We Wish You A...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

It seemed that Santa arrived again while we were sleeping. I guess that must have meant that I was a really good girl this year ;o) DH, in an attempt to make my Christmas perfect, had stuffed my stocking full of goodies, placed a card on the tree and prepared a scrumptious breakfast by candlelight. I was so touched that he did this considering we had agreed no to do anything for each other this year but then again, we never listen to each other ;o) My sweetie got me all of my favorite things - a box of chocolate covered cherries (Lowney's of course), four delectable truffles by Godiva, a pack of Scratch & Win tickets (in which I won $10 from!), a CD (Matt Dusk ~ swoon!), fuzzy socks (to match my pajamas) and a book (Nobody's Mother, Life Without Kids by Lynne Van Luven). Am I spoiled or what! :o) The "kids" each got their own gift. Pickles got a package of Carrot Slims and unbelievably he loves them! Do you know how hard it is to buy for a rabbit???? Brie got a stuffed toy with TWO squeakers in it and Duncan got a nice big doggy bone :o)

After breakfast we packed up the car, with both dogs in tow, and headed down to the ocean to spend Christmas with DH's family. It was a beautiful day, with no snow in sight, and we could have swore it was early fall. Once everyone arrived and we were somewhat settled in, the gift opening began! With eight adults, one baby and SIX dogs, you can just imagine what kind of madhouse we had going :o) All the gifts were wonderful and well thought out. My MIL loved the Flower Lady that I stitched for her -

Our nephew, and his parents, was pleasantly surprised by his new Dory Rocker that my FIL made -

I was very touched by the lovely cabinet that I received from my in-laws :o) DH put it up in the living room for me and it now holds a few of my special horse models -

In all the giving and receiving, the dogs were not forgotten in the least! While we had hors d'oeuvres, the dogs got biscuits and dip (I kid you not!). Each dog received a bag of handmade cookies by my MIL, a special Christmas hanky from my SIL/SO, and a toy from my other SIL/BIL. Brie decided to pose with her hanky on but the way DH took the picture, it looks like she is sporting a pair of bunny ears :o)

We "attempted" to take a picture of all the dogs together but this was the best we could do -

From left to right we have Misha (Burmese Mountain Dog), Duncan (Australian Cattle Dog), Samson (a mix of Jack Russell and Lhasa Apso), Brie (Miniature Dachshund), Briar (Boxer) and Buddy (a Terrier mix). You try to arrange a picture with six unruly dogs and see how easy it is ;o)

My MIL put on a wonderful Christmas dinner as always. Everything was delicious and again, I behaved myself :o) While we waited for dessert and for our supper to settle, we decided to put on a fire...OUTSIDE! Yes, it was THAT nice that the boys went out and built a small campfire overlooking the ocean. I can't tell you how peaceful and tranquil it is down there. My MIL figures this should be our new Christmas tradition and I for one agree, just as long as we have the same nice weather year after year ;o) Instead of marshmallows, we snacked on a Chocolate Explosion Lava Cake for dessert and was it ever yummy! I will see about getting the recipe from my MIL if anyone is interested.

For our evening finale, we all participated in a rip roaring IQ game :o) I have come through it knowing that I am just as smart, or dumb, as those around me. LOL! It really is a neat game though so I will leave you with another brainteaser -

How many times does the digit 3 show up between the number 1 and 50?

For the one person that guessed and guessed correctly, 15 it is!

If you think you know the answer, post it in the comment section :o)

I hope everyone had as wonderful a Christmas as I had!

I Can Dance, I Can Dance,

Everyone look at my...FINISH!!!! LOL! Yes, I am excited to say that I have another big finish out of the way and scratched off my list :o) Flowers is officially completed as of this evening! Whew! It took longer than I expected but work got in the way and there was nothing I could do about that. Bad work! Bad! Flowers has been finished with a few of my own changes and I am quite happy with them. I converted all the buttons to ones made by JABC. I refused to stitch that gremlin looking creature that was crawling out of one of the flowerpots and replaced him with an inchworm button. There was a heart on the leg of her overalls that I replaced with the breast cancer heart button. A bee took the place of beads up in the saying and I left out some backstitched words that were on some of the items. She will soon be off to the framers as soon as I decide what frame will go nicely with her :o)

So what's next on my agenda? Well, I 'really' should complete The Quilt Time Sampler by LHN but my newly acquired Gathering Eggs by Mirabilia is calling out my name ;o) I guess you'll just have to wait and see who wins...

On my way home from work this afternoon, I stopped by a fibers sale that was being held. Most of the stuff being sold was geared towards quilters and rug hookers but one of the booths had a beautiful selection of fibers that were perfect for any stitcher :o) They had pearl cottons and silks in every variegated color under the rainbow! They were just gorgeous! I picked up two skeins of fine pearl (which would be very comparable to Caron's Wildflowers). They are made by Stef Francis from England but a shop called The Cotton Mill Threadworks in Toronto, Ontario, carries them.

When I finally arrived home, DH had the house looking quite nice. He had finished all the laundry, changed the bed and made some chocolate tapioca pudding for after supper :o) To top that, he even prepared supper! We had turkey, mashed potatoes, carrots and squash. Now normally I hate squash and have always refused to eat it because I never liked the taste. I have NO idea what DH did to this batch of squash but it was de-li-cious! I'm not kidding! I think I have finally grown fond of the vegetable that I shunned for all these years. Don't get me wrong, I'm always up for trying anything new but for some reason squash never really did anything for me. It wasn't pushed back as far as pea soup (that's a completely different story!) but it was a good football field's length away ;o) I do have a friend whose name I will not mention, Katie (cough!), that dislikes any vegetable that starts with C. Yes, you heard it right. Why that is, I have no idea and I've been desperately trying to figure it out. What vegetable(s) do you dislike? Is there anyone out there that can top Katie's phobia?

It's The Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown

Do you remember that cartoon? It had been SO long since DH and I had seen it that we were pleasantly surprised when it was on television Friday night :o) Over the years, the Halloween programs seem to have been forgotten. When I was a kid, it was a big thrill when they would show the scary movie Halloween! Now you're lucky if a children's cartoon comes on. I've always been a big horror movie fan. I have no idea why. They used to scare me so much that I would run and jump into my bed, always afraid there was someone under the bed waiting to grab my leg. Around Halloween, I get the urge to watch these movies again but now I just laugh at the really bad acting and lame plot lines ;o)

I finally managed to squeeze in three four-hour days of work and to be honest I'm tired. It's taken a month to get to that point and I wonder how patient LTD is going to be come the middle of November :o( It should be interesting when I have my meeting this coming week. At least they can't say that I'm not trying. Of course I do enjoy the emails that are sent flying back and forth between Katie, Faith Ann, Shannon and I. That sure makes the hours fly by faster ;o)

I had a bit of a happy dance last night when I completed all the stitching on Flowers :o) WOOHOO! The only thing left is the backstitching and the attachment of all the beads and buttons, which thankfully aren't that many. She would have been finished earlier except for the fact that I miscounted and had to start the top heart all over again :o( Needless to say, that froggy is no longer alive, lol!

To add to my happy dance, I also received a much anticipated package from a very special friend of mine down in Louisiana :o) I tell you, stash like this sure puts a smile on a girl's face, especially one that has been on a stash starve since October 1! Shirley sent me two pieces of 20" x 27" 28 count linen (DMC 3865), one piece of 20" x 27" 25 count evenweave (DMC 739), along with these gorgeous hand crafted earthenware buttons from Happy Hollow Designs.

She also included a June birthday needleroll kit by The Victoria Sampler, five packages of Dill Buttons along with a handful of loose ones and four cards of charms by Jazz Ups. Two of the Jazz Up charms were breast cancer ones and I will have to find a very special project to put them on :o) Thank you SO much again Shirley! You are an angel ;o)

Did everyone remember to set back the clocks by one hour????

Should I Stay Or Should I Go

What is it with animals on the side of the highway? Just when you think they've made it to the safety of the side of the road, they turn right around and dart back across. Are they suicidal or do they just make bad judgment calls? I often wonder what's on their minds when they do this. Are they thinking anything in particular or are they just kissing their ass and praying that they get to the other side of the road in one piece? There have been many nights when DH and I will be driving home and we'll see little mice or moles running for their very lives. They are literally running for all they are worth. I wonder if they stop and heave a big sigh of relief when they reach safety or do they go home to their families and tell stories of their grand adventures...

Having a property that is designed for horses, we have very few trees around our house and therefore, minimal wildlife. That is one thing I have really missed. Every year we get the swallows, robins and a few other little birds. We also have George, the groundhog, but he has been MIA for a while now. At least there have been signs that he is still alive :o) Because of this lack of wildlife, I was pleasantly surprised to see a new visitor yesterday when I passed the back patio doors...a grey squirrel! Was he ever cute too! In the six years we have been here, we have never had one at the house. He has now been officially named Squeak :o)

Squeak was having a great time eating all the seeds coming off the big maple tree next door. I took these pictures right through the patio door and they came out rather well. I wanted to try tossing out a few peanuts but they belong to DH so I knew better ;o) Squeak arrived back today so it will be nice to see him stay for awhile if he can :o)

It was a great mail day today when I found a little package from England waiting for me in the mailbox! A wonderful lady from over there sent me a breast cancer ribbon pin and charm for my collection :o) This inspired me to stitch up this little sachet bag with my own design called Love, Faith & Hope. I used Carrie's Creation threads and they are wonderful to use.

I have attacked Flowers this past week with a vengeance and she is coming along really well! I am very pleased with the progress I have made. I hope to make more of a dent in her this coming weekend.

A Bit Of Sunshine On A Rainy Day

You know it's going to be a perfect stitching day when you look out first thing and it's dark and dreary with rain. Even though days like this damper my mood, I still like them because you can bury yourself underneath a heavy quilt in your most comfortable of clothes, snacking away on freshly made chocolate chips cookies (by DH that is!) along with a nice warm cup of hot chocolate. Pure bliss :o)

I was lucky that it stopped raining long enough so I could dash out to the mailbox. There awaited my first bit of sunshine for the day! As I peeked into the big brown envelope, I was delighted to see the chart Antarctic Penguins by Brittercup Designs along with all the Weeks and Crescent Color threads to stitch them with :o) A sweet friend of mine from one of my message boards did a trade with me a few weeks back so technically this was not stash that was purchased so I've still held my ground this month ;o) I am going to have to find some of that gorgeous blue fabric though but that can wait until my stash starve is lifted. Thank you Renee!

I spent the afternoon working on Flowers and she has now graduated to a new size of Q-Snaps! As slow as I'm stitching, she is coming along.

I finally decided to watch Brokeback Mountain. I had bought this movie back in September but never got around to watching it. It was...different. I knew what to expect but it was the acting that really turned me off. Maybe I need to watch it again and then give my review. During the movie my second ray of sunshine appeared when my Gram called :o) She's 85 years old and lives about two hours away. She's the best and I always love hearing from her. I just wish she lived closer so I could see her more often and do more things for her. She sounded great though and that put a smile on my face :o)

The Countdown Is On!

Where is the time going? I can't believe that we're into October already and that means that four more weeks from today is.....RETREAT WEEKEND!!!! Yahoo! I have officially started the countdown :o) I'm really looking forward to this retreat as I never made it to the spring one because there was just too much happening at the time :o( Plus, that means that my stash starve will be lifted as well, lol! For those of you who are not familiar, in New Brunswick we are lucky enough to have a stitching retreat that is held twice a year, spring and fall. It's within driving distance and it's affordable. It's held at Camp Wildwood and although it's not The Ritz, we think it's good enough for us ;o) I mean, what could be better than sitting on your butt stitching all weekend and only having to get up to eat, sleep and use the facilities! If life were only that simple...

It's been a long week but I have a long weekend to look forward to :o) DH has officially left me to go on a hiking trip so I'm home alone with Brie and Pickles. I've got my Chunky Monkey ice cream, my stitching all ready to go and a good handful of movies, including Troy, waiting to be watched. Drool :oP'''' I think my stitching has forgotten who I am because I just have not had the energy to work on it like I normally do. That's what happens when you go back to the real world :o( I have made some progress on my Flowers by Jeremiah Junction and even though she is headless, she's coming along nicely.

I have been given an extra little project to complete over the weekend thanks to a certain 'trio'! He shouldn't take long to complete and I'll post a picture when he is :o) I thought I would finish him into a cube but I've got something simpler up my sleeve...

This past week was mail heaven for me! I finally got my color catalogue from Told In A Garden and my fall catalogue from Nordic Needle. Unfortunately that backfired because I found a few more TIAG designs I don't remember seeing before so that means they have been put on the 'want list' for later purchase. Nordic Needle also had a few things of interest as well so you can only imagine my agony. I also received a whack of fabric!!!! And no, the purchase and trade were arranged 'before' my agreed to stash starve so it is still legitimate girls :o) Doesn't all that wonderful fabric just get your mind going with all the new project possibilities????

Well, it's off to relax, put my feet up and stitch awhile before the 'princess' awakens for her supper :o)