Vacation..

Well i haven't been posting much because work has been a little crazy - now I won't be posting because I will be on a MUCH needed vacation from work. We're not going anyplace except where we are now - back at my parents' house for a few days and then I head up to Maine for a few days at my friend's family cabin and lots of stitching!

I think this will be a great week off from work, the end of the week will be lots of stitching and the beginning will be some working outside and just relaxing, playing computer games like tonight and reading!

So I'll be offline for about a week - with pictures next week of my Celtic Banner hopefully!!!

As promised - a picture!

Here is Carol's RR with my house all finished. It's Woodland Cottage from Elizabeth's Designs with modifications and of course it's not the entire piece. There are a lot of things I like about this piece, the trees are one of my favorite things.

Well my fiance is off on day one of the Bar Exams!!! I'm up in Concord, NH working from the hotel awaiting his return at 4:30? We watched Dejavu last night which I thought was a pretty good movie. We have Breakfast at Tiffany's tonight. It's been a while since he's been able to sit and watch a movie.

Well back to work, at least it helps pass the time without me worrying :)

Stitchy weekend for sure!!! I can't wait to show pictures - I'm going to try to remember to take them tonight before i head up to Concord.

I FINISHED stitching my house on Carol's RR!! It was such fun and I got to stitch most of one of the charts I really like with some major modifications but still, now I feel like I've stitched the chart and can call it "finished" in my stash :)

I'll probably get that packed up and mailed out by the end of the week to Leslie.. this week is a little busy because the Bar has finally arrived! My fiance has 3 days of 6 hour testing (Tues-Thur) and I'll be staying with him at various hotels to help him get up in the morning for them. Tonight and Tomorrow night are up in Concord, NH so instead of a crazy long drive I'm going to just work from there tomorrow. That way I can be supportive and be there when he gets back from his first day of testing.

It's all over on friday!!! I can't wait and next week I'm taking as vacation time! Very much needed!!!! for both of us :) I will definitely have stitching to show after that!

Still around. I haven't been in the blogging mood, I am trying to stay on top of reading blogs, I apologize if I'm not commenting much but I am reading when i find time! Anyhow, part of the reason I haven't been posting is just lack of material, I pretty much just work lately, not much to talk about.

I have had some time to stitch. Last night would have been great but we lost power for a few hours and I can't stitch on 40ct by candle light so I wound thread on bobbins instead.

I've been working on Carol's Neighborhood Round Robin. The house is almost finished and then I can do the landscaping. I'm not worried about making the deadline at least , even with the small amount of stitching time I've had I've managed to get the bulk of the house done. I'll probably try to post a picture on monday!

This weekend is my last weekend house sitting. I will hopefully relax a bit and stitch - maybe sunday when I get home - and otherwise I have some cleaning to do (both at the house I'm staying at and when I get home). Unfortunately it's going to be just one of those weekends that disappears on me I know it.

I really thought I was going to have stitching every night, with lots of tv shows and/or movies. Boy how things change. The first change is that I've been working every night way more than I had planned - last night I worked till midnight! Secondly, my fiance decided to come down and study for his Bar Exams in the air conditioned house (our A/C is broken) so that limits the tv to his break times which include an hour for dinner and maybe after 9pm if he's gotten studying done for the day.

But that's not the real hold up - it's a new game I found - called Chocolatier - you make chocolates and create a chocolate empire throughout the world. It's SO addicting because it's easy but challenging at the same time. Easy because I never got close to running out of money or not finishing a puzzle but still challenging because there's a lot going on to keep in mind. I have played every free second I do have and I've almost beat the game which just spurs me on to beat it already so I can go back to my normal life - very bad. I'm even considering playing on my lunch break today - bad bad bad!!!

Tonight I am promising myself I will stitch! Maybe I'll start Grey's Anatomy on my laptop or listen to my audiobook, either one would be great. ... can't wait!

Carol's Neighborhood RR start:
Finally a picture! I know it's not much but it's a start, the house is from Elizabeth's Designs "Woodland Cottage" with modifications. The grey is a stone foundation and I decided to stitch the house red (instead of white) and I think I'm going to use black - like wrought iron - in place of the green, not sure yet.

Last night was a long night of working. I worked much later than I had hoped so no stitching. Tonight I plan to do a little work and then get right to stitching. I have a movie I want to watch so I can return it to the library so that's 2 hours of stitching right there!

Story of my life, I forgot to take a picture of my progress.. that's right - I stitched finally!! I don't think I've properly stitched since my Neighborhood RR at the end of May, beginning of june.

I re-started on Carol's Neighborhood RR, got a couple of hours in! I find it difficult changing colors on a pattern but I do not like the house color on the pattern I'm using, even though I like the style house, so I'm trying to change it and hopefully tomorrow I can show a picture!

This weekend was very relaxing, Saturday I spent the morning packing for my 2 weeks of house sitting, then moved my stuff down to my Uncle's. I went out Saturday night to stitch with friends. Sunday I relaxed all day, watching movies, stitching and winding floss. It was great - minus the migraine I got but my medicine worked okay.

Now I'm in for a week of working and hopefully stitching in the evenings! I have movies and tv shows lined up! I sure will miss my fiance though - he's busy studying anyway but still. I can't wait to see him next weekend!

Oh IKEA joy!

That's what I did on the 4th! I went to IKEA! I sure do love that store, we spent about 3 hours walking around. I had a gift card so I guiltlessly bought little kitchen things (including a set of silverware - finally i can get rid of the old mismatched pieces I have).

On the stitching front, while I did pick up "stitching" it was to unstitch what I had started on Carol's NRR. I mentioned before that I had forgotten to leave room for the grass, so I unstitched that last night - no biggie. I'm hoping tomorrow to get to start over, with the grass first this time!

Also starting Saturday I am house sitting for 2 weeks. This means no regular access to my crafty stuff :( Tomorrow will be packing anything I might need ( I can stop home on weekends a bit )... plus it's good timing with the fiance studying for the Bar Exams, it will keep the apartment quieter for him.

I'm hoping to get stitching done - first Carol's RR, then maybe some embroidery on Leanne's Quilt, I sure have missed that one!

Okay back to work - what is up with allergies these past few days - driving me crazy!

July Goals:
Well this will look familiar :)
1) Finish Carol's NRR and mail out!
2) Finish Leanne's block 7!
3) Finish fishy part of fishy pin

June Wrapup:
1) Finish Neighborhood RR and mail out! [YES!]
2) Finish Leanne's block 7! [Haven't touched it :(]
3) Start Carol's NRR [Yup - just a tiny tiny bit]
4) Frame Peaceful Silhouette! [Nope :(]

Evidently the summer is not a great stitching time for me.. but that WILL change! I'll be house sitting for 2 weeks with Central Air and not much else to do (besides work). I plan on watching Gray's Anatomy and stitching on Carol's NRR.

I did start on Carol's NRR this weekend but I think I want to rip out what I did because I forgot to leave room for the grass flowers underneath the house and with the house being short I might need the height. I only stitched one length of grey stone as the base of the house so I'll just pull that out and start over.. probably tomorrow night!

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!