Happy Day After Christmas!

Or Happy Boxing Day to those in the U.K.!

Not much blogging has been done around here lately and not a lot more stitching.  Life has been hectic; we recently bought a house and that's taken up a lot of my time.  The house is in the eastern panhandle of West Virginia, near Harpers Ferry and about 2 hours from D.C.  My guy is moving in this week; I can't move until I get a job there, so the hunt is on!  I've been giving some thought to trying to convince my current employer to let me work from home, but I'm not sure I want to work from home.  Home is where I go to get away from work.  Oh well, all will work out, I'm sure (sorry, no pun intended).

The house-hunt was quite the adventure and we found the one we finally bought almost by accident.  Along the way, I did learn 3 of the fundamental truths of buying a new home:

1.  If the listing says it needs work, it needs work.  If the listing says it needs TLC, it needs a LOT of work.

2.  When people tell you that buying a short sale takes time, believe them.  Ours took 4 months to the day from offer to close.

3.  People have some, umm, interesting decorating tastes and they don't necessary jive with mine.  Maroon and orange walls?  In the same room?  Really?

I have got some stitching done.  I took Margaret Havelock with me when I went home for Thanksgiving (yikes!  That long ago?!) and I've made some progress with the alphabet, although I have no photos to share yet.  I've been in ornament mode this weekend; I finished the Bluebird of Christmas Happiness:

 He is done in HDF silks except for the red in his cap; that's a mystery silk that I got in a detritus package from somewhere.  I think it might be Silk 'N' Colors.  I finished him on Thursday and on Friday I started Winter Squirrel by Cathy Jean from The Victoria Sampler:

He is in the 2011 JCS ornament issue and I used the called-for fabric, fibers and embellishments, thanks to a packet from Needlecraft Corner.  He was a quick stitch and I finished him yesterday afternoon, then I started on another of Sharon's reindeer from her blog.  All I have done on that is the border and a couple of rows of reindeer, so not much to show.

I hope everyone had / is having a lovely holiday.  I drove to Kentucky on Saturday to spend Christmas with my family and a good time was had by all.  I had good weather going down and coming back today, so I'm thankful for that.  The worst part of the drive on Saturday was trying to find a radio station with good Christmas music; I can only stand "Winter Wonderland" so many times.  It was a pretty futile effort.  I paused on one station that was playing a rock version of "Away in a Manger" -- no thanks -- and I got a kick out of a redneck version of the "12 Days of Christmas" from Jeff Foxworthy; but for the most part, it was slim pickings.  (Note to self: next car must have CD player!)

Wishing everyone a good week and a happy new year!  Happy stitching!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to all my blog readers!  Life has been hectic lately with little time for blogging but I hope things will settle down in the new year.

Take care and Merry Christmas to all!

Karen

Elizabeth Timms

I hadn't worked on Elizabeth in a while, so I pulled her out yesterday afternoon.  Here's where I started:

I made a little progress:

The berries on the tree are stitched over 1.  This is 36 count fabric, so it's not as traumatic as it could be.  There's actually a good bit of over 1 stitching on this piece, so I'll just get on my big-girl panties and deal with it! 

Wishing everyone a safe and blessed Thanksgiving and happy stitching!

Spring Sampler

Today was kind of warm and windy, like a spring day, so it seemed like a good day to work on Spring Sampler.

The border isn't as bad as I thought it would be.  I've got the right side almost 2/3 done and I'm taking a break from it to work on the main motif.  I really love the colors in these samplers and that makes them so much easier to stitch.

Have a great week and happy stitching!

Books and Movies and Music, Oh My!

So this morning I went to the library to dump some paper in the recycling bins and to pick up one book.  One book.  This is what I came home with: 

I went to pick up the Susan Eisenhower book; last weekend I saw the re-run of an episode of Booknotes in which she was interviewed about this book and I decided I wanted to read it, so my local library got for me from another library.  I also had requested the Rin Tin Tin book and was pleasantly surprised to discover that it had come in as well.  It's really hard to go to the library and not have a little browse through the stacks and today I found the Larry McMurtry book -- a book about books -- and the Grisham.  I'm not sure whether I've read the Grisham, but if I have, I'll just take it back.  I used to feel kind of guilty about checking out books and not reading them, but I don't any more.  When I check out items from the library, it helps their circulation numbers.  Good circulation numbers helps their funding, and more funding means more things the library can provide for its patrons.  Everybody wins.

I love my library.  Lee posted about libraries last week so my thanks go to her for kind of starting my thoughts in this direction.  I love the fact that I can go to my library and get darn near any book I want; if they don't have it, they can usually get it for me and get it for free.  But the library isn't just about books.  When my computer crashed, I could and did go to the library and use one of the PCs they have there -- for free.  I can get music CDs and books on tape, and I can get all kinds of movies.  I haven't rented a movie in years.  Why should I pay $7 to rent a DVD for a week when I can get it from the library for free?  And then there are the programs.  My library has story times for the little ones, as well as book clubs and programs for teens, adults and seniors.  If I have a question about something or need a word looked up in the unabridged dictionary, all I have to do is call the library.

Our local library has been working for years to get a new facility; their current space is simply no longer large enough.  There is a story -- maybe true, maybe apocryphal -- that during a discussion of the library's future at a township meeting, one of the commissioners made the astonishing statement that "not everybody reads"!

Apparently it's been a while since he's been to the library.

A Little Weekend Stitching

It's always a little disconcerting, this first day of "normal" time after a summer of daylight savings time.  The extra hour of sleep was most welcome, but the getting dark early takes some getting used to.  I got up to take a wee break from my stitching this afternoon, thinking that it must be around 5 o'clock, only to discover that it was closer to 3:30.  6pm looked more like 8.

I was in a sampler kind of mood today, so I decided to pull out Little Paradise.  The fibers are Thread Gatherer Silk 'N Colors and I wanted to work on this before the cold weather gets here and starts doing a number on my hands, making it difficult to work with silk.  I haven't worked on this piece in 3 or 4 months and here is where I left off:

I didn't make a lot of progress today but some is better than none.  The green on the tree is done in chain stitch to represent weeping willow leaves.  I was looking at it before I put it away and discovered that I had miscounted a little, but I don't think it will make any difference.  It'll probably stay the way it is.

I was in ornament mode last night.  I've been working on Bluebird of Christmas Happiness by M Designs; it was in the JCS ornament issue in....ummmm, maybe 2010?  I'd look but the magazine is downstairs and I'm not (yeah, I know...lazy).  Anyway, I switched out the DMC for some silk that I had in my stash, mostly HDF but the red is a mystery silk from a detritus bag that I bought who-knows-when and from who-knows-where.  I think this is the first picture I've posted, as it finally looks like something other than a blue blob.

I also finished Daffycat's reindeer ornament:

She has a new design on her blog in the post from Nov. 5th, and if you e-mail her she'll send you a copy.  It's not a reindeer but a cute little bird.

Time to go watch the Steelers and the Ravens go at it, though I'll probably miss the first quarter because there's a special on one of the cable channels about Susan Boyle.  She has the most awesome voice and I truly admire her for having the guts to follow her dream.

Wishing everyone a good week....happy stitching!

Edited to add that the bluebird ornament is in the 2008 JCS ornament issue (2010, 2008...just off a couple of years!)

The Gentle Island (lots of pics)

We spent last week on Prince Edward Island, Canada's smallest province.  It's a beautiful, beautiful place and I wanted to share some of it with you.

We flew into Halifax and drove up through Nova Scotia and across a small piece of New Brunswick to the Confederation Bridge, which is about 8 miles long and is PEI's only physical connection to the mainland.  On the New Brunswick side (I caught the sign in French mode):

And looking back from PEI:

PEI is a small island, so we decided to stay in Charlottetown, the provincial capital, and make daily excursions for sightseeing.  It was off-season, so a good many places were closed, including a lot of the restaurants and shops.  We didn't have to deal with crowds of (other) tourists, but I would like to go back in the summer when more is open and some of the warm-weather events are going on. 

We chose to stay at a bed & breakfast and our home for the week was The Dawson House.  If you ever go to Charlottetown and want a fantastic B&B, The Dawson House is for you.  Stacey and Randy are friendly, gracious hosts and the B&B is wonderful.  The room was immaculate and beautifully furnished, there was a Jacuzzi tub in the bathroom and the attention to detail was perfect, from the fluffy bath mat to the box of real tissues on the dressing table.

And the food.  Oh my goodness, the food!  Good smells floated upstairs every morning -- fresh-baked croissants, banana bread, pancakes, just yummy!  There was fresh fruit and yogurt and cereal if we wanted it, all served in this beautiful Victorian dining room (that's Randy, one of our hosts):

I highly recommend The Dawson House; we'd stay there again without a second thought!

PEI has over 50 lighthouses.  We went to a few of them; although most of them were closed, we were still able to get out and take some pictures.

Point Prim, PEI's only round lighthouse:

Cape Bear:

East Point:

I loved the sign at East Point light:

West Point; it's an operating light with an inn attached behind it:

PEI's big crop is potatoes.  The soil is red and sandy and is great for potatoes.  The only thing I wanted a picture of that I didn't get was a potato truck filled with 'taters.  There are also a number of wind farms on the island.  This picture combines the two, a wind farm in a potato field!

We explored Charlottetown and had some wonderful dinners in some of the local pubs.  It's a very walkable city and we were fortunate that the weather was (mostly) good.  It was beautiful on our last day.  This is the war memorial at Province House:

In 1864, representatives from the provinces met in Charlottetown and there they decided to form Canada.  John A. MacDonald was one of the "Fathers of Confederation" and became Canada's first prime minister.  I tried to chat with him, but he wasn't very talkative.

Leaving PEI, going back across the Confederation Bridge.  Coming to the island is free but leaving there is a toll on the bridge -- an astonishing $43.25 CAD (no, that's not a typo, it's forty-three dollars and 25 cents).

We loved PEI.  It's a beautiful, friendly place where the pace of life is slower than what we're used to.  I definitely want to go back someday.

Report From a Blustery Day

My goodness did we have wind today!  There's a large oak tree in front of the house and when the wind blows it brushes against the siding and makes the most dreadful racket.  I took the cats to the vet this morning and drove through little whirlwinds of leaves.  And yes, you read that correctly, I took the cats, as in both of them.  I've never taken them both at the same time before, but it actually worked out very well.  I had them in separate carriers but took them into the exam room together.  Timothy, Mr. Social Butterfly, wandered around and looked out the window, then settled down with his feet tucked under him and waited for his new best friend the vet.  Mimi wasn't quite as thrilled with the whole situation and stayed under the chair until it was her turn.

I haven't been doing much stitching, but I wanted to show you the stitches in the Tapestry Sampler.  This first picture shows some of the bargello work and petit point, but the diagonally-stitched area with the blue thread coming off it is cross stitch with 2 strands of DMC (on 24 count!)

More bargello and petit point:

There will be another pear to the right of this bit, then another section like the first bargello.  The white stitches around the pear are kind of an open basket-weave stitch; I believe the designer called it "dotted Swiss stitch".  It's a nice contrast to the petit point.

More petit point, some satin stitch and some herringbone:





I'm glad I remembered this piece and pulled it out.  I like the design and I like the earth tones.  It'll be fun.

Happy stitching to everyone!

Musings on a Rainy Weekend, or Fall Has Fell

Fall seems to have fallen with a definite and resounding thud! in western PA.  Mother Nature began teasing us on Thursday and Friday with cooler weather; the sprinkles started Friday afternoon and had developed into a steady rain by the time I got to Panera for stitch night that evening.  It rained pretty much all day yesterday and most of today and the cool temperatures prompted me to put the flannel sheets on the bed yesterday.  I love flannel sheets.  This morning on the way to and from church, I noticed that many of the trees that had green leaves just a few days ago now have a lot of red and yellow mixed in with the green.

It's been the perfect weekend to stay in and stitch.  I did do some chores around the house yesterday and I'm happy to say that the laundry basket is more empty than full for the first time in recent memory.  The ironing board is also clear of ironing (although not so clear of finished stitching smalls that need to be finish-finished).

I think I've made good progress on the stocking this weeknd:



The brownish round thing is her head and I hope it will look more like a head when I get some Alpaca to do the French knots for her hair.  I have the embellishmet package from Shepherd's Bush and there are some little doo-dads to go in her hair as well.  I made the discovery this afternoon when I started on the sleeve that I had used the wrong shade of green for part of the wing.  I thought for about 2 seconds about frogging it and re-doing it, but the error isn't glaring and the green I used works, so it will stay as it is.

I worked a little bit on Spring Sampler #2 at stitch night on Friday, and yesterday evening I started a new ornament.  Sharon (Daffycat) had posted on her blog the other day that she is working on a new reindeer and that reminded me that I had only done two of the three that she has already designed, so I started on her Jinglebell Reindeer.  I'm working it with DMC on 40-count mystery fabric; it's Lakeside I'm sure, and I think maybe Maritime White.

I don't remember if I've shown you a picture of this next piece.  Long ago, in a galaxy far away, I went to a Spirit of Cross Stitch festival in Winston-Salem and one of the classes I took was for a piece called Tapestry Sampler.  I don't remember who the designer is.  Her signature is on the chart and her first name is Jill; I think the last name is Siegle or Siegler.  I started this back in 1990-something, whenever the first SOCS was, and this is all the further that I ever got on it:

The ground fabric is 24-count Congress cloth and it's more yellowish than it looks in the picture.  The fibers are DMC and Ginnie Thompson flower thread.  A lot of the stitching is done in petit point, so that might go more quickly than full crosses on the 24-count.  For some reason I was thinking about this piece this afternoon and decided to pull it out of UFO land and try to finish it.  I'll try to post some close-up pictures of the different stitches; it's really very cool.

Stitching buddy du jour:



He likes being my stitching buddy until I have to shift my position or get up, then he gets all offended and jumps down.  At least he doesn't try to play with the floss.



Wishing everyone a good week...happy stitching!

A Blog? Oh Yeah, I Have a Blog!

Well!  I certainly didn't mean to be away this long!  Sometimes life just gets in the way of other things.

There hasn't been a tremendous lot of stitching done around here lately, though I've made a little progress on a couple of things.  I stitched on Sophie's Stocking last weekend and got to this point:



Then I made the horrible discovery that I'd miscounted and would have to frog.  The point where I discovered the mistake was at the stitch connected to the lower needle; it was late in the day and I was getting tired so I decided to just groan and put it aside for another day, as I envisioned having to take out most of the wing that I'd stitched that day.  As I thought about it from time to time this past week and remembered how I'd stitched the wing, it began to dawn on me that maybe the frogging wasn't going to be as bad as I'd feared and, indeed, when I took a good look at it today, I realized that I would have to pull out only 3 stitches.  3 stitches!  I can cope with that!  So I re-did the stitches and managed to make a little more progress:

I've been working a little bit on Margaret Havelock but didn't make enough progress to make it worthwhile to take a picture.  I did do a little bit on Spring Sampler number 2 last night.  This leaf border is allllll around the piece, but it's broken up in places by the little yellow-ish berry thingies, so those will make it more bearable.  I'm planning to go to stitch night on Friday, so I may take this piece to work on.

Finally, doesn't this look yummy (and, I have to say, kind of pretty)?

A couple of years ago, the New York Times published a list of summer salads (hope the link works) and this is #8 - mango and jicama dressed with lime juice and chopped mint.  I made this for lunch last Sunday.  I found the mint a little overwhelming, so will probably go a little easier on it next time.  You can also use radishes instead of the jicama and cilantro instead of the mint.  The radishes would probably not be as sweet but would add a little more color and are a heck of a lot easier to cut up, especially for those of us who are klutzy and manage to take a hunk out of the skin over their knuckles when attemping to slice off the top of the jicama, but I wouldn't know anything about that, of course.  I first found the list on Laurie Perry's website. 

All is otherwise quiet on this front.  I will be stopping by Home Depot tomorrow after work to purchase one or two of those no poison/no touch mouse traps.  I have 2 cats and have been finding signs of mice in the laundry room.  Next to the litter boxes.  ("Yo, mouse!  How's it goin'?"  "Howdy, cat.  Looks like another nice day.")  Sigh.

Happy stitching, all!

A Finish and Two New Starts

I put the last stitches in Spring Sampler this afternoon...hooray!  Here is the finished product:

I love the soft colors in this sampler; they really are very spring-like to my mind.

Of course, once I finished that one, I had to start another.  I liked the Margaret Havelock reproduction that was in SANQ a few issues back, so I've had it kitted up and ready to go.

I'm stitching Margaret on 32 count linen from Lakeside; I think it's Vintage Examplar.  It's charted for AVAS silk but I'm using the DMC conversion that's provided.  The blue border is actually more of a periwinkle color and isn't as violently blue as it looks in the picture.  I'm not sure what happened with that pic.  My camera usually does a better job than that on colors.  Must have been my lighting, which wasn't optimal.

And while I was starting new things, I decided I'd start another of the Spring Samplers.  There are three of them in the same leaflet and I want to do all three of them.  This is the one I decided to go with next:

I'm using 36-count Navy Bean from Lakeside and the called-for DMC flosses.  All three samplers use the same color scheme and they complement each other well.  I was a little hesitant about stitching this sampler because that border looks like something that might just send me over the edge and, in fact, a couple of ladies in our Friday night stitch group suggested that I could do just the block with the sun in it, but I decided that I like the whole thing well enough that I can suck it up and manage the border.  I put in about a dozen stitches this afternoon, really just enough to say that I've started it.

These will probably be my stitch night projects; I expect that I'll be focusing on Sophie's Stocking on the weekends.

Wishing everyone a great week and happy stitching!

Well, THAT Was Different!

Did you feel the earthquake today?  I had just got up and was talking to a co-worker when I heard a noise that sounded like someone walking in the drop ceiling.  Then I began feeling like I was losing my balance; it was few seconds before we realized that the building was moving -- very disorienting!  I was wearing a pair of MBT shoes -- they have soles that kind of rock and it was only my second day wearing them -- and at first I was blaming the shoes for making me feel off-balance, but not so!  The building was evacuated for a brief time, maybe 15 minutes, until it was determined that there was no damage.  We're a good ways away from the epicenter; hope you guys in northern VA are okay!

Getting There...

No stocking or ornaments this weekend, just Spring Sampler.  I went to Stitch Night (more about that in a minute) on Friday and finished the "C" block and got a good runny-go on the frog, then this afternoon I sat down and finished the frog and did the little blue flowers around him and the pink butterfly.  The last critter is a bird (the brown blob in the lower left), then a little more border and one last rectangle with 2 pink flowers on the bottom.  There are two more samplers on this chart and I'm thinking seriously about stitching both of them.  I just love the colors in these.

This is the whole thing so far:

I've been joining some ladies for Stitch Night on Friday nights recently.  They used to meet at the French Knot, a recently-closed local LNS :-(  and now are getting together on Fridays at a couple of local Panera restaurants (yummmm!), alternating Fridays at each location.  Lee invited me to join them; my first Friday was two weeks ago and then I went again this past Friday and enjoyed myself tremendously both times.  We stitch in the "VIP" room at Panera.  It's a great group of ladies and they're fun to stitch with, not to mention that it's a good excuse to have dinner at Panera (broccoli and cheese soup -- mmm, mmm, good!).

Hoping everyone has a good week -- happy stitching!

Ornaments

I put the finishing touches on Snowdon this evening.  It was about time; I started him at the end of January.  The stitching has been done for a long time but I was procrastinating about putting in the seaweed and the ornament thingies.  The chart called for Glissen Gloss for the seaweed but I didn't have any so I used some stuff from Rainbow Gallery that I had in my stash -- Arctic Rays, maybe?  Whatever it was, it was a PITA to work with.  But it's on, it's done, and he's kinda cute.

He is from Jemini Designs, from the 2008 JCS ornament issue, and he's stitched on 28-count "miracle mint" Lugana with DMC and GAST fibers, that green stuff and buttons from Just Another Button Company.

Having finished one ornament it was, of course, necessary to begin another.  This one is from the 2008 ornament issue as well -- Bluebird of Christmas Happiness, by M Designs.  Here's the picture from the magazine:

I'm using the called-for "crystal icon" linen from Picture This Plus (32 count) but I switched out the DMC fibers to some HDF silks that I had in my stash.  I don't know what the red is; some mystery silk, also from the stash.  I put in a couple of rows of stitching this evening, but not really enough to be worth taking a picture.

Maybe it won't take 7 months to get this one finished.

I Do Love Sunday Afternoons

Especially when they're peaceful and quiet and I can get in some good stitching time.  I pulled out the stocking to work on and you can see that I made some decent progress.

The blue bit and the few brown stitches where I left off are the start of the wing and the back of the head.  The chart calls for stitching the hair with the brown and then stitching over it with French knots using brown Alpaca.  I don't know if I have any in my stash; I may have to make a trip to the LNS.  Darn, I hate when that happens.

I discovered a couple of weeks ago that we are getting a Hobby Lobby just up the road. in the building where a large local supermarket was before it relocated.  I think that Hobby Lobby is the best of the "big box" craft stores -- they have fabric!  Don't get me wrong; the "big boxes" are by no means a replacement for the LNS or the local quilt shop (LQS?) but sometimes they do come in handy (although I doubt I'll find Alpaca there).  And I admire the owners of the Hobby Lobby chain for upholding their convictions and not opening their stores on Sunday.

I spent a couple of hours yesterday afternoon in a nice cool movie theatre with the last installment of Harry Potter and if you're a fan, definitely see it.  It's excellent.  Several people applauded at the end, and one man stood up and shouted, "Thank you!" at the screen.  I didn't go quite that far but I did enjoy it.  I think that overall the series was very well-done and well-cast -- can you imagine anyone else but Alan Rickman as Snape?  I popped movie 1 in the DVD player to "watch" whilst I stitched today.

Here's hoping that everyone has a good week -- happy stitching!

A New Start and a Not Quite Finished

Since this is supposed to be primarily a stitching blog, I will refrain from ranting and stick with stitching.  A little rant goes a long way, at least for me.

I had promised myself that I wouldn't start something until I finished something, but I just couldn't help myself today.  I've been planning to stitch Sophie's Stocking from Shepherd's Bush as the companion for Robert's Stocking and since I finally got all the perle cotons that I needed, I sat down this afternoon and started her.  I had originally planned to do one of the other SB stockings for myself but when I saw Sophie I felt like the design was more complementary to Robert.

Here is my progress:

The fabric is 18-count linen of some sort, same as the other stocking, natural something.  The fibers are DMC #5 perle coton.  The beauty of these fibers on this low count fabric is that the stitching moves quite quickly.  I'm a pretty slow stitcher so I felt like the row of hearts and a little bit of the vine was quite an accomplishment.  I know the chances of getting it finished by Christmas are slim but I'll plug along on it.

Speaking of plugging along, Spring Sampler is getting close to the end.  There are a few more small motifs -- including a not-so-small frog -- to go in the lower part of the sampler, then another alphabet block and another rectangle with the pink flowers across the bottom.  I love this little piece.

Well, that's all the news that's fit to print from this neck of the woods tonight.  It's getting on for bedtime so I will be off.

Happy stitching, everyone!

My Solution

I'm stepping up on my soapbox to deliver a rant, so if you're not in a rant-ish mood, it's probably best to stop reading now.  I'll be back to normal afterwards, I promise.

So.  Is anyone else just freakin' OVER IT with this budget/debt ceiling/spending fiasco being played out in Washington by our elected lawmakers?  It just amazes me that reasonable human beings can't come to some sort of a solution, but maybe I'm setting my expectations too high by thinking that the individuals involved are reasonable.  Don't know.  Be that as it may.  I've come up with a solution.  Not to the budget problem itself, mind you, but a solution that will light a fire under our elected lawmakers (who we are PAYING with our hard-earned tax dollars) and inspire them to sort this mess out.

Here's what needs to be done.

Take the elected lawmakers in question -- hereafter referred to as ELIQs -- to the airport on a day when the temperature will exceed 90 degrees Fahrenheit.  Put them on an airplane.  Make sure that the air conditioning system on the airplane does not work and that the toilets are full.  Not just kind of full, but Tokyo to New York 15-hour flight with a loaded airplane full.  And getting kind of ripe.  The ELIQs will have no access to food, beverage, fans or fresh air.  Next, place the following passengers in close proximity to the ELIQs:
3 screaming infants
2 whining toddlers
1 teen-ager playing the most offensive rap music possible on his/her Ipod at a decible level that can be heard in Jersey
1 person of any gender or age talking loudly on his/her cell phone and whose conversation is liberally sprinkled with "like", "you know" and variations of the F bomb
4 individuals who have not bathed recently and who, like the toilets, are getting kind of ripe

Tell the ELIQs that they may not leave the airplane until they have hammered out a solution to the budget/debt ceiling/spending mess.  Shut the door and lock it.

I figure 30 minutes, maybe 45.

Okay.  Rant over.

A Springy Little Verse

I've been making a good bit of progress on Spring Sampler the past couple of weeks.  I stitched on it last night and decided to work on it this afternoon.  The last word in the verse is "together" and I'm not sure why I didn't go ahead and finish it this evening; sometimes it's just time to stop, if you know what I mean.  The bottom half of the sampler has two more sections with the pink flowers, one on the lower right edge and one on the bottom, them several critter motifs under the verse.  It's really cute; I'm enjoying it.

I made a quick trip to JoAnn's yesterday afternoon to pick up some of the perle cotons for Sophie's Stocking, which will be a comanion to Robert's Stocking.  I did get the charms for Robert, just haven't got them attached yet.  JoAnn's didn't have all the fibers I needed, so I'll do an LNS visit for those.  Would have gone to the LNS yesterday except that she would have been closed by the time I got there and I just HAD to go get these fibers, dontcha know!

I went to our library's summer reading kick-off event last week and while there I entered a 50/50 raffle.  Imagine my surprise when I got home from work the next day to a message on my machine telling me that I'd won!  I drove to the library to pick up my prize, thinking it was probably around $100 (there were a lot of people at the event).  When they gave me the envelope with the prize in it, it didn't feel very thick, so I thought "hmm, must be big bills".  Then I felt some change in the envelope.  Hmmmm, again.  So I opened the envelope when I got back in the car to discover that my winnings were.......$8.50!  Yep, that's eight dollars and fifty cents.  I believe they divided up the raffle proceeds and drew winners for multiple days.  I had a good laugh at myself on the way home!

The cats appear to be deep in conversation.  One can only imagine what they're saying.

"You distract her and I'll get the door open, then we'll blow this popcorn stand!"

Wishing everyone a good week and happy stitching!