Stewart show! Check out her under $20.00 Christmas project on Michael's craft site and rate it to help her win!
• The Artful Crafter
  Eileen shares directions for some lovely polymer clay Thanksgiving napkin rings. You have a choice of one embellished with a cute clay turkey or a more formal looking ring stamped with a fall motif.
• Vickie Howell - Craft.Rock.Love
  Make cool, graphic wall art using Ed Roth's Stencil Decor kit and a little imagination!

Share your own favorite crafty blogs using the comments section below.

Janlynn is a well-known company in the stitching world. Recently Andrew Goetsch took the time to share information with me about the new HOTS program.

Andy is not only the CFO in charge of business development, he is also a stitcher himself! For me, this makes a big difference to know that the person in charge of a company actually does stitching too!

The Heart of the Stitcher program (HOTS) is part of Janlynn's plan to become the crafting online store solution. HOTS is a good start toward that end since it allows stitchers various options for purchasing their most popular designs. Since a majority of stitchers dislike kits, Janlynn offers charts as standalones, in conjunction with various selections of pre-cut fabric, and with pre-cut floss or skeins.

I recently placed an order through the HOTS program and it was quite simple and easy. If you are looking for a great gift for a stitcher or just a great way to get what you want, HOTS may be just the ticket.

Visit Janlynn's site to Learn more about HOTS. You can also become a fan of Heart of Cross Stitch on Facebook to keep up with all of the developments at Janlynn.

Have you tried HOTS? Tell us about your experience using the comments section below.

I get a lot of emails from people looking for fabrics that are slightly out of the ordinary. Many colors of Aida, for example, are only readily available in 14-count. What if you are looking for yellow fabric in 18-count Aida? If you know how to dye your own fabric, then you can just work up your own. But, if like me, your dye efforts don't always turn out so great?

Recently I received some samples from DoveStitch Fabrics. Not only do they have all sorts of colors in all sorts of counts of Aida, evenweave, and linen, they also do custom fabric treatments. You can choose from a wide variety of treatments.

When DoveStitch claims that they have the "biggest Hand-dyed, solid and Patterned cross stitch fabric range worldwide" they aren't joking. From Paisley to Polka Dots to Chocolate hand-dyed fabric and much, much more, the selection is astounding.

I will be posting projects stitched on the samples soon so watch for them!

More Fabric Sources: (just a few of many!)

• Charles Craft
• Zweigart
• Silkweaver
• Stab N' Stash

Share your favorite fabric brands and sources using the comments section below.