Stitching, family and reading....

The Tuesday before Easter, I received a email from the Maryland Disabilities Office about the White House Easter Egg Roll. Our local autism chapter had asked if anyone would be interested in attending this event with their children and I had entered our names in believing the chances of being selected was slim to none. Well, was I wrong!

So, on Easter Monday our family went to Washington DC via the Metro and was able to participate in the annual event and spend a nice, relaxing day together. The kids were so excited and enjoyed the train ride immensely. We were let off about a block from the White House and enjoyed the festivities at the White House. We did receive the commemorative wooden egg; which was a good thing. Some other person there stepped on Ray's egg in the middle of the egg roll and he went ballistic. He had thought this was his "special" egg that day and was wanting to bring home a smushed, smelly, boiled egg and I was having a hard time to convince him this was not a good idea!

Recently, Becky's class went to historic Saint Mary's City in southern Maryland. For those not familiar with the significance of site, it was the 4th permanent settlement in the New World and served as the first captial of Maryland. They amount of archilogical exploration of the site has allowed them to rebuild many of the buildings which are built on the original foundations which were unearthed. The kids really enjoyed seeing the replica of the Dove (this ship was one of 2 which carried the original colonist over to Saint Mary's), seeing the reenactors, the printing press, and al the other neat discoveries in a place like this. Mom loved the stitching supplies in the plantation owner's house, of course along with seeing the tobacco hanging in the barn. My parents raised tobacco when I was a kid and it was nostalgic smelling the spicy, dry smell.

Flat Stanley is in many of the pictures with Becky since Raymond has a Flat Stanley project in school. Flat Stanley is a boy who had a bullentin board fall on him in one day so now he is flat. You can put him in an envelope and mail him around the world. Teachers are using it to promote children to document and write journals about the adventures of their own Flat Stanleys. We thought it would be neat for Stanley (or Flat Ray as my son likes to name him) went on the bigger kids field trip.

Reading wise, I finshed 2 books recently of varying jandres. Ken Follet's Pillars of the Earth was a really interesting read about 12th century England. The story takes place in Kingsbridge; which is a priory for monks who build a cathederal and change a small, insigificanct priory into a thriving city. The story is well prepared and written, very detailed and keeps the reader's interest. It is not a light read and is definititely not a weekend read.

The other book was Twilight by Stephanie Meyer which I started reading after hearing my niece gushing about it and seeing all the hubhub in all the stores about the books and the movie released last year. The book was good; the movie lacked a lot of the the detail but it was fun seeing the characters represented on screen. I laughed when I started reading because I thought I could give Jessica (my niece) one of my old V.C. Andrews novels and she would feel she had found a whole new literary world! The characters were interesting and the story is an extremely easy read. As you can see, my reading interests vary drastically ~ it just depends on what I'm in the mood to read.

Stitching wise, I've been working on a few projects. I have started LK's February Stamp-It (one of the list projects). I am wanting to complete all 12 months on one piece of fabric and finish as one item. I started another Christmas ornament (I would like to complete 1 a month this year) while on the field trip with Becky since it was a 3 hour ride. Also, I've been working on my SAL of BRD Tiny Trees and Gifts for Thee. I am working on my biscornu and looking forward to finishing during my retreat in less than a week. Hopefully a finish will be available soon on something!

Biscornus anyone?????

Yep, I decided it was time to live the big life. Time to expand my horizons, to challenge myself, to soar with the eagles.......... okay, enough of the buildup. I discovered a really cool website the other week called "The Floss Box" (http://www.theflossbox.com/) which had loads of cool freebies, including a large number of biscornu patterns.

What is a biscornu you might ask???? Well, it is a interesting little eight-sided pincushion that has become very popular in recent months. The word biscornu (sometimes written biscournu) is derived from a French adjective, meaning skewed, quirky, or irregular or complicated and bizarre. (NO ~ they are not describing me, silly!) I think these are the cutest items and have been drooling..... ahem, exclaiming over them since I first saw them. Found a pattern I liked and decided it is time to give it a try. Wish me luck!

I decided to change the colors the chart called for because I didn't feel the three colors really went together that well. The original colors called for were DMC and while I liked the 2 greens, the red was just not doing it for me. When I went to the Stitching Post on Saturday, I picked out some Gentle Arts Sampler threads in the following colors. What do you think??? I am going to repeat the pattern on both sides because I think it looks the best. Luckily, biscornus are not very big so I might even manage to get one finished (stitching wise anyhow) in a reasonable amount of time.


Since I went to the Stitching Post, I decided to do a little retail therapy for all the stress that has been going on in my life. I picked up the fabric and floss for the teacher gifts for the end of the year and also found a few charts which really drew my interest. In addition, I picked up some fabric for current charts in my possesion and would be able to have some new items to bag up and have available for new projects. Then I had to pick up their latest chart of the month pack because it had to be that darned FROG in a biscornu. Way too cute! :)

I finished up Ursela Michael's Skating Santa and made myself a list of to either stitch and either complete or make good progress on this year. Also, I am posting a picture of the LK January Stamp-It I had finished earlier in March.

I had mentioned I have lots of things I had started in the past few months when I would be running out of the house and just grabbed the first thing I saw. Now I am going to try and finish up as many as I can so I feel like I've accomplished something over the past few months. I won't share this list because it is a tad bit long and quite embarassing to say that most are started but not finished. But you know they say it is never like the present to finish up something and I guess it is that time. At least I made up a list to own up to even if I don't plan on sharing it with you all and keeping it as one of my deep, dark secrets! How about if I just tell you when I cross an item off the list???? Deal

Stitching Progress

On Sunday I watched the movie Crimson Tide while stitching in this morning. I had planned to start a pattern for a friend at the beginning of the March and while I had selected the pattern, after my Mom's passing; I totally forgot about it until last week. I met up with Beth and Carol (the knitting one) at Borders last week and started stitching on it. Thought I was making amazing progress for me (I stitch about as fast as a snail crawls) until I realized I had stitched one area with the wrong color floss! It was to be a vibrant magenta and I had used a blue color that was used for the other text..... so I had a visit from the frog. Decided that I would rip out stitches later and continued with the rest of the project since I was enjoying stitching too much. Luckily it wouldn't affect my stitching because it wasn't a mis-count; just a color mistake. Yesterday I made really good progress on my stitching and figured that I would have clear sailing (or stitching) from there. WRONG! I found another small stitching error where the thread had knotted and I didn't discover it until too late ~ Froggie visit #2. After removing the stitches in question with my "frog gigging tool" I managed to successfully complete the project! :)

So, the big question is..... What is it? Who is it for??? Well, I can't answer those questions yet; but I'll give you a sneak peek...... NOT!!! Sorry but I had to keep it a surprise. When it is received (and that might take awhile) I'll make sure to post a picture. I apologize for keeping you on the end of your seats...

Earlier last week, I finished up the Lizzie Kate January Flip-It. I will be working on the month of February next. Hopefully, I will catch up on the stitching and be able to work each month during the year as I originally planned. I am also finishing up Lizzie Kate's "Don't Get Your Tinsel in a Tangle" which I had been working on when Mom was in the hospital. There is so many little projects which I had started over the course of the last few months and never finished; now is the time to get all the stitching completed and have something to show for this year.

My stitch-a-long project, Blue Ribbon's Design "Little Trees and Gifts for Thee" is coming along ~ albeit slowly. Here is a posting of this project so far. Once again, I'm hoping my stitching will pick up on this piece as well and there will be a lot more progress to report on next time.

Stitching Retreat to Ocean City is a little over a month away! I am looking forward to this weekend trip and meeting up with Sue, Laura and Beth. Hopefully the weather will be great, stitching will be good and time with friends a wonderful time well spent!