Weekend Stitching

Look out Labor Day Weekend!  I'm almost there!

I know that it looks like I skipped and jumped around a lot on those stars, but I was more concerned about getting them counted and placed on the fabric than I was about finishing them. So now those lovely stars are placed and except for finishing them, adding another bird, and wrapping it all up with my initials and the date, I should be golden.  I learned long ago not to put in the date until the bitter end.  There's no better predictor that I'll have a project dying on the vine than putting the date in prematurely.

But back to those unfinished stars - Sometimes I really don't feel like counting. I'll look at my work and think, "Ehh. Ten up, seven down? That's more than I can handle today." Then I'll just put it away.

I'm a girl who knows my limits.

Oh!  Here's a kind of funny website for you writer types.  Unsuck It takes annoying business jargon and gives us no-nonsense alternatives.  You know...to help us craft better content creation from the cradle to the grave.

Yikes!

Holy cow...10 days without writing in my blog?  And here I am at Day 11 yet I feel like I don't have a single interesting thing to tell you.  I think I've had writing burn-out for the past 10 days.  I had to do so much work related writing that I didn't have any energy left for fun writing.  Consequently, if I owe any of you an email or a comment, I'm so sorry!  I'll be keeping up better in the future.

But here's the thing.  Once I stop blogging - even for a short time, it takes, like, a super-human effort for me to start up again.  (Please try to picture me all red-faced and sweating and squinting with effort right now.  It adds to the drama)

So I packed two kids off to college last weekend, and now let the rejoicing begin.  Well, maybe later, after I finish mailing them all of the crap they forgot.  Mom's Delivery Service, yessiree.

And can I tell you about the mess they left behind and about the disgusting state of my daughter's bedroom? 

I don't have any milestone stitching to show you today.  I'm working my way around the star border on BBD Summer Basket, and it's slow, slow, slow.  Or maybe I'm just bored with it.  My goal was to have it finished by Labor Day weekend and that's going to take some serious dedication.  But I'm optimistic.

Why do I want it finished by Labor Day weekend?  Because I'm planning a trip to Salty Yarns in Ocean City MD, which is where I bought it and I'd love to show it to Sally and her girls.  (Yes...I am a compliment whore)

Have a nice Weekend Before Labor Day Weekend gang!

And another...

I had Spring Violets framed, also.   Believe it or not, I remember almost every stitch of this.  I remember first spotting it on a friends blog (or did she email it to me?) in what felt like the deepest part of the winter of 2010 and knowing that I had to stitch it.  I remember that it lifted my spirits tremendously.  I remember excitedly playing with the colors to make it mine, mine, mine.  Even if I hadn't blogged about it, I still think it would be a memorable stitch.

Spring Violets, by Hands to Work.  Stitched on Lavender Bliss Lugana

Thanks for all of your generous comments on Lo.  I'd offer the book up for trade, but I traded it away months ago.  If you're really hot on the trail of the design though, there are several used copies available over at Amazon.com.  Really, most vendors have it priced so reasonably (somewhere around $4.00), it's practically a steal.   So go here if you want to find the book!

Yippee!

I was super excited to pick up my framed Lo!  I haven't had anything professionally framed in years, so this was a really big thing for me and I have to say that I'm so very pleased with the results.

From BHG's A Cross Stitch Christmas: Lo How a Rose, by Brightneedle Designs

There is a bit of glare in the photo, but in my house of spiders I'm NOT going to spend that kind of money on framing and not put glass on it.

In other things around the house here...Late summer life with college students around has become increasingly challenging. I'm getting them back into the school mode of thinking though, by providing lots of early morning Lectures and Seminars by Mom, like the one entitled "Hey! I'm Not Running a Hotel Here." Their reading lists have included books like Notes from Mom: Please Pick Up After Yourself Before I Kill You.  And I may request that they turn in a paper by the end of the summer on the topic Many Ways to Treat Your Parents as if They Were People, Too.

So why the heck will I miss them so much when they are gone?

One more mention of book club

And not another rant, I promise.  I guess I really needed to blow off some steam on Tuesday! 

After talking to some like-minded friends,  we've decided that we're going to become a little more proactive at our meetings.

For instance, my fellow book friends and I noticed that we tend to sit near each other at meetings.  Now we're going to spread out and sit among and between the other ladies.  The idea is this:  Make all of the unrelated side discussions more difficult by physically separating people.  I plan to be up close and personal with a couple of them.  Maybe snap them with a rubber band if they veer off.  (Is that going a teensy bit too far?)

We're also going to be more proactive when we start putting books into the mix for next year and insist on more variety of genre and setting. (I counted to make sure that I wasn't making a mountain out of a mole hill...In the past 8 months, we've read 5 historical fiction novels, all set primarily in the 1930's and 1940's) When we meet at my house in October,  I'm going to give out a list with several types of books - mostly types of fiction, but adding the categories of biographies and memoirs and true accounts to our 2011 plans.  And I'm going to be as diplomatic as I can, yet strongly suggest that nobody chooses books from the same categories on the list for a whole year. 

The book list is probably the biggest leap of all.  Up until this point, the method for choosing books was that we all decided which month we want to host in the coming year, then the book choice was up to the hostess.  Depending on the hostess, sometimes very little thought was put into the book choice, and that's been part of the problem.  So anyway,  we'll see how my genre list goes over.  If it's rejected, then it's more than likely that our group will split up.  And that may not necessarily be a bad thing, but rather just how these things go. 

So now that we have a plan, I'm cool with the situation.  I just hope I can pull it off.

And my next post will have more to do with stitching, I promise!

Book club rant

This will be a post without stitching news or stitching photos, so you may want to skip past it...you've been warned.

I belong to a monthly book club and we have a core group of about 10 women, plus or minus two. And it's making me a little nuts.

The majority of the women are older, and since I'm no babe in arms, I should elaborate and tell you that by that I mean they are in their seventies.  Issues?  Can we talk about issues?  My god, if we ever read anything that's not set in the 1940's, I think I'll pass out.  And girls, if you're going to choose a book for your hosting month, will you puh-leeeze get the title right?  Don't tell us that the title is In Her Place when you actually mean A Woman's Place, (set in 1942 - go figure) because then we'll end up with this book:

Instead of this book:

Two entirely different things, am I right?  (And I'm actually more interested to read the first book because it's NOT about World War II.  Plus I love the expression on her face.)

I should tell you that the book for my month (October) is Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book.  I thought it would be cool to switch things up and read a YA novel that was sweet and creative and fun.  Plus...it's October.  Ghosts and vampires and what's not to love?  And during our meeting last night one of the women unceremoniously dumped it on the table and said, "This is our book for October?  Does anyone realize that it has pictures?"  Which completely pisses me off because since December 2009 -each and every month - they go through the list of books for the year and each and every month I tell them, "NOW LOOK, this is a children's book.  Look in the YA section of the book store.  It's light reading.  It's fun. And it won the 2009 Newbery Medal."  But as usual, nobody listened to me.

I want to scream.  And I know that they are going to hate it.  Of course, they all hated the last book I chose (ironically, set during WWII), The Book Thief.  And I tried to suggest To Kill a Mockingbird, but they didn't want to read it because it was too depressing and "it just goes on and on and on."  (Seriously.  They said that.)

Fortunately, there are three or four other women who read more diverse books and who are open to trying new things.  These three or four other women also seem to be able to keep the discussion about the book and not veer off to discuss why so-and-so got divorced or the latest church gossip.  So I'm happy to be a part of the book discussing subset of the group.  But the other ladies?  Ay-yi-yi.  Making me nuts.

OK.  End of rant.  Back to stitching.

More Summer Basket

I was stitching away over the weekend! I'm happy to tell you that my urge to stitch has come back to me.  Part of it is the encouragement that you all send my way.  You know how it is when you know something is pretty and you like it, but your enthusiasm wanes?  But then a friend gives you a compliment and you can get all excited about it again?  That's what's happened here.  Some very sweet online and face to face friends have spurred me on!

More excitement...I had a wonderful afternoon with Linda (no blog, but working on it) recently where we stitched and ate and then headed over to JoAnn's with our framing coupons in our hot little hands!  I had decided to frame Spring Violets and Lo How a Rose, and I was glad to have Linda with me to help bounce mat and frame ideas around.  Let me tell you....I haven't had anything professionally framed in years, so it was very exciting!  I think they'll be ready in a couple weeks.

Anyways, here is where I left off with Summer Basket on Sunday evening:

Summer Basket - BBD

August Stitching Bloggers Question

Hello everyone!  Well, we've started into the dog days of summer here in my part of the world.  The days are already noticeably shorter and I can hear the late summer bugs humming all day long.  And school will be starting for many of our children very soon.  Even if you don't have kids, there is still something in the air that seems to be urging us to settle down and get ready for fall.

So I thought that this might be the right time of year for a lighthearted and fun SBQ.  Back in 2005, Anna (her creative self) took a song title quiz and turned it into a Cross Stitch Title Quiz.  (Yes, I did just write 2005.  How can I remember what she wrote in 2005, but I can't remember what day it is sometimes? )

So here's the August SBQ deal. 

Read the list of questions below and answer them with the title of a needlework design.  Include the designer's name, too.  Try to add a photo of the design, if you can.  While you don't have to own all of the designs, you should at least want to stitch all of your answers.  And finally, if you played along 5 years ago, try to come up with answers using new design names (ones that have been published in the last 5 years).

1. Are you male or female?

2. Describe yourself:

3. How do some people feel about you? 

4. How do you feel about yourself?

5. Describe your girlfriend/boyfriend/interest:

6.  Describe your best friend:

7.  Describe where you currently live:

8. Where would you rather be? 

9. Describe what you want to be:

10. Describe how you live: 

11. Describe how you love: 

12. Share a few words of wisdom:

13.  Now use a title to say goodbye: