Finished Bine's RR!

Added the squirrel and flowers last night! Here's a picture of almost the whole piece, I couldn't fit Bine's house in on the scanner but my house is the one on the right. It's a mixture of pieces, let's see what i remember...
The house is enlarged (to match the others) and from Colonial Homes by Little House Needleworks. The pinetree/grass/flowers is from Bent Creek's The Seasons.

This piece was a lot of fun to stitch, i love that it's in a row! Oh and it's not really crooked, that's just how it got "pushed" when I closed the scanner.

The week is going well so far, leaving work by 5, going home to run/walk on the treadmill, eating dinner and relaxing! Tonight I go to my aunt's house and I have my book to read as well as my embroidery!

Happy Almost Thanksgiving :)

I'm working a 1/2 day today and then we're heading back to NY to do the family thing for 4 days. I really need the break so i'm looking forward to it!

I won't have much stitching time so I'm not bringing Bine's RR with me, I'll do embroidery in the car instead but Bine's RR is still coming along. I finished the large pine tree and just have to figure out what wildlife are living in the yard :) I'll finish it up next week during the evenings!

Hopefully I'll have a picture of Leanne's block 8 after this holiday weekend to show!

Deb's RR arrived safe and sound! Sunday when I was no longer contagious I opened it up to take a peek as well! It looks like a lot of fun!

Also on Sunday I worked on Bine's RR, starting on the landscaping around the house!
Bine's RR is in a row of houses and it's quite fun. After this fun pine tree I can't wait to figure out what critters to add to the front yard in keeping with the rest of the houses!

So I'm pretty much recovered. The doctor said it was strep and put me on an antibiotic. So now I'm no longer contagious as well as feeling much better. I'm back to work (for 3 days this week anyway) :) And raring to go!

Oh and another picture hopefully tomorrow or wednesday, I put together a table runner with new fabric from the quilt show and I can't wait to quilt it! I have to figure out the binding fabrics, probably end up piecing a binding from leftovers.

Out of commission -

It's been since Tuesday really that I've been feeling bad, by Wednesday I had to leave work early because the pain of sitting in a chair was too much. Yesterday and Today are just plain old sick days, i've never needed so much sick time in a row in my life. I've got a doctor appt today to try to figure out what this is..

mostly it's a sore throat, sore neck, sore head, sore back. The throat is the worst and I can hardly eat anything (mostly drink but even that really hurts). No other real symptoms except for maybe a fever or something that's making me have cold sweats. Life is only doable when I'm on ibuprofen unfortunately but at least that's something. I'm waiting for some to kick in now so I can eat some breakfast.

So this means no stitching so far, it's just too painful to sit upright, I've been watching movies, reading and sleeping - maybe today I can be a little more productive but i doubt it. The good news is I might at least find out what this is today and then know how long before I'm better.

Boo hoo for me.

Oh and with all this rain, my occupants of Bine's Neighborhood have gotten flooded out completely, luckily some very nice neighbors have taken them in temporarily while they wait for their roof to be completed. I've promised them by this weekend they should have a dry house.
*wink*

My start on Bine's NRR:

Unfortunately I was feeling too sick last night to continue stitching on this, i'm bringing it to my aunt's tonight in the hope I can put a few hours in. This cold is wiping me out - I'm so achy and tired yet clear headed which is odd for a cold. So I'm staying on pain medicine to see if that helps, so far my neck doesn't hurt so badly (just a sore throat) but my back and head still hurt. Atleast that's 1 less pain.

My decision with regards to work has been made. I've switched my schedule and i'm now working 7:30-5pm and after 5 I'm not checking email at all. No work on weekends either. So far I haven't been able to really enjoy my evenings since this cold is wiping me out but I'm sure I'd be feeling worse with this cold if I wasn't getting the time I'm relaxing and sleeping. So it's all for the good. OH and Monday I walked for 40 minutes, last night I was in too much pain but I hope to get back to it tomorrow for sure.

Kicking myself for no picture and I actually stitched a bit :(

This weekend was tough emotionally. Things at work have been stressful for going on 8 months now. Things have been beyond stressful for the last 4 months. I burned out last summer after a similar time (May-July killed me and August was horrible) now I'm just repeating the same with Sep-Nov killing me.

So friday I went to "The Gathering" with my aunt, it's a quilt show and it was great, but I was stressed most of the time that I was not working. Friday night my fiance and I went out to dinner to celebrate him getting a job offer for next year - very exciting! And after that I decided to just give up for the night and read book 6 in the Sookie series.

Well saturday I was stressed since i hadn't worked and I had a bit of a breakdown. I remember having one last summer so I know I'm just repeating and need to start taking care of myself.

So Sunday in an effort to forget work my fiance and I played Civ 4 for most of the day/night. It was very distracting and fun.

Oh and saturday night around 8pm we popped in P&P and I got a few hours stitching time in on Bine's NRR! The house is now started, I think I'm almost to the roof. I'll try to get a picture shortly. I really need to get cracking on this one as time is running out for November! Yikes!

So I will get a pic soon, and hopefully I can work on it some more.

As for taking care of myself.. I'm talking to some people at work today to get some advice and as far as ME goes - I'm going to get home at a reasonable hour and run everyday. I'm going to go to yoga again and I'm gong to stop working weekends. I just can't do it all and the holidays are coming. I need to laugh it off and stop worrying about other people so much :(

No stitching last night....
because my books arrived from amazon! I read number 5 in the Sookie series - from 8pm-1am and some how still managed to rise this morning.

These books are so great. I also got the Fitzwilliam Darcy trilogy that I can't wait to start this weekend after I've finished all of the current Sookie books that are out.

More info on the sookie books (and others) can be found at my reading blog.

hmm.. it's tuesday, i have a ton of work to do - but all i can think about is reading.. not good!

Oh and I finally started some wedding planning. I won't post anything in this blog about it until I'm actually making things to show (such as flower girl dresses) but it will start taking a bit of free time to do the planning. So far we have a potential list of invitees... step 1!

A weekend away.

That's right, we finally left the house this past weekend :) A visit back home was in order, so we spent 80% of the weekend driving and the rest visiting :) I didn't get much stitching done, with allergy problems (every place we visited had pets and we're both allergic), i couldn't manage much.

I did do a LITTLE embroidery on block 8 of Leanne's BOM. Then last night I started on Bine's Neighborhood RR, I got 2 trees done and I'm ready to start the house now. I love that this one is layed out in a row of houses! I was actually hoping my SB&B order would arrive in time for me to stitch a new house I ordered but something is on hold so I had to move along without it. All well.

So all in all it was a fun if not tiring (due to allergies) weekend with some minor stitching. Next weekend we are staying home and Friday is the Gathering (quilt show) so I'm hoping to have a very inspired craft weekend!

Pictures!!

First here's the Shepherd's Purse, finished except for beading and initials:


And here are my first pair of curtains! They came out great! I can't believe I got them even along the bottom and everything. These are the largest curtains I have to make so they are the hardest too right?? :) I love this fabric!

The curtains didn't take long, maybe an hour and a half. I have fabric for the kitchen curtain and then I have to figure out what to do about my sewing room because it has 3 windows, so i'd need 8 yards of fabric - kind of a problem... unless I do three different curtains...

Next up on the list is either the kitchen curtain or the table cloth for the diningroom.

Note to self on curtains: The walking foot is your friend!

October Goal Recap:

1) Stitch Bine's NRR and mail [Nope] -I'm actually waiting for some charts I ordered from SB&B, they are taking particularly long to get here!
2) Finish piecing Leanne's block 9 [YES]
3) Sew the singer costume for other cousin [YES]
4) Start embroidery on block 8 [Not yet :(]

I did however stitch a new piece! Shepherd's Bush Purse, the stitching is complete and it's awaiting the beading!

November Goals:
1) Stitch Bine's NRR and mail
2) Start embroidery on block 8
3) Sew Curtains
4) Sew table cloth
5) Add beads to Shepherd's Purse