Jenn's Counted Threads

A Happy Dance! Heirloom Stitching Sampler

2011-12-29T09:55:00.000-06:00

Okay, I know I haven't been around for awhile on the blog. But I do have a good excuse! I found out in early August that I'm pregnant! Probably many of you know that already from following me other places, but I think I have a few readers that just follow the blog so figured I better explain my abscense. I just haven't been stitching as much or felt much like writing since I found out- fatigue, nausea, and just general business and laziness have gotten in the way. I did finally manage to get in a little stitching though and actually finished my Heirloom Stithching Sampler. I probably could have finished it months ago, but see above reasons - also I was procrastinating at learning the drawn thread hemstitching portion. I had never done it before and I wasn't crazy about the look of it from the picture that came with the chart.

So I dug out some reference books on needlework I aquired ages ago and found the directions for hemstitching and changed the larger band to what you see in the photo above. Still Hemstitching, just a little different than designed. I also changed the smaller band further down, but I made that one four-sided stitch which I thought looked nice also. :)

So I'm happy to have one more Happy Dance for 2011 - I had hoped for more, I only finished Alhambra Garden and this one this year. I'm due on April 15 - so I think it is unlikely I'll finish too much in 2012 either, but one can dream. ;) I think I'll focus on Mother's Tree next as there are just about 5 names to go, so I should be able to finish at least that one. We'll see.

As for the Disney Diary - not sure whether I'll pick that back up or not yet. I'd like to chronicle our last trip, but I'm afraid I let too much time pass and I won't remember all the fun details I usually like to include. The good news is that with another baby on the way, there eventually will be another trip. We had thought with Alex going off to college in a year and a half that maybe it'd be out last trip. But now we cannot never take the youngest - which by the way is a girl. I think Katie is going to love being a big sister and showing her Disney in about 5 yrs or so. :)

Test Track Trauma and Triumph

2011-08-10T17:26:00.000-05:00

Disney Diary - Day 3

Sunday, July 17, 2011

So this day was our first Epcot day. I was really excited about this park because I was relatively confident that Katie would be able to ride the 3 "big" rides at this park: Soarin', Mission Space, and Test Track. I was also hoping that since Katie was going to ride them that Sean would put on his big boy pants and try them too.

So we rode the monorail from the Contemporary to the TTC and then changed monorails to the Epcot monorail. I so love watching out the window of the monorail when you swing around inside the park before getting off - gives you a nice view of the park from above. It was especially fun in 2007 when we got to ride up front in the monorail, but they don't let guests do that anymore because of an accident in 2009 when a monorail driver was killed. :( :(

So we got off the monorail and again it was hot waiting in the sun for the park to open. AND we got in the wrong line, which I seem to have a terrible habit of doing at all places WDW or not. *sigh* So it took us a bit to get in the park. Once we were in we walked right to Soarin' and got our fastpasses. I went ahead and got FPs for the whole family even though Sean was swearing he wouldn't ride on the hopes that I would convince him by the time we came back to ride. Soarin' is my absolute favorite ride of everything at WDW and I really wanted him to be able to do it with me.

After we secured our Fast Passes for something like 11:30a, we headed to the other side of the park for Mission Space and Test Track. Sean didn't want to either despite my urging, so Alex, Katie and I left him sitting on the bench with the water bottle in the shade to ride Test Track. Up to this point, Katie was pretty excited to ride it. As we walked up to the ride you see the cars zoom past over head of the ride entrance. Sean, who was still standing there was going on and on about how fast they were going and how you weren't gonna get him on there no matter what. *sigh* We got inside and in line and Katie started to express doubts about wanting to ride - I think because she heard all Sean's complaning about the speed etc. So I'm trying to be reassuring and moving her along in line, hoping she is gonna be okay. I knew she could handle it, that it wasn't that scarey, but she just kept getting more and more afraid. Finally we were right outside the loading area (where they show you the little movie about the ride) and she was crying and saying she didn't want to ride. I didn't want to scar her for life, but I didn't want to get out of line either. A lady in front of us in line talked to her a bit about her kids and how they were younger than her and had been riding a long time and it isn't scarey, etc. That seemed to calm her a little and we stepped into the movie area where they show a short film on what happens during the ride. When she watched that, she relaxed considerably. She got on the ride and had a blast! I was so close to caving and getting out of line with her, but I'm really glad I didn't. She did great and she talked about doing that ride again for the rest of the trip. It was her favorite!

So after hearing how well Katie did on Test Track, Sean agreed to do Mission Space with us. So all four of us got to do Mission Space together, which was a lot of fun. Katie was the Navigator - I don't remember what everyone else was, probably because I was focused on her the whole time. She was very concerned about pushing the buttons the whole time. Even though I told her it didn't matter and if she didn't push the button at the right time, the ride would still turn out the same, she kept getting all anxious about pushing the buttons. Finally I just said, "Mom will do it for you, don't worry." So I did her buttons for her. She was a little more nervous than she had been on Test Track (after she got over the crying in line) but she did good and liked it okay. I think she would do better a second time now that she knows what to expect. Oh, and we did the Green version - I have been known to get car sick now and then, so have always been to afraid to try out the Orange version.

After that we went over the Nemo and Friends Pavaillion and did Turtle Talk with Crush, and the Nemo Clam shell ride. Both were fun. We snapped this photo outside of Turtle Talk - apparently I didn't take many other photos this day.

After Nemo and Crush, we had just enough time to do Soarin' before our lunch reservation. No dice on getting Sean to ride, and after doing it again, I'm sort of glad I didn't convince him. His main fear of rides is height, and although I suppose you aren't really that high on Soarin', you certainly feel as though you are. It is very convincing to your senses that you are truly soaring in some type of glider, so I think he really wouldn't do well. Bummer cause if you can get past that it is an awesome ride. As Alex, Katie, and I were in line for Soarin', Katie started to get nervous again like she did on Test Track. This time she got nervous BECAUSE of the little movie that shows you what to expect on the ride. She was geting fussy and scared and saying she didn't want to ride. I knelt down and looked at her in the face and asked her if she remembered how she was scared at Test Track and that was okay? I told her I wouldn't take her on any ride I thought she'd really be scared of - that I knew she could do it and to trust mom. She bucked up and got on the ride. Luckily, it turned out she really loved this one too!

After Soarin, we had time to just stop at the gift shop outside Crush/Nemo and buy her an autograph book. I wanted to get her one soon anyway so she had it for character meetings for the rest of the trip, and it seemed like a good time to reward her for being so brave on Test Track, Mission Space, and Soarin. :)

So we went to our lunch reservation at Le Cellier at the Canada pavillion in World Showcase. I had the Filet Mignon with Mushroom Risoto. Sean had the Salmon. Alex had a burger, and I think Katie had a kid's pizza. The Risoto was very good, Sean said the Salmon was just okay. Alex wasn't that pleased with the burger, but I think that is because it had a lot of extra fixings on it he doesn't usually eat. I also had to try the Cheese Soup, which was good, but a little salty I thought. (which is saying something cause I like salty things!) This restaurant gets a lot of praise on the various WDW sites, but I thought it was just okay. The highlight of the meal for me was the Red Maple Smoothie that I had for my drink. It was raspberry smoothie with a splace of sprite and very yummy. The table breads were also very tasty, particularly the pretzel bread, which I hadn't had before. For dessert I had the seasonal sorbet, which was peach. Sean had the Campfire Smores, which he said was hard as a rock, and he didn't like the marshmellows (yeah, I know, why order smores if you don't want marshmellows?) Except for the Campfire Smores, nothing was bad, it just didn't live up to all the hype, and with all the other choices at WDW, we likely won't go back to Le Cellier.

After lunch we did SpaceShip Earth - a real family favorite. We love all the funny pictures they do putting your headshot on a bunch of figures and poses. Yeah, we're easily amused.

Lunch at Le Cellier really took a long time, so it was already something like 1:30p. We didn't get to all the stuff I wanted to do this day because of that lunch reservation - another reason to skip it in the future. So after SpaceShip Earth, we headed out of the park and back to our room for a little downtime. I had wanted to leave the room by 3:15p so that we could see Lights!Motor!Action! at Hollywood Studios. Even after 3 trips to WDW, we have never seen this show. By the time we got back to our room though it was already after 2 - so leaving at 3:15 and seeing LMA just wasn't gonna happen. I think we were all secretly glad because it is a show in an outdoor arena that is pretty sunny - and of course it was HOT. So we soaked up the cool in the room and the pool until about 4:30p before heading over to HollyWood Studios. We rode the bus there and arrived just in time to see the last showing of the evening of Beauty and the Beast.

I cannot believe we waited til our 3rd trip to see this show. It was awesome. Very good live performance - and Katie really liked the dancing as she could recognize several of the dance moves and technique she is learning at her dance classes. Of course, the technique of these dancers was way superior to the girls in her class, but we'll keep that between you and me. ;)

After Beauty and the Beast, we did the Muppets 3D show and the Big Movie Ride. We also tried to do the Little Mermaid show, but the wait/time was just too long during the times we were in that area of the park. While we were over there though, we wandered into one of the gift shops and I snapped this picture of the cross stitch kits they sell near the Academy of Animation. I managed not to by any new stash, mostly because I was remembering how little real estate their was in my luggage!

While we were back at the Animation Academy, we decided to do the drawing class they hold back there. So much fun! They were teaching Tigger, and I thought we all did a pretty good job with it!

After the drawing class we rode the bus back to the hotel and settled in. Alex and I had planned to attend Magic Kingdom's extra magic hours this night and we debated back and forth on whether to go. We were both tired, our feet hurt, etc. In the end, we dragged ourselves out of the room and to the park at about 10:30p. This was just dumb. The EMH didn't really start until midnight, because regular park hours were til midnight. So when we got there, there were still long lines. We managed to ride Buzz and the PeopleMover (Alex wanted to see the inside of Space Mountain again) and not much else. The wait for Space Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain were each over an hour. We got some smoothies at Auntie Gravities for snack credits and walked over to Pirates of the Carribean. The smoothies were wonderful and lasted just long enough to complete the walk across the park. We did Pirates with hardly any wait and then left the park before the true extra magic hours even began. Lesson learned - only do EMH when you can actually do EMH! We had a lot of fun at them in the past when they were earlier like starting at 10pm. midnight to 3am was just too late for us after two long park days.

Next up: more Epcot, Princess Breakfast and Cape May Cafe Buffet

Ohana Means Family

2011-07-26T20:58:00.000-05:00

Disney Diary - Day 2
Saturday, July 16, 2011

Many of the books and websites I've read about Disney World tell you not to do Magic Kingdom on Saturday because it is on the weekend and therefore theroritically busier. I decided to do it anyway because both Friday and Sunday had extra magic days at Magic Kingdom, so I figured fewer people would choose Magic Kingdom that day. Also families that travel from out of town are often traveling on Saturday, so even if they come to MK on Saturday, they arrive later in the day. And I just plain wanted to go to Magic Kingdom for our first real park day. :)

My plan was to get Fast Passes for both Mickey and the Princess meet and greets at the Town Square near the front of the park on our way in and then head straight for Space Mountain. A tip: The Mickey Mouse meet fast passes are not connected to the other fast passes in the park for some reason. In other words you can get FP for Mickey and still get another FP for something else immediately instead of having to wait for two hours or the window to open. (This is not true of the Princess M&G, they are connected to the other fast passes). Well that was my plan anyway. We got to the park about 10-15 min. before rope drop because we like to see the opening show and because it puts us in a good position for getting a FP and to our first ride right away. :) It was HOT, well it was July, so Duh! But gosh it was HOT, and the sun was really beating down even though it was only 9am.

So the rope dropped and we muddled our way into the crowd and headed for the Mickey and Princess greets. Oh, the building was so heavenly cool... and the wait to see the princesses was only 5 min! Why FP it when it is only 5min? Well, it was really more like 15 min. but the line was inside and did I say it was cool? We saw Aurora (sleeping beauty), Belle, and Cinderella and Katie loved talking with each of them. This was about the time she realized that lots of other kids had autograph books and she wanted one too. We had promised her one soveniour during the tip if she was on good behavior, so we didn't get it then because it was still really day one. She got her picture taken with each and got to talk to them though and you could tell she really liked it.

Once we finished with the Princesses I was a little nervous about getting a FP for Space Mountain for me and Alex and Katie seemed content with meeting the princesses, so we decided to skip Mickey for now and do him another time (we'd live to regret that on another day, but I'll save that story for when we come to it). So we continued up Main Street and then turned right into Tomorrowland. Alex and I obtained FPs for Space Mountain and then we all got in line for Buzz Lightyear. This is a real family favorite! The wait was posted as 10 min, but it was really only 5, we got right back in line to ride a second time and probably could have done it a third time but DH didn't want to ride the same ride 3 times. Party pooper! ;) I got the high score the first time, Alex got the high score the second time. Something Sean and I really enjoyed this time was that now that Katie is older she is less clingy and really preferred to ride with Alex on lots of the rides. Alex enjoyed teaching her things and showing off a bit to her, and we enjoyed the chance to ride together and not have to split up so one of us could ride with Katie.

After Buzz we ran into Stitch by the PeopleMover ride. Katie loves Stitch and there was only one other child in line to see him. :) The night before we left for the trip Katie lost one of her front teeth, so she is now sporting that classic gap you see on your average 7 yr old once they lose one or both of their front teeth. Stitch was pointing at her mouth and shaking his head. The character handler was sort of translating for him since the characters with a head costume don't actually talk. The character handler said that Stitch was wondering where her tooth went. Katie said the Tooth Fairy took it, and Stitch had a horrified look and covered his mouth, which really made Katie giggle. We got it all explained to Stitch so he could sleep at night without fear of the Tooth Fairy taking his teeth and moved on to the Tomorrowland Speedway. :)

Again, the kids rode together, which meant DH and I got to ride together. :) And even better I got to take a pic of them in the car together. We rode the Tea Cups and then the PeopleMover before our FP time for Space Mountain was ready. Sean is still scared of roller coasters, and I didn't think Katie was ready for Space Mountain yet - at least not as her first more grown up ride, so just Alex and I were ready to go. Unfortunately the ride was closed when we came back. :( So we were talking about whether to have lunch or ride Carousel of Progress when Katie saw Chip and Dale and wanted to get in line for them. The rest of us weren't really up for that, and told her so. She had a bit of meltdown about that, not terrible, but sassy and pouting and I was ready to nip that in the bud. I wasn't putting up with that for the whole trip. She had a prompt timeout on a nearby bench while we plotted our next move. We ended up doing Carousel of Progress after the 7 excrutiating minutes waiting for the time out to be over was finally done. (Why does punishing your kid always feel like punishing you?)

Just as we came out of the Carosel of Progress we headed over to a restroom and when we came out of there we saw that Space Mountain was just starting up again. We headed over to it and got in line and rode right away. Just as much fun as I remember it. We took a look at Big Thunder Mountain, but the wait was over 50 minutes and the FP return time was 2pm and we didn't plan to stay that long, so we had to take a pass on it.

We ate lunch at Cosmic Rays - DH and I had grilled chicken sandwiches and Alex had a burger. A note if you are on the dining plan. They will only allow you to order a chid meal for a kid, but the choices for kids meals are really limited. However, the counter service credits are really all pooled together in the computer. Basically they enforce this by only allowing you to order as many adult meals at one time as are on your reservation. So for us, we could only order 3 adult meals each time we placed an order. The options for kids at cosmic rays were peanut butter and jelly sandwiches (uncrustables) or this nasty mac and cheese. Katie really wanted a hot dog instead. So we split up (both my card and DH's could charge) and we each ordered two adult meals so Katie could get a hot dog. Why the hot dog is not on the kids meal plan to begin with is beyond me. It isn't as though we were trying to get prime rib for her or anything.

After lunch we did the Liberty Boat, which was way hotter than I expected. My sunburn, although slight, was really annoying me because I was just sweating and hot and uncomfortable. I almost fainted on the boat, and DH helped me sit down in a little bench in the center of the boat and drink some water from the pack we brought, and then crawl (well not literally, I walked, but it felt like I was crawling) to the rail where I could get some air. That is a long ride and it is more in the hot sun than I was expecting. I think it would be fun and relaxing in 70 degrees, not so much at 96 degrees.

After that ordeal, we made our way to Hall of Presidents where we cooled down and DH slept. :) I actually did listen to the presentation this time and was even a bit interested in the history, but the coolness was the little slice of heaven I needed. After getting cooled down in Hall of Presidents we headed out of the park and back to the monorail and then the Contemporary.

We slept a little, swam a little, and then got ready for our dinner reservation at Ohana at the Polynesian resort. This was the reservation I was most nervous about - our family is not really adventurous eaters. I'm trying to change that at least a little bit, which is why I picked it. The food there is Hawaiian Polynesian and is really, really good. To my relief and surprise Sean and Alex loved it. They ate and ate. I liked it too, very yummy. The have sticky wings and pot stickers - two things I usually don't care for much. But here they were just to die for! Katie didn't eat so well.. sigh.. but she really enjoyed the singing and dancing they do with the kids. A Polynesian woman sings and dances and leads them around the tables in a procession and gives them lays. Katie still has hers and still tallks about it even though she basically ate 3 bites of skewered chicken and a few bites of bread and brocilli and that is it. Ah well. Probably the best meal of the trip.

After the meal we went to the Poly bus stop and rode to Downtown Disney to go to DisneyQuest. You want the Pleasure Island stop, not the marketplace stop if you are going to DisneyQuest. DH had been dreading this part of the trip, since he did not enjoy it on our earlier trip. Last time we went though, Sean didn't do a lot of the stuff Alex and I did because he thought it was too video game orientated. Katie was only 4, so she didn't come at all, instead she went to the kids club (babysitting service) last time. So this time we got to do everything as a family, which was way more fun. We did the Jungle Cruise, which isn't at all like the one in MK - it is a simulator of a boat ride where you have to paddle your way through the course. The way you paddle had a real effect on which direction you go in the simulator too. Very fun and it didn't matter that Katie couldn't really paddle much, the other 3 of us made up for it. Next we did Pirate of the Caribean, again not like the one in MK. This was also sort of a virtual reality and we got to shoot down pirate ships, similiar to the way you shoot in the Toy Story Mania game at Hollywood Studios. We also did the big pinball simulation all together and the Tourist Jeep ride (Lost World?). We wanted to do the Animation Academy here too, but kept missing the scheduled time for it. Alex and I did the design your own roller coaster and that was fun - the ride handler made fun of us though for choosing all "green" (easy) and "yellow" (medium) level elements.

After all that we were exhausted, but happy. I felt so good that this trip was going well - Katie could do more and there was a better sense of comradery than on previous trips when we had to do separate activities based on the age and interest levels not matching up as much. So yes, Ohana means family seemed to be our theme for the day.

We rode the bus back to the Contemporary and noticed that mousekeeping left us a brand new towel arrangement. :)

Next up: Epcot and a little Hollywood Studios.

Perfect Arrival Day

2011-07-24T19:31:00.001-05:00

Disney Diary 2011
Day 1 - July 15, 2011

We left the house at 5:30am to make our 7:30am flight. Very early, but we were all so happy and excited to be going - so for once it wasn't hard to get everyone up and going. Even Katie, who can be a bear in the morning, got up cheerfully. :)

The flight left on time and even landed 20 minutes early - guess our pilot had a lead foot or something. Since this was our third trip I knew to ride the shuttle to main terminal and go down to the first floor on the B side to get to the Magical Express counter. I saw the long check in line and gave a little inward sigh, and went to stand in line. Only they had changed the setup a bit since last time - the long check in line was actually for Disney Cruise Line - not for the Disney Resorts at Walt Disney World. The cast members directed me to an EMPTY line to get on the buses - Yay! :) So the cast members scanned our Magic Express tickets and showed us to our bus to the Contemporary which was already there and ready to take off. Extra bonus!

It was 11:30am, and we had 7:15pm reservations for the Hoop Dee Doo that night. Hoop Dee Doo is now a family tradition for us, if you aren't already familiar, it is a live dinner show that serves fried chicken, ribs, cornbread, salad, and strawberry shortcake. To be honest, the food is nothing special - just average. It is a really fun show though. The kids really enjoyed the slap-stick hee-haw type humor. If you have a fourth grade boy or so he will think it is hilarious. The first time we saw this show Alex was 11 and he laughed so hard he cried. Now it is more tradition for us and more mildly amusing. Still a good time, and a fun thing to do on our more laid back arrival day. So anyway - I would have made reservations for the 5pm show, but I was nervous about the flight getting delayed, or magic express taking a long time and needing time to get settled in our room, so I booked the later reservation. Since we were making such good time, I called the WDW Dining number, and moved the reservation to 5pm - no problem there - the cast member was able to change the reservation.

The actual ride to the resort took a little longer than I would have liked because the bus made stops at Grand Floridian, Wilderness Lodge, and the Polynesian before taking us to the Contemporary, but we were still all checked in, settled in our room, and eating lunch at the Contempo Cafe by 1pm - very good time for the scheduled landing of 11:14am. Alex actually had a good idea that I'd use if we are ever in this situation again. We should have just gotten off the Magic Express bus at Grand Floridian (the first stop) and rode the monorail to Contemporary - probably would have shaved another 15-20 minutes off, but oh well.
We checked into our room to find the "mousekeeping" had already left us a towel animal. Some wash clothes arranged like a mickey head. :) A nice touch. We stayed in the Garden Wing of the Contemporary Resort and our room sort of overlooked the pool except that there were trees and folliage between our room and the pool - but that was fine with us - we didn't pay for any special view and we didn't get any special view, so par for the course. :)

We were on the Disney Dining Plan because I had gotten a Free Dining PIN right around the time I was beginning to plan the trip. The Dining Plan is 1 Table Service Credit per day, 1 Counter Service credit per day and 1 snack per day for every member of your party. It might not sound like much, but it can be a lot of food. Each of the Table Service and Counter Service credits include a dessert, drink and entree. And at the counter service places, often a side such as fries is also included. I would probably not get the dining plan if we did not have the PIN code, but since our food is then included in the price of our room/tickets, we do save a bit of money using it. Anway, we used our first set of counter service credits at the Contempo Cafe. One of the dessert options are these huge cupcakes. They were super yummy too. This is the Dos Leche one (caramel) and they also have a Black Forest and a Strawberry which were also very good. :)

So after lunch we changed into our swim suits and decided to check out the pool. I would not recommend staying at the Contemporary resort if you have little kids (say under 7ish) because of the pool. There is no kiddie pool at all. Katie loved, loved the kiddie pool at the Wilderness when we stayed there in 2008, but all the Contemporary has is a water-spout play area. It was a real pain for me too, because although she could just touch bottom in the big pool, she isn't a strong enough swimmer that I felt she could be independent in the water at all. So if she wanted to be in the water, I had to be right there, attached at the hip the entire time. I really liked being able to let her play in the kiddie pool while I enjoyed my drink in a nearby beach chair at the Wilderness - couldn't do that here.

If anything went wrong on this day at all it was that I didn't pack any sunscreen in our carry-ons. We had larger bottles packed in our check-in luggage, which hadn't arrived yet, but I should have thought to pack a few 3oz bottles so that we could have lathered up before going to the pool. We didn't stay at the pool long, and luckily no one was badly burned, but my shoulder and neck got slightly crispy. Enough to be sore for the rest of that day and the beginning of the next - a minor annoyance.

After our dip in the pool we got ready for the Hoop Dee Doo. We were almost late for our reservation because it was raining and the boat that runs from the Contemporary, Wilderness Lodge, and Ft Wilderness Campground had to switch to using bigger, covered boats because of the possibility of lightning. We had our ponchos though, and it was no big deal. We finally caught the boat and just made the reservation. Fun time at HDD as usual. :)

I was really happy to make the earlier show of HDD because it meant we had time afterward to go to FANTASMIC! at Disney's Hollywood studios. FANTASMIC! was playing twice - once at 9pm and again at 10:30p, but we really didn't want to stay up for the 10:30p since we had been up since 4:30am, and 9pm was really like 10p with the 1 hour time change difference between CT (WI) and ET (FL). I love FANTASMIC! It is my favorite night time show at WDW and I highly recommend it.

After HDD we took the boat back to the Contemporary and the walked to the bus stop and took the bus to Hollywood Studios. No problem waiting for the bus - it drove up just as we walked to the bus stop. :) We did have to make a stop at the Polynesian to pick up people there though, and I had heard that in July the line for FANTASMIC could be full as soon as an hour and a half before the show. We arrived at Hollywood Studios about 8:20p - so I was a little concerned we would miss it, but my backup plan was to do some of the other rides planned for a different day if that happened. Turned out there was no need to worry at all. We scored excellent seats about half way up a little the left of the center. Excellent viewing - I think we lucked out because the rain drove a lot of people out of the park and back to their hotels. The pictures below are of the stage as we waited for the show to start and then the finale float with all the characters. :)

After FANTASMIC! we were all very tired, but very happy. We had another small snafu trying to get to the right bus stop - we walked left instead of right out of the gate and went quite a distance before we realized the stop for the Contemporary was on the other side and then had to back track and go the right way. The bus was there waiting for us though and we didn't have to wait long to get back to our resort. Everyone went right to sleep. :)

Next up - Day 2 - Magic Kingdom and DisneyQuest.

Some Heritage Sampler progress

2011-04-30T09:44:00.000-05:00

I know Martina of Chatelaine designed this piece to be a sort of Mother's tree listing your female ancestors. I already have Mother's Tree in progress for that - so I'm using it as a Family sampler instead. So that is my husband's name there. The next line of text will be "wed on January 28, 1995 to" and then my maiden name on the next line. Then a line will say, "Their children" and then Alex and Katie's full names and birthdates on the lines after that. I have a verse I might put in the remaining lines, provided I get that far before the grandchildren are born! :) I'm thinking of doing the verse in backstitch, so that I can easily frog in about 10-15yrs when the grandkids do come and I can then add their names too...

It is a LOT of over one lettering, so I'm trying to make as much progress as I can while I still have my eyes!

Jill Rensel Framing - Alhambra and Mira Mermaid RR

2011-03-31T18:32:00.000-06:00

This was my first time getting anything framed by Jill - and I know it won't be the last - she did an awesome job and I am so pleased. And she wasn't anymore expensive than going somewhere locally, even with factoring in the shipping!

Here are some close ups so you can see the detail.

I took this picture next to the accent wall so you can see that the mat matches pretty good. It actually hangs here over the fireplace on a cream colored wall, but I think the colors will play nicely off of the opposite accent wall color.

Mira RR finished

2011-03-27T15:42:00.000-06:00

This came home to me probably over a year ago now and I finally got around to finishing it off. I stitched the baby in the lower left corner when it came home and the girl with the knitting needles before she left. I had lots of help from several other ladies who stitched all the other designs. I designed this layout to fit in a standard 11 x 14 frame, so as soon as I find one I like at the store I'll get this framed up. Might be awhile though, so I thought I'd share the happy dance now. :)

Heirloom Stitching Sampler Progress

2011-03-12T18:59:00.001-06:00

This one is just flying by - I think I should finish it by summerish time with no trouble at all. :) Unfortunately I'm probably gonna have to skip the fair this year though. :( We are planning on going to Disney one last time before Alex moves up and outta here, and the only week that works out for the special booking dates for our deal and around the kids extra-curriculars, and my boss's vacation schedule is the same week that the fair judging is. *sigh* Ah well, maybe next year. I can hardly complain about going on a nice vacation.

1843 Catherine Eleanor Blain

2011-03-03T21:49:00.000-06:00

Not the clearest of pictures this time. I finally lept into the 21st century and updated my phone to a Motorola Grasp complete with QWERTY keyboard and camera. I took these with the camera - the 1.3MP is obviously not as good as my usual camera, but I wanted to try it out and was too lazy to retake them.

I finished another name on Mother's Tree and started St. Basil's Cathedral. Katie really, really wanted me to start on "her castle" so I caved and started it for her.

I'm planning to change some of the backstitching on the cathedral to make it stand out better against the white opalescent fabric.

All Clean!

2011-02-17T17:28:00.000-06:00

The last time I posted about Stone Roses, I told you all about how some of the white thread had stitched in sort of dingy. I am lazy, so I really didn't want to frog and restitch, but I was afraid that the Waterlilies would run if I washed it.

When I started Convent's Herbal Garden I soaked all the silks for that project to bleed out all the excess dye. Since one of the Waterlilies colors for that design (112 fir) is also in Stone Roses, I decided to also soak the Stone Roses silks. Since neither of the Stone Roses silks bled at all, I decided I could go ahead and wash Stone Roses. No bleeding, and the white looks white now as it should! :) Whew!

So all that said, not a ton of progress this time. I'm sort of in that mid-point of the design where you stitch and stitch all these large blocks of boring color and there doesn't seem to be so much progress. Eventually though it will come together, and I still think she is pretty to look at in the meantime. :)

My new focus piece

2011-02-07T18:55:00.002-06:00

Victoria Sampler's Heirloom Stitching Sampler is my new focus piece, simply because it is the closest to being done. This time I worked the bands from the second scene of stitchers down.

I'm hoping I can have it done in time to enter with Alhambra for the fair, but we'll see. :)

Happy Dance: Alhambra Garden

2011-01-28T19:56:00.009-06:00

Here she is finished and in all her glory! No way I'm waiting to frame this baby. :)

A Tale of Two Chatelaines

2011-01-04T16:05:00.004-06:00

I made a deal with myself that I could go ahead and start Convent's Herbal Garden on New Year's Day IF I stitched on only Alhambra Garden the week between Christmas and New Year's AND once I spent a few days on the new start, it was back to Alhambra Garden until it is finished.

Here is the progress on Alhambra Garden - definitely starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel - but it will still be a little stretch before I can really happy dance.

And here is what I managed to accomplish in 3 days of stitching on CHG. *sigh* it isn't nearly as much as I'd hoped, but the over-one and eyelets slowed me down a bit.

The fabric is 28ct Fairy Dust, which is a soft peach tone - very yummy. I'm going to have to figure out what to do about the yellow flowers along the outside edge of the design though cause I think they will disappear on this fabric if I stitch them in the recommended 094 Lemon Waterlilies. The yellow eyelets in the picture are that same floss color, but I think they are okay here since they are surrounded by other stitching so they still pop okay.

New Year's Mish Mash 2011

2011-01-02T18:50:00.006-06:00

I finished the finishing for both of these pieces on 12/31/2010 so that my year end list of finishes might not be quite so awful. Angel of Summer I finished back in August, but just got around to framing, and the band sampler is a round robin piece that was finished a couple of years ago already but I never got around to making it into a bell pull until now. Tool all of an hour and a half - really should not have put it off for so long! I finally found a perfect frame for AoS; though I really should have hung her and took a picture against a lighter background so you could see the frame better. Don't worry she is going to my mom's house and isn't going to hang there permenantly - that is just where I had space for her at the moment. :)

2010 Review
In 2010 my goals were to try to finish at least 3 of the following designs that were in my rotation:

Inspiration - Rosewood Manor - nope
Mother's Tree - MLI - nope
Angel of Summer - MLI - yes
Heritage Sampler - Chatelaine - nope
Alhambra Garden - Chatelaine - getting close, but nope
Stitcher's Heirloom Sampler - Victoria Sampler - nope
Hardanger Table Runner - didn't even touch this one all year. *sigh*

I also wanted to finish these completed pieces into framed pieces or other items:
Just Nan RR from a few years back - into a stitching book - nope
Band Samler RR from a few years back - into a bellpull - yes, by the skin of my teeth - see above
Mirabilia Mermaid RR - into a framed piece - nope, but I got Jill Rensel's contact info and plan to put this to the top of the list for 2011. It WILL be done. :)

2011 Goals
I'm going to shoot for 3 bigger finishes from my rotation this year too. I know that is an attainable goal for me because for years I finished 4 or 5. I just had a slower for me stitching year than usual. I just didn't pick up a needle as much. I want to get back to stitching more, so I think 3 is still reasonable.

My current rotation list is similiar to last year's:

Inspiration - Rosewood Manor
Stone Roses - Mirabilia
Mother's Tree - MLI
Persian Floral - TW
Heritage Sampler - Chatelaine
Alhambra Garden - Chatelaine
Stitcher's Heirloom Sampler - Victoria Sampler
Hardanger Table Runner
Convent's Herbal Garden - Chatelaine

If I had to guess I'd say I could finish AG, Mother's Tree, and Stitcher's Heirloom Sampler by end of 2011. I'm pretty positive that Heritage Sampler, CHG (new start on new year's day 2011) and the Hardanger Table Runner will not be finished. Stone Roses is an unlikely 4th finish if I get that far.

I'd also like to frame/finish the following:
Mirabilia Mermaid RR piece
Mirabilia Children RR piece
Just Nan RR stitching book

A little inspiration

2010-12-27T19:13:00.004-06:00

Inspiration by Rosewood Manor. Not a ton of progress, but I'm happy with how it is progressing. Because there are so many stops and starts this is one where you feel like you are running in place for ever and ever and then all the sudden you take a step back and Hey! there IS progress after all. :) I think I'll have that next moment when I finish filling in the leaves and flowers in the emptyish section. (Yes I'm making up words now, must be tired~)

I'm back to working on Alhambra Garden now, probably will work mostly on that until it is finished, which still might be another month or so. I am finishing the last of large triangles on the bottom now. I'm expecting the stitching to still take some time to finish and then all the beading in the center will definitely be time consuming too.

I got all the rest of threads for Covenant Herbal Garden for Christmas, so I have them soaking and bleeding out all the excess dye now. I decided to make this my new start for 2011 on New Year's Day even though I know I won't be done with Alhambra. My plan is to stitch on Alhambra til Jan. 1 - then stitch CHG through the New Year weekend and Monday (I have Monday off) so I get a good start on it. Then I'll go back to Alhambra until it is finished.

Fourth Fountain Finished!

2010-12-12T19:16:00.003-06:00

I finally finished all four fountains. The first seemed to take forever and I know I frogged and cursed a lot, the second wasn't too bad, and the third was fine. This one seemed to fly by - don't know why it seemed so hard at first. Anyway, all four are done now. I'm not going to make the end of the year, but it'll definitely be done in time for fair this year. :)

Oh, and Covenant's Herbal Garden is almost completely kitted - it will be started as soon as this one is finished. :)

Advent Wreath Ornament

2010-12-06T19:37:00.003-06:00

This little beauty was designed by Belinda of Tor Rhuann Designs. It is a freebie on her page if you are interested. I changed out most of the supplies for what I had on hand.

The fabric is 32 ct Driftwood Zweigart Belfast. The floss is all DMC rayon - 33607 (purple) 30899 (rose) and 30501 (green). I used PB25 Treasure Braid and Swarovski Crystals for the flames. The beads are Mill Hill 00332 (green) and 00367 (red).

This is my first biscournu finish and I love that it is small and delicate. I've always found the biscouru interesting, but the larger size made me wonder what to do with it once finished. Having a small one was perfect for an ornament for the tree. I really love how it turned out - Thanks Belinda for a great design! :)

I orginally intended to give this to my sister because she was saying she couldn't find many Christmas decorations that celebrated Advent, but I think I've decided to keep it for myself! :)

Think these guys know what's in my frig?

2010-11-22T16:33:00.003-06:00

I guess these turkeys don't understand that it is almost Thanksgiving or they wouldn't be venturing so close to my backdoor. Or maybe they know I already have the bird thawing in the frig - so no need to fret?

We also get deer and the occasional red fox sauntering through the backyard despite being in a relatively populated area.

In stitching news, I've been working on TW's Persian Floral. Finished one of the inside corner motifs, which was fun, but tons of backstitching!

1818 Elizabeth VanDoren

2010-11-14T19:04:00.006-06:00

I finished this name on my Mother's Tree last weekend already, just took me this long to get it uploaded to the blog. This one is going pretty fast - I just do one name each rotation and then whatever I can finish before the end of the weekend on the next name.

I'm worked some more on Alhambra Garden this weekend, but didn't finish enough yet for another pic - probably in a week or two I'll have some more to show on that one.

In other news, Katie has taken to playing with Alex's old match box cars. Course she doesn't quite play with or use them in quite the same way. :) She put them in the shape of a star, a heart, and spelled lots of various words. At least you cannot accuse her of not having an imagination. :)

Alhambra again

2010-11-06T09:05:00.003-06:00

The latest progress on Alhambra Garden. I asked Katie to step into the picture as so many of you commented last time that it helped show size/perspective.

Also you can see my working copy of the chart in the background. I copied all the pages so I wouldn't ruin my chartpack and then cut and taped all the pages together. I really stink at trying to flip back and forth between pages, so that has really helped me a lot even if the entire pattern is huge. This way I can mark and bend and fold and no worries. :) I also clip the entire thing (often folded to the spot I need) to a music stand. I love having a music stand for my charts. I've seen several needlework chart stands that cost $100 or more - this was $12.50 several years ago at the local music store, and it does exactly the same thing.

Anyway, I'm really getting excited that I just might finish this one day. :) I'm starting to order the silks and such for Covenant's Herbal Garden - I've decided to start that when this one is finished. :)

Dance Bag Happy Dance

2010-11-01T18:10:00.004-06:00

I finally finished Katie's new dance bag. It is on Aida, which I haven't stitched on in forever and half. I stitched it with some mystery pink varigated silk from my stash - I think it might be from a Dinky Dyes ooopps pack.

I have a tendency to believe that since I'm stitching something all in one floss color that it will be sooo so easy and quick. Yeah, not so much. I kept losing my place in the pattern with no color changes to go by and also it was kinda tedious and boring. Oh well, I'm reasonably happy with the result and Katie loves having a unique bag that I stitched. Just glad she is still young enough to appreciate stuff mom makes. Soon enough I suppose she'll only want the ultra cool brand name bag that all the other kids have - so I'll enjoy that while it lasts. :)

Some Heritage Sampler progress

2010-10-13T16:06:00.004-05:00

Some good progress on this - I really like how it is coming out, but it is probably going to be forever and a half before it is finished. I guess that is okay, I'll just keep plugging at it. :)

This time I finished another band where the names will go, and I did a few more of the over one alphabet along the left-hand side.

Some more on Stone Roses

2010-09-24T16:14:00.004-05:00

This is coming along quite nicely. :) Only one problem - I'm noticing that the white looks a little yellow or dirty in some spots. It doesn't show up in the picture as much as it does in real life, but you can kinda see it toward the bottom of the white section that is stitched. I always try to keep my hands really clean when I stitch, and I've never had this issue before when stitching large sections of white. :/ I might try and wash it, but I'm a little nervous that the silks will bleed, but at least they are not red. I think I'll wait to get a bit more done before I decide whether she really has to have a bath or not.

Goal Orientated Rotation

2010-09-05T22:16:00.005-05:00

I have been working in a rotation for several years now, but always seemed to go by how much time I spent on a piece - not necessarily how many hours actually stitching, but one night, two nights, one week, etc. I think I've come to realize that it actually works better for me to do a goal-orientated rotation. When I pick up a piece I decide to stitch until I reach a certain point. I try to pick something that will take a week or less, but sometimes I don't get as much stitching time as I'd like, or it takes longer than I think, or the frogs visit or whatever. I still keep stitching until that goal is met. Very satisfying to stay on one thing until I meet the goal I think. You sort of get that satisfaction of being a "one-at-a-timer" but you still have the variety of the rotation.

This time my goal was to finish the second scene in Heritage Stitching Sampler by Victoria Sampler. I started with the white and metalic bargello and cross stitch band above it. The over one vine slowed my down a little bit, but not as much as I feared and I finished this one day earlier than I expected to - which almost never happens.

Anyway, I'm going to work on Katie's dance shoe bag tomorrow before going back to Alhambra Garden, which is my current focus piece.

Alhambra Garden

2010-08-30T19:24:00.005-05:00

One pic of just the WIP - one with Vanna. LOL

Katie just needed to be in that last pic, so I let her. :) I made some good progress on this one the last two weeks. Finished the triangle on the right and worked some more down on the yellow and brown lattice work. I *think* I *might* just be able to finish this piece before 2010 is out - certainly for fair next year!

I also started a new travel project - just two small monochromatic designs of ballet figurines that I'm stitching on a tote bag made of aida. It has been so long since I've stitched on aida - but at least it is easy and this will be a fun project to work on while watchingng Katie's dance classes. If you didn't already guess, the finished product will be a dance bag for her dance shoes. Maybe I'll show a pic next time I post, right now it is just sort of a blob.

Inspiration 8/15/2010

2010-08-16T19:37:00.002-05:00

This time I filled in the area on the left side down to the pot and started the vines beyond. I like to backstitch in the vines first in an area to sort of mark it out and then I go back and fill in all the flowers and birds. This is fun to stitch cause it goes relatively fast in spite of all the color changes. It is a little challenging to anchor all those loose ends in a way that they don't show, but it isn't too bad either. This is a relatively good picture except that the fabric color is a bit yellower than it appears here.

Persian Floral - new WIP

2010-08-08T19:12:00.005-05:00

My new start - Persian Floral by TW. I included the mag cover as this is probably not one of the more well-known of Teresa Wentzler's designs.

I don't really keep track of my stitching time, but I'd guesstimate this is about 7 or 8 hours of stitching. It was fabulous to get that much stitching time in one weekend. Something that doesn't usually happen that often lately.

I'm all motivated now to get going on my other WIPs too. I'm going to work on Inspiration next and then Alhambra Garden, as that will be my new focus piece. If I can stay motivated I just might have another finish before 2010 is done!

Angel of Summer Finish! :)

2010-08-06T19:54:00.005-05:00

Here she is all done! I'm not especially happy with the photos, but too lazy to retake them. She will likely be a present for my mom's birthday in November. I started this at her request back in 2004 or 5 I think. Probably mom has forgotten all about her. Just need to get her framed sometime before November I guess.

Cat

2010-07-31T19:23:00.005-05:00

I know its been awhile, but I've been in a bit of a stitching slump lately. I think I'm getting out of it now though- knock wood.

Anyway, here is a small finish - Katie has been bugging me to stitch this up for her since it came in the mail from Susan after I won a giveaway on her blog some months back. It was a quick and easy stitch and I just framed it myself with a standard 4x6 frame I had laying around in the craft room - probably from a yard sale!

Nothing fancy, but Katie really likes cats and she's tickled with it. :)

I'm getting really close to finishing my Angel of Summer, just a little bit of filling in on the flowers on the bottom of her dress and some beading left! Whew - I'll be glad when that one is done.

Now, I need some votes on what to start next when I finish Angel of Summer - these are my top choices:

Persian Floral - Teresa Wentzler - I want to put this in an end table inset for in my craft room.
Covenant Herbal Garden - Chatelaine - saw a WIP of this somewhere and fell in love with the detailed flowers on this piece.
Tablecloth - I have several small tablecloths made of 32ct linen that I'm dying to have done up so I can use them - would need suggestions on designs though - holiday themes would be good as I really only pull out a tablecloth for holidays - Christmas, Easter, Thanksgiving.

The first name done!

2010-05-31T19:08:00.004-05:00

It took me forever and a half to decide what to do for the names threadwise. Mostly because the threads I picked when I started are silk Dinky Dyes and I was now questioning whether I'd have enough of it to finish and have some left for future names - without running into dye lot issues.

I finally ordered a bunch more of the color I wanted to use for the lowercase letters and good thing I did - the color that Mother's Tree is stitched in and the color that is the lowercase letters are really the same color - just two different dye lots. I love the Dinky Dyes threads, but it is something you really have to have all of the color on hand before you start (which I knew, but I misjudged how much I'd need). Anyway, I think I have plenty of threads in matching dyelot to finish now and I think I'll leave Mother's Tree in the different dyelot as it is still in the same color family and I think it looks good being a little different than the rest of the lettering. I have 8 more names to stitch (provided I finish before Katie starts having kids!).

2 for the price of 1

2010-05-09T19:46:00.002-05:00

Some time ago I promised an updated picture of Angel of Summer, this is progress as of last week or so... I haven't picked it back up yet, so it is still current. Just took me forever and a half to get around to uploading the picture to the blog.

As long as I'm at it, I'll also show a picture of my recent progress on Stone Roses, here she is as of today - I actually got several hours of uninterrupted stitching time over the Mother's Day weekend. :)

The last Mira RR section - Petal Fairy

2010-04-25T18:24:00.004-05:00

I'm officially done with all the obligation stitching I took on in 2009. I really enjoyed stitching all the Mira RRs, but I'm also glad to be done and be able to focus on some other things. :)

Next up, a few more days on Angel of Summer. I've had some progress on her since I lasted posted, but she moves so slow I don't want to bore everyone with a new pic every time I work on her. I will update though after this next time as I think I've finally made enough progress to show. After I get in some good progress on her I've been itching to get back to Stone Roses. :)

Heritage Sampler progress

2010-04-07T10:58:00.003-05:00

Not a ton of really visible progress on this one since my last post, but trust me it was a fair number of hours/time consuming. I did the grape viney border next to the over one letters on the right and then I did the eyelet border under the top band and the orange line under that. I think next time it will be unavoidable and I'll have to do some more over one lettering! There is a lot in this piece. I'm happy with how it is coming out though. :)

Mermaids of the Deep Blue

2010-03-07T19:31:00.003-06:00

Here is Rachel's RR - I did the section in the bottom center from Mermaids of the Deep Blue. A fun quick stitch. :)

3 Down, 1 to Go

2010-02-19T16:46:00.004-06:00

Fountains that is! I really love this design, but those fountains always trip me up. This one actually went pretty smoothly though with no real major visits from the frogs. I finished the fountain on the right this time and began the triangle on the right out from the fountain. I think that when I finish Angel of Summer, this will likely be my next focus. I'd really like to finish it for fair this year, but probably shouldn't be saying that out loud! Don't want to jinx it!

Endless Pink Dress...

2010-02-12T16:13:00.005-06:00

Well, not really, but it sort of feels endless. Probably because it is sort of boring and all I can think about stitching right now is my Alhambra Garden. Sooo guess what I'm going to work on next? :)

Last time I posted a progress pic of her, someone asked about the fabric. She is actually on that MCG Textiles fabric (Twilight Blue) so loathed by many. Yes, the fabric weave is uneven, and yes it is very slubby. I really don't mind though and I think she is coming along beautitfully inspite of these imperfections. I knew about the problems with the fabric before I began and chose this fabric anyway because I liked the color and because I had done another piece on it before and was happy with my beautiful, but slightly different (from everyone else's) Fairy Idyll. Gives the piece a uniqueness because the lady is proportioned a little differently, but not so badly as to notice any real issue. It wouldn't work on a geometric piece of course, but I might use MCG Textiles again on another figure like this one.

Inspiration progress

2010-02-04T20:36:00.002-06:00

Just plugging along on this one. You can sort of see my approach to how I'm stitching this piece in this picture. I like to stitch some of the vines to "mark out" where things should fall and then fill in the leaves and flowers. Makes for fewer counting mistakes. I didn't get a whole lot done this time, worked on the border some and did the viney part that is missing the leaves/flowers and the planter on the left side.

Angel of Summer progress

2010-01-29T18:50:00.004-06:00

Meet my new focus piece. I started it for my mom a few years back and I think it is time to finish her up. This time I worked on the greenery hanging down from her hand to that yellow sash - also finished the sash. That greenery is a real pain! I'm going to stitch some on Rosewood Manor's Inspiration next, but then I'll be back to this. I'm going to alternate it between my other pieces until she is finally finished. :)

I finished the tree! :)

2010-01-22T17:02:00.004-06:00

I think I will now just mark where I will start the names and call it quits for now on this one. When I began stitching this piece I had decided to use the dark green you see and a lighter green for the non-dark green lettering. I've decided I really do want to keep the shading as it was designed and therefore I need two shades of lighter green for the lettering. Lucky for me, it just means ordering a third color of Dinky Dyes silk, which is what I am already stitching with: 052, 051, 050 for the curious. 52 is this color you already see, and I needed to order 50, as I had originally planned to just use 51. Anyway, it is going to take a bit for the silk to arive and I am ready to move onto something else for a bit now anyway.

I think I will stitch on my Angel of Summer next as she is the closest to a finish in the WIP pile.

Southwest Mermaid

2010-01-18T19:59:00.001-06:00

Here is the latest section for the Mira RR all finished up! :)

I think for my next act I'll try to get a little stitched up on Mother's Tree. I think I can finish the tree this time if I put my mind to it. :)

New Year's Mish Mash 2010

2010-01-03T18:51:00.002-06:00

Last year I started Stone Roses on New Year's Day. This year, instead of starting a new project, I decided to get some progress in on her because I really enjoy stitching her. Just. for. me. :)

I spent far too much of my stitching time in 2009 on obligation stitching, so this year my main stitching focus is to stitch what I want on my own projects. The only obligation stitching I'm doing in 2010 is to finish up the Mira RR I'm currently involved in. I don't think of that as too much of a hardship though - I love Miras to begin with, so meeting that obligation is not going to be too tough. :) But that along with the baby blanket I just finished meant that I didn't get in much progress on all my WIPs in 2009. I'm afraid the blanket was my only major happy dance for 2009 and I missed competing in State Fair because I didn' have anything to enter.

So anyway, no new obligations for 2010! I just want to focus on finishing as many of my current WIPs as possible. I may have a new start or two - but only as I finish something else. I spent the first three days of 2010 loving to stitch Stone Roses. I'll spend the next few days finishing another section on the Mira RR and then I want to get some progress in on each of these other WIPs:

Inspiration - Rosewood Manor
Mother's Tree - MLI
Angel of Summer - MLI
Heritage Sampler - Chatelaine
Alhambra Garden - Chatelaine
Stitcher's Heirloom Sampler - Victoria Sampler
Hardanger Table Runner - (don't know designer offhand - too lazy to go look)

The hardest one to work on is going to be the Hardanger Table Runner - I think it is just sort of an "I don't love you anymore" project, yet I've done so much I cannot just not finish it either. *sigh* maybe a little at a time?..

I also want to finish these completed pieces into framed pieces or other items:
Just Nan RR from a few years back - into a stitching book
Band Samler RR from a few years back - into a bellpull
Mirabilia Mermaid RR - into a framed piece

So that's it - I've made my New Year's post - hopefully I can stick to it (mostly)! :)

Finished finished! :)

2009-12-31T09:33:00.005-06:00

The back is a plain yellow fleece and the binding is an ordinary satin blanket binding I got at JoAnn's.

I just hope young Teresa understands Aunt Jenny is a much better stitcher than she is a sewer - the satin binding was really hard to keep straight. I think the result is passable, but I'm sure a more experienced seamstress would have done much better. Ah well.

Happy Dance!

2009-12-30T18:43:00.005-06:00

All the stitching is done on the afghan! Woo Hoo! And not a moment too soon. My sister had her baby yesterday morning at 4:30am. She had a little girl they named Teresa Lucia. They don't find out the sex or reveal the name of the baby til it is born, so usually I don't get a chance to include any name or anything before finishing the blanket. The timing worked out this time that I was just finishing up when she was born. The text along the side of the center is the baby's name and birthdate. :)

I'm planning on doing the finishing tomorrow as I have off from work. More pictures once I have it all blanketified.

Little Squares done!

2009-12-20T17:36:00.003-06:00

Finally! Now just Mother Gooser herself and this afghan will be ready to be finished into a blanket. :)

Shoveling and Stitching

2009-12-10T19:14:00.003-06:00

As many of you know, there was a big snow storm in WI Tuesday into Wednesday which resulted in a day home from work and school. I spent the day shoveling the heavy snow the blower couldn't get at the end of the driveway, and then stitching 6 over one letters on Chatelaine's Heritage Sampler. Good thing I have no deadline for finishing this thing - there is a ton of over-one letters! :)

Peter, Peter Pumpkin Eater

2009-12-08T19:41:00.002-06:00

I'm afraid to say so, but I think there is a light at the end of the tunnel. Only two more small squares left and they are both rather easy. Then the large center design of Mother Goose herself, which is going to be over-two, so it really isn't that much harder/bigger than the small squares. I'm thinking it will take about as long as two of the small squares. Anyway, getting close now. And no obligation stitching for 2010! (Well except for the Mira RR I'm already stitching for.)

MissyAnn is the awesomest!

2009-12-03T15:46:00.004-06:00

Well, that is what Katie said anyway. :) Actually she said, Mrs. {Missy's last name here} is the awesomest, but I don't want to post the name here. :)

A few days back Katie was watching over my shoulder while I read Missy's blog, and insisted I buy the pincushion that Missy just made. She thought it was so pretty. :) I explained that Missy had made it for herself and that it wasn't a store or a sale, but her own pincushion. Katie was very put out, but suggested maybe we could go to Missy's house when she has a yard sale and buy it from her. I thought that was pretty funny and told Missy the story in the comments on her blog.

Missy made her a pincushion and sent it complete with a note telling her how Santa called and asked her to make her one because she had been trying to be such a good girl. Katie was a little suspicious and didn't seem to think Santa could possibly know about the pincushion, but I think I convinced her saying that Santa must have been making his list and checked in on her while we were looking at it on the computer. Little too smart for her own good I think. *sigh*

Anway, THANK YOU so much Missy - you really made my day and Katie's! :)

Little Bo Peep

2009-12-01T18:15:00.002-06:00

Only 3 more little squares to go, then the big one in the center. Mother Goose herself goes there.

Also, I'm trying to come up with a creative way to include the year for the baby. I usually put "Baby [last name] 2010" somewhere on the completed afghan where it won't look too out of place. Right now the best I've come up with is the lower right square which will otherwise be empty. It won't look exactly right though cause that square should be empty to keep the every other square stitched pattern I've got going.

If anyone has any bright ideas, please feel free to share. :)

Heirloom Stitching Sampler progress

2009-11-28T19:21:00.006-06:00

I took advantage of finally having some down time this weekend and pulled out this from the WIP pile. :) Just couldn't work on the afghan when I was feeling so blissfully lazy I guess. :)

I did the three small bands under the scene and then the over-one letters and the band beneath them this time. Fun to work on but I think I'll put it away now and get back to the afghan - Wendy is due January 10. I think I'm likely shooting for the Baptism at this rate but I still have to keep plugging if I want to make that.

In other news I think DH and I have finally settled on a carpet for the basement. We ended up going with Home Depot even though we thought we wouldn't use them again because they are a big PITA. But their price is almost 2k less than the others so I guess we'll put up with it. I plan to post pics of the basement once the carpet is in - which I'm hoping will be before Christmas.

Hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving and a good Black Friday. I skipped going out for the sales this year, but did manage to score a PS3 bundle from Walmart online at 3am when they went on sale. Setting the alarm, turning the computer on 15 min. before the sale, and going back to bed 20 min. later was so much better than actually having to leave the house and fight the crowds. I might never actually leave again to try to shop the Black Friday deals. :)

Finally!

2009-11-16T19:07:00.002-06:00

My husband finally figured out why our PC wouldn't load any pictures and got it fixed. So now I can share these with you. In between painting all the trim in the basement I'm still plugging along on the afghan. Here is Sing a Song of Sixpence and a picture of the whole thing. I'm working on Little Bo Peep next. :)

Mira RR - Athena :)

2009-11-01T18:39:00.002-06:00

This one has lots of bling, and she was really fun to stitch. Hope you like her Autumn! :)

I'll be back to stiching on the afghan next. I've been spending a lot of time on yardwork, housework, and painting our new finished basement lately, but I'm trying to get in more stitching time! :)

There was an old woman who lived in a shoe

2009-10-13T18:52:00.004-05:00

This one went faster than I expected. Finished just in time for Autumn's RR to show up on my doorstep. :) So I get to stitch on the RR for the next bit and take a break from the afghan.

I'm stitching Athena for Autumn's RR, and then Sing a Song of Sixpence for the afghan after that.

Jack be Nimble

2009-10-07T19:48:00.003-05:00

Finished this up just today. :) There was an old woman who lived in a shoe is next. Might have to get in some progress on something else first though - this afghan is burning me out. Sister is due in January though - so not much time left to get it done.

Renovation Update

2009-09-29T16:21:00.004-05:00

To see before pictures, click here - I posted them a few weeks back.

Just decided to take some photos of the progress on my basement finish and thought I'd share. Although a lot of work has been done, it still mostly looks like this - framed walls! Note the wiring too! There are also lights and heating vents in the ceiling.There are a few highlights to share though - Now we have a hallway, with a wall that will hide all the ugly mechanicals - furnace, water heater, etc. (on the right).And there is the bathroom that is all roughed in, water supply done and in the right place, and tub in too.And the best part so far - the windows! When we bought this house we knew immediately upon seeing this slope on the side of the house that we'd take advantage of that landscape to add egress windows! Well actually, the windows aren't in yet because they are on special order to match the siding, but the structure and openings are all there.

Mira RR - Poppy

2009-09-27T18:10:00.005-05:00

Finished putting the beads on this one on Saturday. Next up I'll be working on another nursery ryhme block for the baby afghan. This one was a quick and fun stitch.

Also on Saturday we did what we've been doing for several Saturday's in a row now - we went to one of Alex's cross country meets. He's been doing so great and improving his time so much, we are just bursting with pride for him. Last week he took 30 seconds off his best time, and this week another 1 min and 20 seconds more. It is really building his confidence to finally feel he fits on a team and can do well. He's tried other sports before and just never felt like he was close enough in skill level to the other kids to try out for a team. With cross country he is still a middle of the pack finisher - but he is moving up and feeling good and so are we. :)

Alex is third from the right in this picture. :)

Rub a Dub Dub - 5 kids in a tub?

2009-09-15T19:16:00.005-05:00

Some of these take longer than others and this was definitely a longer stitch. It is done though, and I'm happy with it. Just in time for the next Mira RR to show up. I'll be stitching the Poppy pixie for Missy Ann next. :)

In other news our renovation of the basement has begun. They put in the HVAC vents today. No pics, cause well it is just vents and nothing interesting to look at there.

This past Sunday, my sisters and brothers and I all got together at my mom's for a picnic. It was the first time in probably years that all 5 of us were together. It is so hard for me to believe that the boys are practically grown. Me and my sisters are from my mom's first marriage and we were in high school when my mom had the boys during her second marriage. Here is the pic of all 5 of us.

From left to right: Mat, Karen, Wendy, me, Andy. Wendy is 5 months pregnant and will be the recipiant of the afghan when it is complete.

Sweet Pea!

2009-09-06T19:10:00.003-05:00

Managed to get in enough stitching this weekend to finish up on this round's section on the Mira RR. This is Annette's RR, which is going to be all pixies. :) I really enjoyed stitching the deep pinks and purples in this one.

My Big Amazing Renovation

2009-08-30T18:31:00.005-05:00

Well, not really, but amazing to me. We are going to go forward with finishing our basement. Contractor is already pulling the permits and we are very excited, but also very busy as a result. I never knew how much work it was just to get started on a renovation. So many appts with contractors to vet them out, get a good price, find out what can/can't be done. And then meetings with the bank to get everything set up and in place financially. Add that to the stress at work, and well I guess I just haven't been keeping up with my blog or my stitching the way I used to.

Anyway, I'd like to document the transformation my basement is going to make here in my blog, so I took some before pictures tonight. DH and I already started ripping down the ceiling tiles in the one room of the basement that is already finished because we are having the contractor do this room like the others to bring it up to code (it is a DIY "finish" right now) and so that the basement will look seamless when it is finished. Here are my before pictures with a short explanation of our plans.

As you come down the stairs this area is on the right - it is the largest area and will be a huge rec room. It is actually larger than what I could fit in the pic.

If you continue to travel right after coming down the stairs there is a doorway in the right wall that leads to this already finished room. This room will be my craft room. See our demo work on the ceiling - yeah, lots left to do. The exterior walls are just painted cement, so this room is not up to code - we will have drywall and electric put in around the exterior walls in here and the ceiling replaced with drywall like the rest of the basement will have.

To your immediate left when you come down the stairs is another doorway - this one leads to a large walk-in closet. Believe it or not this was actually a big selling point of the house. I've always wanted a large game type closet for the kids to shove all their toys into. In here we aren't doing much, cause well, its a closet - but we will have dryall and insulation put up on the exterior wall and put in some nicer shelving.If you continue left, you come into another large open area. This will also be a large rec area. Except that the leftmost 1/4 or so of this pic is where the full bath will be.If from there you look to your right at the back wall this is what you now see. We are going to install two egress windows - one on the left where it is now solid concrete (in the large rec area) and one on the right where the existing well window is.If you continue to turn slightly to the right, you can see the area where the existing well window is. This will be a legal bedroom once the new egress window is installed and we've removed the workbenches and finished off the poles into the walls.

And lest you think I've given up stitching - I assure you I have not! I have my latest section for the Mira RR all but done - just waiting for a missing spool of kreinik to arrive in the mail so I can finish it. I also have another nursery ryhme afghan square in the works - "Rub a Dub".

I was dissapointed to have to miss out on a GTG this weekend, but I stitched some on my Alhambra Garden in honor of those fine ladies as it is what I stitched on last time we were together. Will have to show progress pics soon as it is getting close to being able to see the light at the end of the proverbial tunnel.

Mary had a little lamb

2009-08-09T19:13:00.002-05:00

Finished this a few days ago - just now getting around to uploading it. :) I'll be stitching on Annette's RR for the Mira RR next, so hopefully I'll have a pic of that to show soon enough. :)

Stone Roses progress

2009-08-02T18:34:00.002-05:00

Manged to get in a bit of progress on Stone Roses over the last week or so. I was really happy to be able to work on the pinks in the ribbon. It was a nice break from all the shades of white and gray. I was worried about the gray shades being too much, but they really aren't that bad and between getting to stitchi in the pink ribbon and doing the colorful silks (they are Waterlilies) around the edges, this is really fun to stitch. Putting it back into the WIP pile for now though.

Now I'm working on a "Mary had a little Lamb" block for the nursery ryhme afghan - but it is going much more quickly than the Jack n Jill block did. I imagine that by the time I finish "Mary" I'll have Annette's RR to work on for the Mira RR - so I'll be stitching another pixie soon enough. :)

Finished!

2009-07-26T18:40:00.004-05:00

I managed to finish Katie's silver curtains, the Jack n Jill design for the afghan and mulching the front garden. Still haven't settled on a paint color for the bedroom, but whatever, I'll get to it when I get to it I guess.

Katie was pretty happy with her silver valance and I was happy I talked her into this in lieu of the silver walls she really wanted.

In other news, I won a prize on Susan' s blog for showing a pic of my "to-be" craft room. Look at all the awesome stuff she sent. Thank you Susan!! :)

WIPs

2009-07-19T19:17:00.005-05:00

Seems just about everything is a WIP right now and nothing is done. I've been stitching for what seems like forever and a half on this Jack and Jill square for the mother goose baby afghan. I guess it is taking me so long because I'm not really enjoying this particular design and also work has been really, really tedious lately. Last thing I want to pick up when I get home is something that also feels tedious cause I don't really like it. Work is about driving me batty - they seem to think that I will somehow just know what to do and do it right the first time with no explanation or plan of attack. When I point out there is no way for me to know this stuff, they agree and apologize and act all understanding and then say something insane like, "So you'll be done tomorrow right?" It also doesn't help that the work is not at all technical writing, it is more like code writing and I find it extremely tedious. Instead of writing documentation, I'm fiddling with the code of the xml pages to make the content management system display the pages correctly. If you understood what I meant by that - you probably understand it as well as I do. I've tinkered a bit with this sort of stuff before, but it was never the whole crux of my job before and my handlers seem to think that experienced technical writer means I'll figure out what they want and just do it without them telling me. Anyway, if the economy didn't suck right now, I'd so be telling my resource manager to get me out of there - but with assignments so scarce, I gotta make the best of it.

Anyway, went off a bit of a work rant there, which I try not to do in my blog so back to my WIPs. Besides my stitching WIPs, I also have several other projects that seem to be in the middle. I guess if I had more than the attention span of a gnat, I'd have something done instead of a whole slew of things that are "in progress".

DH and I pulled all the bleeding heart from the bed around the garage because it was seriously overgrown and choking out all the other plants - we didn't quite get it all finished though - a little weeding and mulching left to do on the right side. See my lilies, before we cleared the bleeding heart, you couldn't even tell they were there

Then there are Katie's silver curtains - I bought fabric a few weeks ago and just this weekend got around to hemming all the edges and starting the pocket where the rod will go - there will be tapered sides to this when it is done. I got sick of it though this afternoon and put it aside. Hoping to get back to it sometime this next week - we'll see.

And then there is the master bedroom. I picked out and purchased curtains - got a steal in JC Penny's clearance bin on some lined silk panels for $20 each (reg. price $75). The valances were on sale too - but not quite as good a deal. We're having a hard time selecting a paint color for the room - I want a sort of steel blue but darkish. I think I've ruled out all three of the samples you see in the pic. The one on top is too "baby" blue, the one in the middle is too purply, and the one on the bottom is just too, well blue.

So anyway, there is what I've been up to and what I've accomplished - a whole lotta nothing!

My brother the soldier

2009-07-12T19:07:00.003-05:00

Very early Thursday morning, my sister, my mom and I all traveled to Lawton/Ft. Sill Oklahoma to attend my brother's graduation ceremony from basic training. He graduated with the rest of his class and will continue his training for the field artillery in the US Army National Guard at Ft. Sill for the next 6-8weeks. After that he comes back home and will be a "weekend warrior" in the guard unless/until he is deployed somewhere.

I've always had respect and gratitude for what our armed forces do, but this experience was very moving to me. Seeing the dedication on my brother's face and on those of his classmates and watching him graduate made me so very proud to be his sister, but also so very proud to be an American. I know I'm not capturing in words what I mean to say - it wasn't just knowing that these guys are having to face the real possibility of being deployed and risking their lives - and it wasn't just having known this kid since he was born (he is 19, and was born while I was in high school - so he really is a "little" brother). And it wasn't even that he has struggled to find direction in his life as he's matured to adulthood or that I've never seen him feel so certain that this is what he wants to do, or so positive about doing it, or that I could tell he was feeling like he is making a difference. Those things were part of it, but somehow the whole was greater than the sum of the parts.... I'll just say I'm so proud of him, despite the fact that I feel that statement is incredibly inadequate.

Mira RR - My first Pixie!

2009-07-05T19:30:00.003-05:00

Just finished stitching my first ever Pixie - well part of one anyway. This one is Lilac. I'm finding that the ones that have at least a hint of a face rather attractive. Previously I had sort of written off all the pixies because of the lack of a face (yes, yes, I know they are supposed to be coutures and all and that is the reason for no face - but somehow that doesn't make the lack of a face any better to me).

I get to stitch two more pixies for other ladies that have a pixie themed round robin, so that should give me more chance to experiment with them. This one, has an eyelash and she is looking away, so it doesn't seem unnatural for the face to not be there. Lucky for me there are several others like that, so I should be able to happily stitch Pixies for my other round robin stitchy friends that desire them. :) :)

Success!!

2009-06-28T18:30:00.003-05:00

I managed to add the piping to the pillows! All of you sewing experts out there for whom this is no sweat please just humor me a second here. :) I've never done anything that involved using a different foot on the sewing machine before so just let me have my moment. LOL I ended up using the zipper foot to do these since my cheapy brother model of sewing machine did not have a piping foot and I didn't want to look for and buy one.

An experienced seamstress will be able to find room for improvement upon close inspection of the pillows, but I'm pretty happy with how they turned out and now the window seat is complete. Except of course for the silver curtains Katie has requested....*sigh*.

Speaking of curtains, I have no earthly idea how to dress the window in my living room. The valance was left by the previous owner and I know it is hard to see in the pic. This house is so hard to photograph because there is always all this natural light pooring in the windows where I'm trying to take the picture. Anyway - it is a burgandy gingham valance on a thick wood pole. I'm fine with burgandy - but gingham not so much, plus this window set just seems like it needs more than just a weaky mealkey valance on it.... suggestions??

Katie's Window Seat

2009-06-23T19:57:00.012-05:00

Please excuse the poor lighting and the messy room, but here is a picture of the window seat cushion I made for Katie's room. When we moved in there was just no cushion at all, so I started from scratch. I bought two 72in rolls of 2in foam that was 24in. wide. Since the window seat is 31 in. x 110 in. I ended up cutting the foam in five 24 in strips and glueing them together with tacky glue. I could have done it length wise, but I felt the longer seam would not have held together as well and might have been more noticeable. Sorry, I should have taken a picture once I had the pieces glued together to illustrate what I'm talking about, but I didn't think of it at the time.

Once I had the pieces of foam glued together, they seemed pretty secure, but because the cushion was so big, I felt I really should find a way to more securely keep all the pieces together. I had this muslin-like fabric left over from a clearance purchase of fabric years ago and it was exactly the right size to be able to enclose the whole cushion in one piece of fabric. The width of the fabric just made it around the cushion, so I had to whipstitch it on. I wanted a really tight fit anyway, and with a piece this big I just couldn't imagine fighting with sewing it inside out and then trying to wrangle it onto the foam without the pieces coming apart.
It took about 5 hours or so to whipstitch around both angled sides and the shorter straight edge. (The longer straight edge is the fold of the fabric.)

Here is a close-up of the fabric I used for the cover. It is a chenille, and DH hated it, but Katie loves it - and it is her room. I like it too, because I guess I always wanted a girly room when I was a child and never really had the chance because I was raised by my dad who didn't get such things, and I also had to share a room with one of my sisters and she wasn't the girly type as a child (though come to think of it she is now).

Oh, funny aside about DH and fabric: We were in JoAnn's picking out this fabric and I suggested a fabric to Katie and DH said, "Jenn, look this one is all messed up on the edge - I don't think you want that one. Actually lots of them are like that - maybe we should go to a different store." It took me a minute to realize he was talking about the selvedge edge. I actually had to convince him that was supposed to be like that to prevent fraying - when I first explained it (trying not to laugh in his face!) he didn't believe me and acted like I didn't know what I was talking about and this was all just poor quality fabric, etc. etc. Yeah, cause I've been doing crafty stuff including minor sewing projects since I was 10 - but you who are in a fabric store for about the 2nd time in your entire life, know more than me....

Anyway, I had decided I wanted the cover for the cushion to be removeable. Katie is only 5 after all, and although we don't allow her to eat food in her room, she does have markers and crayons and paints that she uses in there, and who knows what mischief a 5 yr old can get into right?

The fabric for the cover did not come in as wide a bolt as the fabric I used to enclose the cushion. I orginally intended to do either a zipper or an envelope back for the cushion, but I ended up doing this on the fly. The diagonal seems are all machine sewn - since I was using the fabric from selvedge to selvedge edge I didn't need to put in a hem to prevent fraying on the part of the fabric that didn't get sewn together. I just used a million pins to pin it tightly and to keep the fabric from slipping around and losing the shape I wanted. The opening works out fine, because it is just large enough to slip the cushion out of if I need to, but it is completely invisible on the back while the cushion is in place.

Now for the pillows - probaby won't make them until this weekend. The pillows are also a chenille, but in a lighter pink shade with hearts for the raised design instead of circles (Katie picked out both fabrics). I was thinking of using the small bit of fabric I have left from the seat cover to make piping on the lighter colored pillows to tie them together a bit. I've never done piping before though, so we'll see. I have pillow forms for them and will just do a standard envelope back on them, so except for the piping (if I go that route) they should be really easy to do. I'm in the middle of stitching a section on the Mira RR though, and having fun with that, so I'll probably wait to do the pillows until over the weekend.

Yes, I edited this after I realized I had missspelled "selvedge". :)

Stitcher's Heirloom Sampler Progress

2009-06-22T19:01:00.005-05:00

I'm working on new window seat cushion for the big bay window in Katie's room and that and the endless gardening has been eating a lot of my stitching time. I did manage to stitch a little though and completed the first scene in the Stitcher's Heirloom Sampler by Victoria Sampler.

I'm hoping to share pictures of the window seat cushion in the next few days. :) I'm going to make coordinating pillows and am trying to decide whether to take a crack at doing piping around them, or to just glue on some cording when I'm done like a lazy dope. We'll see what wins out. I also received Sophia's Mirabilia RR today - which is a pixie-themed design. So I'll be working on that shortly too. :)

The Universe

2009-06-18T17:05:00.004-05:00

Somedays I think the universe is just mocking me - you know playing head games and such. Today was shaping up to be a pretty awful day. It's TTOM for starters, which gives me headaches, sinus problems and insomnia. Didn't have the insomnia part, but check and check on the other two. Got to work this morning and I had forgotten my security fob so had to stand outside the office like a big DORK until one of the executives (why oh why couldn't it be the receptionist or the nice HR lady) comes by and lets me in. Then at lunch time I drop a big ole creamy noodle out of my lean cuisine microwave dinner right onto my satin-like shirt. Yeah, so I went the rest of the day with a palm-sized stain on my shirt that was VERY noticeable.

But then, one very good thing happened - I found out I got a new placement!! I interviewed on Monday and was starting to get nervous since I hadn't heard anything yet. Today my boss got the call though that I start July 1st. What a huge relief. Just before I found out, I was playing on facebook and took one of those silly quizes - this one read my fortune and said that something I was hoping for was going to happen - less than 30 minutes later my boss comes over to tell me.

Of course the day went right on being crappy except for that one huge good thing. My headache persists, I got to go pee in a cup for the new job in a seedy part of town, my mom called to try to weasel her way into coming an extra weekend this summer, the plants I planted over the weekend are threatening to wither and die, and I still have to figure out what to make for dinner.

Reading back over this, I think I have it figured out - The universe is saying, "Quit your whining - you got it pretty darn good girl!" Even after all the annoyances, I have to mark this day in the good column.

My Craft Room (to be)

2009-06-17T18:40:00.004-05:00

This post is inspired by Susan, who is asking for pictures of your craft room so that she can get ideas for her own stitching room. :) As most of you know, I just moved into a new house too and having a craft/stitching room was definitely on the priority list. This is the only finished room in our basement, and as soon as we finish the rest of the basement so we can use it for our family and computer rooms, this will be mine (all mine!!). As you can see the room is currently serving as our second living room or a family room, the computer is in it, as is the lazy teenager most of the time! See there he is! And our old couch and the video game system. *sigh* but it will be all mine when the rest of the basement is finished. We are hoping that is later this year, but we are waiting to see if I get a new placement at work before we commit to spending any more money on the house for right now.

I did, however, unpack all my stash into the built in shelves though. This is the bulk of my stash - I also have my beads and a few WIPs and other miscellaneous supplies in a two-drawer end table next to my stitching chair upstairs, but this is pretty much everything else. Now that it is unpacked at least I can get to everything again. The door next to the shelves is an unfinished closet that goes under the stairs. I'm going to finish that off with more storage for crafty stuff too.

Oh, and I almost forgot, the previous owner left this huge storage closet in the unfinished part of the basement. I might just snag this for the craft room too. I'm thinking it will give me all the room I need to start a fabric collection and other miscellaneous supplies for all the crafty goodness I can stand! :)

Humpty Dumpty

2009-06-10T20:09:00.004-05:00

A couple of pics of the latest afghan block and the whole afghan as it stands now. I think I will take a bit of a break from this for a little bit. I want to stitch on something else for a few days until the Mira RR comes, then maybe when I finish with that I'll come back to the afghan.

Thanks everyone for your comments on my garden - the ones here and some made on facebook really helped point me in the right direction. I'm slowly getting there on what I want/need to do to make it look decent. :)

One other thing, I think I'm going to skip entering anything in the Fair this year. I'm just not close enough to finishing anything, and in no mood to push myself to have a finish just to enter. I'm going to try to go to the judging though anyway. It is always a fun day. If you are thinking of entering something in the WI fair this year though, be aware the entry deadline is June 20 - so go check out the website if you want to enter. :)

We are Closed!

2009-06-07T18:51:00.005-05:00

On the house that is. :) Our closing went off without much ado or any problems on Friday morning. Relieved isn't even the word for it. First item on the agenda after becoming the offical owners was to paint Alex's room. It was pink before:

And now it is green:

Neither picture is the best, and they show different angles of the room because I picked the one from each bunch of before and after pictures that showed the respective colors the best. I won't be winning any decorating awards for this room, and it still needs curtains, but at least we aren't forcing the almost 14yr old boy to live in a pink room anymore. :)

I also managed to transplant one of my hostas to the decrepit border garden around the house. Provided it takes well, I'll transplant a bunch more to finish off the area better. The more I look at the garden areas though, the more I see additional plants sprouting and blooming. It is hard to tell what is weeds and what is plant sometimes, but I'm learning. I weeded out a bunch today and want to get some mulch down soon to stop the weeds coming up so much. A little at a time is how it is gonna get done I'm afraid.

I got in a little more stitching on the baby afghan today too - will probably have another block to show in the next few days. Pretty soon I'll be mailing off my Mira RR and someone else's will arrive for me to stitch on - looking forward to that. :)

Rock a bye Baby

2009-06-02T17:46:00.004-05:00

We had a little good news on the house today - the seller's bank says we can close whenever we want now! I'm excited, but also nervous that something will come up again at the last minute. The new closing is scheduled for Friday at 9:30am. Cross your fingers that this time it will really close and the bank has no more surprises.

Lately I just haven't had the concentration for any of my WIPs as they are all larger pieces. Instead I've been working on the baby afghan for my sister - each block is a quick finish. I've also been working on one of the smalls I got at Celebration, so hopefully I'll have that to show one of these days too. So the above picture is another of the nursery rhyme blocks from the baby afghan.

The job situation is looking up too - it sounds like I have a definite maybe for a new placement, which would be awesome and aleviate some of the "OMG, I have a larger mortgage payment and I might loose my job." angst I've been having.

So things are looking up, I hope, maybe, I think. Cross your fingers and say a prayer though just in case!

In My Garden

2009-05-31T19:04:00.004-05:00

We are still in limboland with closing on the house, but since we are here, we've begun to settle in a bit. I moved my stitching down into the room that is to be my craft room - but haven't unpacked it and fully settled in yet. Here is the set of nifty shelves already built in where I can organize the stash.

We've also had the carpets cleaned - well the living and dining areas, bedrooms are being done next week and we bought a nice washer and dryer set since this house did not come with w/d and we didn't want to bring our old ones.

The thing I could most use some input on is the Garden areas outside. Since we looked at and made the offer on the house in early April, all we saw was last years dead grass and a bunch of leaves in the backyard. At the inspection in early May we saw some daffodils here and there which were beautiful. When we actually moved in we discovered there is a ton of flowerbeds that have probably been pretty much let go the last few years. We have a nice rose bush, lots of tulips and a few other perinnals, but also a lot of weeds. I'm afraid DH and I have decided to make much of it grass cause I just don't think I can keep up with that much garden. I took a bunch of photos though and any advice or even just telling me what kind of plant some are would be helpful. Then I can look them up and figure out how to take care of them. I'm thinking I might move some of the leafy plants from the largest area to some of the smaller garden areas when we plant grass in the largest area. Anyone know how well they take to being transplanted? I'm totally clueless about gardening - so any advice is good. I pretty much know what you learn in 1st grade from growing tomato plants - sun and water - other than that I'm stumped. Here is a link to the webshots albulm with all the photos - feel free to comment there or here with any suggestions.

Garden

Well, we moved

2009-05-24T19:50:00.003-05:00

First let me say we are all moved into the new house. We are completely free and clear, clean and closed on the old house. I cried like a baby at 11pm Friday night when the last items were removed and we finished vacuuming and cleaning so the new owners could move into a clean home. It was a really good house and except for the apartment complex across the street that was becoming more rundown and us just generally outgrowing the place, we loved it there.

I'm sad to report that we did not have an uneventful closing/move to the new house though. We went to the walk-thru at the new house at 4pm on Thurs evening, and closing was scheduled for 10am Friday morning. We already had a good portion of the old house packed and loaded onto the moving van. When we got out of the car our realtor's face was just white. She told us that aparently the bank had continued to move on the foreclosure of the house even though they had accepted the short sale. Apparently there are two different departments at the bank and the right hand does not know what the left is doing. The seller aparently knew this but did not tell her realtor, so nothing was ever communicated to us and we thought we were smooth sailing since it was less than 24 hrs til closing. Anyway, bottom line was we couldn't close cause the bank did not have a payoff number because the foreclosure attorneys now need to get paid (even though they have accepted an offer before the foreclosure attorneys were in the picture).

We obviously did not want to be bullied into paying these fees just because it was the last minute and we had no where to go. We threatened to get an attorney and sue for breach of contract and basically the seller and the realtors agreed to let us move in under an occupancy agreement where we pay a very small rental fee per day til we can get the thing closed. The quasi-closing was really to set up this agreement and it was a little ugly because the seller, who is the person who is being foreclosed on was there and she was bitter about the whole thing and wanted us to pay more for the rent. We didn't want to pay anything because we felt we already agreed to get a mortgage to pay for the house - why should we ultimately increase our cost to own the house by paying rent until we close and then still pay the agreed price. We only agreed because the amount we are paying is so small that should the bank continue to drag their feet we are getting an awesome deal on living expenses. The seller felt we should pay what it would cost us to rent an extended stay hotel. The realtors all told her too bad - we shouldn't have to pay anything, and that we were getting the house. It wasn't down right hostile, but plenty uncomfortable.

So anyway, we are in, the house is a mess with stuff needing to be unpacked, and we are unsettled and stressed about whether this will all work out. The realtors are all saying it will, probably within the next week - but when I read up on short sales/foreclosures online there are plenty of horror stories that start out sounding like our situation... so we are hoping and praying for the best.

Soooo to completely switch gears and include a little stitching, here is a pic of the first block of the baby afghan I started for my sister. She is expecting her third child in January. I finished this inbetween packing the week before we moved. The afghan is going to be all mother goose nursery ryhmes (sp?).

New Mira RR

2009-05-17T18:37:00.003-05:00

Here is my new Mira RR all ready to ship out on June 15. I think I'm going to request children and fairies for all the sections. :) The section I stitched is from Baby Boat.

Celebration Bobkin

2009-05-12T16:31:00.005-05:00

This is another one of the projects we received at the Make It, Take It at Celebration. The first picture is with the Bobkins safely stored under the ribbon in their new holder and the second is the back of the holder with the bobkins out - so you can see what they are. :)

This stitched very quickly in about 2 hours on Sunday afternoon - just didn't get around to uploading the photos til now. This was my first attempt at Nun's stitch, so an easy quick finish to learn a new stitch! :)

I'm pretty close to having my Mira RR all ready to go too - just a bit more stitching on my section to go - hope to have a pic to post of that soon.

Celebration aftermath stitching

2009-05-09T13:22:00.004-05:00

So since getting back from Celebration I've ignored all my WIPs and stitched only on stuff I got there. I really have not had that much time to stitch , but I did manage a little progress on Heirloom Stitching Sampler and to finish my Drawn Thread Fob.

I still need to do some over-one leaves and flowers around those squiggly lines on the top and sides of the sampler, but I'm happy with how it is coming out so far. I made the fob a little smaller than the design called for just because I wanted too.

Celebration of Needlework 2009

2009-05-02T22:01:00.006-05:00

Sorry folks - picture intensive post! Just returned from my first ever Needlework Festival experience at Celebration, and it was a great time. Below is a picture of me with everyone I met from "the boards."

Standing is Carol, Kate, Robbin, Holy, & Erin. Sitting is me, Susan, and Erin.

Holly and Susan were gracious enough to let me share transportation to the airport and hotel accomodations with them. This means they also put up with my company the entire 3 days we were there. Yeah, basically they are saints! :)

The first day I was really, really tired. I usually am not so socked out by one bad night of sleep even with travel, but by the time Holly and I went to our Bumbling Bullions class at 3pm on Thurs. I was barely keeping it together. The class was great though and although I didn't finish any of the class piece I did learn to make a better bullion! I'm confident now that I can do the class piece, where before I probably would have just avoided doing it even though I like the little button designs. I would have been worried I couldn't do the stitch well enough and wouldn't have attempted it.

Later that night we went to the Make-It, Take-It classes. A great value, I would have enjoyed it a lot more if I could have picked my head up off the table for the majority of the time I was there. I found out later that Erin was even at my table for this, but I didn't know who she was at the time. :) I got lots of great projects and even managed to finish the Drawn Thread fob on Friday while stitching in the lobby.
I'm too lazy to go and look for all the designers names and the pattern names, but above is a picture of what we got. See my fob all stitched up on the right? I still need to put it together, but the stitching is done. All nice projects. I decided to give the bag on the far left to Katie. This project involved making flowers out of fabric using a plastic form - very easy and this afternoon I spent some time with her making a few more flowers and decorating the bag with them. She loves that she has her own craft bag now. :) She was just thrilled with it.

This is Erin, Susan, and Holly at the Intermediate Techniques Hardanger class we took on Saturday - I learned the picot which has eluded me for forever and a half and the Edelweiss stitch. Julie Norton was a fantastic teacher and a pleasure to be around. She talks a lot about her granddaughter, but she has a wonderful sense of humor and works really hard to ensure everyone in the class gets the most they can out of it. Even though there was one lady in the class who couldn't do basic Hardanger she managed to keep all of us moving at our own pace while patiently helping her with easier stuff too. Everyone learned - no matter what level they were at when they arrived.

Here are some more pictures from that class. I think it was my favorite because I learned the most.

Above is the class kit as we received it - Isn't it pretty - presentation is important you know! :)

Here is the kit after I got it home so you can see what was in the box. The book has very detailed instructions for how to do all kinds of fancy hardanger stitches. Below is the work I actually accomplished in class. Pretty darn good picots if I do say so myself! I'm also pretty proud of the Edelweiss - though I'll freely admit it still needs a little work. BUT I understand how it works now, it is just a matter of mastering the techinique from here.I also did quite a bit of stach enhancement while I was there. I purchased Marriage of Minds and Wayward Sampler from Drawn Thread, a fat quarter of 36ct antique white Lakeside Linen, two small kits from Colonial Designs (one of a ruler holder and fob, the other a pin cushion), 4 skeins of SNC (they were $4 each!) and the real budget buster: Heirloom Stitching Sampler by Victoria Sampler with fabric and thread pack. I just had to put a few stitches in Heirloom Sampler on Friday. I ended up buying a very narrow but long enough piece of fabric to work it on. I'll have to sew muslin on the sides to frame, but I think the coloring will work very well for the piece.

I also really enjoyed the round robins - these are a great way to get a lot of little projects without busting your bank account like you do for the regular classes. Of the 14 projects I got from the Make-it, Take-Its and the 2 round robins, I could honestly see myself doing about 12 of them. The two I couldn't see really doing were both by the same designer and she will remain nameless.

I think my favorite memories are of the people though. On Friday Holly, Susan, and I sat at a table along the edge of the high traffic area in the lobby and several people recognized us from the nametags Holly and Susan stitched and finished for us. It was nice to realize somebody out there really does read my blog - one lady knew all about my house drama even though I didn't "know" her at all. I felt a little like a celebrity stitcher. :) Everybody was friendly and nice and I really enjoyed getting to know several people from the boards a little better. I'm afraid they also got to know me a little better too - like don't give Jenny too much caffeine all at once! :)

I really hope I get to do it again someday and meet all the same ladies again and maybe a few more too.

More Heritage Sampler

2009-04-26T19:06:00.003-05:00

Not so much to show this time either, but I did get A-F done in the over-one so I think that is pretty good. The close up shot shows the progress made this go-round. I'm not sure I like these orange and brown shades so much, but I think they will look better once I can see the piece as a whole come together. :)

I've just about finished with the frames on my Mira RR, so I'm going to start stitching my section next, hopefully I'll get to that tonight.

Oh, and thanks everybody for the well wishes on the house. :) :)

Holy Cow!

2009-04-24T17:26:00.001-05:00

The bank just accepted our offer - IN WRITING and everything! Woo Hoo!! I can hardlly type. What a load off my mind. We get our closing date of May 22nd too! :)

Mira RR frames WIP

2009-04-20T18:12:00.006-05:00

Well it isn't finished yet, but here is my progress on my layout for the Mirabilia RR. We are going with a smaller design size for each participant this time, so my sections are smaller. The plan is for each person to stitch something in one of the rectangular shapes or do two of the smaller squares. The fabric looks a bit more molted in this pic than in real life - it is 32ct Dreamin' Joblean by Silkweaver. When I'm done stitching in the frames the finished piece will be as wide and as tall as it is now - just fillin in the top left corner to do.

I had about all I could take for the next while of just stitching squares and rectangles so I'm putting this aside for a few days to work some on Heritage Sampler. I'll be back to this when I've had my fill of that.

Oh, I almost forgot. We have a verbal acceptance from the bank on the short sale (#2 below) house. Nothing in writing yet - which of course makes me all sorts of nervous, but that's where we are at.

Inspiration - Rosewood Manor

2009-04-13T18:34:00.003-05:00

I finished the whole top! Actually I was almost there the last time I worked on it, but it was still satisfying to complete it. Next time I think I'll work on the inner rectangle of the design and see where that leads me.

In house news, the sellers have accepted our offer on the short sale, which I guess is good news, but means absolutely nothing if the bank doesn't approve it - so we shall see. :)

I decided to participate in another Mira RR (I know, I know, but I'm not moderating this time.) so I'm working on my layout for that next.

Housing update

2009-04-11T19:10:00.003-05:00

We put in an offer on house #2. Even though it is a short sale, it has everything we need and has lots of potential to get all the things we want. The location is also the best of all the houses. #4 also has a good location, but despite being priced the highest and the description reading like it was perfect it was really NOT what we expected. A lot of maintenance has been let go and a lot of very obvious do-it-yourself shoddy workmanship in that house. The whole house had a really weird/awkward layout too.

Sooo we are giving the bank just one week to respond firmly to our offer, if not we'll move on and we've decided we'll offer on house #1 if that happens. Sooo we are still sort of in limbo, but we have a game plan and either way we'll be happy in either house. :)

Alahambra Garden WIP

2009-04-10T17:11:00.003-05:00

I finished working on this several days ago now, but just took forever to take the picture and get it uploaded to the blog. This one is coming along nicely I think. :)

Ding Dong!

2009-04-06T17:20:00.005-05:00

In case you're not familiar that is the sound that starts every episode of House Hunters on HGTV. I'm such an obsessive dork I've been watching that channel almost non-stop since we listed our house for sale.

We finally finished all the inspection negotiations and the Accepted Offer sign is firmly in place on top of the For Sale sign outside... which is just peachy, wonderful. No more cleaning for showings at a moments notice, no more open houses, no more angst about the backyard, etc. etc.

Until.... OMG! I have to move by May 22nd! How the H-E-double hockey sticks is all this gonna work out?? I need to somehow get another place even though we cannot close on the next place before we close on this one. I know we can put everything in a pod and close same day or next day and stay in a hotel for a day or two during the move, or we can rent back from our buyer, or we can rent ahead with the seller of the new place - but lordy I wish that was all worked out already. AND since both kids start new schools next year and we have a definite agenda for where we want Alex to go and the deadline has passed for him to go to apply for school choice, that limits our choices... sigh.

ANYWAY....

As promised, here are our current top picks - no promises that we will actually buy one of these mind you as none of them are really screaming "this is the one" very loudly... but they are the best (to us) of what is currently available.

House #1
Cheap but dated
This house was an early favorite and I posted about it before. We like the bones of the house and the neighborhood is pretty good too. The inside is pretty dated though - nothing that has to be fixed really, but there are tons of projects we'd want to do over time to update. It is not in Alex's high school district though. We might be able to get him in to his high school of choice anyway, but we don't know that for sure yet.

House #2
Newer Short-sale
This house has the newer look we like AND it has a private wooded backyard. This combination is exactly what we are looking for and seems pretty hard to find. Also the price is very attractive for a house this new. It is 2 blocks from Alex's high school and 3 blocks from one of the acceptable grade schools for Katie. The negatives are that it has a small kitchen (we are babied with a rather large kitchen at the moment, the current owner has a dog that has pooped all over the backyard (I know temporary problem, but still ewww!), the basement is unfinished, which we'd have to do and would be a major expense. The biggest problem though is that it is a short sale. We aren't sure that after being on the market for 6 months ourselves that we have the fortitude to pursue a short sale. We've heard stories of it taking months to negotiate an acceptable offer with the bank and we really need something we can move into on or near our closing date on this house.

House #3
Hot tub heaven
This house has many of our wants and all of our needs. It is in the same neighborhood as house #1 and is probably a bit overpriced. The agent selling this house is the same agent that sold our house and is functioning as our buyer's agent, so might be a conflict of interest. It has a hot tub that we know we'd enjoy for the first few weeks or so until it came time to clean and maintain the thing. The yard is okay, but not as nice as the other two houses. Biggest concern here is the same issue as house #1 - not in the right neighborhood for Alex's high school. It is a small thing, but it has a perfect craftroom with a built in craft desk under a window overlooking the backyard.

House #4 (yeah, I know HH only does 3 - so sue me!)
Pricey but perfect (maybe)
This house is the most expensive on our list, but it is listed about 20k above where it should be in my opinion. Of course even if we get it for a more acceptable amount, it is still the most expensive option. We haven't actually been inside yet because the owner put it on the market with one of those "do-it-yourself" type realtors that doesnt' have an agent for the property and then went on a trip to Europe. WTF? Who does that? Sooo they are probably not that motivated to sell. The house is newer, has a wooded lot, is close to Alex's desired high school, has a man cave complete with sound system (DH is totally drooling over that one!) and has a big soaker tub (my drool) and a large upgraded kitchen.

So which one will we choose?

Accepted Offer

2009-03-31T11:34:00.000-06:00

I’m almost afraid to post this…but we have accepted an offer on our house! We got our full asking price (we had just reduced the price) but the buyer asked for closing costs, so after we figured that in we sold for a little less than asking. I think the ladies that came to my GTG must have been a good luck charm! We had 4 showings back to back on Sunday and our realtor managed to schedule the eventual buyers last so that they would see all the other realtor cards on the table (they were coming back for a 3rd viewing, so we felt it a good bet they were a little interested).

We have not been through the inspection process yet, but I understand that should happen rather quickly – like within the next week. I won’t really breathe easy that the sale is “for sure” until that process is over. Blame it on watching too much HGTV or whatever. We aren’t expecting anything to come up, but I guess you just never know. I know our retaining walls in the back are old and such, but they don’t pose a safety hazard or a drainage problem, so we are hoping that won’t be an issue. So we are cautiously optimistic, yet afraid to trust this is it, given how the earlier offer fell through.

I’ve already had a question or two on facebook about what houses we have in mind for moving to… we have about 4 on our short list. Provided the inspection goes well and we can actually start thinking about buying one of them, I’ll post links so you can all play along like on House Hunters! Ha.

It's a Tree!

2009-03-27T18:28:00.003-06:00

At least I've made enough progress that now you can tell what it is! I can actually begin using a different color any time I'm ready now too because I can do the letters "Mother's Tree". :) Looking forward to when I can start on the names!

I've decided I'm going to work on my Alhambra Garden during the GTG tomorrow! :)

Not much to show

2009-03-21T17:50:00.003-06:00

Not so much to show for a week's worth of work, but that seems to be par for the course these days. I completed the top band in the section where the names will go and I extended the outermost border down on each side. Didn't do any over-one this time, but will get back to that the next time I pick it up.

I'm stitching on my Mother's Tree next. I wanted to work on my Angel of Summer since she is the closest thing in my WIP to a finish, but I cannot find her pattern. I've searched high and low and cannot find the @#$! thing. I know it is here somewhere and someday I'll run across it somewhere really odd and wonder why I ever stuck it there. *sigh* For now I'll just work on something else - it isn't like I don't have enough things to stitch!

I never used to be like this!

2009-03-13T17:55:00.003-06:00

I've always had some sort of rotation or plan for how I was stitching - never was I really a screaming rotation kind of girl. Lately, not so. I just stich whatever, whenever. I guess with the economy being bad and the house not selling and such I just feel like it is one of the few things I *can make* go just my way.

Anyway here's my progress on Stone Roses. I'm gonna go back to my Heritage Sampler now even though many of my projects haven't been touched since the last time I worked on it. *oh the horrors*

Birthday Stash

2009-03-09T15:06:00.002-06:00

This is just part of what Sean got me for my birthday. He actually went to froggystitcher.com , looked up my wishlist and ordered a bunch of stuff off of it. Pretty cool huh? Remind me not to complain about anything he does for the next while. :)

Pictured is A Fair Maiden's Etui by With my Needle, Cirque des Carreaux by Ink Circles, 32ct Waterlily Joblean (my fav fabric ever!) a dragonfly needleminder from Kelmscott Designs, and Enchanted Dreamer by Mirabilia. DH also ordered JBW's Advent Calendar, the letter "J" Angel fairy needleminder from Kelmscott Designs, and the AppleSeed Needle Book pattern from Jeanette Douglas. Karen from Froggystitcher is sending the rest when it comes in but didn't want me to have to wait to fondle all my birthday stash. :)

This might be one of my biggest stash hauls ever and to think DH ordered it all! Knock me over with a feather. :) :)

Hen Party finished. :)

2009-03-07T17:27:00.004-06:00

I came across this JP Threads tin in my stash/linen closet today and decided it would make the perfect finish for Hen Party. :) I'm going to use it to store part of my threads stash.

I think it came out rather well. I stitched this on Norfolk Blend 32ct linen from R&R Reproductions and I changed the DMC 676 in the trim on the house and sun to an orange shade of DMC so that it would stand out against the fabric. I'm forgettting just what color I used now, but it was something in the 900 range of the oranges.

Thank you Kelly for gifting me with such a fun chart - I'll think of you every time I dig into my threads. :)

Hen Party

2009-03-02T17:34:00.004-06:00

Just a few photos to brighten things up after the last post.

I decided to go ahead and post a progress pic for Hen Party. Susan and Holly are also doing this one. :)

And this doesn't look like much, but Katie got up on the bar at gymnastics last week. She has been so afraid of doing anything that required any kind of height, so this was a big deal for her. Of course it would be a better photo if she were looking at the camera, but the picture is taken from behind the glass from the viewing room that overlooks the gym, so I had to snap while I could and hope it turned out halfway decent.

Much Stress = Little Stitching

2009-03-02T16:47:00.005-06:00

Just a general update from me:

There was massive blood letting at work on Friday. About 50% of the contractors in the area I sit were cut from the company I'm placed at. It was a really tough week. I was told on Tues. that the contractor that reports to me and one other from my writing group were going to get the ax. I wasn't allowed to say anything though - they only told me so that I could make sure all the work was backed up somewhere and such. I was pretty troubled by that alone, but when Friday came and lots and lots of contractors across the company all found out it was their last day that was really hard. Also on Tuesday I found out from my contracting agency that someone who was "benched" (we are all on salary so we get paid when we don't have a placement, otherwise known as being "benched") had to be let go because there were no forseeable placements for him. He was a friend with two young kids at home and his wife is a SAHM, so I felt really bad for him.

Of course much of this news came on Tues - right when we were trying to negotiate the offer on the house. It definitely influenced us not to be as flexible with our price. No use buying a bigger house if I'm getting layed off and cannot make the payments. There is rumor at work that they are going to be getting rid of all the "local" (non-offshore) contractors over the next several months. It is just rumor, but it makes sense that is where they would cut if more cuts are needed so I'm not feeling very secure. Then again, I know my department has more work than it can handle and technical writing does not lend itself well to offshore contracting (not that they won't try to do it anyway though).

So DH and I are weighing the options with the house. Right now we still have it on the market. I'm not afraid to sell - we can rent for about what our mortgage is now. I am worried about buying bigger and having a larger payment though. We might go ahead and sell, and then wait to see what happens (if we are even lucky enough to sell that is). We'll save whatever we make on the sale and buy when and if we feel my job is secure enough. I hate to think this way, and I know some who read my blog are Obama fans, but some of the economic decisions being made right now have me thinking home prices are only going to plummet for the next while. Might be smart to sell at a reasonable price now (again if possible) and buy even lower in a year or so. We know the house we are in now is not our "forever" house, so there is no fear of "losing it" to a buyer.

So stressing over all of the above means that I've gotten almost no stitching done recently. I do have some progress on "Hen Party" for the SAL I've been doing with Holly and Susan, but it seems silly to show a WIP pic for such a small design. I will post a pic when I finish it, which should be soon.

The bright spot? I'm still going to Celebration - no matter what - and I've picked out my classes. I'm taking:

Bumbling Bullions (always wanted to learn bullions properly)
Make it/Take It
Both RRs
Mary Queen of Scots sampler
Hardanger Intermediate Techniques

A lot of classes for 3 days I know, but I don't know when I'll get another opportunity to go to one of these, so I want to take what interests me.

House update

2009-02-25T13:48:00.002-06:00

Well – the offer fell through. We are happy with our decision though, we came down as far as we could and well below what comps in our neighborhood are selling for. They wouldn’t budge at all. Their realtor told ours that they are backing away from the offer on our house and will begin looking again in a lower price range. The difference in our counter from their original offer would have only meant $40/month difference in their payment. If it was that close for them, it makes me worry the financing wouldn’t have held up anyway.

It would not have made sense for us to accept their original offer as it would not have given us the down payment we need for the next house. If the market is truly that low, then it makes the most sense for us to stay put…

So we are disappointed but feel we did the right thing. Our realtor has set another showing appointment with a different buyer for tomorrow btwn 6 and 7pm. So there is still interest, I keep coming back to if we are really overpriced no one would be scheduling showings. It was only 10 days ago that we had 4 showings in one weekend – all is not lost.

The silver lining: DH and I did really well through all of this – we didn’t argue or fight at all – we knew our game plan and where our bottom was and we played it just like we discussed we would and had no conflict between us at all. We didn't let our realtor push us into doing something we personally weren't comfortable with either (which she did try to do - she wanted that commission). I look back on our 14 yrs together and I have to smile and feel grateful at how far we’ve come and how our relationship has matured. What would have caused great stress and conflict a few years ago is playing out so smoothly now. I guess we’ve learned something over the years anyway.

Finally!

2009-02-23T14:05:00.002-06:00

OMG! We have an offer – the number is not where we need it to be, but I think it is close enough to meet in the middle somewhere…. My head is spinning and my concentration for the day is shot! More later… hoping to have an accepted offer sign in front of my house soon!

P.S. The offer is from the 1 out of 4 couples who did not complain about the slope!

I'm going to Celebration! :)

2009-02-18T12:06:00.004-06:00

For those of you not familiar, here's the link.

Finally convinced the DH to agree to my going to one of these. Been wanting to do it for years. Not so much I needed his permission, rather I was looking for his blessing - after all I will be gone for a few days and he'll be on his own with the kids. Something I wouldn't really enjoy doing for him either. He has reluctantly agreed and I wasted no time sorting through a bunch of classes trying to decide what to take.

I had to eliminate anything that was on Wednesday because the very earliest I'll be able to arrive is late Wed night (Thurs by noon is more realistic). I'll also be leaving sometime on Sat. so anything late on Sat. or on Sun is also out. That at least helped me weed out the selection a bit.

Here are some I'm considering - help me decide - which ones do you like?

King James Needlecase
Pretty in Pink Etui and needlebook
Round Robins (I'm definitely doing at least one of these)
Mary Queen of Scotts sampler (nice description, but no pic)

Scratch that - DH IS my best friend!

2009-02-16T17:14:00.003-06:00

Apparently 3 out of 4 home buying couples think our yard is too sloped. *sigh* The 4th couple saw that the house 2 doors down is for sale and wants to see that one before they make a decision. The other house is only 2 bdrms and has an even worse slope in their yard. So anyway, yeah, I'm so over trying to sell my house, and that isn't what this post is supposed to be about anyway!

Looky, Looky, I got roses for Valentines! And choccy too. YUM! The good kind. So the weekend wasn't a total loss. DH saves the day. :)

My realtor is my new best friend...

2009-02-13T07:38:00.002-06:00

She called AGAIN last night at about 7pm to set up yet another showing for this weekend. This one is another couple for whom we've made their 2nd cut list. So for those of you keeping track, that is 4 total showings, 2 of which are 2nd showings...

It's getting really hard not to count chickens!!

House happenings

2009-02-12T13:19:00.001-06:00

Cross your fingers for us – we have 3!, yes 3 showings for this weekend. Two on Sat. and one on Sunday. The best part is that the couple coming on Sunday already saw our house once (last night) and their realtor told ours that we are at the top of their list. They are revisiting their top 3 on Sunday and making a decision then.

I probably shouldn’t get too excited until I see an offer or what it is, but I don’t know if I can help myself. This isn't the first time I've been all excited about a prospective offer, only to have it not materialize...

Alhambra Garden - half way there

2009-02-07T18:51:00.004-06:00

Since I have two of the side triangles and two of the diagonal triangles and all of the center I'd say I can claim this is half way done, right? This time I did the diagonal triangle on the right, the foliage underneath and the purple bridge thing to the left of the foliage. I guess it is a bridge, I dunno - looks pretty anyway right? :) So I'm having a small half-way done with AG dance.

I had to put away all my 'big stitching stuff' - the stand for my charts, the lap stand, the boxes of threads that normally sit by my chair for a showing yesterday and for the open house tomorrow - so I'm just gonna stitch on small travel type projects for the next day or two. When I do pull out something big again I'm going to work on my Angel of Summer.