I've Been Tagged!

I have been tagged by Noreen.

First thing first...
The Rules:
1. Once you are tagged, link back to the person who tagged you.
2. Post THE RULES on your blog.
3. Post 7 weird or random facts about yourself on your blog.
4. Tag 7 people and link to them.
5. Comment on their blog to let them know they have been tagged.

My weird facts. That's actually hard to come up with than you would think!

1. I always drink milk when I eat popcorn.
2. Most people find this strange: I went to an all academic high school so we had no sports. No football, basketball or baseball.
3. When I get nervous or upset, I tend to twirl my hair. I end up with tight corkscrew curls.
4. When I am really stressed out, I talk in my sleep.
5. I love mexican food! I can eat beans morning, noon and night!
6. I can't speak spanish but I can read and write it.
7. My favorite all time movie is Grease. It's kind of like a blanket, I watch it when I need to be comforted.

I don't know 7 people to tag so I will tag just 2! How awful! LOL!

1. Karen
2. Cindy

The Kiss - Update

This past week I focused on one project. I was on a roll and didn't want to stop! I can definitely see significant progress and have gotten over my initial fear of tackling a Mirabilia project!

It may not seem like a significant amount done but it really is! And it's been fairly easy to stitch! Thread Heaven makes working with the threads a breeze!!!

Weekend Update

This weekend I stayed home and stitched. Not because I didn't have anything I could do, but because I was home sick. I was off Friday and that gave me a whole day of stitching. So I have two updates to show off after this weekend.

My first update is the Iris Storykeeper. I stitched on this all day Friday. I got quite a bit done on that day! I'm hoping to have it finished in the next two months.

My second update is on The Kiss. I have to admit that I haven't stitched on it as much as I should. Mostly because I am intimidated by the different elements of this particular project. However, I devoted all day Saturday to it and came away with some great results. I have to say that I have fallen in love with Thread Heaven. It does amazing things with threads! And after you get into the rhythm of stitching on linen, the fear kind of goes away!I did start a new project today, Sunday. I started the Dragon's Knot. I didn't get very far on it as I forgot to buy one of the threads for it and I don't have it in my stash! I guess I'll have to make a run to Hob Lob soon!

Hope everyone had a great weekend!

Finally an update!

Yes, I have been quite absent from blogging lately. I have been still reading many of my favorite blogs though! Life has just been so busy that I haven't felt compelled to type out my thoughts!

I do have an update on my current project, Iris Storykeeper. I've been stitching on it for a week solid and made good progress. While it was supposed to be a Christmas present, it will now be a birthday present that will be completed well before September!

I finally finished kitting up the Queen of Hearts (see below)! I spent the time while I was supposed to be watching the Super bowl to get all the threads onto bobbins and organized in a box. I have the fabric already and I purchased a Q-snap today so I am looking forward to trying it out!

HAED is having a Valentine's Day sale so I splurged on two new patterns. Because I just don't have enough to do already! I purchased Mystique and Dragon Knot 2. Dragon Knot is for my honey, the sailor. Not sure when I will start this one but hopefully it will be a 2008 project! Mystique I bought for myself! Will it ever be done? Who knows? I have yet to complete one for myself!

Alive!

I'm alive! I've been focusing mainly on work lately as I had my annual convention this past weekend in Shreveport, LA. I won't bore anyone with the details but this was a very difficult convention to put together this year due to circumstances that were beyond my control!

I've been doing a lot of lurking lately. But I've noticed that many of the bloggers I typically read have also been busy with life and not able to update as much as they normally do! It amazes me those people who have the time to do this every day!

I've started to stitch again so I hope to have an update posted soon! It amazes me those who already have 2 or 3 finishes for the year! If I have one done by March I'll be doing great!!!!!

Till later!

No Progress

Unfortunately, I have no progress to report on any of my current projects! It's currently convention time for me so I am very busy with work planning and putting together materials for my convention which is the 24th thru the 27th of January. I'm working really long hours and am so exhausted at night I am not picking up my needle at all! Shame on me! I should be, especially since I am not sleeping at night! I have plenty of time to be stitching!

Saturday I had lunch with an old high school friend. Her husband, daughter, younger brother and parents came along too. It was a great time! It amazes me that no matter how much time passes, we seem to always be able to pick up right where we left off! It reminds me how thankful I should be that I have some very good friends who are genuine people! And seeing her daughter, who is now 13 months old! It made me feel guilty that I had not started her blanket yet! This is the blanket that I am going to do for her! I've had it for over a year now!

Now I am not going to get crazy and say that I am going to start working on it today! LOL! I have plenty of others. But definitely going to start it in the next month or two!

Well, I need to go and start work on at least ONE of my many projects! Plus laundry and other chores! I spent all day Saturday shopping, having lunch with friends and seeing a movie! It was so nice to spend the day with friends (family!).

New Year

2008! Not starting off exactly the way I wanted but it will do.

First off, I had a wonderful Christmas with my family in Austin. There was one little glitch when one of the CV joints on my car broke on the way to Austin but Dad took care of that in Austin before we came back.

I must have been a very good girl because I received a lot of really good gifts. I still have some more gifts coming as I have not yet done Christmas with my girlfriends or my honey either!

One of the gifts that I did receive was this cute craft tote bag. I now have something I can put my cross stitch projects in! I can tote them with me all the time! I'm quite excited!

Unfortunately, due to circumstances beyond our control, my sailor was not able to come home for the holidays. First it was car trouble, then it was work and then he came down with the flu. So we didn't get to spend any time together. We are trying to reschedule our visit but I have my annual convention this month so that has me really super busy and then he ships out again on the 8th of February. We will have a week of down time between the end of my convention and him shipping off but we still don't know if we will be able to arrange anything! He doesn't ship off for his 6 month tour till June so hopefully things will slow down at some time for the two of us and we will get to see each other. Until then, thank goodness for cell phones, text messaging and emails!!!

This holiday season was so very busy! I think that this has been one of my busier seasons! It wasn't very conducive to cross stitching but I do have an update on my Iriskeeper!

Resolutions for the new year:

1) Try to be more patient

2) Be less dramatic

Stitching resolutions:

1) finish the Iriskeeper

2) Start HAED Queen of Hearts

3) Finish The Kiss

Hopefully now that the holiday season is over, I will be able to post more frequently. Although I have noticed that other blogs I read must have been just as busy as they haven't posted very much either!

I hope 2008 brings all the happiness and love that everyone deserves!

Melinda

Holidays!

I love this time of year! A time for family and friends. I know I haven't posted lately but it's because I have been so busy! And more on the sick side than the healthy. But hopefully I am on the road to recovery!

I have decorated my apartment! My mother was kind enough to purchase me a little 4 1/2 foot pre-lit tree (that has been one of the best innovations, pre-lit trees!) and I have it up and decorated with my few ornaments. I've also put up my stocking and the stockings for my two pets!

I finally finished my niece's present. And by finished I mean that I have a frame for it and I've decorated it. It was originally intended for birthday, but what's a few months late? LOL! This time it was Snow White. She already has Cinderella and Sleeping Beauty.

I am almost completely done with all my Christmas shopping. I already got out all my Christmas cards to family and friends. And with my ILCS group I have already begun to receive cards and am trying to keep on top of it all!

It's been a few years since I've enjoyed the holidays so much! (And yes, it has a teeny tiny bit to do with a certain sailor who I will get to see again around New Year's!) Between Christmas, New Year's and the LSU Tigers being in the National Championship game, life is pretty good right now!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I don't know why I thought that going to the grocery store on the day before Thanksgiving at around 1:30 p.m. would be any better than any other time! Yep, I ventured out to the Walmart. It was a zoo. It's as if with the holidays everyone leaves their commen sense and decency at home! I got in and out as quickly as I possibly could and still had to go to a local grocery store to pick up the rest of the items I needed because Walmart didn't have everything! Shock!

Anyway, after vowing to not to return to Walmart until after the holidays, I am home. I currently have two sweet potato pies in the oven baking and I will make a cran-apple pie later this evening. Aren't I just domestic? First time attempting to make dessert for Thanksgiving dinner. First time baking! We'll see how it goes!

After posting on Sunday I spent a few more hours working on The Kiss. That wasn't my intention but I got into a zone so I kept on working on it! I'm actually enjoying working on more than one project. Keeps getting bored with one at bay!

I've spent some time on my Iris Keeper. It's coming along great! It still amazes me how quickly it is coming along with all the changes in color!

I printed out the pattern for the HAED Queen of Hearts today. I am going to see what stash I already have and then prepare a list and hope that either Michael's or Hobby Lobby have a great sale on threads! Next I will order some fabric and I will hopefully have this one kitted up before the end of the year and I will get to start her in 2008!

I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving holiday! I am lucky to be spending it with my parents this year! And with the start of the holidays that means that my Sailor will be home very soon! I can't wait!

Answer

I had a question about whether or not when Iris Keeper is finished, would you still be able to see the fabric. I made sure that when I purchased the fabric that I got a big enough piece so that I would be able to use it as a "border". I thought that if I framed the piece, instead of matting it the fabric would be the matting.

I also had the question some time back what fabric am I using. It is a 25 count Lugana from Sugar Maple Fabrics. The color is Hera. I fell in love with it when I saw it on the website and was even more impressed once I got it into my hands!

Pat on my back!

I was actually very successful in stitching this week. I don't know how many hours I put in but I put in more than just a few! This has also been a very good weekend of stitching. I came to a stopping point on both of the projects so I thought I would post some progress photos.

The above photo is the progress I made this week on the Iris Keeper. I think that I actually accomplished alot considering how many color changes there were! There were actually times when you only used one color thread for ONE stitch! I worked on this particular pattern all week. I accomplished a lot on Saturday while watching football.

This photo is the progress made on The Kiss. I have to admit I only worked on this one for two hours this Sunday morning. Since my other pattern is for Christmas, I devoted more time to it this weekend. But I didn't want to not touch on this project so I picked it up this morning. I'm hoping to maybe do a little bit more this afternoon before resuming the Iris Keeper.

Since I am only working 3 days this week and thus will have a 4 day weekend, I am hoping to have even more progress to show next week! Thank goodness I don't really care for shopping and most of my Christmas shopping is done so I won't be compelled to hit any of the big sales after Thanksgiving!

I was excited to see that HAED is having a sale this week. I am going to be good and purchase just one pattern when I get paid on Tuesday! I have many patterns already and no clue when I will begin them so I think one pattern is all I should limit myself to! LOL!

WIP Update

Time for an update! I have been working on two projects. Well, not as diligently as I normally do but then I am not used to having two projects going on at the same time. Actually I have three, but I have put one aside for now. I will hopefully revisit it soon!

It's a very gloomy day today so it was pretty dark in the apartment. So the pictures are not very good quality. I know, I am very picky!

The picture below is my progress this past week on the HAED Iris Keeper Storykeep. I am hoping to have this one done by Christmas but there are so many color changes! It just may not happen. It may have to turn into a birthday present next September. But I am keeping my fingers crossed!

This second pictures is an update on The Kiss. I haven't worked on this much . I am going to try to keep this as my weekend project. I worked on it this past Saturday. I have to admit I have been pretty leary about working on it as I am not used to working on this type of linen. I believe it is a 28 count piece. It is 2 over 2. My first one! So it is very slow progress!

Iris Keeper Storykeep

Ok, my newest project is the Iris Keeper Storykeep from HAED. Isn't she pretty? The pattern is 3 pages long. That doesn't include the 5 pages that list the different color threads required. This project has 90 different colors! It took me two nights to kit it up! I almost gave it up it was so monotonous!

I've only worked on the actual stitching a little bit. I was having quite the lazy weekend after my New Orleans Halloween trip. Sorry the picture quality is so bad. I just can't seem to repeat the same "procedure" each time I take a picture to get a good quality one!

I hope to work on it some more this week as I will be out of town again this upcoming weekend. This time: Houston! I am going to see my 6 year old niece compete in a cheerleading competition and watch the LSU-Alabama game with friends!

Halloween in New Orleans

I am back from New Orleans. We had so much fun! We attended the Witching Hour Ball at the Howling Wolf in New Orleans. It was fun! It was so interesting to see how people really get into the whole vampire/Anne Rice books and spend a lot of time and money on their costumes. I don't have many pictures (I was busy drinking and having fun!) but here are a few of me and my friends dressed up! There are more, but they are on my friend's camera! We also went out on Bourbon Street and ended up at the Piano Bar of Pat O's! Always a good time with singing and drinking Fuzzy Leprechauns! It was overall a very good way to celebrate Halloween!

Finally!

I finally finished!!! Yeah! I had to take a couple pics of the finished project because it is an icky day here and I couldn't get the lighting right! So this is going to be for my friend Joy for Christmas. It only took me 3 1/2 months! Yikes!!

I am getting ready to kit up my next project, which is the Iris Keeper Storykeep (last picture). I am going to be doing it on the fabric that I also have pictured here. Unfortunately it didn't photograph well!

It is currently monsooning here as we have a cold front coming through so I couldn't get my lighting right! But I wanted to get this post up as quickly as possible instead of waiting till it was a better day to take pictures!!!

I also still have The Kiss I am working on. I haven't touched it since the last time I posted progress on it as I have been so busy with work, play, and working on Amore! I may try to put aside one day this week though to work some more on it! It's ok though. My friend doesn't expect it for at least another 5 years or so!!! LOL!

I recently received a RAK of the Queen of Hearts chart from HAED. I am looking forward to starting on that one. I will probably work on kitting it up first. I will have to check out Sugar Maple Fabrics to see what would look good with it!

Where did the weekend go?

This weekend was supposed to be a quiet weekend. Time to catch up on housecleaning, laundry, and projects. Instead it was a non-stop weekend.

Saturday I ended up having lunch with some friends who came into town for the LSU game. Which I didn't mind. One of them was a friend I hadn't seen in a couple of years so it was good to catch up! After lunch, I ran by my parents house where I got a phone call from another friend saying that she had gotten tickets to the LSU game and did I want to go? Of course I wanted to go! So off to campus for the game which didn't start till 8 p.m. It was nice though because we caught up with my other friends from out of town and I was able to spend some more time with them!

So since I wasn't home Saturday, that meant that today, Sunday, my lazy day was anything but! I had to finish laundry, do some household chores, etc. I was able to work some on my current project, Amore. I am hoping to have a FINISH picture this week. I am very close! Less than 200 stitches.

It will be an early night tonight to get ready for the week. But my plans for the week do include pictures of a completed project and a start to my next one. Plus maybe some additional ones of other projects that are currently ongoing!

Sisters?

My sister and I finally found the time to go have our pictures taken. The last time we had our pictures taken together was probably when I was 15 and she was 10. Let's just say that it was long enough ago I really can't remember. Plus I haven't had my picture professionally taken since I was a senior in high school. Can you see the family resemblance? LOL These are the pictures that we are giving our parents:

Since I really dislike taking pictures (never like the way I look in them), it made me especially happy when my sailor said that he loved the pictures. Good! Because I put the picture of me by myself in the mail for him!!! LOL!

Trip to Bama

Just got back from my trip to Point Clear, Alabama. We stayed at the Grand Marriott. This place is beautiful! Did not want to come back! This is an absolutely beautiful resort! It has a beach area, a huge pool, boardwalk all along the property so you can walk or bike by the water, go sailing, so much that we couldn't even begin to enjoy anything as we were in class! The rooms are heavenly. I can't wait to go back!

Upcoming Events

Just wanted everyone to know that I probably won't be posting an update on any projects this weekend. I haven't made much progression since this past weekend and I will be going out of town on Sunday for a work related event!

If I should get some progress done on any of my projects before I leave on Sunday I will gladly post it! But with my sister currently in town, we are have portraits being taken tomorrow as a surprise for our parents. We haven't had our picture taken together since we were probably 10 and 5 years of age! They should be so pleased. We are also taking single portraits which I have not done since I was a senior in high school.

Saturday is of course football. And since I will be leaving on Sunday all household chores and laundry must also be completed on Saturday!

On a happy note I did get a new cell phone today. My sister surprised me and bought me the new Chocolate phone. Total surprise. I hadn't mentioned that I needed or wanted a new phone. She just brought it to me out of the kindness of her heart. Or.....will I be asked for some favor at a later date? LOL!

I will be leaving for Point Clear, Alabama on Sunday. I have never been there and am looking forward to it. Attending two days of continuing education. But also get a chance to go to the huge outlet mall in Foley, Alabama. The only downside of this whole trip is that My Sailor will be in Talladega, Alabama for the car race and even though we will both be in the same state, we will not be able to see each other. We will still be 5 hours apart! Darn it! So close and yet so far away!

Our mascot is supposed to be making his first appearance at this weekend's football game. This seems to be a big game as the CBS Early Morning Show is broadcasting from our stadium on Friday and ESPN Game Day will also be broadcast on Saturday from our university's parade grounds for the second time this season. Here's a photo of both of our mascots:

Old and New

I didn't quite as much done on my Amore project. Life just seemed to get in the way! LOL!

On Saturday, my friend Joy came over to watch the LSU game and since Amore is for her for Christmas, I couldn't work on it in front of her. So I started The Kiss. I didn't get much progress done. This is being done on 28 count. It is 2 over 2. This is my first time doing that and well, I already hit one snafoo but was able to pull the stitches and correct it pretty quickly!

It amazes me how different the colors look in the two photos from the original piece and even from each other!