September brings School Bells

And I was in class.   September saw me in OCMD for a Jackie DuPlessis class.   The project is beautiful albeit intense.   I debated back an forth about signing up knowing I have scads of unfinished class pieces in my forbidden closet of stash.  I also have so many projects in rotation right now and I want to finish up some WIP’s  before going astray. But sign up I did and it was all worth it.  What a great piece and what a fabulous teacher and person Jackie is.  I'm afraid I have crossed over to the dark side.   I can't wait to start but need to tame the hoard I already have.  If all goes well, this will be my January 2023 project.  Me thinks I need to sort and purge my current project basket again.

I also met Ann from Stitching Foolishness at the class.   So nice to put the face with the name and blog I follow.

Fall is around the corner.  School has started, pool is covered, flower beds are getting cleared up, cooler temps have come and the beauty of the changing leaves will soon be teasing our senses.   I’ve said it before but I just love the change of seasons.   I enjoy the weather of each season, yes even the heat and even the snow.   Seems to me when you have had enough of one, the next one is around the corner.   I am waiting for the arrival of some summer bulbs so I can get them in and will then patiently anticipate their beauty next summer.  That said, I feel that each year I am less interested in yard work.   This upsets me as gardening was my passion before stitching.  With the lack of rain we have had and the heat, I lost a few plants in  my back 40.   Seems I just have more on my-want-to-do-list that keeps jumping ahead of working in the garden.   ….to everything there is a season…..  

August also brought other great news.  Both my son and daughter got promotions at their respective jobs.  My son is now a lieutenant in law enforcement and my D-in-L is, well, she is an Electro-Chemical Engineer specializing in corrosion and instrumentation so I don’t know what she does but she is apparently doing it right!  

August ended with the Annual Thompson Family Crab Feast. All the family was here and the food was fabulous.    These times are great:  the heart swells, the kitchen shrinks, the memories created, the pounds on the scale increase, the laughter abounds, left-overs were endless and sent off in all directions.  It was the first time both grand babies spent the night without mom and dad.  For Raegan, let’s just call is an UN-sleepover.   She suffers from night-terrors so it was interesting.   She went to bed without any issues and was up in the morning happy as could be…..it was just the in between part.  

I spent some stitchy time on Christmas Rules from Primrose Cottage Stitches.    "Go sledding" and "Believe" are the last two sections to be done.   I'm feeling confident I can get this completed and fully finished for this holiday season.

I also put in some stitches on Red February from Sassy Jacks.   It is a good piece to work on when with friends as the count is large and there are no color changes.  I've got 70 more rows of the pattern to finish.  I'm not sure if I want to continue to work on it, or put it aside until next February.   I probably just ought to finish it since I am so close.

I participated in the HOD Mystery Halloween Costume Party.   Sign ups were in July, supplies gathered and then September 1st,  Cathy, Mrs. HOD herself, started the emails.   It was a great project.  Although I didn’t keep up with the every other day assignments I am working on finishing the project.

Even though I said I ws swearing off SAL's I have signed up for Moonfeather Advent SAL as well as Carol Ridyard’s Advent SAL.  Both start December 1st and continue until the 24th.   This is all I plan to work on in December; let’s hope I keep up with both.   For Moonfeathers, I signed up in late August fearing that mail from Denmark would take some time.   To my surprise, I received my package in under a week.  This is an embroidery project with each day doing a new section on what will eventually be a Christmas tree.   Carol’s i-Stitch Advent works much the same but with her emailing you each morning the next part of the pattern.  

I continue to daily thank the stars above for the wonderful life I have.  I can come and go as I please.   I have the means  to attend retreats.  I have tons of stitching friends and a few that don’t stitch but I still talk to ….lol.  I can take off for girl’s weekends at a moments notice.  My grand babies live only an hour away.  I have a happy healthy family with grand babies that think I walk on water.  Kids are successful in their jobs. Retirement is great!   Life is just plain good.

Up next month…..10 days in OCMD.  First weekend is my guild retreat and the second weekend is Jamboree at Salty Yarns.   And hey, why not spend the four days in between at the beach stitching with friends.  The ‘plan’ is for  extra days of stitching progress and NOT more time for more items to jump in my shopping bag.    

Hope everything is going well in your little corner of the planet.   Thanks for stopping by and keep on stitching. 

August Days

I did it!  I finished my i-Stitch Band Sampler, the 2022 Denim Band Sampler.   I used Gloriana’s Bellagio with some coordinating solids for highlighting some motifs.    I enjoyed the SAL but I am glad it is over.   Some weeks it seemed this was all I had time to stitch on.    Thank you Joan B. for the idea on how to display it.    I can now roll it this way or that to showcase different sections.

I think I should have pressed it!

My grandson stayed with me for a week which left little time for stitching but we did all the fun things.  A couple or three days we logged about 6 hours of pool time each day, we did night swimming and watched the bats come out.   I took him to his first movie in a theatre, Minions, Gru.   We went to the County Fair and did the bounce house, petted piglets, sheep and cows, fed cows, watched tractor pulls, had cotton candy and rode a horse.  Second night, more feeding the animals and watching Pig Scramble and Mutton Busting.  Squeals of delight from a little boy and squeals of distress from the piggies and sheep.  One day we tie dyed tee-shirts.  We saw fireworks and last but not least, we went to a local winery and saw Uncle Choo Choo playing at an open mike night.  (Yes, children were permitted - Pop pop had a fit thinking I was taking him to a bar…..🤦🏽‍♀️ )

I've done some work on my hexagon quilt.   It was the only thing I could stitch on when William was here.  I’m pretty happy with the progress.   I am not so optimistic that I will finish by the end of September but I definitely feel like I am in the homestretch.  I have the length I want; just need to finish adding to the width.

I fully finished the folding book from my Guild’s 20th anniversary celebration in May.   

Trying for some quick rewards and wanting to wrap up a small UFO, I stitched and finished the a blackwork flag from an EGA meeting.  I stitched this over one rather than as charted.   I want to go back and restitch it as charted.  I'll have an ornament and a small pillow.

Sometime during the month I had to take an honest look at the basket of projects for 2022.   I mean what was I thinking when I pulled out like 30 projects to work on in 2022?   For sure I do not have a basement sweat shop of stitchers helping me.   Heck, I don't even HAVE a basement.  Six projects going back in the basket after purging.  As for the other,  I took back upstairs and put away and threw them on the bed.

 

I came across this piece when I was cleaning up my UFO basket and I decided to work on finishing it.   The word "stocking" is the halfway point. 

And of all things, I stated a new quilt project with my sister.   100 blocks in 100 days from Gnome Angel.   So far so good.  Each daily block only takes ten to 15 minutes each morning.   Having the blocks cut ahead of time has proven to being the key to keeping on track.  I have been getting together with my sister one day a week and we spend it cutting our upcoming quilt blocks.

My approach to machine sewing turns out to be the same as my cross stitch.....several projects going at once.   This 100 blocks/100 days challenge  has put me in the mood  to spend extra time each morning with the sewing machine.  I picked up the red white and blue quilt that I started last year and I am stitching up a block every other morning.  30 of the 36 6-inch blocks are now done.  Soon I will be cutting out and stitching the 12-inch blocks.

This could be unprecedented!  I might actually complete two quilt tops!  I am considering sending them out to be long-armed.   Otherwise they will just sit in a pile ……..truth be told, for years.

August did bring a good ten days of low humidity days and cool nights.   It was a joy to have the AC off and the windows opened again if even for just a week.  

And then, I’ve done a bad thing……When I was at Hobby House in July, I met Jackie DuPlessis.   Between meeting her and seeing her class projects as well as the beautiful pieces from stitcher's Show and Tell, I was feeling the need to take a "Jackie Class".   It wasn't even a Bucket List item for me.  Just so happens, there were some openings at Salty Yarns in September and I signed up.   I just hope I don’t become addicted to her pieces and if so,  can hold myself to one class a year with Jackie.    I really went back and forth on signing up.   I kept thinking of all the patterns, kits and class pieces that are already tucked away upstairs.   By my calculations, I have to fully finish 1.5 projects each and every month for the next 20 years and NOT buy anything new, to be close to exhausting all my stash.  But I signed up anyway.  Yikes!   Maybe it is time for another sort/purge of charts for sale.  Oy!

I know it seems like I've done a lot but it has been a month since my last post.  I don't want to stop blogging and for now monthly posts rather than weekly ones are working well for me.  

Hope everything in your neck of the woods is going well.   Thanks for stopping by and keep on stitching.

July Fun

Hot hot hot it has been here in the mid-Atlantic. This last week I have done little outside but the pool and my yard shows great documentation of that.   A bit of weeding and deadheading needed but it will have to wait.  As will the analyzation of the annoying Lantern Flies that seem to be everywhere. 

I had an invite to go for a long weekend in Pittsford, NY which just happens to be where Hobby House Needleworks is location.  There was a class at Hobby House the weekend we went.   A friend and I were not signed up for the class but a group of our friends were.   They had rented a large Air B & B and had room for us to crash with them for the weekend.    Always great fun being with members of your tribe.

On the ride up, we stopped at the Salt Museum in Liverpool just outside of Syracuse.  It was a self guide tour on Lake Onondaga.    It was a great place to stop, stretch our legs and take a walk around for an hour to spell us from the drive.   The local lore is that this Salt mining enterprise was instrumental in winning the Civil War......"the Union didn't defeat the South, we did by not providing them salt....."  It was a 5 1/2 - 6 hour drive and I was able to stitch quite a good little section on my hexagon quilt - pix next time.

Lake Onondaga

Life size display of the salt process.  Taking
water from the lake and boiling the water off
leaving the salt crystals.

We also stopped in Canadaqua, NY at Expressions in Needleart.   Another town filled with wonderful large homes and a bustling little main street.  The shop was well stocked and the owner was super nice.  If it were my local LNS, I wouldn’t be unhappy.

Now on to the town of Pittsford, NY.   What a charming area north of the Finger Lakes on the Erie Canal.   The houses were so adorable and the town so full of Victorian mansions and well kept yards.   Bunting was draped on more houses than not.   Great restaurants, great shops.   

Because I  had a trip  to Hobby House Needleworks in Pittsford NY and of course.....it was necessary to buy 'souvenirs' for my stash.  Both the needlework store and the wool shop were awesome.   The staff and owners were beyond nice and over and above helpful.   It was really like we were dealing with not only knowledgeable people but with long lost friends of the same mind!   

We went to the George Eastman Museum in Rochester, NY.  Built in 1905, what a beautiful house.   I learned the the work “Kodak”, which Eastman used to name his cameras and film, was nothing more than a made up word.   He wanted something easy to pronounce, something that would not be close to referring to anything else, something easy to spell.... so he made it up.  Eastman was a great philanthropist, having no wife or children, he donated his fortune to Rochester Institute Technology, MIT, Tuskegee University and Hampton University and other innumerable charitable causes.   He was a pioneer is work force benefits offering employees health insurance, disability, sick time, and more.   Upon his death, his entire estate was given to the University of Rochester.   

His house was gorgeous.     He built the house for his mother and himself.  Unfortunately his mother died only after living there two years.

Front Entrance

West Garden

Rock Garden at rear of property

The Dining Room Look at that work on the ceiling!

The Conservatory.    I would not have a problem sitting in this room with my stitching and a cup of coffee.  Or even in the evening with a glass of wine.

Well maybe the elephant over my shoulder could be troublesome.

Wood work detail everywhere was intricate and beautiful

The Billiard Room

Beautiful hand carved chest gifted to Eastman from a Russian Czar
for Eastman's advances in photography.


The Eastman Library


The Front Stairway


The ornate balusters 


From the landing above, a beautiful view of the Conservatory

The Living Room

Mrs. Eastman's Room

I don't believe this sampler was old but a sampler on the wall always catches my eye.

The home, while not as large as say Biltmore or others built in the late 1900th century, it was open and airy and was created for class and for comfort.   It was a different kind of opulence.  Can you imagine, Mr. Eastman has a central vac system installed when he built the home in 1905.  

Camera used on the lunar orbitor.

Now on to my Hobby House purchases.  I didn’t go too overboard with purchases but….. I have been in love with the Red Bird Sampler from Brenda Gervais for awhile so pattern, fabric and floss were obtained.   I really like the Quaker Christmas designed by Hobby House shop owner Kathy.  I also have wanted Theresa Venette's Red Sampler Book so that was added to the basket along with some nice white linen.  And you know we went to the shop three times and each time I felt I had to buy.   Having seen a presentation on Bristol Samplers from Claudia Dutcher, I picked up Erica Michael’s Bristol Sampler and Strawberries.   

   

On our last day, we spent the morning at Ontario’s Beach in Charlotte, NY.   A beautiful public park.  We walked the pier and sat on the beach.   Toes went into Lake Ontario but that water was COLD!   

From the pier

The sand, not so nice.   Ground shells.   I don't know how anyone walked without flip-flops.

1822 Lighthouse at the entrance to the Genesee River off Lake Ontario.

I've never seen such purple flowers on hostas.

So on to what I have been doing stitching-wise outside of galavanting to upstate New York.......  I managed to accomplish a mere 53 days without making a craft purchase and then......I got into a(another) quilt challenge with my sister and needed 7 one-yard coordinates.    Oy!  If not with these, surly would have been broken at Hobby House.  

I found these 30 fat quarters (7 and 1/2 yards) of retro fabrics on Etsy.  The project is from Gnome Angel in Australia and is 100 blocks in 100 days.  (surely you know I am laughing at myself because in reality this is just another start that may never be finished.    I don't know why I have such gusto at the start of a project and then.........is crash and burn on the interest)  

Our June EGA meeting was a blackwork patriotic piece.   Me in my infinite wisdom (not) to change things up decided I would stitch the pattern over one instead of as charts.  Well, I should know by now that designers know so much more than me.   I plan to stitch it a second time and at least I will be able to end up with an ornament as well as a piece large enough to frame or to make into a pillow.

  

For the i-Stitch Band Sampler, we are closing in on the end.  I have week 28 to do, and to print out Week 29 from last Friday and then print out the final week this upcoming Friday.   I may catch up, there are still 3 1/2 stitching days until Week 30 is published.

I helped teach a Christmas in July Class for EGA.   Look at these no-sew beauties stitchers were able to walk out with completed, or nearly completed.   No sewing, just a lot of folding and a ton of straight pins.

On to August!

Thanks for stopping by, keep smiling, keep safe and keep on stitching!