Back to UFOs

Hello there, I am back at work on an old unfinished piece The AbeCedaire. "This shall be finished" I tell myself sternly. And then the other two UFOs shall be done and from that time onwards I will become a one-at-a-time girl! Seems to me that the only way I will cope is by only having one large project on the go at any one time . I have tried rotations for three months now with extremely limited success so it's back to the old "one at a time" for me.

Last night Chief Inspector Barnaby of Causton CID assisted me with the top right hand corner. Well, assisted is probably too kind a word - the convoluted plot of "Midsomer Life" proved too much of a distraction at times and slowed progress. Who would have thought it was the Deputy Editor what did it??? By the way Staci, do you want the boxed set of Series 5? If you'd like it email me and refresh my memory of your postal address and it shall be yours.

Hope all of you have had a bright sunny weekend too.

Thank you to all who left comments on yesterday's post. Stupid moi! I left out the name of the magazine and only showed you the etui. Anyway, it is the current issue of Inspirations Magazine and if you go to this website you can see it and find out more information about ordering if your LNS doesn't stock it. Jo Ann can you email me - my email address is in my profile

Thankyou Inspector Barnaby

While watching Inspector Barnaby of Causton CID solve four murders in and around Midsomer - the 'Left for Dead' episode which according to Wikipedia 7.16 million people have already viewed - and once more decided that John Nettles is soooo distinguished looking - I managed to complete the next section of Quaker Row . So now I will roll it away until next month's Embroiderers Guild and get back to Edgar's RR.

I also promised the half deaf half blind elderly Mother a small white pompom as a rabbits tail to complete the childs cardigan she has knitted. At the moment however the HdHbEM is engrossed in a Maeve Binchy book from the large print section of the local library and wouldn't even hear her name if called!

This afternoon I called at the local sewing centre to buy a zip and a reel of thread and somehow this found its way into my bag too! Isn't this etui wonderful? I have promised myself that when I finish my Anne of Green Gables Book and my ABeCedaire I will stitch this. Hope I can wait that long - but as it takes Gloriana floss I will need to source that first which should give adequate time to complete the two UFO's.

So have a happy evening all of you. I'm off to make a pumpkin, chickpea and broccli curry and then settle in to a night of stitching and The Amazing Race. Be good all of you.

Progress Report

Today was Embroiderers Guild so I took along Quaker Row again and made ..... minimal progress. Here's an appalling snapshot taken just now in today's fast fading light.

And here's why - we had a speaker. He was a cinematographer who specialises in time lapse photography and of course time elapsed and my needle didn't move. He made a "name" for himself as the photographer of the Tree House Restaurant project run by The Yellow Pages in 2009. I'd recommend you go to this link and see what I'm talking about. Each year The Yellow Pages run these crazy projects and this year was The Taste of Yellow in which the resulting yellow coloured, 'yellow tasting' chocolate sold out in two weeks!!! - you can see what I'm talking about at this link. Despite the office being literally down the road from my house I didn't manage to buy any - all gone, all gone was the chorus wherever I went.

Anyway I digress long enough- nothing can detract from the fact that little stitching was done this afternoon. I intend to redeem myself tonight while watching Midsomer Murders.

But I can report that I am making progress on my section of Edgar's piece of the "An Emblem of Love" Round Robin. Love the fabric and the floss Edgar - it's a pleasure to stitch but I do rather feel that the butterfly should have been a frog. I had to reverse stitch that one three times - but all is well now!

Have a great evening everyone.

Finally some stitching

Life has been rather too frantic lately but I have managed to get some stitching done. This is the third ornament in the Brides Tree SAL . March was to be a Flower or a Flower Basket symbolising beauty in the home. Do you like this adaptation of the Country Cottage Needlework ornament in the 2007 JCS Ornament issue.

Carol R in England has nominated me for a Beautiful Blogger award - thanks Carol. For those of you who have never visited you can find Carol here and see the exquisite work she does.

Now I have to tell you 10 things about myself that you might not know.

Well!!!!

1. My favourite colour is blue.

2. My favourite season of the year is Autumn.

3. Many years ago my teacher in Primary School taught me to speed read.

4. I don't like peas but I do like beans.

5. I have a ham and salad sandwich for lunch everyday - yes I am a creature of habit!

6. I have worn spectacles (contact lenses for some of the time) since I was five years old.

7. I studied mathematics and science at university ( a long long time ago)

8. I have a patchwork quilt of scars on my shoulders from four surgeries and 2cm of bone missing from the AC joint on my right shoulder.

9. I will never never never never never watch another James Bond movie - when I was recuperating from shoulder surgery last January I watched 20 Bond movies back to back!

10. I was the first granddaughter born to paternal grandparents who had six boys!

Now that is out of the way - who would have thought it so hard to think of 10 pieces of trivia about oneself?!?!

Next is to nominate 10 other people to receive the same award - I think you are all worthy of the award and its too hard to name just 10 of you. But here we go in no particular order - blogs that I think are truly beautiful

Blacksheep's Bit of the Web

Purple Peacock

Squazi and the Chickens

Wen to Stitch

and finally two more that have been a real inspiration to me

Hohla

and the blog that first introduced me to this wonderful world.

The Peacocks Feather

No stitching tonight either !!

Tonight I haven't picked up my needle either - it's Autumn now and harvest time you know. So I have been picking beans, beans and more beans which are in the freezer for Winter eating. And tonight I made mint jelly - my mint bush has gone mad and so I harvested the leaves, searched Google for a recipe and with some trepidation made this mint jelly. It has worked - hooray hooray. Now I can enjoy my lamb and mint jelly with the added flavour of "self satisfaction"!

This week the rotation is to work on Edgar's RR for An Emblem of Love. I am looking forward to this as it is a beautiful multicoloured piece. You can have a peek here - I intend to add the bottom left hand corner.

Well good night everyone. Happy stitching.

No stitching - only knitting

No stitching news to report today. I promised to do the diamond band at the bottom of the cardigan the "half deaf half blind elderly Mother" (hdhbeM) will knit for me. So here's why I haven't been stitching. Tonight will see the first instalment of my promise complete and I am back to DMC and John James needles not Patons 8 Ply Totem and Milwards 4mm knitting pins!

The hdhbeM knits childrens sweaters for the local hospice charity shop and over the past year has done 20. After Easter she takes them to the store and they after pricing them, make a window display of them all. Guess what the hdhbeM does then - she watches each day to see which sells first, how many sell each day, how long it takes to sell the last one etc. Its almost like collecting statistics! One day at the local supermarket we saw a small girl wearing a hdhbeM sweater and I admit to a certain sense of excited satisfaction also. Basking in reflected glory perhaps?

Anyway this is a snapshot of this years hdhbeM sweaters - taken to send to my younger sister who does something similar in the city where she lives. She doesn't have this tally though! And hers of course are ydohdhbeM sweaters = "younger daughter of half deaf half blind elderly Mother"