New Years Eve!!

Of course not so much fun yet since I have 9 1/2 hours of work to get through but I got here a bit earlier so I can leave by 5!

Last night we watched Pirates of the Carribean, I stitched through most of it but I do like the movie, it makes me laugh for sure. They did a really good job with it. I got the second snowflake on my piece It's Winter by Sue Hillis - I will be posting a picture on my webpage soon now that I have visible progress and not just a blue block. I am enjoying it very much. I do however have to put it down soon and work on my round robin that is due Feb 1st. I'm also joining another round robin that will start probably in March sometime. I haven't decided what to do for that one but it might be this simple calendar piece since there are 6 of us, the whole calendar could be done. Only problem is that it has to be done on Aida which I don't have a lot of - maybe I'll get out my white and wash it (to make it softer) and dye it to look older - tea stained maybe. That will go good with the pattern I think.

So tonight will be poker and drinks. It may just be the four of us, or a few of my boyfriend's friends might come and make a larger group, although more than 6 makes poker tough. No matter what I'm sure it will be fun and I can go to bed soon after new years. I don't think we've stayed in at new years in a long time (going on maybe 6 years now). Definately will be a change to watch the ball drop on my tiny tv. I hope everyone has a great New Year's Eve and of course, A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Another night of games...

So I work a long day, go home and play my new computer game with my boyfriend for a few HOURS - then go to bed and literally drag myself to the shower in the morning. Not tonight - i have to stop the cycle before I waste my life away. Tonight I will cross stitch and maybe watch tv while I cross stitch. Go to bed early (need to rest up for new years eve).

I found a new job possibility yesterday, it's an option in boston so I'm really hopefull, i'll put in my resume maybe tonight, and the interviews are on campus in the beginning of Feb. It's a great opportunity so hopefully it also pays well :)

Today and tomorrow will be long days, my friend at work is on vacation so I have no one to talk to during breaks and the days will drag for sure. 9 1/2 hours today and 9 tomorrow, then only 4 on friday but she'll be back by then.

In the world of cross stitch, i'm coming up with new ideas for some large projects. Right now I'm stitching the Dragon Dreams Virtue Series for a round robin - that will get 6 of them done, 2 done already. I will then continue them myself and maybe my sister and grandmother will each stitch one for me. Maybe do another round robin with them as well - there are 14 in total so it would have to be a small round robin. Then they will be made into a quilt. Well I saw someone else's idea (i take no credit) who changed their colors and made a quilt for a new baby. That would be perfect for when I have kids. (eventually). I could do them in light pink like her, or mix it up a bit and for a girl do light pink and purples mixed together, or use softer greens for either and for a boy light blues, or just mix them all up and do soft colors (blue, pink, purple, green, yellow) for all of them - there is one dragon that really only looks good green and it's the one i stitched for my round robin (Strength) - breathing fire so the fire clashes with the pink/blue. This quilt will be for my first child - but maybe I'll just start working on it when I have children and add other names to it if i have more (really only want 2 kids). Then finish it as a wall quilt for their room. I doubt I'll want to make a seperate one for each child, but maybe dragons for one child and castles or something or a different dragon quilt for the other. This is all years from now but my mind sure does like to run so I go with it - and right now it's going back to work!!!

And Christmas is over ...

Well I must say that the past 4 days were the best 4 days I had all year! Christmas eve dinner at my boyfriend's was great, his parents got me a really nice set of stoneware dishes that I love and dinner and conversation was at an all time high. The little kitten slept in my lap after dinner which completed the night for me and I headed home grinning.

Christmas morning was later than normal but it was wonderful, we made some tea, opened stockings and then presents. My parents went all out and I got a ton of stuff, my sister and I got mostly the same gifts, a lot of baking and kitchen stuff and digital cameras! I also got one of the table standing Ott lights, true light. I love it!

After that it was off to my grandmother's for dinner, I got PC Stitch from them and a gift certificate to Joann's from my uncle. Then the boyfriend's came up to our house and we did gifts, my boyfriend got me a ton of cross stitch stuff, mostly things for organizing my floss. That was put to good use on friday :)

Friday my sister, mom and I hit the mall so my sister could return stuff and we could buy some christmas ornaments. It was quick and easy and only when we were leaving did the mall really start to get packed. Then it was off to Joann's to use my gift card and then home to organize all my floss (3 hours organizing) I now have 400 colors organized in stitch bow cases (minus about 30 colors that are missing or being used for projects). Then my mom cooked dinner and we played games all night. It was a great day/night.

Saturday I had the day to myself, I watched movies, stitched for 3 hours during Lord of the Rings the extended editions (1 and 2). Sunday was another relaxed day, we went to dinner and then to walmart and bought a new computer game which we then played for a few hours until bed time.

Now it's monday and I'm back at work for a nice long 9 hour day. I can't wait to get home and stitch some more tonight (or play computer games) :) I've been eating my Christmas candy for the last 2 hours ;) So with that i'll get back to work and let my wonderful 4 day vacation travel to the land of memories!

Merry Christmas Eve!

Well it's my last day of work this week - I have a little over 5 hours left, which includes going out at lunch time to buy a book at Barnes and Noble. I'm psyched for Christmas now and wish it lasted longer but I'll be back here monday morning to fill in my blog...

So still no stitching as i guessed, and tonight I'm going to my boyfriend's family dinner, maybe doing a gift exchange not sure, they may save the gifts till Christmas or later. Then home for the night and up in the morning to do my own family christmas exchange/breakfast and then to my grandmother's for dinner.

I can't express my excitement, I can't wait for everyone to open their presents, I know a few presents that people are getting from people besides me and I think they'll really like them so I can't wait for that. All in all I think it will be a very fullfilling Christmas and i'm glad to be a part of it.

I wish I had more to write but I don't, maybe it's time to eat something and get some work done so I can go home at 4!!!
Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays to everyone!

And Health Returns...

Well I made it through my 12 hour day of work while feeling sick all day, I hardly ate anything, maybe I'll lose some weight from this episode :) I did manage to get to sleep within an hour of getting home, my boyfriend woke me up at 9 to see how I was doing but I fell right back to sleep.

Up at 5 no problem again and I'm feeling fine! Completely back to normal, I even ate an apple danish for breakfast and had a cup of tea before that (1/2 a cup really). I think I'll buy lunch today and then eat my chicken and brown rice for dinner since I'm here until 7.

Tomorrow I only have to work 8 hours then I'm done for the week! I hope friday is worth all these extra hours. Atleast tonight I can get some stuff done when I get home and watch my tv show if it's on.

So now it's back to work, still trying to get these diagrams filled is by Wednesday, I'm almost finished with the largest one then I have 1 more new one and then just fixing old ones. I think I can finish by Wednesday, just feeling better today will help my productivity a lot. Back to work...

Ah another weekend passed and I'm back at this desk (I even have gloves on because this office is so cold!).

So shopping went well friday, i completely finished it all, didn't go over my limit too much and I can still pay my bills, so i'm still in a good mood about that (paying off 2 more credit cards this morning). There will be only one credit card that i'm not paying off completely this month, i'm leaving 160 on it plus I charged another 250 on it friday so i'll pay that off in january. I've never payed interest before so really i'm interested to know how much it is.

Saturday we drove out to my uncle's, and my youngest cousin was sick with a fever, with tylenol she was her self most of the time and only sick off and on with no other symptoms luckily. We did presents and had a roast beef for dinner, 14 lbs too. During all of this my mom had a migraine and slept through dinner. After dinner we put the kids to bed and played poker for a few hours. My mom, dad, aunt, uncle and cousin went back to their house around 10 and we stayed up to watch a movie. My youngest cousin woke up again from her fever and ended up staying up until 2 am. My sister and I stayed up talking until 3 since we hadn't seen each other in a while.

Sunday we got a call that the birthday girl (my cousin who we were going to go see play her basketball game) was throwing up all night so breakfast and the game was off, but we would still meet at their house for presents and cake at 1. Before we left the fever hit again and my little cousin was wiped out by it, she luckily slept on the car ride over and was feeling better though. The party went on without incident and then the drive home. As soon as i got home i started feeling sick however and the night was horrible, my stomach was in knots, but i did get some sleep and got up at 5 to get into work early so i can work 12 hours. When i get home tonight i'll go to bed early again and do the same tomorrow so that I'll only have to work 8 hours on wednesday and be done for the week. Definately worth it i think.

Well that was my weekend, now i'm working, been here for over 3 hours, which is good, getting some work done, i want to try to finish up the design i'm working on by wednesday. I won't get much cross stitch done until the end of the week unfortunately but i did atleast get to start a new one, It's Winter by Sue Hillis, i started it in the car after buying the floss for it on friday. This will maybe be a birthday present to myself in April if i can get it done by then, then i'll do It's Autumn for my mom.
So the saga continues and so does the work...

I'd have to say that today is the first time that I've looked at my bills and been in a good mood.. I will have the money to pay them. With my paychecks coming this week (and every week for the next 4) I can pay off my credit cards, finish christmas shopping and buy the books I need next semester. My one hardship is paying my parents the rest of the tuition I owe - I have to see if I can post pone that payment since I really don't have the money. It's hard but I really have to work more so I'll get another large paycheck in January.

To top that off, i will be owing a lot of taxes, that will hurt but I do have until April to get that money together, and then I need to save up for my first vacation after I graduate.
But this can not bring down my mood, i have money in my account and i'm going to finish my shopping today and it's only 3 1/2 hours at work today which makes it all the better.

Last night I stitched for 3 hours (that's pretty much my max in one day), and I finished the miniature quilt for my aunt, it's got a hanging cord and everything, just need to scan it in and then wrap it for this weekend (tomorrow). Now it's time to either start something new (probably do that) or force myself to work on the piece I want to finish in January for my mom (probably not). I might kit something up to work on during the car trip tomorrow and sunday, there are a lot I want to start but to keep it small I might do a small dragon on my hand dyed fabric.

Well this time at work won't pass unless I get to work - tata - see you next week!

The movie was great. Except for a nagging pain in my stomach the whole time, the 3 1/2 hour movie was worth it. The weather was not on our side when we headed it, snowing and slushy but it stopped snowing while we were in the movie so the drive home wasn't bad, except we couldn't get my car up my road so I had to park down at a neighbors for the night.

I slept in a half hour later than normal, felt great, when i woke up i didn't have that dreaded feeling for a change, i even hit snooze and slept for 9 more minutes. So I got to work a half hour later and have to leave a half hour later, I'm only working 7.5 hours today though so I think I can leave at 4:30, I have to make a trip down to Chatham at that time then home to stitch for the night since my boyfriend is going out (he rarely does and I enjoy the night to myself once in a while). Not that we spend every night together because we don't but it's nice to feel like I have no obligations for a night, can just sit and stitch the night away, plus the Thursday night shows are on which is good. And I can come in late again tomorrow since I only have 4 hours of work, then I'm doing my Christmas shopping.

Enough rambling, I definately recommend seeing Lord of the Rings (if you've seen the others). I'm looking forward to watching all 3 again sometime, maybe when the third comes out on DVD. The end dragged on a bit but they had to tie up all the loose ends, unfortunately my sore back and stomach did not agree with me on that part but what can you do. Well it's back to work for me - only 7 hours to go (plus a workout).

Well the week is heading towards the halfway mark (over really due to the number of hours I worked). Today is Lord of the rings day - and it's going to rain all day long! Then tonight it might snow and tomorrow snow. I just hope the roads don't get bad before the drive home from the movie tonight.

So I managed to get almost nothing done last night, but I did cross stitch, worked on the border of the miniature quilt I'm doing for my aunt. It's more than halfway done now and I'm sure I can finish it by Saturday morning. So far I've spent 11 hours working on this piece and it's tiny! I can't wait to finish it and start working on the Round Robin piece that I got in the mail. That should go quickly and then it's back to my own stitching, maybe even something new I get for Christmas?? maybe?? My boyfriend finished shopping for me, he got me a ton of small gifts (just like i wanted since there isn't anything large that I want). He won't let me touch the wrapped gifts under the tree for fear I'll figure out what they are but I honestly have no idea what he got me and I can't wait to find out. Now I just have to finish my shopping for him, I'm at a loss for what else to get him and so far I've just gotten him a few small things, nothing that he'll actually be excited about either. Unfortunately when i get time to go shopping (friday) it is going to be BUSY at the mall and I'm going to hate it, hopefully my brother will come with me like he said he might, he can help me pick out presents.

Well - a short day today, only 8 hours plus the gym. So I gotta get back to work if i want to get anything accomplished today.

Okay not much new but...

Here I am at work again, and my work is boring so I wanted to write. I wish it was more than Tuesday but hopefully today will go quickly. It's goodie day at work so everyone brings in food and everyone eats food all day. I also have a meeting on Tuesdays and that helps to pass the morning along - it's mostly the afternoon I dread since I'm here until 6:30.

Well the tickets are bought and the movie is on tomorrow night. I leave work at 4:30 and the movie is at 7:40 (we are going to get there early since it's opening night).

I have an official job offer - but they want me to say yes or no by Jan. 5th and by then I will have no idea if that's where I want to move or not. Atleast by then hopefully I'll also have a second offer from where I work now. I'd like to hold out for a job in boston however so that's probalby what i'm going to do.

This weekend is Christmas weekend for my family, we're headed out to NH to have Christmas at my Uncle's then a birthday party at my other uncle's house on Sunday.

I can't write anymore - there's this woman talking very loudly here at work and I can't even hear myself think - I can't believe how annoying her voice is, there's no way I could get work done right now! Gotta go!

A weekend full of fun.

I really don't know where to begin - basically I got no stitching done this weekend, but lots of other things accomplished. Saturday morning was interesting to say the least, we got our Christmas tree and after some chaos that I won't go into, we got it up and decorated. It really looks nice and just having it up really makes it feel like Christmas. After that I cleaned the house - almost at the same time my brother and his band came over to practice - oh boy- so i finished up quick and showered. So then I went out to start my holiday shopping, mostly Walmart and Hannaford (groceries) and now I'm about half done with the shopping. Then it was home to wrap presents and head to my boyfriend's house to watch a movie.

Sunday - got up early - what a change, and we did a lot. I made the hot cocoa mix i'm giving as gifts to some people, and the cookie mix. A few short breaks, my boyfriend working on his final project due today and then i sat down to help him. I made a webpage for him to display all his information and sound clips, i editted sound clips to use as links and made graphics for links on the side bar. It was a long day and by 8 it was completed, but my day wasn't over. I still had to bake my muffins and cook my food for the week - and do a lot of dishes. After this it was time to shovel - about a foot of snow had landed and i didnt' want to save it all for the early hours of the morning for sure!

Well it kept snowing and this morning I had another foot of snow to shovel and this time it was heavy with sleet mixed in. So I was only 10 minutes late to work and boy were those roads a challenge. I'm not looking forward to the drive home, especially since it's been snowing lightly all day long. I do only have about 2 hours left of work (i say only because this is an 11 hour day for me with an hour of that being exercise). I do have a lot of work which is nice, keeps me busy but it does get boring since it's not programming, just diagrams and descriptions. At least i get paid well - and soon (Thursday).

So that was my weekend - no stitching, no work - that's all pushed to this week. I really need to stitch the mini quilt for my aunt, so i have to get cracking on that and i still have some shopping to do. Friday I plan on getting out early and heading up to the mall to finish up shopping, Wednesday i leave a little early so we can go see Lord of the Rings - opening night :)
No need to ramble further. Gotta get back to work now!

And it's day 2.

OK, so I get home last night and my dad is working on my hot water problem (no water pressure). About 8pm he tells me that i will have no hot water tonight or tomorrow. Great. So i pack up all my stuff to head down to my boyfriend's house. He was currently at my house as well. It was nice to shower in a pressured shower. This getting up at 6am is really hurting me though. Thankfully i only have to do it for 5 weeks then it's back to getting up at 8.

My boyfriend started reading the DaVinci Code last night - i highly recommend this book, it isn't among the great literary works or anything but the actual story is amazing. It captures you and I personally couldn't put it down, seems to be doing the same to my boyfriend since he was up to midnight reading (i went to sleep at 10). I did get some stitching done last night...

So I'm stitching this miniature quilt for my aunt for Christmas. I started using Caron Wildflowers for the first time and loved it, only one color, the rest was DMC, now i'm almost finished with the "inside" part of the quilt and the Caron Wildflowers border just doesn't go. So last night I took the border out. Now I have to not only redesign the border but also choose new colors that do go and get this all done by next weekend. It's small but it's completely filled in so it's taking a while. I do hope she likes it. I'm designing it as I go along and maybe after I get PCStitch or something I'll put it on my website for others to use (not that it's hard to design yourself however).

I also updated my webshots album last night to include my updated WIP - Herbal Sampler. (The link is on the right). For some reason though webshots is being funny with some of my pics and they act like they're not there. Hopefully that gets straightened out today.

Well here I am back at work, wishing I could be home stitching. Unlike yesterday, today I have a full 9 hour day -- then only 4 hours tomorrow and a trip to Joann's fabrics tomorrow!! That should be good. I may need to stop by Stop and Shop today however because I'm out of milk and a few things.

No need to go on further and bore anyone that may be reading this - time to find something else to do in this oh so fun working environment!

December 10 - The first Blog...

I've been reading a few stitcher's blogs for a while now and with all this free time at work, thought I'd join in the fun. A little about myself...

I am a student, a senior in college to be more specific. I am graduating in May 2004 and right now actively searching for that full time job that will make me rich at a young age and pay off my student loans. Right now it is my winter break between semesters and I am working full time as a Software Engineer, this I have done on most of my summer and winter breaks from school. I also work a part time job during school and breaks, this is more along the lines of web design and database programming and I currently have two new projects that are keeping my little free time busy.

Besides work and school I stitch. I started 2 years ago and have just become more and more addicted. This past summer the collecting part really hit me and I have quite a collection of fabric, floss and patterns, which is good since I have no money now (due to school and holidays) but I still have plenty to stitch without buying more.

Currently I have 4 WIPS, a breadcloth, a snowman piece for a stitch-a-long that I'm way behind in, a miniature quilt that i'm trying to finish for a christmas present and a sampler of Herbs for my kitchen which is coming along very nicely. I stitch an average of 30 hours a week and being that i'm an organization freak i keep track of the number of hours per day and per project. I also keep an online album of pictures of my finished and in progress works. This can be found at this address:
Album

So that completes my first blob... I will update often the first 5 weeks since I'm at work with hardly any work to do.
Have a stitchy day!