Monday again.

First things first, cut me some slack. I was in bed after 10pm last night, up at 4am this morning (after hourly wake ups for fear of missing the alarm), and on the road with my sister just after 5:30am so she could dump me off on her way to the airport. I am not therefore fully functional :)

I am certain that I'm back from the hinterland and sorry to say I have no stitching to report. It's not like I didn't take plenty -- BBD My Quaker House, MSD Quaker Meeting House, misc Christmas ornies, and the Vierlanden. I just didn't have time to work on them. Clean, sort, box, and trash -- that was my week last week. Oh, there was some photoing though....

My sister in action -- photographing collectibles from our childhoods....


I experimented with space bags and the fabric collection -- for the record, very cool. The silks and wools seemed to not mind the experience, and I expect this will solve my fears about stains and bugs. However, Space Bags apparently have lousy quality control -- only 6 of the 9 bags I bought worked. The 3 defective ones wouldn't seal. They went back to Target to enjoy life in the defective merchandise pile


We visited my aunt who has a definite bird-watching fetish. Despite growing up with birds, I only recently started "watching" and it's all my Aunt's fault. While we were over for dinner aside from the run of the mill sparrows, there were 4 red wing blackbirds, a pair of band-tailed pigeons, a dozen humming birds, and a yellow grosbeak. They certainly made for nice dinner scenery.

While I got no pictures of the birds, my Aunt's garden poses no movement problems so I photoed away.... If you know what these lilly-ish things are I'd appreciate a heads up:



Get these rose of my Aunt's -- first is called something-or-other Samba and buds in yellow, blooms to peach, then flowers out to pink. The second is a striped white and fuschia called George Burns. I just love him. By the way, there's a black thing stuck on some of the blooms of the George Burns -- that is bamboo ash. While I was taking these there was a fire a few miles from their home and the sky was raining slivers of coal black ash. Turns out that burned bamboo creates ashes 1-2 inches long and around a quarter of an inch long. It's darn freeky to have black snow falling on you!




About the only stitching I can report is that I did a floss toss for a friend who wants a sampler like my M Designs one just in different colors. We came up with the following and a list of a couple dozen things that would make for nice motifs.


Oooo, a very exciting (yet annoying) thing while home -- I found my charm pack for my M Designs sampler. Yeah, the sampler that I just got back from the framer. LOL The charm pack had slid into then through the lounge chair to be found when I had to shift the chair to get at some power cords. :) Oh well, charms for something else!

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Recently finished reading: Rex Stout's Too Many Cooks -- fun as usual, a definite piece of its times (written in 1938) in terms of racial references, yet handled adroitly and correctly by character -- want to know why I think so? Go read the book. :)
Currently reading: Terry Pratchett's Going Postal, Jim Butcher's Storm Front, and Rex Stout's The Black Mountain
Wishing I had LoJack for: Zelazny's This Immortal

What to say?

I'm wearing as close as I can get to maroon and orange for the Virginia Tech folks. It's the least I can do. Such a sad, sad world. But I am most impressed with how the VT people are handling this, especially the students. Good show to you all.

Maybe today is just a day for some nice things. Here are flowers from mom's garden last weekend.


BBD My Quaker House update from last weekend:

It's working up rather well. Of course there's some incidental wheedling since I changed all the colors. But then again, given how often I "adjust" patterns, I'm rather used to this sort of thing.

Aww

I had the nicest compliment by accident the other day. When my friend picked up my M Designs sampler from the needlepoint shop which had sent it out for finishing the woman working said that there was another cross stitch piece in the back without a name on it, but she was sure it couldn't possibly be mine. Apparently it "wasn't nice enough." lol Ain't that sweet? :)

Happy, happy Spring!!! And some random wonderings...

Happy Easter and Happy Passover's-Almost-Over :)

I must share a happy dance. My M Designs sampler came back from the framers :) :) woooo hoooooooooo



I am a very happy badger. :) I have no clue where I'm hanging it, but I'm glad to have it home.

Now for the randomness. So I'm peacefully flipping channels yesterday. Ok, not so peacefuly since if I'm flipping channels I'm grumpy because nothing "worthwhile" is on. Anyway, I'm flipping channels and I hit the History Channel-- a channel which sometimes brings me interesting viewing, but not this day. The channel was showing Planet of the Apes. Planet of the Apes? The History Channel? Planet of the Apes? What the devil? You're with me on this right??? Honestly who do they have doing their programming? Oh wait, possibly a trained monkey... err ape? Idiots.

And some random Spring joy from my environs. for those of you who hunted eggs in snow... sorry ;-)





Like I said, happy Spring!

I'm very lucky

My dear friend, Tracey sent me a great surprise. It had been quite the day at work. Actually quite the two days of fighting and fuming and pissing.... and that was just me. But I came home to a note that my manager had a package for me. Off I sailed for the office and look what joy a received!


She had also included some lovely threads and a beautiful card with a long letter. It was exactly what the doctor ordered. From then on the week was just fine! Thanks, Tracey, you're the best!!!!

In my excellent mood (courtesy of Tracey) I sailed forth Thursday night to pull fabric and floss for Blackbird Designs "My Quaker House," a pattern from their new book With Needle and Thread. It's supposed to look like this:

I, of course simply *have* to change the colors. What can I say, it's a hobby. My final choices are to work on Wichelt's hand-dyed jobelan in "Summer Sky" with Olde Willow Threads (Raspberry Ripple, Vampire Kiss, Frankenstein, Sandy Beach, Grape Soda, and Churned Butter) and Sampler Threads (Liberty and Freedom). The floss toss looks quite nice I think:

I'm doing this with the folks of the "Quaker Inspired" blog -- http://quakerinspired.blogspot.com/ It's the first of the group's SALs and I can hardly wait. Ok, let's be honest. I started a little. Well! I just had to see how my threads looked on the fabric. lol

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Just finished: Tony Hillerman's Hunting Badger -- excellent as usual
Currently reading: Rex Stout's Too Many Cooks and Jim Butcher's Storm Front
Sure Wish I could find: Zelazny's This Immortal ..... sigh

April plans

Ok, let's see how I do on some stitch planning.

1. Finish through page 9 on Vierlanden (so far I'm in page 7)
2. Stitch 3 ornies
3. Actually do the finishing on the pile of ornies I have completed thus far.
4. Make progress on Midsummer Night Designs' "Quaker Meetinghouse"
5. Make progress on Mirabilia "Halloween Fairy"
6. Take part in the Quaker Inspired SAL -- Blackbird Designs' "My Quaker House" from their most recent book.

Quick update

I've been working on Vierlanden! It's a miracle, I know. :)


As you can see I changed not only the alphabet around, but I took liberties with the end where a date was supposed to go....


I also did some on Midsummer Night's "Quaker Meetinghouse"

And, what with me being me, I changed the red flower to a rose/pink flower. The flosses are for the blue Silk and Colors "Stormy Skies," the green Sampler Thread "Grape Leaf," and for the pink Silk and Colors "Nan's Mulberry."

Catching up

I know I owe some shots of stitching, but I don't have those downloaded, and I'm even more overdue on some bday pics so....

My counter :) with cards and flowers from my office stitching buddy. Judicious water changes made the flowers last two whole weeks :)


And a balloon is required with flowers (at least from that friend... thanks Judy!)


Then the humor begins. There's this huge box in the middle of my office floor with the following label:
It's from my sister.

I open the box to be greeted by:


I lift out layer one of the formed-to-fit styrofoam to find....

Yuppers! Two six-packs of pear cider! lol My fav. Please note the special gift tucked between the sytro and the box -- the cardboard six-pack holders are included for ease of transport home. :) Do I have a wonderfully silly family or what? lol


I also owe several folks a picture of "The Yellow Tree." It's outside my building on campus and it has three versions of itself-- All green (leaves); all yellow; all twigs. It doesn't really do in between periods. Honest. Here it is in its Yellow stage:


It's a realy pretty tree in its Yellow stage, but trust me any day now I'll look out the window and it'll just be twigs again. It';s like it puts it's whole life into blooming as big as it can and then *poof* it's down for the count. :) And, for the record, I have no idea what kind of tree it is so if you can clue me in, thanks!

As close as you get to stitching pics today is some fresh stash....
I got the following in from Down Sunshine Lane this week:

The Blackbird one has several pieces causing my palms to itch with the desire to start them-- especially:



Oh pulheeze stop me before I start again!!!!!!!!


Ohhhhh, wait! I do have one stitching thing I can show you. I finished up that little Quaker over-one motif with the Victoria Clayton silks! :)

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Still looking for Zelazny
Still reading: Hillerman Hunting Badger, Pratchett Going Postal, and Butcher Storm Front
Spent yesterday watching: old Perry Masons (black and white only, darling), misc BookTV, NCIS, Medium, and Bones
Currently stitching: Vierlanden Mystery Sampler and 6 million other things