March Goals in review:

1) Add name/country to little girl RR [Done]
2) Finish seaside RR [Done]
3) Work on Going To Market [YES]
4) Work on Peaceful Sillhouette [no]
5) Start applique of baby quilt [FINISHED applique!]
6) Start piecing baby quilt blocks [FINISHED piecing!]

Guess I did better than I thought with my goals! On top of those I started the teapot RR as well, and I made really good progress on Going To Market.


now that our work deadline was pushed a week (april 11), next week will be NUTS, tonight I will be working late and monday and tuesday as well. I sure hope things go well today so I can relax this weekend!

Worked on the teapot RR. Last night before class, sitting in my car listening to my book on tape, I worked along on the teapot, it's a slow stitch only because I've had hardly any time to stitch! Tonight maybe after I go grocery shopping I will settle in and stitch into the night :)

Oh and it's the end of the month - time to check those goals - which I know got way off track due to all the round robins!

A stitch night?

Not exactly, my stitching friend came over last night but we didn't get any stitching done, we just talked the whole time (and ate dinner). But we had a great time and it was a very much needed break from thinking about work and stuff in general. A very good night.

Of course I fell asleep by 9 last night - after starting a new book that I really am getting in to but the stress of the week is really getting to me and I needed the sleep.

And tonight I have class, I will probably get a little stitching in before class, a girl can hope right?

An update:



That's what I did last week before packing this piece away in favor of the round robin I have to finish up. I did work on the round robin last night - it will take a little while but hopefully by the end of next week maybe i'll be able to finish that up and go back to my own projects? So much to do, and so little time :)

I got some more homework done last night and it looks like I have a bit more tonight to do, then I have some baking to do tonight, just brownies or something simple.

I'm working an off schedule lately, coming in around 8:40 and working till 6 instead of 7:30-4:30 like I used to (although the last few weeks was more like 7:30 -6:30 anyway). But I am still running most mornings and hopefully I can get back to getting up early tomorrow so I can leave earlier and go hang out with a friend :)

A pretty good weekend ;)

Sunday I did the applique blocks for the baby quilt which you can see here:

This is not all put together, I just layed the blocks on top of the fabric I plan to use for sashing, which I haven't even cut yet. Maybe by next weekend I can start piecing the quilt together, then it will have a nice flannel border as well, the animals are flannel which I thought would be nice for a baby quilt and I'd like to add some fun details possibly using yarn (like tails on the zebra and giraffe or something).

So that is what I did on sunday. Saturday was a busy day visiting family and then going out to a potluck dinner, we had a very good time out and it was good to actually get out :) I didn't get any cross stitch done this weekend but I did bring the teapot RR to start today at lunch and tonight I will try to remember to update the Going To Market pic since I've finished the dress now and added a tiny bit to the border. Well back to work...

Well class last night so no stitching. We did get a good start on the next assignment that's due next wednesday, i think i can finish my part up sunday night and then we just have to review everything mon-wed.

Tonight after work I am going to the mall - gotta buy a new dressy (but warm) outfit for saturday night and a new pair of shoes. Maybe i can find deal on some work shirts too, i generally wear long sleeves all year so some new sweaters would be great.

After that i'll be up late making meatballs to bring to the party as I'd like to make some nice large ones, i have no idea how long they will take to cook!

It's not that cold out - or maybe it was just really warm inside but I didn't use my heat driving in to work today :) I can't wait for spring and then summer!

I finished the dress on Going To Market last night! I will work on the border a bit at lunch time but very soon this piece will be put away again so I can get the teapot RR finished up and sent out. Still I'm very happy with Going To Market and I will definitely stay focused on this piece to finish it up this year.

Well another day another dollar...

A sleepy night - and oh how it was :)

We went out to boston market for dinner and I saved my dinner in the microwave until after I got a run in (since i didn't get up yesterday morning to run). So I ran - and walked and read... Then i ate a little bit of the dinner and packed it up to keep for a lunch later this week (probably tomorrow).

Then i fell asleep - yup - 8:30 - i picked up my book which i love and was almost finished with and out like a light. Finally at 9:30 i just went to bed giving up on the book which I finished this morning while I cooled down from my run. (3 days of running already this week!)

What to read next ... well actually I wanted to go with something short but serious, with very little time to read it's hard to read long books and feel any sense of moving forward so Pride and Prejudice is going to have to wait until the summer time when I'm done with my class. So it's going to be Dawn by Elie Wiesel i think. Then i think i'll read animal farm - some short ones that should only take a few weeks each :)

Well the pizza was good yesterday - and to help explain how i can manage to keep my weight down - i exercise more if i eat more. This week i gave up my morning hot chocolate which will turn into an afternoon snack on days that i don't eat girl scout cookies or something else. Today i have chocolate cake in the kitchen calling my name - i'm holding out till 10am though and for lunch we are ordering in thai food so my boston market dinner becomes tomorrow's lunch :)

A really great night, just chatting with a friend. And man does the time fly! I didn't get home until after 10 but I did get to cuddle up with my book for a good 20 minutes to read 2 more chapters. I really like this book "So Many Books, So Little Time". It's a light read with a lot of insight.

I did get to stitch at lunch yesterday on Going To Market, I finished the crescents in her skirt and started filling in her dress more. I will work on it again today if I can and definitely tomorrow. Once the dress is done I will switch over to the last RR to get that finished up.

I think we get free pizza for lunch today - yummy :)

Finally a weekend of stitching!

And proof:


That is pretty much how I spent my saturday and sunday, actually mostly just sunday as I worked on my quilt on saturday. So the baby quilt has paused with the 5 pieced blocks finished and the applique blocks no closer as I need to get some freezer paper from my aunt before I can continue those. I will only have 4 blocks to applique though so I'm pretty hopeful this is a doable project!

Sunday was a lazy day, I did clean up a bit but then I settled in to watch tv shows on dvd and stitch, going through about 9 43 minutes shows and stitching. It was a great treat and a much needed break! I plan to continue working on Going To Market this week until the dress is finished, once I stitch all the little crescents in her dress it's just fill in which generally goes pretty fast. Then I'll switch over to the teapot RR that i have to finish up. I'm psyched at how much I got stitched, that is almost the height of the piece (just missing her feet and then i'll hit the bottom). It will be a close call on the fabric but I will have almost 2 inches. :)

I survived - snowboarding that is :) We had a great time Friday night, I stuck to the bunny hills except for one trip down an easy trail - which was excruciating, it was after 2 hours of boarding and my legs hurt so bad I had to keep stopping. Not only am i out of shape in general but I have never been a snow boarder so these muscles are all new. Especially since i'm not good at it so I bend my knees a lot and that works out my quads.

Anyway - we had a really good time and I spent the day today working on the baby quilt, I got the 5 blocks pieced and 4 pieces of fabric cut out to be appliqued on, now I just have to cut out the animals and get them ready to be appliqued - that will be tomorrow's project (starting the animals).

For the rest of the night I think I will enjoy some cross stitch while watching tv. We watched Elizabethtown last night as well, it wasn't as good as I had hoped but not bad, I was horribly tired from boarding so it might have been better if I was more awake :) Maybe tonight we'll watch Just like heaven.

A short day at work, a long day out -

That's right - tonight is snowboarding, my third time ever and my first time in a few years (mark that 4 years i think). Now i have all my gear, my bright green snowpants arrived safely yesterday. So we're all set. I leave work at 2 and we hope to be at the mountain at 4!

Got my midterm grade last night - 1 point off so I got an A. We just handed in 3/5 assignments and are starting the 4th this weekend. The class is moving right along and I really look forward to it ending :)

Last night in class while I was bored I planned out the cutting I have to do for the baby quilt i'm going to make. I decided on doing a simple 3x3 with 4 squares of applique animals and 5 squares of pieced purple stars. Simple stars, made of squares and triangles. So i figured out all the measurements and wrote out a list of what to cut from what fabric. So Saturday I hope to maybe get some blocks pieced and at least one block ready for applique that i can carry around then.

I also hope to start the third RR piece (the last one) which is a teapot piece. If i can get that started it can be my at lunch piece for the week and maybe in 2 weeks I can have that finished and get to Peaceful Silhouette at lunch.

Well off to get some work done - 5 hours left to go :)

No cross stitching yesterday, I worked so hard during the day missing lunch and all that all i could do after a late dinner was watch Philadelphia and pretty much fall asleep - no concentration could have been accomplished.

I did however start a new book last night - "So Many Books, So Little Time" by Sara Nelson I believe. So far so good, I think she has a lot of insight and i can relate to her quite easily. Although I love to read, I actually love to collect books that I may or may not read as I am a collector at heart (Cross stitch, books, yarn, fabric etc) It can't be helped!

I just spent some time resizing pictures on my server so hopefully loading time will decrease and I can store more pictures.

All because I finally remembered to take pictures last night :)

First - here's my RR that has returned home to me. It's the Shepherd's Bush months and they need buttons which I have not gotten yet but as I have quite a few left to stitch it's not a big deal. Although I do hope to frame these up soon, I'm going to get one frame and change them out monthly. So maybe I do need the buttons before April starts since I have April-August stitched now. My sister has offered to stitch November or January for me too!


And here's the first RR piece I finished - just updated to have my name now.


And here's the seaside RR piece I finished last weekend. These are going to get mailed out Saturday.


Last night due to such a late lunch we skipped dinner but I did get to stitch a bit on Going To Market! while watching tv. It was great and I look forward to pulling that out at lunch today and this evening as well!

Looks like we'll be snowboarding Saturday instead of friday evening now if the mountains do open up again, our new snowboarding pants should be here friday. I still plan on leaving relatively early friday due to all the hours I've been working so hopefully there will be some quilting this weekend!

Ack, i forgot pictures again last night! I got home later than planned and after dinner went right to homework which led straight to bed. Sorry about that, I will really try to remember tonight as I shouldn't be as late this time.

And I managed a decent wake up time this morning, not what I hoped but better than yesterday so now it's two days of running this week. Just trying to beat the 3 days of last week by making 4 this week and running on the weekend too.

Interviews - I hate em, i have to interview someone shortly over the phone, I hate trying to talk with someone I don't know. Funny though, my boyfriend has an interview today with a corporation nearby (for a summer co op position) so we are going out to a late lunch together after (around 2 so really late lunch). I figure I'll eat something at noon to tide me over and work through lunch.

Homework due wednesday is under control, tonight I want to do some reading that i'm behind on but other than that it's looking really good. And tomorrow I can stitch maybe...

No pictures as I got home late last night but I will try to remember tonight to get pictures before I pack up the RR's to mail out.

That's right - I finished the second RR this weekend (saturday actually) so they are ready to be mailed out.

We had a great weekend, Friday we went shopping like planned, we didn't get snowpants (couldn't find any the right size) but we got everything else we still needed for snowboarding so I'm going to try to get pants online. Then we went back to NY friday night to have dinner with family.

Saturday I went to my 1 year old cousin's birthday party, which was a really good time, and the drive gave me time to stitch :) After dinner we drove back home (arriving quite late) but managed to squeeze in Flight Plan anyway - it was okay, the whole first half we were just waiting for something to happen because you know that can't be it, so waiting for the twist kind of killed the twist.

Sunday I went to a wine and chocolate party with friends, we had such a blast, we all brought chocolate and wine (and i brought i pie), then we brought stamping projects kitted up to demonstrate and then everyone got to make the projects, it was a lot of fun. We ended up staying pretty late and i just crashed when I got home (after doing some homework of course).

So now I have 2 of the round robins finished and I have 1 more to stitch which I will start this week. I have my round robin back all finished now so I will try to get pictures of that too soon. My sister offered to stitch one of those for me as well because it's the Shepherd's Bush months so I only have 5 of 12 months stitched, but they go fast so I have no problem finishing those up!

Well this is rambly, probably because I'm tired, I didn't feel well this morning so I quit running earlier than usual (less than a mile) but i felt kind of dizzy so I really couldn't keep going. Now I'm just tired and wishing for a nap. I guess not having a very relaxing weekend makes the work week more difficult...

Eldest is finished! I couldn't help staying up a little last night to finish it after a great night out stitching with my friends!

I made great progress on the round robin too, I finished the bird and all i have left is a part of the rope border which I'm sure I can finish this weekend especially if i stitch at all during the car ride to and from NY (whichever one I'm not driving for).

Well it's a half day at work so I'm busy of course - then shopping this afternoon before driving back to NY for dinner (plans keep changing). So i best get to it!

Well I did it, I got my homework done last night, nothing else but at least that's done. Unfortunately I was too tired to get up and run this morning so I've only got 3 days of running in so far, I do plan on running tomorrow and sunday however.

Tonight I actually get to leave work at a normal time (5pm) and I'm going over to stitch with friends! I can't wait, a nice relaxing night is exactly what I need, I just hope I don't fall asleep. Last night when I started doing my homework I immediately fell asleep and had to be woken. I'm am just worn out.

But it's thursday - that means there is only friday before the weekend is here, even if it is a very busy weekend where I won't get to sleep in at all. I think I will have time in the car maybe to sleep :) Well off to conquer the day, leaving at 5 should make the day feel like it's short!

Day 3 -

Running that is, I somehow managed to drag myself out of bed this morning (albeit a half hour later than the days before) and still run, a little farther each morning now.

Last night when I got home at 8 from work (and gilmore girls was an old one - boo), I tried to read for school but ended up just falling asleep (no I did do laundry first so that's a bonus). Finally I dragged myself to bed at 10:30 and picked up Eldest and couldn't put it down again - I did manage at 11 to make myself go to sleep though. I'm so close to the end of Eldest, I just have to finish that this weekend! Tonight - another late night at work and homework when I get home.

Round Robin:

I stitched the sea horse and started the outline of the blue empty square which will be a bird before I am finished with this piece completely. I'm hoping with probably 3 lunch stitching days this week I can almost finish this, plus I have a stitch night Thursday night since I have no class (spring break week) so I'm pretty optimistic.

Last night I spent the entire evening reading - getting close to the end of Eldest now and I love this trilogy (even if it's missing it's last book still) I don't know what I will read next that could keep me this entertained. I read for 2 1/2 hours last night and had to force myself to go to bed so I could get up and run (day two running in the mornings!)

Tonight I have homework to do when I get home but hopefully I can also get a little more reading in :)

Picture coming tomorrow.

I did manage to stitch a little this weekend, working on the second RR piece I have. I didn't take a piece because the seahorse that I stitched just needs to be backstitched and that will be finished, then I will just have the bird to stitch but i'd like to at least have the seahorse finished before I take a pic. I hope to finish that at lunch today.

The rest of the weekend went really well, we had family up and had a great time with them saturday, friday i got everything done that I wanted to get done even after getting a migraine (took some excedrin migraine and that helped plus gave me a caffeine boost to get me through the night) :)

Yesterday I relaxed, took a nap after a late breakfast, got some homework done and then stitched while watching lots of ER's :) It was a very good weekend.

I plan on working pretty late the next few nights and working on homework in the evenings so I won't make much stitching progress this week but maybe I can still manage to finish up this RR before the weekend so I can mail it next week.

A long night indeed but first - Celebrations.

I finally sent in my celebrations registration, I am taking Catheryn's Pyn Pillow on Saturday, attending the Saturday night event and the Sunday round robin. This was a compromise with my sister as she is coming up to attend with me for the whole weekend.

I may still sign up for one more class - on Friday morning I think - Know Your Knot, I'm going to wait a bit because it's also offered thursday and if anyone wants to take it with me i could take it either day.


I just finally solved the mystery of my perpetually wet rug in my bedroom - the steam radiator which I know leaks water around it's base actually shoots water out the steam release in an arc and wets the rug. I thought the water was puddling and running to the rug but the floor between the radiator and rug were never wet so I was baffled - i've seen it with my won eyes now! This thing is surely going to ruin the wood floors it's dripping and puddling all around - not my house though :)

Well the long night - i was at school until after 11 last night working with my group on our next assignment. I didn't get to bed until after midnight some time and i'm exausted but by working from home I can work until 12:30 or so straight and then be done for the day and start cleaning and cooking. I forgot I also have to get my brother a gift tonight some time...

Strange things were happening with blogger today - couldn't get in this morning. But it's working again.

I was looking up Michael Powell designs today (a few minutes ago actually) - because I really like them - especially the 2 flower pot ones, but also the cottages (mini's too) and the really large ones. But when I saw the prices! Holy Cow! I just could never justify spending 94 dollars on a kit when I'd rather buy just the chart and use the floss and stuff I can get for 5/dollar.

Does anyone know what type of floss is used on these? Are they silks or something? Is the fabric made of gold???

More importantly, is there anyway to buy just the charts instead of the kits as I would prefer that anyway, especially with the stash I have, if i had all kits I'd have no place to sit in my apartment but charts can be stored nicely in binders for whenever I do get around to stitching them. Maybe in a few years when i get around to having free room in my "to do" list I will reconsider the astronomical prices for these kits but for now I will just have to look fondly on as others stitch some of this beautiful artwork as my money is best spent elsewhere!

On non stitching news - I'm considering working from home tomorrow due to my check engine light being on, i think actually it's best if i do if i have work i can do from home which i do. Then i can get my car checked on sunday to find out if it's anything to worry about or not... which reminds me.. i have emails to send...

March Goals:

1) Add name/country to little girl RR
2) Finish seaside RR
3) Work on Going To Market
4) Work on Peaceful Sillhouette
5) Start applique of baby quilt
6) Start piecing baby quilt blocks

That's all i can plan on with the amount of homework i will have this month and with my work deadline being April 5th i know work will just be picking up regularly!

A busy night :) But I do have something to show for it at least!

Last night I worked until 8 - I dont' know what happened, I was ready to leave at 5! But it was good and I'm glad I stayed because we accomplished a lot. When I got home my boyfriend still had his study group over so I got my stamping stuff and moved to the bedroom to make some cards while catching the end of gilmore girls.

So here is what I made:



Now I just have some birthday cards on my list of things to make, unfortunately that probably won't happen until next week as things are getting booked quickly. Tonight I'll be at my uncle's and doing homework, tomorrow I have class and then a group meeting after, friday i have to clean because all my family is coming over saturday and sunday I might be headed up to my other uncle's in NH to get my check engine light checked and give my cousin the dress I made her. Yup - looks busy!