Finishing up the old year...Edited

Can you believe that 2011 is almost history?  Time does fly by faster and faster each year!  Seems like only yesterday that my own kids were babies and now they are grown and having babies of their own! 

2011 was a good year for my family with the birth of two new grand-daughters!  My family still mourns the loss of my youngest daughter who died tragically in 2010 and these two new additions to the family have been such a blessing. The babies are a reminder that God gives us joy even in the midst of sorrow.  The babies have given my family hope for the future and they have given me the ability to find the joy in life to keep going even when I am in the depths of grief.  All blessings really do come from God and are given to show his love for us!  God is good!

I wish you all a Blessed New Year...May 2012 be a year of happiness, good health, much love and the making of wonderful memories!

Just had to share....

I finished my two granddaughters ornaments today and just had to share them!  This was my very first pillow finish ever for an ornie and I am pleased with how they turned out!



Homespun Elegance
"Cradle of Christmas Joy"
stitched on scraps of natural linen 32 ct.
DMC & Crescent Colours threads

 And as long as I had the camera out, I took a snap of the ornies that are stitched but have to be finished!

I will give details on these when I show them finished.

Thank you so much for all of the comments on my previous post, I enjoyed reading your comments!

Again, I wish everyone a Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukka, or whatever you celebrate!

Blessings to All!



Christmas Is Almost Here!!!

Sorry I haven't been around the last few weeks...it has been a very busy time.  I have been visiting your blogs just not commenting much.

My time has been spent stitching on a few Christmas ornies but I have not taken any photos yet...finishing day is tomorrow and I will take photos then to share after Christmas. 

The presents are bought and wrapped...the decorations are up.  All that is left is the grocery shopping and cooking. 

My family is hosting the family Christmas Eve gathering this year.  The extended family will gather at our house to share a meal and then we will all go to the Christmas Eve Service at our church.  It will be a special time!

I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy Hanukkah!



First Christmas



May your holidays be blessed with family and friends, good food and lots of love and happiness!

It's Thanksgiving Week!

Wow, where has the month gone!  Time does seem to be flying by doesn't it!?!

Stitching has been minimal lately.  I am working on my grandbabies' first Christmas Ornaments but not sharing pictures of those yet.  Also I have been working on a couple of Prairie Schooler WIP hoping to finish them this year.  My Crazy January Challenge pieces have been put aside for now.  I will be content with the 9 finishes that I have on that challenge for the year.  Wanted to finish more but it's not going to happen.  Besides I have finished other pieces other than the Challenge pieces this year so that counts for something!

My family celebrated Thanksgiving this past Saturday!  It was such an enjoyable day full of good food and family!  My oldest daughter has to work on Thanksgiving Day this year so that was the reason for the early celebration.  Unfortunately my husband could not be at home for the celebration. His uncle passed away unexpectedly and the funeral was on Saturday, so my husband decided that we should all carry on with Thanksgiving as planned and he traveled to the funeral.  Not the ideal solution but the only one possible for the situation. 

We were lucky to have been able to attend a family reunion just a month ago centered around this uncle and aunt.  It was a special time with family which we don't see for years at a time.  How lucky we were to see him one last time before his death.  Here's a picture of our family gathering! 


Family Reunion October 2011

 It was a beautiful day with perfect weather and a great time with extended family; a time for  reconnection and the telling of stories of family members gone but remembered.  A blessed day...

Not Much Stitching Going on Here BUT...

I wanted to say Happy Halloween to all those who participate in the holiday!! 

Granddaughter No. 1 in her first Halloween Costume
and look how well she is sitting up now!

Blessings and Happy Stitching!

Thank You All for Feeling My Pain....

It was so nice to receive so many comments on my stitching frustration in my last post! You all made me feel better and offered wonderful advice!  I am going to take the advice and put the piece aside for a week or two and then approach it with a fresh and renewed enthusiasm!  Looking at it now I think that I can make it work!  Thank you all so much for your help!

Blessings and Happy Stitching!

I Am So FRUSTRATED !!!!

There I was stitching away on my Little House Neighborhood when...

well I noticed I was one stitch off....

so I say to myself...

"I must have miscounted that row"....

recount....

no, right number of stitches....

well, the tree must be off by one....

recount....

no, tree is exactly right....

what could be wrong...

I know I could not have miscounted on the house....

OH NO....IT'S THE HOUSE....NO NOT THE HOUSE!!!.....

yep it's the house,

exactly one stitch off center...

I am not frogging that house!!!...

so I guess the only thing left to do is salvage what I can of the linen for some small projects

and just start over!!! 

BUT NOT TONIGHT!!!

Think I will put that project away for a day or two or weeks or ????? 

Here's what it looked like before I worked on it today.

I finished the tree, started on the grass and was stitching the vine on the left of the house when I noticed the problem.

Oh well, guess I will laugh about this goof someday in the future, probably the far future!

It's A Beautiful Day after the Storms!

Isn't it amazing how fresh and clean the air is after a storm!  We had a bumpy time last night with storms, rain and tornadoes around our area.  We escaped the destuctive weather at my house and had only torrential rains.  Just two counties over to the west and a few counties to the east of of us there were a couple of tornadoes with lots of property damage but thankfully no physical harm to residents. And today, the skies are that beautiful blue with fluffy white clouds and the wind is gently blowing with a touch of fall coolness, a perfect day.

It has been a busy couple of weeks for me.  I have not seemed to accomplish much but I have been busy doing it. LOL

My youngest son and his wife and baby came for a visit last weekend.  I had so much fun playing with my grand-daughter!  She is 4 months old now and just the cutest little thing!  We all went out to the State Fair on Sunday afternoon along with my oldest son and his wife and baby.  We had a great time checking out all the sights at the fair.  We saw some of the calf judging which was a new experience for me.  It was fun to try to figure out what the judge was looking for in the calves. After a couple of rounds of judging I was able to at least figure out which calves would be in the top half of the class.  The babies at 4 and 6 months old really were not too impressed with all of the hustle and bustle of the fair so we only stayed for 3 hours.  It was a fun time though!  I would share some pictures with you if I had remembered to take along my camera, cannot believe I forgot it.

EDIT!! My sweet daughter-in-law shared a couple of pictures with me so you could see us at the fair! Aren't they soooooo cute!



Sweet Babies!

 

Hi cous! I want to eat you!


I really enjoyed looking at all the crafts at the fair.  There were only about a dozen cross-stitch entries.  They were all very nice but one was just gorgeous...it was a large Quaker Sampler stitched in dark blue thread with dark red accents in a few of the motifs!  The alphabet was across the very top of the sampler and then just rows of beautiful Quaker motifs...I have tried to research to find the pattern but no luck.  If anyone has an idea what this pattern might be let me know by email or comment.  I would love to stitch this sampler myself.

It is a shame that there are so few entries in the cross stitch division.  There was a time that half of the large craft building was filled with cross stitch.  Are there so few stitchers out there or do they not enter their works in the fair?  I don't know but I do miss seeing the entries in person at the fair...guess that is why stitchy blogs are so popular!

I do have one finish to share with you from what I shared last post. I finished The Prairie Schooler February design.  When I was stitching this one all the brown was really a little depressing to me but after adding the bottom row the reds really made this one pop.  Now I love it!





Prairie Schooler February
stitched on Lambswool 14 ct Aida with DMC Threads

That's another UFO finish for me!  Yea!!

Well, that's all for me today.  I get to babysit my 6 month old grand-daughter tonight and on Sunday she will be spending the night with us!  Wish me luck!

Blessings and Happy Stitching!





What I Have Been Up To This Month!

Time sure has flown by...One day it's the beginning of September and now here we are at the end!  It's officially autumn even though the temperature outside today still thinks it's summer.  But as they say "stick around and the weather will change again."  We have had a lot of rain and a lot of cloudy days these last few weeks, so I am not going to complain to much about today's weather because the sun is shining and the skies are a beautiful blue. 

I went to the Outer Banks with a friend earlier this month.  It was a wonderful, gorgeous week!  We had rain the first day and it rained the last day but in between the weather was perfect!  It was so relaxing to just roam the beach each day looking for shells. We had so much fun shopping at all the outlet stores and little shops in the area and trying out the restaurants.  It was a good week!

Kitty Hawk Beach, NC

I took several stitchy projects with me to the beach.  Decided it would be a good time to finish a UFO or two.  There was not much time for stitching but I did manage to finish one project and get about halfway on another.  Here is my finish...



PS Autumn stitched on 14 ct. Fiddlers Cloth with DMC Threads

The above project was 3/4 finished and did not take much time to complete. 

And here is the progress on my second UFO...


PS February stitched on Lambswool 14 ct. Aida with DMC threads

 This one is about 2/3 finished now.  I'm not loving this one but am determined to finish it. 

These projects were perfect for the beach because the lighting was not the best in our room and stitching on aida cloth enabled me to be able to see my stitches without bringing along my stitching lamp.

Next up is my progress on two more of my Crazy January Challenge pieces.

BBD Their Song stitched on 28 ct Irish Linen with recommended WDW thread

LHN Little House Neighborhood stitched on linen 32 ct with DMC Threads

They are projects #10 and #11. 

I have not been stitching on these much because my turn came to work on The Traveling Pattern!  Yes, the pattern and scrapbook arrived in my mailbox last Friday afternoon!  Thanks to Myra for sending these along to me and thanks to Jennifer for organizing this project.  Peggy Lee provided the pattern and Jennifer added the scrapbook.  Peggy Lee, I have to tell you, you will just love looking at the scrapbook and seeing all of the finished samplers!!

Here's my take on the sampler....


La D Da "A B C D" stitched on 32 ct Stony Point linen using DMC #924, #4210 & #310

I just love the varigated thread for the alphabet. My initials were stitched with #310.  I decided that the leaf design should be stitched with a lovely blue/green with just a hint of gray.  You can't tell by the picture but the linen is a lovely shade of gray/green.  The colors look so nice together.  Can you tell I am pleased with the effect?  I chose not to stitch the border around the design but would like your comments on whether you think that the border would add to the finish.  I am still on the fence a little about adding the border. This pattern will be on its way to Cat at Bramblewood Stitches by the first of next week.  I need to add to the scrapbook before I send it on its way.

A special welcome to my new followers!  I hope you all are enjoying visiting with me and I really look forward to any comments you might be inclined to leave.  It's so much fun making new friends!

Thought I would leave you with a picture of the mate to the cardinal in my header.  She has been hard to capture by the camera but one day she seemed to want her picture taken and posed a little for me.

She was looking at me like "Are you happy now?  Take the picture and don't bother me anymore!"  LOL I love it when the pair are in the tree next to the feeder chirping back and forth to each other.  Their calls are so distinct, I can always tell when they are outside the window.

Wishing you all a Blessed Autumn season!

Two New Finishes! And New Stash Too!

This week has just flown by! Hard to believe that it has been a week since Hurricane Irene paid us a visit. The weather has been beautiful all week, starting to feel like fall, warm sunny days and cool nights!

I have gotten a lot of stitching done this week! "Pumpkin Farm" was finished on Wednesday. I just couldn't put this one down until I finished!

"Pumpkin Farm" by With Thy Needle and Thread
stitched on 28 ct. evenweave with DMC threads

"My Ways" was completed on Thursday. My goal was to finish it by the end of August, but I am pleased to finish it only one day later. It is an easy little sampler to stitch but I did get bored with the alphabet stitched all in one color so I had to stitch on other projects in between working on this one which is why it took longer than I expected.

"My Ways" by La D Da
stitched on 32 ct. linen with DMC threads


These finishes are #8 and #9 of my Crazy January Challenge pieces! I don't know if I will be able to complete all 15 starts this year but I am making progress toward my goal!

Project #10 is "Little House Neighborhood" by LHN. I picked it up last night and was able to complete the vine part of the border before bedtime. I gave a little cheer when it matched up!

"Little House Neighborhood" by Little House Needleworks
stitched on 30 ct. linen with DMC threads


My postman delivered some new stash this week! I had been trying so hard not to buy any new projects from the Baltimore show but the temptation was too great. So I limited my purchases to only 3 projects...

"Weeds Make Haste" by Shakespears Peddler, "Halloween Eve" by BBD, and the new Inspiration Boxer by Lizzie Kate.

Don't you just love the beautiful colors in "Halloween Eve" and "Weeds"?

In family news this week, my youngest son and his wife purchased their very first home. They are so excited! And the best part for us is they are only a hours drive from us now so more frequent visits with our granddaughter are in our future! Yea!!!

Well, that's all for this post. I wish everyone a fun and safe Labor Day weekend! Hope you get to have some fun and some stitchy time too!

Blessings and Happy Stitching!

Made it through the storm!

Well Irene came with lots of rain and wind. We lost a few pieces of siding and have two trees down on the power lines. We will be busy picking up all the twigs, leaves and small limbs for a couple of days and I hope we can get our power back soon. But, that's all the damage we had and I am so thankful!

Others were not so lucky. Lots of trees fell in the area and landed on cars and houses doing much damage. And there were a couple of fatalities due to trees falling. My prayers go out to those families.

To those still in the path of Irene, I pray that God will keep you safe and sound!

I have been SO busy stitching!!

So glad that today has been less eventfully than yesterday! We have had a couple of aftershocks but none for several hours now. Now we get to focus on hurricane Irene which could possibly cause us some weather this weekend. Gotta love Mother Nature!! Never a dull moment!! LOL

As I said in my last post I have some finishes to share! I have been a very busy stitcher...the frogs have been staying away most of the time which allows for much progress!

First up is

Totin' Hare by La D Da, stitched on 28 ct grey linen with DMC threads

I just love this finish and can't wait to get it framed!

The next three finishes are small ones but it still feels good to be able to check off a couple of finishes on my Crazy January Challenge!

Winter Sheep by LHN stitched on 32 ct. Amber linen with DMC threads

Wool Needlebook by LHN stitched on 32 ct. Amber linen with DMC threads

Joy to the World by LHN stitched on 32 ct Amber linen with DMC threads

I have made good progress on "My Ways" by La D Da this month and hope to finish it in the next week!

And I have been busily stitching on "Pumpkin Farm" by WTNT. The colors of autumn are calling me on this stitch!

The weather has been so nice the last couple of days with warm days and cool nights and NO humidity! Wish it could stay this way, I am really looking forward to the coolness of autumn.

I will leave you with a picture of my granddaughters. They both were at my house for a visit on Saturday. They were so good while the grown-ups were having dinner as you can see in the picture. They are getting so big!

Thanks to everyone who has commented on my posts! I really enjoy your comments, they make my day! Thanks for the visit!

Blessings and Happy Stitching!

Shake, Rattle and Roll!

We had an eventful day here in Virginia today! An earthquake measuring 5.8 hit this afternoon at 1:51 p.m. I never felt it because I was driving home from shopping but my poor husband was home and I think it shook him up a bit. He said he began to wonder if the house might fall down around him. But really no damage just pictures hanging crooked and a few items fallen from shelves. We only live 20 miles from the epicenter so we may feel some after shocks, hopefully not. And I was glad to know that the nuclear power plant near the epicenter automatically shut down the reactors when the quake hit. It's a bit of a comfort to know that the safty plan worked when needed!

I have been stitching away on my Crazy 15 Challenge pieces and will post about the finishes (Yea! More than one finish!!) as soon as I take pictures to show them off!

Until then wishing you Blessings and Happy Stitching!

Stitching Update...Sorry no Pics today

Just wanted to check in and say that I have been keeping my needle flying on my two challenge pieces My Ways and Totin Hare by La-D-Da! I have made good progress on both but have not taken pictures yet.

Had a great week at Vacation Bible School last week! It is always so much fun to be with the kids of the church and teach them about God. We learned about some of the Jewish festivals and how Jesus changed them after he came to earth. The kids made unleavened bread which only one child thought tasted good and they made butter to put on the bread which most of them loved. We learned about the elements of the seder meal and how Jesus evolved it into Holy Communion at the Last Supper. And we learned about the Festival of the Weeks after Jesus rose from the dead and how our celebration of Pentecost took place during that Festival 50 days after His resurrection. All in all it really was a wonderful week!

This week has started off on a down note. I am not feeling very well at the moment. Been having trouble sleeping and feeling sick and unable to eat much. I went to the doctor yesterday and he switched one of my medicines so hopefully that will do the trick and get me feeling better in a few days. So until then I am trying to hang in there.

I have been trying to keep up with your blogs but haven't been commenting as much. Just know that I am enjoying reading about your days and projects and will get back to commenting when I feel better.

Wecome to my new followers and as always I appreciate your comments to my posts. It is so nice to get to know you all!

Blessings to you and Happy Stitching!!

Finishes and WIP!!!

I am so pleased to announce that I have two finishes for my Crazy January Challenge!! First up is Simple Joys by LHN, stitched on 28 ct antique white evenweave with the called for CC and WDW threads.

This was a fun one to stitch but I did run out of Bean Sprout and had to purchase another skein which made matching dye lots difficult but I think it turned out ok.

Next up is Bluebird by BBD stitched on the called for Cafe Kona by R&R Reproductions and GA Uniform Blue thread. An easy and quick stitch.

That makes finishes number 3 and 4 of my challenge pieces!! I am so far behind but that's ok...I am enjoying working on these pieces and that's really all that counts!

Here is the my progress on Challenge piece # 5, My Ways by La-D-Da

and #6, The Totin' Hare by La-D-Da

I hope to be able to finish both of these by the middle of August. They are both easy stitches! I'm keeping my fingers crossed that I can make this happen!

This week is Vacation Bible School at church and I will be the Storyteller each day! It promises to be a fun and busy week with all the children of the church! Our theme this year is on cooking, it's called Shake It Up Cafe. Tomorrow the kids will make unleavened bread as part of their storytime and during the science lab time they will make butter. Should be so fun for them and of course they get to eat the bread and butter they make for snack time!

Hope you have enjoyed your weekend and for those in this heat wave, kept cool!!

Blessings and Happy Stitching!!

Well, I didn't keep my word now, did I?

I have been a very bad blogger of late. Three weeks between posts and I have no real excuse except that I am a procrastinator (hangs head in shame). I promised you more timely posts in my last post and well, it did not happen. Please forgive me I will try to do better...

When last we met I was heading off for a long family weekend. We drove a couple of hours west to Massenutten Resort where we have a timeshare. The men golfed and we women, well we had two babies with us that kept us in line! Let's just say that a lot of time was spent feeding, holding, playing with and changing those little darlings!

It is amazing how two such small people can control a room full of adults and keep us hopping!

We did pay a visit to the Green Valley Book Fair while on route to our weekend destination. A great place to stop and peruse thousands of discounted books! It is out in the middle of the country on a farm, a huge two story warehouse just brimming with books of every kind...luckily I am trying to downsize my book collection so I was very good while there and only bought one book, a slow cooker cookbook that has some very nice recipes and it only cost $3.00 so my hubby was pleased! The new parents bought lots of children's books at great prices!

On Sunday afternoon we watched the Women's World Cup Soccer match up between the US and Brazil. What a tense game it was and when the US scored to tie things up we all let out a yell which scared the bejebbers out of one of the babies. From then on we remembered to use our inside voices! lol Told you those babies were in controll of the adults!!

There was a mama deer hanging out around our condo with her 3 babies! Don't know if she birthed all three or if she adopted an orphan but they were all with her!

The deer are so friendly on the mountain that they just seem to ignore us humans. They are so pretty but this mama doe was very skinny.

Well the weekend came to a too fast end and it was time for us all to leave. Here is a picture of my family before we left.

If you are wondering why we are all making a 'V' sign, it was in tribute to my youngest daughter....she always made this sign for pictures...it was just one of her quirks...it was our way of including her in the family vacation picture.

We had a great weekend just being together with good conversation, lots of food and just catching up with each others lives.


Until next time, Blessings to You and Happy Stitching!

A Stitchy Post!!

I know it has been ages since I posted any stitching updates. Sorry I am so bad about getting out the camera and taking those pictures, but I promise to be better about it in the future. Sorry also about the quality of the pictures I am posting today, the sun is not cooperating with me.

I have been stitching quite a bit but I have also been a very lucky stitcher!! I won two giveaways in the last weeks and now that my prizes have arrived, I thought I would share!

My first win was from Belinda of Blue Ribbon Designs! Belinda has a new facebook page which I joined last month. She had a giveaway of a chart of your choosing, you just had to "Like" her page and comment about the chart you would wish to receive. She chose 3 winners and I was one of the lucky three! I chose Liberty Stitchery as my chart! I had been wanting it since it was released!

Belinda even autographed the chart for me! Wasn't that so nice of her!! I have gotten it all kitted up with DMC threads and the suggested 40 ct. Fawn linen and have managed to put in a few stitches. This is my first time working on 40 ct. I love only having to use one strand of floss but it is slow going on such a small count linen. I think I will adapt to it though with more stitching as long as I have very good lighting. Thank you Belinda for sending me this beautiful chart!!

Next I won Terri's Blogversary Giveaway at Dixie Samplar Designs! My Package arrived today and I am totally blown away by Terri's generosity!! Just look at all my goodies!!

Can you believe all the things she sent?! The little bunny scissor fob and pin pillow are so beautifully stitched and so cute! I just love bunnies!

I love all of the charts she sent and am overwhelmed by the number of them! And I don't have a single one of them already in my stash!

There was 32 ct., 36 ct., and 40 ct. linen included, along with overdyed threads, needles, notecards, a floss keeper for me to stitch, gold beads, some ribbon and some chocolate for me to enjoy!

Thank you so much Terri for my winnings! I love everything!!

Now on to the stitching progress I have made! First up is a finish!!

As The Crow Flies by Prairie Schooler
stitched on 28 count lambswool linen with DMC threads

This was so much fun to stitch and I just love the colors, especially the red barns!

Next is one of my January Challenge pieces...

Simple Joys by LHN,
stitched on antique white evenweave using the suggested CC and WDW threads

This one is also fun to stitch! I do have to order more Bean Sprout thread, one 5 yd package was not enough. Wish the quantity needed had been posted with the design. This is the third of my Challenge pieces.

My next WIP is a start my first biscornu.

Frogscornu by Barbara Ana Designs
stitched on 32 count linen from my stash with DMC theads

Isn't that frog cute? I have been visited by the frogs so much lately that I just had to start this piece!

I want to send out thanks to all that have visited my blog and left comments. I love reading your comments and appreciate the time you take to make them! Also, welcome to my new followers!

My family and I are going to the mountains this weekend for a mini vacation together! It is going to be so much fun having my two new granddaughters together for their first getaway!! I can't wait!!

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Blessings and Happy Stitching!!!