Still alive and kicking... trying to beat the heat .. holy moly it's hot out - and our A/C is not working in the new apartment!!! I basically can't do much at home, i lay there and try to work but I'm too hot for the most part.

And some news .. we bought a "new" car! It's not new new, it's a 2000 BMW 328 with ~ 40,000 miles on it. We're hoping to get it before the end of the week, if we can go sign the paperwork tonight. Yippee - I really like hte BMW 3 series!

Tonight I go over to my aunt's house - and they have A/C so maybe I'll even get a little stitching done. Tomorrow night is stitch night down in Lexington, I'm most likely going to hit that up so I can see all my friends, it's been so long (except for those I saw on Sunday). And this weekend is busy busy - I can't wait!

I love summer, especially the eary summer! The cool mornings - sitting here with the door to the porch open and cool air coming in while I work laying on the couch... ah!

This weekend was great! I got the apartment completely cleaned and organized before my sister even arrived on Saturday so I was stress free! Then she and I went wedding dress shopping!

I tried on 4 dresses and while I really liked 3 of them, 2 of them are in the actual choosing. The one I think I like the best they only had in a size too large so I couldn't get the right idea about how it would look from behind - the front she was able to pull so we could see how that would look. I have a year and 2 months so I'm not in a rush and I really didn't expect to just pick a wedding dress already because I was very very picky about certain things - but it turns out when you go in and say "I want this, this this and none of this, this or this" they can just give you what you want - sometimes!

So that was fun! And when we got back (after doing other shopping as well) we started cutting out ideas and pictures to put in my wedding planning scrapbook. Including pictures of the two dresses, bouquets and cakes.

Enough about that - Sunday was my party and everyone made it - it was great! The only hitch was that the road/complex sign had been taken down for maintenance so everyone had trouble finding the place - what are the chances!!! I swear, I'm cursed, my last party at my old apartment (over a year ago) - they happened to close the roads in town that day and everyone got lost!

The party was fun and I think everyone had a good time, it was done and over with by 5:40 and I was able to clean up and relax by 6! It was great. Then after dinner and some tv I spent a few hours working which has made today stress free because I got my code working last night and now I'm just tweaking things!

Oh what a great weekend. Now back to a normal life with stitching! I can't wait to start Carol's RR this week!

Party!!

I know I've been slacking in the blogging world lately. Things have been busy! And there's no stitching to report, I haven't touched it!

I'm having a party on Sunday! A couple of my friends and a bunch of family are coming over, this party was my incentive to get completely unpacked in a month and I managed to do so! Last night with the bookcase finished I was able to "finish" my craft room! My bedroom is now finished with the new dresser!

I just have to pick up the livingroom and diningroom, move some stuff to the basement and clean! Cleaning will be tomorrow morning and moving things to the basement I'll do today! I'm very excited - can you tell by all my exclamation points :)

The party is 2pm on Sunday and I have some baking and preparing I will be doing tomorrow night and sunday morning. My sister is coming tomorrow and we're going to do some shopping - including shopping for a Bridal Dress! My first official wedding related shopping trip :) So that should be fun too.

Pictures of the craft room and other finished rooms will be coming very soon!

Yeah the dresser is done:
Here's the dresser all done and already in use, although we don't use the tv when we're in bed at least we can now see it (the bottom of our bed is very high).

Last night I put the second coat on the bookcase and I'm hoping tonight to do the last coat on that! That will leave only the sofa table unfinished and maybe by the end of the summer I'll have finished that :)

No stitching or anything to show :( I do hope soon to get back to stitching as I have Carol's RR to start up!!

I forgot to post a picture.. I will post it tomorrow. I finished the dresser this weekend! Knobs and all! And I got one coat of poly on the bookcase which took about 45 minutes so I think I can handle the last two coats Monday and Tuesday this week!

Also this weekend I got some old closet shelves from my dad and sanded and painted them (they were really really old and ratty!) I'm looking forward to adding them to my closet tonight and organizing my craft room closet a little, getting that room a little closer to done!

So pictures coming tomorrow for sure! I hope to have a very productive night!

No news, last night I went to my cousin's middle school graduation, then out to dinner. It was a nice but late evening. We got back around 10:30, after help fix up the new router for my uncle I crashed.

Got in to work early today though and hopefully I'll have a good day, leave at 3:30 to beat traffic, work a bit more from home and then finish the dresser! Then tomorrow we drive back to NY to see family - oh man i have to get some father's day gifts tonight!!!

Well I haven't done anything more with the furniture but I figured I'd show some more pictures. Here are the bookcase and sofa table, first unfinished and second - stained (no poly still).
The shelves are separate.
Here it is stained.
Sofa table - behind the couch where it will stand when it's finished.
And stained. These two pieces are sitting in a dark area indoors waiting to be finished - hopefully this weekend i can start on them. The dresser still needs one coat of poly :( I'm hoping Friday night I'll be motivated enough to finish that and put a coat on one side of the bookcase shelves.

No stitching but I did work on my craft room last night, I unpacked all my stamping supplies and put them in the cubes that I bought at ACMoore. The stamps take up 2 shelves on a bookcase and everything else fits in my organizer cubes. I've rearranged things and made a place for the above bookcase to go. I can't wait to finish this room!

Well that was a busy weekend - didn't really feel like a break. But I did get some stuff done (no stitching) -- here's my finished quilt hanger - please excuse the messy craft room, it's the only room not unpacked yet. And the microwave cart is also finished....
And already put to use!
I also got the dresser almost finished, it needs one more coat of poly tonight, then I have to do all the knobs, which are stained but no poly yet. I want to put them on the drawers sticking out before I poly them.

And lastly I finished staining the sofa table and bookcase last night so they both need 3 coats of poly - this is the last time I buy shaker style furniture UNFINISHED! All those bars are killer! But I will love these pieces when they are done!

More pics as more furniture is finished and hopefully soon I will have time again to stitch. Besides furniture I worked a bit this weekend and I think that's it. Tonight includes a trip to ACMoore to take advantage of some sales! I can't wait!!!

Well with the onset of the diet and exercise again I've started a new work schedule as well. I've decided to work from 8:30-4:30 (with an hour break for the gym) - and then go home to have dinner with my fiance. Then work from home for 2-3 hours in the peace and quiet of my office/sewing room.

This does cut out stitching time a bit but I still get a little time during the dinner break. Last night I pulled out my fishy pin from Celebrations - knotwork and worked on that a bit. I'd like to make some progress on my Celebrations pieces this weekend before starting Carol's RR but we'll see - it's hard to stay away from it!

Well back to work - it's amazing how I can get more work done in 2 hours at home than 4 hours here! Then add in the meetings and the day is just insane!

Wow thanks everyone for the great comments on my RR. I'm very happy with it and I'm very excited to stitch on Carol's next. I think I have a house pattern picked out - I will have to change the colors but that's easy, I just need to figure out the measurements for the house to see what I can fit in a block!

All finished and ready to mail tomorrow!
I ended up doing a lot more landscaping than I had anticipated but I really loved pulling different flowers from different patterns and then making some up (okay I only made one up - the little purple ones and they're just smyrnas). The veggies are all over one (so is the bunny) so that really took me a while.
And here's a picture of most of the layout. It's 10 squares, the last square will either be stitched by a close friend or I'll add a saying of some sort with everyone's names or something at the end. I will also add a title when it comes back home next year.
So this is off tomorrow to Leslie.

All in all my day went okay, I slept through a lot of it, then took some Excedrin migraine and after eating I started feeling better. I did a little unpacking (filled our bookcase) and then sat to stitch and listen to my audiobook around 4. I'm afraid I may have worn myself right back out with that 40ct (my eyes are very sensitive with migraines) so I'm going to relax before bed now.

Oh and even better - Carol's RR arrived today! I can start on that straight away!! Now to go post my pictures on the RR blog!

Out sick...

I woke with a horrible migraine today so I won't be posting my usual monday morning progress pic but i do have progress to share and i'll share tomorrow. I'm hoping to have my neighborhood RR finished up tonight or tomorrow night to mail out and even with the over one stitching in the veggie garden (which is done) i think i can manage!

June Goals:
1) Finish Neighborhood RR and mail out!
2) Finish Leanne's block 7!
3) Start Carol's NRR
4) Frame Peaceful Silhouette!

May Wrapup:
1) Finish Leanne's block 7 [nope]
2) Frame Peaceful Silhouette [nope]
4) Start Neighborhood RR [YUP]
3) Work on Celtic Banner?? [nope]

I tried to keep it light for myself but things at work really got in the way I had absolutely no stitching time this month.. but that is all going to change this month!!!

Am i crazy???

Well I got home kind of late last night but I did manage to stitch a little. No picture though because there isn't much new to see. I finished the second tree, added some grass and added a bunny.

I am hoping to stitch a vegetable garden near the bunny and the pattern I'm using had the bunny 10x10 - that's kind of big so I decided to stitch it over 1 - well now i have to do the whole veggie garden over 1 to match! YIKES! Whatever I do on the other side of the pathway will not be over one, maybe just some bushes or something.. hmm.. I need to plan this out.

Tonight it's unpacking and then relaxing - maybe with some over 1 40ct stitching - hehehe.