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It took years but we finally got one!!!! I know it isn't a LNS but at least it's a craft store and somewhere that I can buy DMC at a reasonable price. Yesterday they opened their doors for the first time. I didn't think I was going to be anywhere near the store so I hadn't planned on being there. Someone must have been smiling down on me because I was dropped off right in front of the store :o)
As soon as I got to the floss section, lo and behold there was Carolyn! She wasn't kidding when she said she was going to be there the first day they opened. We had a quick chat and then I picked up some floss. Out of all the floss that I have, I couldn't believe it when I only had one 451 in my stash! That's always the way though isn't it? LOL!
Well, the contractors are finished! The building for The Needlework Shop is complete -
There were times when I didn't think they were going to finish their job but they came through and worked steadily all week ;o) Now I have some time off while I hunt down a landscaper so it's back to stitching Tot. I wonder how hard it is to get a landscaper at this time of year. Anyone know?
DH and I had some company this weekend :o) Mom and Dad arrived Friday evening and work started on the bathroom right away. Because we'll be putting the house up for sale as soon as possible, we're trying to get some of the remaining renovation projects completed. One of those projects was the main bathroom. It was really dated with the grey fixtures so it just needed a makeover ;o) This was the progress by Saturday morning -
No more grey fixtures (okay, except the sink) and no more gross flooring :o) GONE! Woohoo! This is the status as of today -
Have you ever seen a redneck's shower before? Well it probably looks something like this ;o) LOL! Toilet and tub are in as well as my new floor. We ended up falling behind but not because of something we did. DH and I had picked up the roll of flooring a few years ago and on the label it stated - "6 ft x 9 ft, approximate size (minimum size 6' x 8'9")" but when we rolled it out, it was only 6' x 6'. Hmmm...where did the other 3' go???? Grrrr! Sooooo, DH had to run back into town to get new flooring.
I'm really pleased with the work that got done this weekend though and I've got to thank Dad and DH for their hard work. Mom did her share of the work though and ended up babysitting Brie the majority of the time. LOL! I'm sure if you asked her though, she'd say she doesn't consider it work when it comes to her grand-dog ;o)
WOOHOO! Today I got stash in the mail :o) It's been such a long time so I'm still ogling everything. This was a small order but hey, anything is better than nothing! DH had bought me The Garden Chair by The Cat's Whiskers and the order arrived from Needlecraft Corner this morning -
The fibers are so gorgeous! The pin for the parasol is just amazing and the pattern book itself is quite the instruction booklet. When you look at it, there really isn't a lot of stitching involved but putting the chair and parasol together is going to be time consuming. Oh well, it's a challenge I'm willing to try ;o)
Since Lizzie Kate came out with another pattern for breast cancer, I got Drema to throw that in the order as well. Yes, bad me. LOL! Peace, Love and a Cure is so pretty. I love the tuck the model is in and if we get down to Maine this weekend, I'll keep my eyes out for some of that fabric so I can make my own. Now that I think about it, this would make a great project to take with me :o)
Over the weekend, DH and I put our bedroom back to rights again. We now have all the new flooring down! Yay! Our bedroom looks so much better and I'll get some pictures up at some point. We also have the new bed that we ordered and it's now in the extra bedroom. I thought I would post a picture for you since the bed was missing when I showed you the renovation pictures -
I still need to get a duvet to fill the duvet cover. I still say this is a huge queen duvet but DH doesn't think so. We'll see once it's filled. The quilt on the end of the bed is one that my mom made me quite a few years ago. It won grand champion at the fall fair that year :o) It was too small for the new bed but I still wanted to display it so I compromised!
I have to say that I was a 'very' bad girl this past Friday... Let's just say that the living room has been 'rearranged' and finally been put back together ;o) Was it worth it? Most definitely! But if you asked that same question to my body, it would be screaming..."Let me die! Let me die!"
When we bought this house, it was almost head to toe FULL of wallpaper and borders! The living room was the most striking with 'vinyl' wallpaper -
Do you see the darker brown towards the top of the ceiling in the picture below -
No, that is NOT paint. It's the layer of glue that was left behind when we peeled that wallpaper off the walls! It was like the walls had sprouted fuzzy hair all over. LOL!
Once our transformations were complete, the living room looked like this -
Very basic but at least it was looking much better ;o) Over the years, some color has been added and we've also put our own touches in the room.
So, as we did in the extra bedroom, we laid down the Autumn Oak laminate flooring to replace the carpet. Again, one of 'the' best decisions we have made lately! Let me take you on a tour :o) This is where you enter the living room from the kitchen -
That's our front door and we added the two rugs.
As you pan right you see -
That's my Angel of Grace on the wall :o)
If you continue going right you'll come to DH's chair and Brie's bed -
Yes, those are stairs going up to it ;o) What would a princess be without a set of steps up to her bed? LOL!
Another right turn shows the wall with the television -
On the other side of this wall is our garage.
Turn right again and our couch, my stitching space, comes into view -
DH and I just bought the area rug you see. I love the colors but it doesn't go with our present couch. Hopefully at some point, this will be fixed. Both of them together are a little too busy for my taste ;o) On the other side of the half wall is the kitchen. DH really hates the wooden spindles and they will be taken down at some point.
Finally, you come back to the living room entrance -
That's my Quiltmaker hanging on that wall :o)
It's still not exactly like the image we have in our heads but it will do for now. As they say, it's a work in progress and we're doing the best with what we have :o)
Next up will be our bedroom but DH has promised not to start that until after the party. Our new bed is being delivered tomorrow and there will be some interesting changes take place ;o)
As promised, I have some pictures of the renovations we did in the extra bedroom :o) Unfortunately I don't have a good before picture but let me tell you this, it was one of the 'few' decent rooms in the house when we bought it! Originally the walls were a neutral color and the carpet was blue. It also had two closets. In the first picture below, that door is where you walk into the room and now the walls are a pale yellow. Behind the blue Tickle Trunk, was where the extra closet used to be -
A number of years ago, DH took that closet out and used it to expand my computer/craft room area :o) If you remember those pictures, it's an alcove that now holds all my storage bins and my shelves full of horses, much to DH's chagrin. LOL!
The next picture pans over a bit to show the remaining closet (the door still needs to be put back on) and my super duper organizational skills ;o) Just to the right of the closet is one of two windows in the room -
This is the farthest corner of the room and you can see one of my prized Bev Doolittle prints and a horse painting that my Gram had done for me :o) Sorry there is no bed -
Finally, we zip around to the right side of the room where the second window sits. This used to be an octagon window :oP We have one dresser and DH's desk with his computer. You can also see my cabinet 'full' of miniature horses -
I also wanted to show you a picture of the laminate flooring -
The color is a 'bit' washed out but hopefully you can get the idea from the room pictures. It's called Autumn Oak and it goes really well with some of our furniture and the wood accents in the house.
So there you go! That's Stage One of our renovations. When we get the living room back to rights, I'll take you through that one and believe me, this was a HUGE transformation from when we first moved in ;o)
Every year I keep track of my stitching in a pocketbook calendar. I tried keeping track of the amount of hours that I spent on each project and that just didn't work out for me so I started keeping track of the days I stitched. Each day that I put needle to thread, I would mark down the project I was stitching on. If I finished a project on a particular day, I would write 'completed' after it. This tends to give me a better idea of how much time I stitch and how long it takes to finish a project. Plus, it's a much easier system ;o)
As I looked over the month of January, I have to say that I am sorely disappointed :o( Out of thirty-one days, I only worked on Stargazer for 16 of those days. Very depressing. I'm into the month of February and I still haven't picked her up. At this rate, I'm really worried that she won't be completed for the fall fair. I will persevere though!
So this is my progress as of January 30 -
She now has a bottom :o) I'm still really enjoying stitching her; I just need more time in my day. Either that, or another extra pair if hands. LOL! I've tried to calculate how much I have done and I think it only works out to be approximately 20%. That's quite scary when you get down to numbers!
Now just what am I doing with my time? Well, DH and I have decided to do some home renovations. Terrifying I know, considering DH's track record of finishing the projects that he starts ;o) I, firmly, put my foot down this time and I have to say that he's been 'very' good! At first we were just looking at getting a new bed for the extra bedroom because the one in there was old, a combination of beds and smelled quite musty. Yuck! Our initial idea was to buy a cheap tight top but once we got looking around, we figured another few extra hundred would be worth it to buy a nicer bed. Well...we did find one that we really liked and it looks like it's going into 'our' bedroom when it finally comes in :o) Our new bed will be put in to the extra bedroom. Same quality bed but the new one is much softer. Sigh! Sweet dreams for me!
Anyway...we kind of got off track and decided to take up the old carpet in the two bedrooms and the living room and replace them with laminate flooring. Boy, am I glad we did! What a difference! DH did the extra bedroom first and I just can't stop looking at it :o) I'll take a picture of the room once we get it all back together again. Tomorrow, DH is working on the living room. It's a little crazy here at the moment because we have furniture and things everywhere! It's driving me a bit over the edge but I'm trying to keep my focus on the end result.
While doing the major overhaul of the extra bedroom, we decided it might be beneficial to put in a closet organizer. Well, you know from my last post how THAT turned out. Here is the end result -
Not bad, if I may say so :o) Black was not the color I wanted but everything matches and they fit perfectly on their shelves. I still have a few things left to go through but basically it's done. If you look really hard, you can see the color of the laminate flooring but I'm going to wait to unveil the new changes later in another post ;o)
Where's that you ask? Here. Right here. I've always joked that we lived in the arm pit of the country but after this week, I KNOW we do!
Now don't get me wrong, this city has a low crime rate, it's easy to get around and it's the most beautiful city in the province. But as far as variety goes, it...SUCKS! You go out to buy clothes; every store has the same thing. If there's something specific you're looking for, you're never going to find it. Want something different or unique? If you're lucky, you 'might' find it but that's after spending approximately five hours of shopping from one end of the city to the other.
DH and I decided to install a closet organizer in the extra bedroom to...well, organize it ;o) Everything had been so difficult to get to. My books were beneath heavy boxes or high up on the shelf. Our box full of wrapping paper, bows and tags had been buried under anything that was thrown into the closet. Not the easiest thing to get to. Items I had picked up for finishing projects were all over the place!
So my idea was to find some magazine holders, boxes or baskets to make the space on the new shelves more efficient. Sounds easy doesn't it? HA! Over the past week, DH and I, together or separately, have been to FIVE of the bigger stores in the city. You would 'think' that after seeing all these great products by Debbie Travis or House & Home that it would be a piece of cake to pick up these items. I'd rather gouge out my eyes!
Why does something so easy end up being so difficult? It's because of where we live. This city dislikes change. Why have five McDonald's, only two kinds of grocery stores, more dollar stores than you can shake a stick at and so many Tim Horton's that it's like they multiply overnight? It's because they're the same and they're safe. The city threw a hissy fit when Winners wanted to open a store here and we're almost one of the last major cities to 'finally' get a Home Depot, Michael's, and Eastside Mario's.
The new stores are still under construction and whether they will last or not remains to be seen. It's about time that this city grew up and grew some balls though! Unfortunately that does not fix my current situation but at least it gave me a chance to rant ;o)
