Birthday Treats!

First of all - I received this absolutely beautiful - amazing - fob from Carol! I saw Dani stitch this and I knew it was a must stitch for me eventually and now I have it already finished! I absolutely love it - here's some pics:
And the other side:
Here's a picture of the gift my aunt got me - it's a beautiful chart for a quilt which includes an embroidered center piece about the Seasons - I love seasons! And some gorgeous fabrics!
And from my best friend - A Cake decorating kit!! Plus some super sticky tape for making the dvd boxes she's going to teach me to make!
Tulips from another friend and the cards I've received. I really feel loved on this birthday!
Last night was such a surprise! I went to go out to dinner with my best friend and it turned out to be 6 of my friends (our stitching group) - 2 couldn't make it but we had a blast! It was 3 hours of relaxing with great friends (and eating good chinese food of course). I was so thrilled.

I guess the birthday doesn't end yet either, my sister and her boyfriend are coming up this weekend to celebrate over night on saturday and my mom is going to try to come out, then my brother might come by for the night as well after his baseball games. My mom got me a gift card to IKEA!! That will be great once I've moved and I have new space to fill (hopefully) :)
I really think this is the best birthday ever!

Well I wanted to dedicate this post to the generous gifts I've received, I am truly truly thankful! I'm working from home today so that by 4:30 I can start cleaning around the apartment for company and doing any more packing I can get away with. I'm also planning on going running outside because the weather is amazing! What a beautiful day - now - back to work :)

So close and yet...


First I want to say THANK YOU For all the birthday wishes. It really was a great birthday, one of the very best.

Secondly - I am finally showing my progress on Peaceful Sihouette. The next picture will be stitching complete for sure as there is only one color left to fill in (half stitches) on the bottom right. I'm VERY excited! 4 nights of working on this from 1 1/2-2 1/2 hours and it's almost completed.

BUT THEN - I realized I had an error... not a minor one either - I accidentally used dark brown (2 strands!) in the tweeding instead of regular brown for what I stitched last night - it's not a lot darker but it definitely shows. I am undecided if I will leave it - or my other alternative is to take one strand of regular brown and stitch over that whole area. I'll decide after I actually finish it and see it all together ... OOPS!

Anyway - so there's my progress. Tonight I don't think I'll have stitching time, I'm going out to dinner with a friend and friday I have to clean but probably this weekend!

Birthday...

Yesterday was my birthday and it was a great day. I got home from work around 6:40 and I'll leave the rest to the pictures:
This is what I came home to - freshly made (and VERY YUMMY)!
My gift (actually got that first thing in the morning) - it's a subscription to Martha Stewart Living which I secretly wanted :)
My home made pizza (my absolute favorite) and he even picked up orange soda for me!
I picked out 5 favorites and my fiance got to pick the one he'd tolerate the most - he actually likes Notting Hill so he picked that one.
And this is how my movie/stitching night started - Some wonderful pizza and soda, lots of laughing (I love Notting Hill) and a very good amount of stitching - Peaceful Silhouette. I know I haven't posted a progress pic - yesterday was a non-blog day and today I have so many other pics to share I'll post one tomorrow.

Off to my aunt's for the night tonight, I'm looking forward probably some shopping at Kohl's and then some dinner out.

A necklace and Ebay...

First a necklace - this is the necklace I made Saturday night, it is a birthday gift for my fiance's sister. I really like how it came out, if it was for me I'd make it much shorter but I'm a very small person so I was more generous with then length. This took forever!

There's a lot of wire work (all new to me) and I basically wrapped each stone chip individually creating the hoops as I went and connecting each one very slowly!

And on Ebay I sold my first item! It was a pair of headphones we had as a duplicate gift and they sold very quickly for buy it now. I will be shipping them off tomorrow!

Last night I finally stitched! I will post a progress pic tomorrow - Peaceful Silhouette, I hope to also stitch on it tonight. I really want to get this finished and with so little stitching time I was really getting worried. Plus there was a wopper of a mistake and I was trying to ignore it but I finally figured it out last night and it's not that bad, I think I can work around it and not make many changes.

Well back to a busy work week. Probably working late today - but at least I ran this morning!

Ebay - and Magazines

Well I have finally made the move to do some selling on ebay. I was going to start packing up my closet and I looked up to my top shelf and saw all the magazines I moved out here with me that I have not touched in 3 years!

So I've decided to go through them and if I don't find more than 1 pattern I'd stitch I'm adding it to the sell pile. I'm giving ebay a try - I've uploaded some small groups of magazines, they're expensive to ship (heavy) though so I'm doing Flat Rate Priority. This is all new to me.. .we'll see how it goes.

I was thinking I'd list a few on my blog as well, especially ones that don't group well. Going through these takes forever though!

If you're interested in looking at my auctions - my username is "groudn" on ebay!

Working from home today - no bad weather like predicted but this way i'm home already at 5:30 when it's time to go to dinner for my fiance's birthday. And i get a full day with little to know interruption of work in. Unless you call laundry an interruption.

Back to work!

Stitching, what's that...

No stitching still.. probably not until Friday and this weekend unfortunately. Tonight I need to figure out something small to get my fiance for his birthday (tomorrow) nothing like putting something off to the last second. Then we'll probably watch a little more Pretender Season 1.

Tomorrow night we're going to the mall for his birthday and then to dinner. So Friday will be my first night home relaxing and hopefully stitching - maybe adding beads to Barnabee or working on Peaceful Silhouette.

So nothing fun last night, just worked late and watched some pretender while sorting through my audiobooks and downloading some missing ones.

Worked late... no stitching...

Last night I left work pretty early (4pm) and went and got my hair cut. Then I settled in for the evening to continue working. I just wanted to get home before we had people coming to look at the apartment. I ended up working until 10pm and then I read for a half hour before bed.

Ahh that reminds me, I wanted to start a reading blog... to keep track of the books I've read and if I enjoyed them etc. I too often get books confused with each other.

I am SO SORE today from lifting yesterday, it was great though and I'm so glad to be back on the diet and exercise and doing well. Tonight I need to run, didn't run yesterday but I can make up for that :)

Barnabee just needs beads!


I finished the backstitching last night, beads are all that's left to finish this one up! And last week I ordered Lady Scarlet's Journey (the three charts). I will save the finishing on Barnabee until I finish Scarlet as well and then figure out how i want to finish them together.

Weekend update --
Horror of Horrors Friday night. I got home from work around 10pm and needed to make the princess hat to match the princess dress I made two months ago (the birthday party got delayed). So I take out the dress to just iron the hem quick - but the iron was on a Cotton setting and next thing I know I have a HUGE hole at the bottom of the dress! And it's after 10pm!

Well a little fabric glue and some extra fabric patched the hole.. I really should have ripped out a bit of the stripe and resewn it but I just had no time, it was too late. So I made the matching hat and just lived with it.

Saturday my sister and I went up to celebrate birthdays and easter with family, the 3 yr old loved the dress and hat, the kids were great, it was a great time.

Sunday was a low key day - saturday night was a late night because my fiance had friends over to celebrate his birthday and they stayed up till 3am, which meant i was up till 3am. So I was fighting headaches all day sunday, but I did manage to do that little bit of backstitching on Barnabee.

Tonight my goal is to maybe do the beads, not sure if I will have time or how I will feel.

As promised...
Off to Easter :)

Totally spaced.. on the picture of the quilt that is. I will try to take one tonight before it gets given away :)

Unfortunately I got home last night with a headache and went right to bed at 9pm. I did read a bit but the headache would not go away. Today has been a busy work day (still at work and it's 7pm) but I should be leaving shortly (7:30 maybe??) and meeting my fiance for dinner and then a quick shopping trip.

I'm not sure all the cleaning i wanted to do will get done tonight but I can get up tomorrow and clean before my sister comes and we head up to celebrate easter with family. That's my plan and i'm sticking to it :)

For now I will eat some skittles and try to get out of here!

Finished the Baby Quilt! I will try to take a picture tonight to post tomorrow!

I spent a few hours last night listening to my audio book and finishing the binding on the quilt. I'm listening to "The Tenth Circle" by Jodi Picoult which I'm of course enjoying immensly.

Then I read for an hour, I'm reading "Perfect Match" by the same author. Not a great before bed book but whatever.

It was a great night but I wasn't feeling well and wasn't very social after dinner (went up and read). But I'm feeling fine today and I have stitch tonight with a friend so I hope to work on Barnabee and maybe by this weekend get that finished up so I can switch over to Peaceful Silhouette completely.

I can't believe it's only Thursday :( For some reason this feels like a long week. I really need to go to the gym tomorrow as I will be up late friday cleaning!

Quilt almost finished!!

Well I got home by 5 last night and after getting my taxes done finally I then moved on to the baby quilt! I finished all the quilting and then squared it up and added the binding which I then started tacking down. I'm about a 1/3 done with that and hope to finish it tonight! That's one thing I can cross off my list!

Sometimes things just work out. Now if i could just finish the website and then the xstitch for my fiance for graduation I'll have no more obligations! That's my goal by mid may or sooner.

Taxes were a serious hit financially but I kind of expected it so I was all ready for it. And if i can finish the website I'll be making up for the taxes for sure.

Well work work work - time to see what I have going on for today!

As Promised - progress on Barnabee:

This is after Friday and Saturday night stitch. Sorry the scan is so crooked. The next pic will hopefully be a finished one! This one went really fast. All i have left is the backstitched saying and the honey comb backstitching with a little bit on the bees and butterflies a the bottom.. Then the beading!

I worked a ton on the website yesterday. I'm very happy where i am on that and I think I can finish it up maybe next weekend. I have a kink with the emailing still but hopefully i can resolve that when I do the payment processing anyway.

I worked on quilting the border of the baby quilt. I got the triangles all around done then I did one side of diamonds. My hope is to finish that tonight and *maybe* even add the binding too??? But I do have tomorrow night. Then I can hand stitch the binding the rest of the week and have it done before Saturday!

And now it's back to work - feeling loads better from my cold last week! I'm hoping to keep the week relatively light as I've been overworking so much but we'll see how it goes!

Stitch last night was great, I worked on Barnabee and I got the roses all done! All that's left is the last backstitched saying and the honeycomb row, then the beading throughout! This piece is lovely and I'd really like to do Lady Scarlett as a companion some day soon (of course I have to get those patterns first). I think I will finish this as a bell pull, not sure yet, I need to be on the look out for some pretty bee fabric for the back first. I probably will not finish this until the summer (after we move) anyway.

And after this piece, I will focus on Peaceful Silhouette until that's finished then I have a new pattern to start - not sure which, there's so much to choose from!

Well gotta work on the website today! I played some Elebits on the wii all morning - love that game! Now if i can get the website someplace I can then quilt later! Wish me luck...

April Goals:

1) Finish Barnabee!
2) Finish Peaceful Silhouette!
3) Finish Baby Quilt before Easter!
4) Start a new xstitch piece!
5) Finish Leanne's block 7
6) Piece Leanne's block 8
7) Piece Leanne's block 9

That seems like a lot but I want to try to take it easy this month with work and what better focus than my crafts! Plus May will be my packing up month to move up to Nashua (end of May) so i have to get my crafting in early :)

Pictures come monday...

Well yesterday was a much needed day. I spent hours listening to an audiobook (Jodi Piccoult's Tenth Circle) and stitching on Barnabee. I've gotten the center garden on part III finished and all I have left is the roses, the last saying and the last honeycomb row. I'm very excited that this piece will be finished pretty soon. I'll scan in a pic on monday.

Then we went out to dinner with a friend of my fiance's last night and we watched "You, Me and Dupree" which i thought was pretty funny. Today I'm just getting to work on the website now and I'm going over to my friends' for stitch at 5pm. Tomorrow I'll most certainly have to work on the site more but we'll see how it goes today.

I also talked to my mom and she's going to start quilting her baby quilt this weekend. I need to get mine done by next Saturday so I can give it to her to take back home in case the babies are born soon. So hopefully tomorrow I can square away some machine quilting time!

Well - website time!

Sick day (for real) and March Goals Recap:

Well today I took a real sick day - no computer, no logging on to work (except to make sure nothing crazy is going on of course). We delivered our document last night so the deadline passed and considering I felt horrible this morning I decided to stay home and stay away from the computer and tv for a whole day.

The tv part is no problem, i have an audio book going and I'm stitching away on little Barnabee! What a happy day. I did a little cleaning and picking up too so the day is not wasted and tomorrow is the weekend! I can't wait, I will work work work on the website and I will stitch with friends. Sunday I will quilt.. oh what fun!

And now - how did I do on my goals this month:
1) Finish Part II of Barnabee and start Part III - YES
2) Finish Leanne's block 6 YES
3) Piece Leanne's block 9 nope not yet
4) Start applique on Leanne's block 7 YES - finished applique!
5) Finish all half stitching on Peaceful Silhouette nope - for some reason i want to finish Barnabee first now
6) Make baby quilt for mom's friend - Almost completed, border quilting and binding are all that's left!

Sick day - kind of, not really...

Well I tried to stay home sick today but ended up working a full day anyway, just from home is all. But the sleeping in helped immensely and I'm on DayQuil now so I'm feeling okay and I'm going to stitch for a bit - been almost 2 weeks since i did any cross stitch.. so I'm pulling out Barnabee to see what kind of progress I can make on part III finally!

And my friends are getting together for stitch saturday night - i can't wait! I'd like to bring barnabee to that probably.

I'm going to keep work as a light day tomorrow if i can, so I can come home and relax. Then saturday I'll work on the website all day until going to stitch. Sunday I'll try to finish the website and then I need to finish the baby quilt! I will need the coming week to add the binding! man time has flown by on that!

i hurt all over....

yup that's right - i got sick - a really nasty cold that comes with horrible pain (even aleve isn't helping) and did we make our deadline yesterday - NOPE..

so i'm at work, trying to help us deliver today or tomorrow. If it's tomorrow I won't be involved so i have to do everything today - i'm taking a sick day tomorrow... i need to sleep!

Almost over ...

I can tell because last night I got to read for an hour before bedtime! I finished working a little after 9pm for a change.. oh how nice! And tonight should be even sooner!

My car is in the shop to get the timing belt changed. It will cost a LOT but then my car can go another 80K which will be another ~5-6 years! So today all the stress should be lifted (car and work) and tonight I plan on ... dare i say it... stitching?!

Now to get back to the grind - 3pm is our deadline!

Nap Time...

That's what happened to me today. So I ended up staying over at my uncle's last night. We slept on the pull out couch. I didn't go to bed until about midnight and unfortunatly at 6:45 I heard pitter patter and *wispers*. Two of them (the oldest and youngest) were up and about. They kept running in, looking over the couch to see if we were sleeping and then running off into the other room. The oldest keeping the youngest quiet the whole time and berading her for asking "why" too much - it was cute - but it was also 6:45 on a sunday morning!

Finally by 7:30 they couldn't hold off anymore and I had 3 little munchkins jumping on me and giggling. By 8 I had given up trying to fall back asleep and we left around 9.

The day was going well, I got some work done, then we went out for a late lunch and some shopping. Came back and I was so stuffed from lunch that I fell asleep for 3 hours! I'm sure not getting enough sleep last night was part of it. But since 6 I've been back online trying to get all my work done. I was hoping for some me time later tonight but it won't happen. At least I got out to Linens N Things (I had a gift card) and got some fun kitchen stuff....
I got :
-a small metal strainer, good for getting the yuckies out of drippings on a roast.
-A really nice baster with a cleaning brush
-Meat thermometer - digital, with a wire so you stick it in and the the wire can run outside of the oven to the digital reader and alert you when the meat hits the right temp
-Can opener
I guess I'm in the mood for cooking a roast of some sorts :) It was fun though. I also got a new mattress pad. I promised myself when I got a new mattress 3 years ago that the cheap 20 dollar mattress pad would get replaced by something better in a few years. That time is now and I can't wait to put it on tonight! My cheap one doesn't stay on anymore, the mesh has ripped in the corners.

Wow this is long - i'm just stalling. Back to work. Look out for crazy stitching later this week! I hope!

Stitching deprived...

That's how I'm feeling. I didn't realize it had been so long (since last monday night and that was just quilting at the machine) - but I was catching up on blogs and all the stitching going on made me realize how much I miss it. It will be a short while longer before I get to stitch though - soon hopefully but a few more days.

Babysitting went just fine today. Of course there were ups and downs (there are 3 of them) but the day went pretty smoothly and no one got hurt (most importantly not me). I haven't figured out if I'm staying over or just going home tonight - it's already 8pm (the kids are being put to bed).

Tomorrow will be work work work. I want to work on the website and I have regular work to get done as well. Maybe if I'm lucky and manage my time well I can do a little something for myself at some point. But Tuesday is my work deadline so after catching up on sleep, by thursday and friday I should be stitching again - especially if I take a day off work to just relax. Plus I need to get that baby quilt done still!

Of course the stress of the past 2 weeks is hitting me pretty hard now that I've taken a day away from it all. It will be very hard to get myself to actually get out of bed tomorrow. :(

Well just popping on quick, I know I'm usually better about blogging but work has been insane - beyond insane. Last monday night was the last time I did anything besides work or sleep! It's almost over though - next tuesday should be the last day of this craziness.

Tues, Wed and last night I worked till midnight (luckily from home after 7pm). Tonight will be another late night but tomorrow is a day off - well from work anyway - instead I'll be going up and babysitting the 3 little monsters cousins. A whole day with them, then an evening with my aunt, uncle and fiance.

Then sunday it's back to the grind, I need to work and i need to work on the website as best I can so that next weekend I can finish that. It does look like I may be taking off at least next friday for free (due to all my overtime). That will be a much needed day of sleep! 6 hours is just not enough for me - i really need 8 a night!

Quilting :)

When I got home last night (after dinner), I managed to spend another hour at the sewing machine. I finished the quilting in the center of the quilt! Now all i have is the border quilting and binding. I haven't figured out what i'm going to do for the border quilting so I've mocked something up to send to my mom - opinions welcome here too of course :)

What's in red is what is quilted (I colored over the pink so ignore that), what's in white are possible options for the border.
1) (top) Triangles and diamonds - my preference, something different than the rest of the quilt but still straight lines.
2) (right) Continued Cross hatch - a simple choice, a little hard on the machine quilting in that it's not really continuous but it will run off the edge and when the binding is added those parts will be reinforced.
3) (bottom) Diamonds - Continuous but I would have to figure out a 1/4 inch along each edge to estimate where the binding will end. Could easily cut off points.
4) (left) Mimicing a pattern in the border fabric. I've never done free-style - this would still be using the quilting foot so it may very well come out as it looks above where i was wrestling with a paint brush in paint :)

Ideas welcome!

No other stitching last night, we finished up the second season of 4400 and loved it, unfortunately i have to wait until May for the third season to come out :(

As Promised - Barnabee Pic:

That's progress from Thursday and Friday night last week (making up for missing last week). Part II is complete and the border (minus the backstitched line and beads is also complete for Part III). I think 3 more weeks on this and it will be done for sure.

What a great weekend (i think I mentioned this) - quick recap:

Spent friday night working late then stitched for a few hours on Barnabee! Saturday I worked on Leanne's Quilt block 7 doing the applique while watching P&P. Sunday I worked on the website for a good 6 hours or so and then started quilting the baby quilt!

Tonight I will hopefully quilt the rest of the center of the baby quilt and start planning the border. I may have to add the binding before quilting the border so planning might be all I do. Maybe I'll add the binding tomorrow.

And this week I'm pulling Peaceful Silhouette back out - I need to start making progress on that again! Once the baby quilt is done this will be my focus until it's finished. Then I can finally start some new piece!!

Weekend wrap-up:
1. Work on website - YES - spent over 6 hours on it!
2. Start quilting baby quilt by machine YUP!
3. Start appliqué of block 7 Finished appliqué, started embroidery!
4. out for dinner and bowling (7 year anniversary on sunday!) Nope -watched P&P instead

What a great weekend, I worked a lot more than I would have liked but I got the feeling of accomplishment from all the work I did do.

Website work went well, I have a long list of what's left but it's broken down so it's maybe a day or two of work and all time dependent, so hopefully next sunday I will be just wrapping things up!

Started quilting the baby quilt about an hour ago - did quite a bit. I think I can finish the center quilting tomorrow night even and then I just have to measure out the border quilting :) I need to send this picture to my mom with the quilting lines drawn out so she knows what i'm doing and we can stay in sync.
The red is what i've quilted so far, the pink is my plan. Then I'll do the big square (in ditch by border), and then figure out the border stuff. I think that should be enough without having to also outline the pinwheel squares.

Now for one more episode of 4400 (season 2) and a little more embroidery maybe. I never did pull out peaceful silhouette last night - but it will surely come out this week when i get bored with block 7!

Quick weekend update ...

I managed to finish Part II of Barnabee last night - I'll post a picture on monday. Today I've been working on Leanne's Quilt block 7 - I finished the appliqué and started the embroidery but I've gotten tired of it so I may be switching to Peaceful Silhouette, it's been a while.

It's been a wonderful day, I didn't work on the website (I've put that off until tomorrow) and we spent the whole day relaxing, did a little shopping, went out for a late lunch, and now we're watching Pride & Prejudice (the A&E version)... a perfect day - what a way to celebrate our 7th anniversary :)

Working from Home and Stitch night..

Well with the expected bad weather today and with working until 11pm last night (after 9 that is) I decided to work from home today. I get more work done (less interuptions) and I miss the drive which is at least 1 1/2 hours of the day - worse if there's snow. Unfortunately I'll still be working pretty late tonight (probably 8 or 9) but at least I can take it easy this morning (slow start) having stayed up late.

Last night I did got to stitch for 2 hours - had dinner with friends and pulled out Barnabee. The problem with stitch is that I need to work on something where I don't need the pattern, so I stuck to the border, finishing it for Part II and making good border progress on Part III. Tonight I'll work on the actual bands and my goal is to finish part II. I'll post a picture monday morning.

Oh so much to do this weekend:
1. Work on website - get it near completion! (goal is to finish it next weekend)
2. Start quilting baby quilt by machine
3. Start applique of block 7
4. out for dinner and bowling (7 year anniversary on sunday!)

Okay it doesn't look like a lot but for a weekend it is especially the website stuff, that will take a while!

A late night - well i worked until 7pm, went and had dinner with my aunt and uncle (and cousin), then I logged on and worked until 10pm. But I got it all done and checked in and now I have 40 more minutes before the CPR training we have today to get anything else done :) Actually i have this afternoon too so i'm not stressing but still.

So I did not start the applique and i'm thinking it won't happen at stitch tonight, it's not the easy type of stitching that i can bring some place, so i'll have to check through all my stitching projects and pick something else to bring, maybe Barnabee so I can work on the border a bit or something.

Well off to water a plant and then review some things :)

Block 6 Finished!!!


Somehow I managed to finish this block last night - all I had to do was the two small squares off to the right. I worked a bit at the dentist at lunch time and then finished it up while baking pies last night.

It was a long night - I got home after 7, went for a run outside again (warmer than monday night!), then baked two pies - unfortunately i really packed in the pumpkin (3/4 batch) and it took almost 2 hours to bake! It came out around 10 to 11.. yikes, that was close!

So it was a late night but I got a lot done and tonight I go to my aunt's house, I hope to start the applique on block 6 which I'll continue tomorrow at stitch. Friday will be barnabee night, and to make up for last week probably a bit on saturday for barnabee as well. I'd like to finish part II and get a good start on part III.

A little stitching - no picture yet.

I'm almost done with Leanne's house Block 6 - so very close. I will try to finish it tonight and take a picture. Then wednesday i can start on the applique to block 7! Wow only 3 more blocks to go!

I didn't get a lot done last night, I got home late, we went for a run (still light out - love that early time change!) - then I settled in and worked on the block while watching the Prestige (which I loved). I couldn't stitch much because I had to pay a little bit of attention (I kept getting lost).

Unfortunately I stayed up until 11 reading and didn't get up until almost 8am! (now i'm hating the time change :) ) So it's a late day in to work - but i planned on working late anyway - I'll be running in the dark tonight :(

Anyway - hopefully a picture tomorrow and it looks like the quilting of the baby quilt won't start until friday...

Quilting weekend!!
My mom and I made the quilts for the twins - all that's left is to machine quilt them. Here's mine:
And the one my mom made:
It was a lot of fun. We got the pinwheels finished saturday night and a start on the flying geese blocks. Then sunday we finished it all up. I got back home around 5 so my fiance and I went out to dinner and then settled in for the night around 8 - a nice headache had started so I pretty much just zonked out.

Poor Barnabee -- unfortunately I did not get to him last friday because we went out for the night (and I worked late). So there's nothing to show there, I'll post a picture of him after I get to work on him this week - probably friday, maybe thursday.

And now of course the quilting bug has hit. I haven't set up my quilting station at home to start machine quilting but I'm going to do that tonight. I'd like to set little goals each night, like stitch in the ditch of the main diagonals tonight to get started. Then the stitching of the diamonds from the center out another night (one diamond in each pinwheel). Then the zig zag in the flying geese another night. And lastly the border zig zags which I have to measure and draw out first. My goal is to be finished by March 25th, put the binding on and finish attaching the binding before the weekend of the 31st so I can maybe work on another quilt :)

Pictures monday - i promise...

I did go to stitch last night and I worked on Leanne's House block 6 - finally. I finished about half of the embroidery that I have left. I think I can finish this block next weekend and then start on the next.

And speaking of Leanne's House, block 8 arrived so now I have all 9 blocks! Next month I get the borders as my last installment. I'm not going to sign up for another block of the month right away (but i want to) only because we'll be moving at the end of May and it's easier to wait until after we move to sign up but I've already got it narrowed down. I've done so well actually completing these blocks that I think I will keep up with another as well. Maybe one with more applique and less embroidery??

Still have the quilting bug - I can't wait for this weekend to start - going to be a semi late day at work though and then tonight we're going out bowling!!! Yipee - a night out with my sweetie!

Getting the quilting bug...

Well with my cross stitch going so well (having made so much progress on Peaceful Silhouette and Barnabee)... what happens.. of course I get interested in quilting again. I really really want to make a new quilt. Of course I get to make one this weekend - a baby quilt in batiks.

Why did this happen? Well my mom mentioned that she wanted me to pick out a quilt pattern for her and my grandmother to make me for my wedding (which isn't until the summer 2008 but a bed quilt takes a long while!). So I started browsing the quilts - and there's so many I really want to make! I found one that I love but it doesn't have a pattern so I'll have to mimic it and re-design it myself. I can't wait!

But I must remind myself that I need to finish one of the many quilts I have started already - need to get my quilting needle going and work on my amish quilt or my sampler quilt and finish them up!

But I did place an order with some new fun gadgets (rulers and such) so now I'm looking forward to getting those things! Since I can't cut my batiks tomorrow night (i still have to wash them), maybe I'll pull out one of my quilts and get working on it (which means I have to find all my supplies!).

Saturday after the birthday party my mom and I will start the baby quilts (they're for twins). So monday I will have a picture of a hopefully pieced top I made and then I'll machine quilt it - hopefully by Easter when I see my mom again. Is it friday night yet??? :)

Tonight is stitch night - i'm bringing Leanne's Quilt to work on (still haven't touched it). Last night was a computer night all night long, still fiddling with Vista. Looking forward to the night off tonight though!

Good Work Day..
I'm having a very good work day, making a lot of progress on things and I may not finish tomorrow but I will definitely finish by Friday which I think will be great. I'm just about to pass my last hurtle and then it's just finishing the documentation and code after that (once the concepts are done).

Last night again I did not stitch - because my new computer came! I haven't decided if I'm sticking with Vista yet or not. Unfortunately I can not VPN into work which is a very big strike against using it for now. And I can't get my Codecs to work to watch dvds on my laptop but I'm slowly working on it. I'm sure I'll play with it some more at my uncle's house tonight. Right now I have it retrieving the files I backed up onto my work computer from my crashed computer so I can have all my personal files back.

Oh and I played a little Zelda last night - I beat the second dungeon!!

Zelda night :) - no stitching.

Well last night I had to go grocery shopping and then cook all the diet food for the week. That went fine, was done around 7:30 or 8 I think. Then I played about an hour of zelda - beating the mini boss in the Goron dungeon (second dungeon). I'm up to about 12 hours into the game now.

Then I finished the book I was reading (a mini book really) before going to bed so no stitching at all. Tonight I'm hoping to have my new laptop so there will be some computer playing going on, probably no stitching. Wednesday at my aunt's I hope to break out my Leanne's quilt block 6 and maybe make some progress.. we'll see!

Barnabee Update...


This weekend was a family weekend. I didn't get to stitch Friday night as I'd hoped because we ended up out shopping until 9 just about and we bought a new Wii game - Elebits which I stayed up playing until about 1am. Saturday my family all came over, we played Wii, we played cards, we ate lots of food. It was another late night (till 1:30am). Sunday after saying goodbye to the last of the family still around, we decided to stay in and watch shows and stitch. So I got a few hours in on Barnabee while watching the rest of season 1 of the 4400 and Arrested Development.

I adapted the bunny band just a bit. When I purchased the chart I purchased the chart packs for Part I and III but not Part II for two reasons. Firstly I generally don't mind roosters but this one was a little oddly colored as far as roosters go for me and secondly I had decided to stitch on 32ct and I thought the rooster charm was too large when you increased the count since it's already a large charm. So I modified the row a bit so I don't have to worry about a charm at all for that section.

That was my night - unfortunately all that stitching started bothering my neck and i ended up with a tension headache that I now still have. I need just a few more hours of sleep :(

Surprise last night...

I came home last night to find my fiance had been cleaning for a good part of the day! I was in utter shock! I mean really cleaning, organizing things, going through piles of paperwork, cleaning the kitchen (scrubbing the stove!) Everything. And he wasn't stopping. So I got right to work cleaning the bathroom (scrubbing the shower) and that's all I had to do last night.

All that's left is to dust and vacuum and he swears to me he's doing that today. No big deal if he does or not because that will take about an hour and I've decided to work from home today with the yucky weather so I don't have all that time lost to driving.

No stitching last night though, I wasn't feeling well after dinner and just worked until about 10 before going to bed. I'm borrowing a laptop from work and evidently having a computer again means I'm on email all night and getting things done for people real time (we have a california office so 9pm is only 6pm for them and they are still working).

Progress pics on Monday as i'm sure i'll be able to pick up Barnabee tonight and maybe Peaceful Silhouette on Sunday!

Goal met - just updated...

Well I was going to have my March goal for Peaceful Silhouette to be to to finish all the light stitching (sky and upper part of water) but I finished that last night as you can see above. All I have left is the darker stitching in the bottom right. I hope this month to finish all that if not the whole piece - I am really psyched with this piece lately and really loving it! Even with all that tweeding :)

So last night I stitched through 3 episodes of Gilmore Girls (saved on DVR at my aunt's) before heading off to bed. I also got some reading done for work so it was a very productive night.

Tonight I have to clean clean clean - no stitching :( But the more cleaning I do tonight the less I'll have to do tomorrow night and maybe i can get some stitching done since tomorrow is Barnabee night!

March Goals (i've been lax on goals, i'm getting back into it now :) )

1) Finish Part II of Barnabee and start Part III
2) Finish Leanne's block 6
3) Piece Leanne's block 9
4) Start applique on Leanne's block 7
5) Finish all half stitching on Peaceful Silhouette
6) Make baby quilt for mom's friend

I think that's enough for March, we'll see how it goes :) I'd like to have Peaceful Silhouette finished in April and Barnabee as well. Then it will be a month of starting new pieces!

Peaceful Silhouette last night. I really like sticking to this piece and see it come along. I'll post another progress picture tomorrow. I worked on the sky last night and finished all but the last tweeded color in the sky. Then I'll move down to the lighter part of the water (which will finish quickly) and lastly the dark part of the water. It's so much fun to see this piece come along!

Besides stitching (I only stitched 2 hours last night), I went through my patterns last night and pulled a few that I really want to start soon.

The piece I want to stitch for my aunt for Christmas is this one:
America The Beautiful by Rosewood Manner
Then for myself I'd really like to start Random Thoughts by Drawn Thread
And possibly for my fiance's step mother for christmas: Winter Wonderland by Little House Needleworks

Those are the ones I actually pulled out of my stash. As soon as I finish up Peaceful Silhouette I will start on one of those (probably America the Beautiful). Then I think after Barnabee is done I'd like to get Lady Scarlet - another one just for me :)

Peaceful Silhouette Weekend Progress...

I really think I'll have the sky finished soon, I've gotten it down to almost a single color left in the center after I finish the white and one other color.

Unfortunately the water will take a while. It is all half stitches but it's very dense. And then there's the backstitching.. ho hum :)

Anyway - no stitching last night at all. I got a new book for work and I spent the evening reading it and then just sleeping. All well.

Barnabee progress!

I got to stitch on Barnabee friday night after all had settled down with the computer issues. I made about 1/3 progress on Part II which is great. The over one stitching took a little while and those yellow star stitches are a lot of fun!!

Then the rest of the weekend my stitching was devoted to Peaceful Silhouette- progress pic tomorrow - but i made some great progress! I think I can finish up all the sky stitching very soon, leaving just the water in the bottom right. I really will finish this in time for my fiance's graduation!

Otherwise I didn't do much this weekend, I ordered a new laptop, to arrive hopefully by March 9th, I'm currently recovering the data on my old laptops hard drive and then i'll try to repair that one and give it to my mom. Sunday I changed my oil since it was nice and warm out - must remember to update my car blog about that :)

Anyway, that was my last free weekend for a while but it was lots of fun relaxing with my fiance and basically watching all of House Season 2 :)

Computer problems...

Well I was going to work from home today (Actually I did) but after a few hours my good old reliable laptop died on me! Just dead, no hard drive error or anything. It will take some debugging but it will have to wait until next week when I can bring my hard drive into work and try to recover the data.

Anyway, we have multiple computers, so I'm using my fiance's laptop (have all day) and getting by... but I just ordered a new laptop. I've been thinking about doing it for a long while now and this just finally gave me the kick i needed. It's a dell and it has a much better video card so I can play all the games I used to play on my gaming computer (which I no longer enjoy lugging around) :) I can't wait for it to arrive - probably a few weeks but still!

Anyway. I plan to get some Barnabee time in tonight even though it's late. This is going to be a *hopefully* crafty weekend as we have no plans at all! But boy do I have sewing plans :)

No stitching no pics, last night was a blah night, i was tired and just layed around watching House and went to bed early. The good news in I finally got up early and got in early again, maybe I can keep this up and get back on schedule - so I won't be leaving work at 6 or later anymore and I can have my evenings back.

Well if I want to leave at an earlier time I need to get some stuff done... :)

Pictures from this weekend!
Here is the dress I made to be Dora's Fairy Tale dress for my 3 yr old cousin. This took about 8-10 hours with the zipper taking a full hour!
And here is the finished wall hanging for my coworker. I really love the fabric in the border and the backing (I didn't take a picture of the backing). I gave this to her yesterday at work.

Last night I did a little embroidery on Leanne's block 6. I really want to do the applique on block 7 but I'm trying to be good and finish 6 first. This coming weekend I think I'll piece block 9 - for some reason they sent block 9 instead of 8 so I have to wait until next month for 8 - all well. Then I hope to make some serious progress on the pieced blocks and maybe get caught up again. Oh why can't it be the weekend already???

Barnabee Week 3 progress:

That's where I got on Barnabee Friday night. Part I is pretty much finished (except for part of the border) and I'm ready to start Part II this week - probably Friday night again with how things are going this week.

I had a great weekend, lots of sewing - more pictures to come tomorrow for sure. Saturday I cleaned the apartment and then started the princess dress for my 3 yr old cousin (her birthday is actually today). Then I settled in for the evening and worked on the website!
Sunday I finished the dress and did some hand stitching (tacking the mohair onto the dress and all) and then Finished the winnie the pooh sampler for my coworker. Then I made that into a wallhanging (another picture for tomorrow) and finished the binding and everything. A very productive weekend.

Today its back to work and tonight I have to work on the website some more. I really can't wait until next weekend, another weekend with no plans and I'm going to try to keep it that way again if I can!

My poor fiance who was sick last friday is still sick - all weekend. He stuck to the couch and so far I haven't gotten sick - i hope it stays that way!

Back from Vacation and other things...

I got a little stitching done this past week, focusing strictly on Peaceful Silhouette and finishing the dock to the right (it's a little cut off on the scan). Now I just have all the sky and water to finish. I'm going to work on this a bit at lunch today as well hopefully.

So it was a long week. And now it's friday. We went on vacation up to NH to snowboard Sun-Tues. We didn't stay Tuesday but left in the morning because my great grandmother passed away. So we drove back to NY for Tues-Thur and stayed with my parents. So during that nice huge storm we were driving in and out of town for the funeral.

But we got back last night, and all is well....except now my fiance has the flu. He came down with it last night. Ruining his plans to go snowboarding with my uncle today, poor guy is home on the couch. I'm working today, probably a quiet day and I'll be leaving around 4:30 to head to Joann's and get fabric to sew this weekend. Maybe I'll have some pictures monday of my project (for one of my cousins).

Oh and Barnabee was neglected this week. I hope to work on him tonight if my fiance is up for watching some movies after I get home. So hopefully a progress pic of that monday as well...

On vacation... be back wednesday... i'll be in the mountains snowboarding - or sitting in the hotel room stitching because i'm not good at snowboarding and it's cold outside :)

No stitching, I was lazy last night and just watched tv. I had to work late again (gosh I hope not tonight!) and got to my aunt's just in time for dinner. Then we caught up on the last 2 gilmore girls (since I showed up at 11 last week). I pretty much was zonked after that and my Leanne's block 6 didn't even see the light of day.. um.. night.. whatever.

Tonight stitch was canceled but i think i'm going to go home at a normal time (umm... 5 maybe?), run, eat dinner and then settle in to work on ... umm... something, not sure what yet ;)

Oh man i can't wait for the weekend....

Barnabee Week 2
This is about 2 more hours of progress - my second week on the Barnabee SAL. I finished band 3, stitched band 4 and 5 and did a little of both 6 and 7 (the worms and the bee) because i couldn't resist those little guys! Next week will be two little blue birds and another row of flowers and probably some more border. I love this piece, always have and it's so much fun to stitch, even when it feels like the snails will never end, they do :)

So that was my night. Tonight I will work on Leanne's Quilt block 6 and Thursday at stitch I will continue with Leanne's block 6. I'm hoping tomorrow to stitch on Peaceful Silhouette at lunch time and I need to start bringing that home to stitch in the evenings, I just want to finish block 6 first (always something :) )

3 more days until my mini vacation. Too bad I won't be stitching much on my "vacation" as we'll be too busy snowboarding but maybe I'll get a little embroidery done or something small. I still have to finish Pooh bear too :)

Okay no barnabee last night .. this whole planned night of stitching rarely works out for me :) Last night we ended up going out to dinner with a friend of mine from high school who was driving through on her way back to Maine. So I didn't get home until almost 10pm - no stitching.

But tonight there will definitely be stitching! Probably Barnabee, and then I have to make sure I have all the threads I need for my Leanne's Quilt embroidery for wednesday at my aunt's house. I'd like to finish this block this month so I think I'm going to stick to embroidering this block a bit more than I have been so by the weekend of the 17th it will be done and I'll be onto the next one (block 7).

I've decided it's time to sew another princess dress.. almost. One of my cousins is about to turn 3 , she's a princess girl, I made her a dress for her 2nd birthday but it isn't poofy enough and princess enough so it's not her favorite. I'm going to see her this weekend and find out what her favorite princess is and if i make her a dress if she'll wear it this time :) Then the 17th when I'm home alone I can sew the dress! We'll see :)

Barnabee's Quest SAL - started on Friday...


The problem with friday stitching for me is that I don't get to show the picture until Monday because I'm too lazy to use my scanner at home. I will stitch on Barnabee on Monday nights so progress pics will be on Tuesdays. I had a blast starting this one, I have wanted to stitch this since I moved out here in 2004 and bought it (around July time I think). Then I stitched the bee skep in the wrong place - UGG so I ripped it out and stitched everything else you see. Then saturday morning when I got up I restitched the bee skep - just so I'd be where I should have been friday night :) Any tonight I will continue working on this one.

The rest of the weekend I didn't get as much done as I had hoped. I did a lot of shopping on saturday (but luckily did not spend a lot). Then wound some floss saturday night. Sunday I packed up my stamping stuff into boxes so that clears some room in my closet. I'm not going to pack it such that i can't get to it but it's in boxes (3 large boxes) and I don't see getting into stamping until the summer anyway with everything else I have going on. So if we move in May I'm prepared already.

Then after getting the food cooked for the week and everything else done I got a littel bit of time to work on Leanne's Quilt block 6 - not enough to show but that will be my Tuesday night project so I will show a picture wednesday hopefully. I still have to finish the winnie the pooh - soon - no reason to rush since I can't finish it this weekend anyway but next weekend (the 17th) will be my quilting weekend - my fiance will be away ice fishing and i will be quilting away!

This is a long one - i'm going to go post on my other blogs now :)

Yippee .. and Pooh and Piglet are just about finished :)
That's right - last night at stitch I finished up all the backstitching. All I have left is to add the name and date and finish into a wall hanging. I hope this weekend will be enough time.

So I didn't start Barnabee's Quest last night - but I plan to start it tonight if I can ever get out of work and get home to start it! I think Monday nights will be my barnabee night but tonight in celebration of Imbolc I will be starting a new piece. Now if only i could get out of work while it's still light outside!

Yup - changed the template - playing around with things a bit :)

No stitching last night... zelda called to me ... couldn't help it. I finished gathering the tears, I learned to summo wrestle and I just beat some bad guy by throwing him off a bridge.. after losing about 5 times I beat him anyway - all well :)

Anyway I will stitch tonight - on Pooh and maybe I'll have an update tomorrow. Oh and it's January goal wrap up time ... okay I take it back - i didn't set january goals :)

And some more progress...

This is just unknown - me actually remembering to post progress pics ;)

Anyway - here's Pooh in all his glory as of last night. I finished all the actual stitching in the picture, just have to backstitch piglet and the flowers, then add the personalization, probably underneath for the name and to the side for the date, just like the other one. I really think I can get this finished up this weekend.. if I really focus.

So - almost time for Barnabee's Quest to start!! I'm not sure yet if I will start this on Thursday or wait until the weekend - only because I want to finish the Pooh piece and Thursday is stitch night, it's an easy thing to bring along. I'm really looking forward to Barnabee though and it's almost ready to go, I just have to make a working copy of the patterns and buy some missing DMC on thursday at stitch.

I played some zelda last night - I beat the first major boss - all by myself! Now i'm back to being a wolf and finding all the tears. Almost done with that. They did such a good job with this zelda, it's very similar to the other zeldas but it has a lot of new stuff! I might have to play a little tonight but i really shouldn't... oh man..

I did it - I switched to the new blogger - I hope it all works, it looks okay so far. I have a couple of blogs and I'm going to create a new one shortly - books I'm reading/read. Keeping all my interests separated by blog :) Anyway so now this one is updated to the new blogger... I'll post an updated picture of Pooh very shortly - I've finished Pooh himself, and the flowers. I started Piglet last night and probably tonight I'll make more progress on him :)

Making progress...

What is this - two pictures in a week - Nicole is on a role!! Here's Pooh after Stitch Night last night when I couldn't resist starting the backstitching after finishing the actual pooh stitching. Still left is Piglet and the flower bouquet (hence the strange holes in his hand).

Pooh is coming along, I will work on him some more tonight and this weekend hopefully (sunday after website work). My goal is to finish the whole piece before next weekend so I can make the wallhanging then. I have lots of cute Pooh fabric in my collections so I'm sure I can pull something together and machine quilt it.

Mt. Washington here we come... so I just booked a mini vacation in Feb. for 2 nights and 3 days of snowboarding! I can't handle that much snowboarding but there's lots of other things to do and my fiance and I always have a good time so it will be a blast, i can't wait! Plus it was much cheaper than i thought - cheaper than just lift tickets for 3 days! Maybe we can afford to go snowboarding once in march as well for just a day if we ever get some snow!!

Nothing new going on. I stitched on Pooh Wed night at my aunt's and last night at stitch (hence the fast progress). Tonight I will start piglet probably while we watch some tv. I won't point out my mistakes in Pooh - i'll have some fudging to do while backstitching his lower half - oops - too late now :)

Here he is:


He's really going much faster than I remember Pooh to go... which is good because I'd like to get this done before the end of january so in February when I start Barnabee I will have no obligation stitching holding me back (besides Peacefull Silhouette which I HAVE to finish by the end of may!)

So somewhere I made a counting error on the lower part of Pooh. As you can see I outline and then fill in, that way I can do some mindless stitching, well as I was doing the arm, it didn't match up with the body correctly and I realized that somewhere there is a mistake - I couldn't figure out exactly where but I'm sure i'll find it when I do the backstitching ;) I'll just have to fudge it a bit.

So last night I stitched (can you tell) :) We watched some of Season 1 House. Nothing else got done but tonight I hope to work on the website and then maybe finish Pooh's head. Then I just have his arm, the flowers, and Piglet to stitch :) Oh and the personalization of course. If I can finish this by Feb 2nd, I can make it into a wall hanging that weekend and be all ready for my coworker a month later!

All right - much to do ... must stop dreaming about a life where I just stitch all day!

What a busy weekend! But I did finally start the Winnie the Pooh piece - I'll post a picture as soon as it's more than a blob of golden brown.

Saturday we went up and visited my cousins for the day - a long day, getting home late but we went out and saw Night at the Museum with them and that was a lot of fun.
Sunday was a day to myself as my fiance had to work in boston (on our cheat day - kind of lame :( ), anyway , I filled my day - I got up early and spent 2 hours reading, then I got into the organizing mood and I cleaned out all the drawers in our bedroom (the "junk" drawers). And reorganized and packed some stuff away into the basement (might as well start packing for May now if it's things we dont' use often).
By noon I was done with that (that felt great!) so I settled in with my new pattern and picked out my fabric and floss for pooh. I watched the Office and stitched until my friend came over to visit and then we just sat and stitched and chatted for a few hours.
So I got a decent start on Pooh but all in one color still. I didn't get to working on the website at all - tonight I'll have to take a look at that and work on it before doing anymore stitching. And now I have zelda calling to me again - it's been almost a week :)

UCK - migraine attacks...

No stitching last night :( I had a headache most of the afternoon and when I got home there was no way i could do anything. I sat and listened to my audiobook in the dark and fell asleep (oops) a few times. I missed dinner (migraines cause me to feel sick so I generally can't eat) and ended up getting carried to bed after 11, essentially getting about 12 hours of sleep when I got up at 6:30.

But I'm feeling loads better today - and it's amazing that it's friday - getting all that sleep makes it feel like monday or something so I'm really looking forward to this weekend now! We're considering going snowboarding tomorrow but if we don't I will have lots of crafty time. I have to work on the website as well but I think I'm scheduling some time sunday for that... oh i can't wait for the weekend!!!

Winnie the pooh pictures hopefully by monday...

Oh Zelda... completely throwing off my plans for the week :)

Well last night instead of going to my uncle's house, I had to run home after yoga so my fiance could use my car - his car would not start in the morning. So I worked from home in the afternoon and being home for the evening unexpectedly, I decided to play a little zelda... and 3 hours later... :)

I love zelda and I love the wii, I think I've played 5 hours total of zelda (it tells you how long your game is), and I've gotten pretty far - I'm no longer a wolf and I technically finished the first dungeon. They have this new thing in this zelda about learning special moves - this is great - they didn't have that in the older games and I learned my first special move.

Anyway sorry to bore you... no stitching but tonight I really really do plan to gather bits for the Pooh piece i need to start. I think I have a pattern picked out, this is the one I did for the first child:

So I'm thinking about a piece with Pooh and Piglet holding a bouquet of flowers with the second baby name. I really hope I can whip this up quickly. I can hopefully get a good start on it this weekend.. oh man it's only thursday ...

Anyway so my coworker is bringing the baby in to work today - so I get to meet her :) Maybe that will kick me in the but to get started on this :)

Barnabee's Quest and other things...

Well last night I got a whole hour to myself - so I headed into my closet (where I keep all my craft stuff). I pulled out Barnabee's Quest, and then I realized I already had chart packs for it as well, I bought part I and III's chart packs... what about II?? Well I didn't like the rooster very much so I didn't buy part II, so now I have to figure out if I should buy just beads or the chart pack. If I buy beads I'll need another charm to replace the rooster but my friend that owns an LNS has tons of charms so it's not a problem. Plus I'll save the beads and charms to the end anyway.

Anyway - so I need on Kreinik and I still have to gather my DMC, I figure I can do that in the next couple weeks before we start this as a SAL. Oh, i picked out some white belfast linen, just some zweigart I think to use.

Our second Wii controller came yesterday too (no Zelda yet) - so we played some Wii Tennis together. Then after my fiance got back from the gym, we put in Criminal Minds and finished Season 1. I got to work on Celtic Banner a tiny bit .. I finished the two motifs by the alphabet and I started the large square motif. I may put this away for a bit because...

I completely forgot - a friend at work had her second baby in Dec. and for her first baby I made a winnie the pooh wallhanging, I forgot i wanted to do a second one for her second. I need to get cracking on that. So tonight I might pick out a pattern and fabric and get the threads for that together. If i get it done before her maternity leave is up I should be okay. So this will be my focus for the next 2 full weeks at least. Somehow I'll have to keep working on Leanne's Quilt as well...

Promised Pics!!

Not a lot of stitching this weekend (hardly any). Saturday during the car ride I worked on block 6 a bit - here it is so far:


Friday night when I got home I felt in the quilting mood so I pieced block 7 and got it ready for all the applique. This one doesn't have a lot of embroidery, just the top right block and some on top of the applique later on. Here it is just pieced.
It was a nice weekend but a whole lot of driving. We drove home saturday and then drove up to Albany to get a family portrait done (JCPenny) for my parents' anniversary. Then we went out to dinner, then drive back (45 min to albany from my parents').
Saturday night we played games - this new CSI game my sister has was really fun.
Sunday was our cheat day on our diet, so we had a big breakfast with family then lunch with my fiance's parents, then dinner after we got home - long drive back in the rain :( We finished the night with disk 2 of season 2 of LOST... which we are totally addicted to :)

Now it's back to work - I'm trying to get back to getting up early again, I don't know what's been going on but I haven't been able to get up before 7 the past few weeks ... but no longer - today I got up at 6:40 but I'm aiming for 6 tomorrow and the rest of the week. Then I can get in before 8 and leave by 5 and have more of an evening at home.. we'll see!

Ack, sorry - it's been a very busy day - i like days like this as long as I can leave on time - we'll see - i'm hoping for 5/5:30 - which means busy busy now :)

I did get to work on leanne's house block 6. I finished the embroidery on mini block 1 and maybe tonight I can take a picture when I get home. This one has a lot of embroidery but it should go pretty fast - much different than the last block. A lot of repetitive stitching which is nice.

Stitch night was fun last night, i finally got to tell most of my friends that I got engaged. I also bought a few new charts and some floss I needed. If I have time tonight I'll post the charts I got too... but for now i'm off - hitting the ground running!

A little stitching, not as much as I had planned since I got a headache. I worked on block 6, starting the embrodery on mini block 1. There's a decent amount of embroidery in this block but I think it will go fairly quickly, unlike block 5.

Tonight I have stitch, I hope to work more on block 6 there and then go home and play a little on the Wii!!! My Zelda game just shipped so we may even have it by saturday, not that we need it saturday since we'll be going back to NY but we do have sunday night to play then :) Oh it really is a disease.

The cold I have been fighting is still threatening me, i'm kind of losing my voice now and my throat just feels gross. But I'm not too congested and my head is pretty clear so I'm sticking it out. My guess is by saturday when I can finally relax it will hit hard. I can always take monday off though if I need to.

Finally - I finally can post my picture from this weekend - sorry about that. I finished block 5 Sunday as you can see.. there's a TON of embroidery but it's done :) I also pieced block 6 and will start the embroidery tonight hopefully.

I also worked on Celtic Banner a little this weekend - almost finished the two small motifs next to the end of the alphabet.

In more fun news - we just got a Wii today! My fiance just went and got one - and now I'm ordering Zelda from Amazon today too - I will be much less productive when it comes to stitching if i have zelda but it will also be good for my fiance to have something to do while I'm quilting and can't watch tv shows with him. Like tonight - he'll be playing Madden all night long now.

So hopefully I will have a picture of block 6 on friday with some good progress to show. I may be able to finish it even this weekend since we have a drive back to NY and that's 2 hours of car time. Then I'd like to piece block 7 and be caught up. I am really enjoying Leanne's Quilt and I can't wait to start another block of the month when this is complete - of course I still have to quilt this one but I'm sure that will happen too :)

Back to work - it's like monday and friday at the same time :) That's what taking thursday off does to a person!

My poor fiance (still really not used to saying that) - has a really bad cold, the one I fought off last week. He took a sick day yesterday and ate lots of soup and today he's trying going back to work but this weekend will be very relaxing and we gave up on snowboarding (no snow!).

I have so much I want to do this weekend since we're finally home:
1) take down holiday decorations - pack them up and put away (really pack since we're moving in May)
2) clean the apartment (a good vacuum and bathroom cleaning for a fresh winter start)
3) Finish (really finish) Leanne's Quilt Block 5 finally! I have a little more embroidery and applique in each corner left!
4) Piece Block 6 and maybe 7 of leanne's quilt!
5) Work on the website for a few hours sunday
6) Work on Peaceful Silhouette or other stitched piece - need something to do while we watch Lost and ER. We started Lost Season 1 last night (First 4 episodes) and we're pretty hooked now. Plus we have ER season 6 disk 1 to watch from blockbuster.

Yesterday was great, aside from the long drive, the baby was great, only cried when she needed something (diaper change/bottle/sleep) and actually played for a bit and slept (on me) for quite a bit. I watched Pride and Prejudice since I could leave the room and not worry about missing anything (seen it before) and not have to change channels since it's 5 hours long I could just keep it going all day :) It was a very good time and if I didn't have to take work days to do it I'd offer to watch her more often!

A non-eventful evening. I got home after 7pm and my fiance had dinner ready for me. We ate, we watched a Criminal Minds episode. Then he went to the gym while I ran on the treadmill re-watching the last half of davinci code. Then another Criminal Minds when he got home, a Good Eats episode and off to bed to read a little "Princes of Ireland". A nice, relaxing evening, only thing missing was the stitching I was too lazy to get out of my bag.

Tonight I'm headed to my aunt's, hopefully I'll stitch a bit, I don't have to get up so early tomorrow since I'm headed out to babysit in Springfield tomorrow instead of work. I haven't watched such a young child in a long time (few years), and she's only almost 3 months old. I don't know what to expect - but I'm guessing lots of crying since I'm not mommy or daddy :) It might be a long day :) I brought Pride and Prejudice to pop in just in case I need some background noise.

For picture see 3 posts down - I should have posted that post last :)

A few goals for this year - 2007 - nothing major but I do have some things I want to get done:

1) Finish Peaceful Silhouette for Fiance's graduation (I really need to focus on this!)
2) Stitch eagle piece for fiance
3) Work on Celtic Banner - finish at least halfway
4) Start/Finish Barnabee's Quest as SAL with Carol and friends
5) Stitch piece for fiance's step mother for xmas 2007

6) Finish Leanne's Quilt (piecing and embroidery)

I won't make any other goals even though there are lots I want to start/finish, these are the ones that are high priority, others will be just for fun and when I'm bored. I hope to take advantage of the spring semester off and make killer stitching progress this year- we'll see :)

Oh and this weekend - trying out snowboarding again - looking forward to it .. probably someplace small like Wachusett and then in Feb, we're thinking a long weekend at a cabin or something - should be fun :) Cabin means stitching time too!!!

Year end wrapup:
2006 Goals:

1) Finish Green Old Gardens [YUP]
2) Finish Wrapped Butterfly into pillow [nope]
3) Finish Blackwork Dragon [YUP]
4) Work on Peaceful Silhouette [YUP]
5) Stitch/Make ornament for my sister [nope]
6) Stitch/Make ornament for my mom [nope]
7) Finish It's Winter [YUP]
8) Start/Work on Going to Market [FINISHED]
9) Start/Work on Kingdom Sampler [FINISHED]
10) Start a seasonal fall piece [YUP - Dry Turkey]
Also stitched:
Mini Cottages II
Just a little Peace and Quiet Please
and started Celtic Banner!

Quilts:
1. Work on Amish Quilt (hand quilting) [nope]
2. Work on Sampler quilt (hand quilting)[nope]
3. Start a new quilt [made baby quilt for friend!]
Started Leanne's Quilt - month by month

Knitting: [none...]
1. Learn to knit socks
2. Learn to knit sweaters (try it)

And a December wrapup:
December Goals:
1) Finish alphabet (and 2 ornaments next to y/z) on Celtic Banner [Finished Alphabet only]
2) Piece and finish block 5 of leanne's quilt [Pieced not finished]
3) stitch 2 ornaments [nope]
4) make all 3 ornaments [nope - made 1 ornament]
5) Work on peaceful silhouette tues/thurs at work (lunch time)[I think I was too busy]
6) Make crafty gifts if time allows (gift tags/cards/bookmarks...) [made tags]

It's not much but finally a picture:


I spent a little time working on block 5 again yesterday. I'm almost 3/4 done with the outside but then I have to do the corners still! This block has a LOT of work involved. Plus I have blocks 6 and 7 waiting to be pieced and finished.

HOWEVER - I decided against taking a class this semester, I'm going to probably transfer to WPI and I can't carry over more than the 2 classes I've already taken so it would really be a waste so I dropped the class. This way I can focus on the website and getting that finished and enjoy the spring with some stitching and quilting :)

Well I can't believe it's 2007 already! I have to go back and wrap up all my goals for both the year and month!!