January Starts

...and one finish (so far) for the month, it's an ornament from The Trilogy's 'Ornamentology' leaflet. Once again, I left off the border on this one. My silly dogs were running around while I was trying to take pics, and kicking up dead grass that kept flying over onto my cross stitch.

Above is my progress on 'Coffee Menu' by Little House Needleworks. It is stitched with DMC, GAST, and Crescent Colours on 28 ct. Vintage Autumn Fields by Zweigart-love the fabric!

And this is my progress on Bent Creek's 'Snapperville'. I didn't really have any interest in stitching this until I saw it all stitched up together with the free border on their website. I am stitching mine on Birds of a Feather 'Sandpiper' 32 ct. linen.

And now for my Ewe&Eye&Friends start from the 2006 calendar. I call it the 'funky coffee cup' but it's called 'Winter Warmth' on the chart.
It's been a weird month. There was even an entire week that I didn't pick up a needle! I just haven't really been in the mood to blog, and with competition for the computer, I don't have a chance to be online some days until really late (past 10 pm). My son changed schools and is going to school an hour earlier than before, requiring an hour earlier alarm setting for me. There has been some crud going around and we've all been down with that.
I have been able to attend more stitching get-togethers than ever though! It's been great fun to meet more stitchers, stitch, & gab. It's definitely my idea of fun. I went to the movie once this month too, to see 'The End of the Spear'. Great movie! I am so glad I had kleenex handy. I am a big cryer when I watch movies and read. My two friends that I went to the movie with were completely dry-eyed. Hrmphh!
I just picked up my mail and had a *wonderful* new Quaker chart waiting in the mailbox. LOVE IT! I can hardly wait to buy my 40 ct. linen and start stitching this one!
Today, I plan to stitch on 'Coffee Menu' some more. First things first though....laundry calls. I hope there is something good on tv tonight!

Cleaning closets

It's always fun to see what will be unearthed when cleaning out my closet, what treasure has been covered up and forgotten. I'm still working on the closet, but look what I found already:my gingham purse that I made the summer before last ('04). I love this purse. I dreamed about this purse before I made it, even the particular decorative stitch. LOL
There's not a lot of stitching to report lately, although I kitted up 2 more projects yesterday and today-4 My Boys Snow Proud Sampler and Imaginating Bethlehem, which will be changed from the blech yucko brown to GAST 'deep sea' on a gorgeous Picture This Plus linen. I believe the shop I ordered it from told me it was the color 'mercedes', but I've already trashed the piece of paper with the color name on it, so can't be sure. Will share a pic of it soon! It's sparkly too! :)
Oh yes, about the closet.....I bought some photo boxes recently, with the intent to use them to organize some of the junk, er, stuff in the closets. They fit & stack nicely on the shelves in there, plus can be labelled easily. It looks like I need about 40 more though. ;)

Saturday

Goodness! This picture accentuates every little wrinkle! It doesn't really look so bad in person, but I also did not iron it yet. So, here's my Bent Creek 'Winter Snapperland' all caught up. You know how some things are just more fun to stitch than others? This one is fun! I think it's really cute too, and looking forward to the next releases. Since I'm using my Q-snaps to stitch this, I'm waiting until the stitching is complete before attaching the embellishments. I have already used one complete skein of WDW 'Whitewash', and using a 2nd skein now. My skeins had some particularly uncooperative kinks in them, that made it hard to make nice laying stitches. When I have that problem with DMC, I just take my cut length to the sink and soak it with water, and then run my fingers down the length of the floss to squeeze out excess water. After that, I just drape it across a chair to air dry, and then it's so much easier to work with. I had never tried that with overdyed threads, afraid of bleeding. What I decided to do with the whitewash, was that I dipped my fingertips in water, and ran them down the length of floss to just barely dampen it and straighten it, and then air dry it. Worked like a charm!
I haven't yet decided what I'll work on next. Maybe it will be the January design from the Ewe&Eye&Friends calendar.
I thought for sure I would have more 'free' time this week when the kids were back in school, but it ended up being a busy week. Next week is looking to be packed with activities as well. I've said it a million times before, but I would love to be able to get by on less sleep! But then I would probably spend all that extra time online. ;-)

Happy New Year!

It's 2006. Weren't we just celebrating 2000 and a new millennium yesterday?? I know everybody is saying it, but time just flies by faster and faster every year!
I am going to write out my 2006 stitch list here today. Rather than it being a goal list, I think it's more of a list of things I have in my stash that I really like and want-to-stitch. Being the fickle girl that I am, I expect to be sidetracked and distracted by new (new new, or new to the stash) things and that's o.k. It's still good to have a list, because if I don't write it down, I forget that I have it! :) OK, here goes:

*Millennium Sampler-Ewe & Eye & Friends
*Trudy's Flower-Elizabeth's Garden
*Winter Snapperland- Bent Creek (in progress as of 12-29)
*Snapperville-Bent Creek
*Winter Welcome-Country Cottage Needlework
*Deftly Wrought-Midsummer Night Designs
*Quaker Meetinghouse- """"
*Coffee Menu-Little House Needleworks
*Coffee House-LHN from JCS
*My Country-Erica Michaels
*American Quaker-Scarlet Letter
*Love the Truth-Examplars From the Heart
*Snow Proud Sampler-4 My Boys
*She Gathers- """"
*Land That I love- Birds of a Feather
*America- Little House Needleworks
*Soweth Sampler-Birds of a Feather
*Home Sweet Home- Sunflower Samplings
*Westwinds-Carriage House
*Bethlehem-Imaginating
*3 Pink Houses-Ewe & Eye & Friends
*monthly calendar designs- """"
*Summer Jubilee-Blackbird Designs (in progress)
*Britty Puppies and Kitties-Brittercup Designs
*at least one Chessie & Me
*at least one Sheepish Designs
*at least one ornament a month

Now, whether that is a do-able list or not remains to be seen. ;-) I think it's pretty ambitious, yet within the realm of possibility.

I am thinking seriously about putting my first stitches into EEF 'Millennium Sampler' today, just to say I had a New Years Day start. LOL But I'm enjoying working on my Winter Snapperland. I'll come back later today to hopefully plug in some links to the pieces from my list, and perhaps add a picture of my WIP(s).
I want to go stitch right now, while the family isn't demanding my attention. Hope you're all having a great day, and wishing you all a wonderful new year.