Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! I hope everyone has a happy and fun sweet-filled day!

***

My thoughts are scattered today. I've been feeling like this a lot lately and it's not helped by being in the midst of my monthly pity party. I'm feeling quite sad and unappreciated. After housesitting for my parents for five months, all my dad could do is give me a hard time that I hadn't paid all the bills before they arrived. Seeing as I arrived from New York 27 hours before they did, I thought they could handle paying the two bills themselves seeing as they weren't even due for another 2 weeks. Five months of wasting gas, adding miles to my aging car, paying bills, watering the plants, making sure the house is ok, constant calls...and I don't even get a thank you. No consideration for the fact that I work and did this for them despite having my own problems and trying to mend and heal a broken heart. Or that I bought them groceries and stocked their fridge before I even stocked my own. I do not have the typical happy family relationship most people *seem* to have with theirs. Despite everything I do, it's never enough and I am always the "bad daughter" even though I am the only child that does anything to help. As my parents age and need more help, I don't want to be the one that does everything anymore. I don't want to make the tough decisions that will soon be necessary. Even if I were to make the decisions, I have parents that don't listen to a thing I say because I'm the "baby" and apparently stupid. They are both deaf as doorknobs and refuse to get hearing aids and I am so tired of yelling and repeating myself that I don't even talk to them if I don't have to. They don't understand that we would all be happier if they were to get the aids because we could all hear each other but they are too frugal. How much they miss out on life because they can't hear anything. How frustrated I get because when I do tell them a story, it gets terribly mangled because they only listen a little and then make up the rest on their own. I am so frustrated! I want to be able to live my life and experience all the things my older siblings have been able to because they've been free of the burden by moving away. Sometimes I feel that my parents decided to have another child so late in life so they would have someone to take care of them. It's been my role since I was a teenager. A stunted youth...no fun extracurricular activities like sports, hobbies, dating, boys, etc. I don't have much support from my brother who I feud with like you wouldn't imagine and acts like he is a 55 year old child who is king of the household and that everyone should be waiting on him and a sister that would help if she didn't live 1500 miles away. For years, I've thought of moving just to have a little more freedom despite my heart belonging to San Francisco. It's sad when you think about moving away to escape your family so that you can live with the freedom you believe you deserve. To be able to travel and have fun without constantly being questioned and being served a healthy portion of Catholic guilt for every little thing. *sigh*

***

Ok I had to get the sad, depressing part out of the way. Now for the fun part. It's heartwarming to know that when those in my real-life world have forgotten or disappointed me in some manner, my blogging family is out there thinking of me and sending me little rays of sunshine. I got some sweet packages recently. Meari read about my excursion to the Snoopy Museum and she sent me a Happy Birthday Peanuts book. It was fun to flip through! Thanks Meari.
And then Natasha sent me this fun overdyed skein of Happy Birthday floss by Ozark Sampler. How great is that...a color specifically called Happy Birthday! Thanks Natasha! I will have to find a spring project to use this for and it just screams spring to me. I love it when birthdays last all month long! haha

Despite stashing like mad at the Shepherd's Retreat, I couldn't let my birthday discount at Needlecraft Corner go to waste. Because you know...SALE is about as good a four letter word as CAKE. Here's my haul...

First 8 charts of the BBD Anniversaries of the Heart Series

And I also got The Drawn Thread's Almost Halloween, Kelmcott's Miniature Monogram Hornbook Margin Marker, Kelmcott Lace Scissors and a slew of CC, GAST, WDW threads. Most of the threads I purchased are for the BBD Anniversaries of the Heart Series and BBD Mystery Sampler with a couple of others tossed in for good measure.

I am hoping to start Anniversaries of the Heart in January and do one block per month. I just need to purchase fabric. I contacted R&R for 40 count Olde Towne Blend but they are out of it and the base fabric. If anyone knows a LNS that stocks 40 count R&R, can you let me know? Otherwise, I will have to decide between Lakeside Linens Meadow Rue or Exampler. I wonder if a trip to NiaH is on the horizon to help me decide...

***

After days of not stitching due to travel and housesitting running around, I got some good stitching time in. It helped that the weather was rainy and gloomy and there were baseball games to watch on tv at home. OMG, it felt wonderful! And due to my efforts, I finished the Traveling Stitcher!!
I'm stitching this as a SAL with Carol R. I wonder how far along she is now. She may be done too. I'm not totally finished though since I still need to finish the little "Needles" piece which should be fast going. I think I will try to start that tonight. I am tempted to start looking through my Christmas ornie patterns as I signed up for an exchange and may do another if my local stitching group will in fact have a Christmas get together. There are tons of ornies that I want to stitch. It's just the finishing part that trips me up.

***

One more question...is anyone doing NaBloPoMo? I'm debating...but I don't think I have it in me this year.

Well, I best be going. I'm supposed to be dress shopping. The baseball game starts in 4 hours so I should run errands and shop and then it's time for baseball and another round of "stitch-ass".

Happy Halloween everyone...be safe!

Until next time...

Mr. Postman

Mr. Postman was very kind this week and brought me some wonderful mail! First up with the scissor frog I won from Deb's giveaway. I was so excited to win this giveaway! I've been searching for a frog for a while without any luck. I figured I was destined to be frog-less. Well, of the glass variety...those stitching ones still attack once in a while! Deb was kind enough to include some goodies as well...scissors, a strawberry and some tweezers. It will all come in very handy! I had to run around collecting all my scissors and I've put them all in the frog for the photo. Once I include Deb's scissors, I only have 2 free slots left! Who knew I had so many scissors?! I do have to say thank you to everyone who left a congratulatory comment on Deb's post. It gave me many warm fuzzies to read how many people were rooting for me during my "low" period and were happy that I won. You guys are the best blogging buddies! Deb, thank you so much for hosting a terrific giveaway!
Then I received a package from Marjorie. I won her blog giveaway a little while back and even forgot I won so this was a nice surprise to find in my mailbox. Marjorie stitched up a cute pumpkin pillow which I know is a JBW design. She also included some charts, purple fat quarters of fabric, pins, ribbon, buttons and rickrack. Lots of fun stuff! Thanks so much Marjorie!

***

Other things on the stitching front...I realized I forgot to put up a photo of my stash acquisition from NiaH last week.
After my last post, my sister emailed me and said that all she saw was a brown house and that didn't classify as "color". Hey!! I think goldenrod and brown are colors! So maybe this will make her happier. I didn't get to stitch too much last week because I re-caught my cold and was down for the count for a couple of days. Missed the gym and everything. But I stitched my little heart out yesterday and I think I don't want to see any green for a while.
The funny thing is that I started with a different skein of Bean Sprout and it was more yellow than green and the grass was looking sickly. Mind you, lots of grass in California looks sickly because we're always in some form of drought and the sun dries out the grass but that wasn't really the look I was going for. So I looked in my stash and I had 3 (!!) other skeins of Bean Sprout in varying shades of green. How did I end up with so many skeins of one color!? I have to take a little break from Simple Joys so I can do some obligation stitching.

Here is my fabric/floss toss for what I'm about to start! Black fabric! I hope I don't go blind...err...blind-er than I already am. The one good thing about black...all colors go with it!
Hopefully, I can make a decent start tomorrow. I think my right wrist needs a break...I've either been doing too much stitching/typing or I've been twisting it weird in my sleep which I am sometimes prone to do. It's a tad painful. Ow!

I've also been going through my stash and trying to weed out the items I know I won't stitch or already stitched and don't have any need for anymore. I created a stash sale blog years ago and then never put anything on it. Yea, I know, weird. I just posted some OOP kits that I bought in my college/post-college years and then never got around to stitching. My tastes have changed since then. If you like kits, please take a look at my sale blog! They are almost all OOP and hard to find through Google. I'll be adding charts soon.

As for this weekend...the key word is lazyness. Or maybe less busy than normal? I dragged myself out to a happy hour on Friday that was a combination of fun, awkward and intimidating. It's always hard walking into a group of 60 people that you don't know and just be social but I found my niche and hit it off with a handful of people...and that was nice and worth the awkward and uncomfortable aspects of the night. Those being dealing with quasi-stalker and familiar faces I recognize from the online dating world. Um...all just kind of weird. This weekend, my neighborhood's been overrun by it's annual festival so I've been hiding out avoiding the crowds. I did go check it out yesterday to check out the vendors and eat lunch! Tonight I'm looking forward to dinner out with a couple of girlfriends. All pretty quiet and lowkey.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend so far!

Until next time...

Fabric Frenzy

Thanks to everyone who voted on what fabric I should pick for Waiting for Ships. As you can see, the winner was Taupo!

Help Me Decide! What fabric should I pick for Waiting for Ships?
Country Stitch Taupo	45.7%	21
Polstitches Stormy Seas	41.3%	19
Country Stitch Lagoon	6.5%	3
Country Stitch Wintergreen	6.5%	3
total votes: 46
powered by blogpoll

It's funny how I went into things thinking Lagoon was the way to go but I was swayed by the popular vote. I usually resist the bandwagon but I am easily convinced in the arena of fabric and floss. I ended up ordering both Taupo and Stormy Seas because Missy Ann is a bad influence and posted a link to her Mediterranean Mermaid which of course, reminded me that I wanted to do that one too! I'm not sure what I will use for either project yet as I am not up to doing a floss toss yet but I tell you, I am in love with Stormy Seas and I may just do both of the mermaids on the same color! I've already decided that next year will have a heavy focus on Miras...starting with Fairy Moon. Yea, I say this all the time but it's happening once I get over my fear of dark fabric and using 3 skeins of white! There's a spot of honor waiting for her.

I've been fabric stashing like a crazy fiend...all with projects in mind. At this rate, I'll be busy well into my 40's just stitching on the projects for *these* fabbies. Forget the rest of my stash...that will take me into retirement! lol

Here are the recent fabbys to come through my mailbox!

From left to right (back row): SW Scattered Leaves (for Lilac), SW Golden Promises (for Taj Mahal), Polstitches Stormy Seas and CS Taupo (for Med Mermaid and/or Waiting for Ships).
(front row): CS Southern Star (for Stargazer) and then two small cuts that Staci rak'd me with. I had asked Staci for some beginning sock patterns and look what was in the envelope along with it! Thanks Staci!

I am in fabric heaven!

I've been stashing too...
Some LHNs that caught my attention. I bought the threads for Simple Joys which are beautiful colors! There's also some GAST that I received in a trade, some Silk N Colors for a mystery project I think I may start next over anything else and a beginning hardanger kit from GoS.

I finally managed to finish fright on my Boo Club. This took much longer than I thought. There were a lot of color changes not to mention the computer has been eating away at my crafting time. I need to stay away from it...it just sucks too much time!
Sorry for the crooked picture but you get the idea. I really love these designs but I can do without that border. I like the crispness of the black and white...it's just such a bore to do! Time to put this away for a bit and work on my mystery piece and be a good crochet student.

Oops...just lost the photo of my TUSAL update. Guess that will have to wait for another time. Darn computer!

Hope everyone had a great weekend. I now I did...so glad I reigned myself in yesterday and just relaxed. No running around with packed plans and such.

Until next time...

Stash!!

So...remember way back when, when I said that I got birthday money from my parents and *the boy's* mom and I was wondering what to do with it?

Well, *the boy* bought me a lovely red leather purse for my birthday and I wanted to get a matching wallet. But all the wallets were garmongous and I only wanted a french wallet. You know, one of those that are maybe 2/3 the size of a checkbook wallet? Well, no such luck for me.

And I needed some new work flats since my comfie ones are worn down and eaten through the leather. Seriously...they are ghetto flats now but so comfy! But I have gone to every shoe store imaginable and still can't find a pair that is both cute, stylish AND comfy.

So I bought a ton of stash! I do have to say that I was holding out for a while knowing that I would have my birthday discount at Needlecraft Corner. This is my favorite online needlework shop. They are brick and morter but umm...Maryland is pretty far for me to travel to shop in the store!
Plum Street Samplers Paradise Lost and Christmas Tea with recommended Belle Soie. I couldn't resist Paradise Lost with it's 60's style Eve and funky trees and let's not even get started with the animals! I'll get to it someday. Christmas Tea will be my December start this year. There's something about it. And after stumbling upon many times in the last year, I finally decided to just get it already! I am hoping to get to NiaH next weekend to buy some fabric so that I can maybe put some stitches into it Thanksgiving weekend.
I also bought LHN's Love One Another, assorted Cresecent Colors for my LHN Traveling Stitcher and Pumpkins for Sale which will be started sometime soon in my head but probably much later in reality, as well as a ton of AVAS for my American Sampler. So...now you know why I was waiting for birthday discount. I think American Sampler requires 37 different colors and I really wanted to do it in silk if I was going to attempt it. I also purchased 3 French charts from another online needlework store called The Threadbasket. The owner has the same name I do! Except with the french accent and all. I thought that was funny.

I also bought stash for gifts and my exchange so I pulled that stuff from the photos. Someone needs to take my stash buying priviledges away! Ummm...but that's not it.

I saw on Danielle's blog that she had ordered some scroll covers off of etsy. Now that I am about to start Mary Wigham and she will be strictly an at home project sitting on scroll rods, I decided that I needed nice protective covers too! So I bought a cover for my 16" rods and 20" rods...which are the only ones I have! LOL Ann was a pleasure to work with! The scroll covers are a custom item so you have to email her directly to request them. Be sure to give her the correct scroll measurements as I discovered my scroll rod measurements were different than Danielle's. I love the prints I chose plus she quilted them. I think I'll be getting a lot of use out of them!
Speaking of Mary Wigham, Lisa and I are going to SAL together and start on Thanksgiving weekend! Ok, I've put it out there for all of blogland to see so I am committed and definitely starting! I am so looking forward to turkey weekend. I have lots of stitching time planned and 2 starts to attempt.

*sigh* I am very behind! I didn't knit Thursday and I haven't even started on my sewing. Looks like tomorrow will be an all-day sewing fest attempting to finish making (umm...haven't even started!) my pants.

*The boy* leaves tonight...back to RI. Looks like I'm solo through the holidays. Again with the mixed feelings. But I'll go back to all out craft mode and hopefully, get into some sort of fitness routine. You know you've gotten out of shape when you get winded climbing up your own damn stairs!!

OK...sewing pics tomorrow! :)

Until next time...

Show and Tell...and Questions

Wednesday...midway through the week. I figured I would share stash I've accumulated over the last month. I took advantage of time at a stitchy get together and a fabulous blog sale. Here are a couple of those mesh bags to cart projects around. I figured this was better and more secure than the old drawstring Gap and Apple bags I've been using! I scored two of Valerie Lejeune's books, Repertoire des Frises and Repertoire des Alphabets. These are tough to come by so I am happy to add them to my library. There's also a few overdyeds and these lovely scissors! I've seen these scissors all over stitchy blogland and have been coveting them for awhile. I finally figured out how to get them. If anyone is curious, they are an eBay.fr find. They will run about $22 with the international postage. If anyone has problems locating them, let me know and I'll put you in touch with the seller.
And here are some charts I added to the evergrowing stash...Brightneedle Pretty in Pink, Drawn Thread Too Tiny Samplers, La D Da Love is Patient and The Sampler Girl My Everything. There's also a cut of Antigue Ivory belfast because almost anything looks good on it! I bought the last two charts because I decided that as so many people want to have a sampler wall...I want to have a "Love" wall...whether I'm in or out of love. I haven't got anything to put up to start one but at some point, I'll be ready to start!

With this last purchase, I have to now put myself on a stash diet for the rest of the year. The whole new tires (2) purchase last night didn't help the cause any. Time to tighten the belts especially as talks about furloughs and layoffs start to resurface at work. I have the feeling some tough decisions will be coming around in November. Time to save a little bit of money...just in case.

And here is a shot of dinner. This was the dish I wanted to make on Monday..you know...before the whole flat tire stole two of my evenings. I saw the recipe on eating/sf and it's called Corn and Sweet Pepper Hash. I couldn't find any sweet peppers to save my life so I just used red bell pepper. I alsolutely love corn...and I have a unique way of eating it...to avoid the whole corn in the teeth problem. Since I had 3 ears wasting away in the fridge, this seemed a good way to use them and have a healthy dinner. I used 3 ears and 1 red bell pepper.
This and some yellow squash was dinner and it was a nice, light, healthy meal on a nice summer night. Mmmmm.....corn! Dessert will be either yogurt, rice pudding or fresh figs...decisions, decisions!

So onto questions..

I'm leaving on vacation in 2.5 weeks...time is flying! I am struggling to get through The Queen's Fool to return it by it's due date this weekend. Time to get new books.

I am looking for a Jane Austen book recommendation. I've never read one before. Which one is your favorite? The must read?

And I'd love a ChickLit (i.e. fluffy and funny) book recommendation too!

And for those Facebook fans out there...what in the world is Mafia Wars?! It is worth looking at? I'm scared to try it out because I don't want it to suck all my free time...need time for my shows and stitching!

Hope everyone is enjoying their evening. I'm about to peel off the computer to watch some CSI:NY and read a little more of my book.

Remember to enjoy and relax.

Until next time...

Tuesdays Are My Stitchy Nights

I am procrastinating big time! I always do when I have finishing deadlines. Love stitching...mental block with finishing. I'll get over it. I should be working on my exchange but figured I would be better off working on that during the light of day. I'll be a day or two late getting it in the mail but I think my partner will forgive me! =)

I've been using my procrastinating time working on Carol's QFRR but am too lazy to take it off the qsnaps for a picture. I only have 1.25 motifs to do and will bust through that tomorrow. Woo! Will show it off once it's done and ready to be mailed to Wendy.

I promised to show off my stash. I put in an order with Sew and So in the UK because I decided to do Newton's Little Uns Sampler as the birth announcement for my friend Claire. Newton is a UK-based product and I figured Claire would love the little bear in the tub with the ducky and bath bubbles stuck on his nose. It seemed very "Claire". I will most likely switch out the aida for some linen at my upcoming LNS-shopping spree. Since I had to order from the UK already, I decided to splurge and buy that Elbesee embroidery hoop/seat frame that I mentioned after my RSN Intro to Embroidery Class. I *have* to finish the class project and it would be much easier to complete that and other future projects with this handy little device. Service from Sew and So was amazing! I ordered on a Friday evening and received the package by the following Wednesday! Fast! In the picture below is the Heart in Hand Little Angel in the Clouds chart. This was the chart I won from KarenV's recent chart giveaway. I was so excited to win it as I've seen it stitched up but haven't come across it in shops or online. It is *so* cute! Thanks Karen!
Oh yes, and there is even more stash. I put in an order with Drema because I saw that she had a chart that I was coveting and that led to more buying, or course. I have seen everyone stitching up BBD Beneath the Sunlit Sky and the more I saw it, the more I had to have it! Drema had it so that's what started this order. I also bought BBD Autumn Song, Cricket Collection Rest and Be Thankful and all the overdyed threads for Mary Wigham per The Daily Mel. I'm not sure I will completely stick to the conversion but it's a good start. Fabric for Mary wont be purchased til the aforementioned LNS-shopping spree.Well, I am off to finish that QFRR...that way I have no other excuse to keep procrastinating on my exchange finishing!! Vacation has officially started...loads and loads of stitching on the agenda. I am so excited. Hopefully I do a little road trip too but we'll see.

Until next time...

Floss Stash!

Finally! After one month of waiting, I received the floss I ordered from Stitching Bits and Bobs. Even though, I anticipated a wait, I still didn't think it would take over 4 weeks to get my 28 skeins of floss. Most of this is for Quaker Christmas which now means that this project is fully kitted! Woohoo! The other floss was for my exchange piece but since Bobbie was taking forever to get this to me, I had to do an emergency purchase at NiaH as I didn't want to be further delayed. I called NiaH on a Tuesday and received them in the mail on Saturday of the same week. Why do I stray from them!?! I know why...that beautiful 4-letter word...SALE. Stitching Bits and Bobs always is having a sale and I like to save money. Crescent Colors and GAST does NOT come cheap! But I am wary of purchasing from them in the future. I had emailed saying that I was worried it was taking so long and if she could at least send me the GAST ahead of schedule so I could start the exchange project and she told me she would receive shipment in a couple of days however it wasn't until another week and a half that I received the email saying my shipment had been posted. I also had put in an order in the beginning of December and that order took six weeks to be posted yet they charged my credit card at time of order instead of time of shipment. I don't really like it when people have my money long before I have my things. If anyone has any leads on a friendly and service oriented online needlework store that has sales, let me know. Otherwise, I should just support my local needlework store which is NiaH. They are a great little shop!