RAK Surprise!

Today I came home to a special surprise in my mailbox!

I won a RAK giveaway from Angela last week, which was a surprise itself, I am not usually lucky.  It is a BEAUTIFUL needle and pins box that Angela painted.  Look at the sweet card, love it!!

It is so beautifully stitched and finished...

...with such sweet details, charm, and trim....

It is just PERFECT for holding my scissors and notions!  LOVE it!!

I can't even explain how special it is to receive this gift.  As a stitcher, I have made many gifts for others over the past 30 years, but I have NEVER received one myself since there are no stitchers in my circle of family and friends.  I think that this idea of RAKs in the blogging community is so special and it is nice to be a part of it.  I hope to send out such love and kindness to others as well very soon.  

Thank you so much, Angela!!  :D

As for my weekend and week of stitching, I have been working on Elizabeth Hancock faithfully, although not as far along as I thought I would be.  I had hoped to have the top section done, the flower pot and house.... Almost!!

And so, stitching Elizabeth continues on!

Happy Weekend and Happy Stitching to you ALL!!!

xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Daffodil Days

Today was the most gorgeous day!  I hope you all had summer-like weather too!  The daffodils are popping open everywhere basking in the sunshine :)  

I have a bouquet of them on my desk at work.  Each year at work we have a daffodil days drive for donations to the American Cancer Society so I get a bouquet for the cause.  

Daffodils are such a happy flower!!

I have gotten a little bit done on Elizabeth Hancock, although it is hard to see...

... see all those lines under the pretty lady?  well, that was really BORING! LOL!  And the house is now started.  

I also changed the color of the lady's eyes back to brown... the gray-blue was too gray and it seemed weird that they matched her shoes!  So now they are back to brown, like mine.  

And since it is a new moon today, here is my TUSAL update.  It does not seem like so much has been added, I think because I stitch to the very end and save every thread I can just in case!

Last night I went to see Casablanca on the big screen!  OMG, what a treat! I was thrilled to see it was playing near me.  I have always been a classic film buff and especially a Bogie fan so it was great to see him larger than life.  I hope they keep bringing classics like this to the theater, it seemed to be a big hit, the place was PACKED!  :D

And this week, Vickie, a blogging buddy, gave me a blog award, how sweet!  

Thanks so much Vickie!!

Liebster is a German word meaning favorite, dearest, or beloved and the Liebster is awarded to new bloggers with less than 200 followers.  In doing so, I pass the LOVE onto five more bloggers; thank my friend and link back to her; post the award on my blog and list the bloggers I pass the Liebster on to with their links; let them know by commenting; and then share five random facts about myself that people do not know about me!  

All in all, I think it is nice to share other blogs that we love as it can only broaden our community and learn more about each other.  So the five blogs I pass on the Liebster to are:

1/ Stitching Cat @ Cat Tails and Needles

2/ Joy @ Counting Bits of Joy

3/ Denise @ Country Stitcher

4/ Sue @ Berkshire Cottage

5/ ~*Shar*~ @ Sharlene's Stitching Site

And 5 random facts about me..... 

1/ I am no longer an early bird!  

2/ I love to travel.  

3/ I need my coffee EVERY day! 

4/ My favorite ice cream is Edy's French Silk.  

5/ I am a Rolling Stones fan-atic! 

Thanks again, Vickie!  And Thanks So Much for all of the wonderful comments.  I really appreciate it!  Welcome to my new followers!

It has been a slow stitching week for me but the weekend is looking promising!  :) 

I wish you a happy, stitch-y weekend!! xxxxx

Here's looking at you, Kids!

March IHSW update

I hope you all had a beautiful weekend!  

No green beer here, but my corned beef came out so yumm-o! :D

 This past IHSW I dedicated all of my stitching time to Rachel Hyde.  There are five shades of green making up these vines so there was a lot of changing threads!   Just wondering how the rest of you do this when stitching with many different colors in a small area, do you thread up several needles and switch as you need to or thread up each new color when the time comes?

Love the eyelet stitches now mixing with the rice stitches in the alphabet….

Since I have done further than expected in the first ‘step’ of the SAL, I am going to return to Elizabeth Hancock for the next week or two.  It would be nice to get to the finish line on one of these BAPs… 

so I can start another! LOL

Enjoy your week! 

I wish you all happy stitchings!  xxxxx

Top O' the Morning to You!

'May your thoughts be as glad as the shamrocks,

May your heart be as light as a song,

May each day bring you bright, happy hours,

That stay with you all the year long.'

...and happy International Hermit and Stitching Weekend too!!

I have done only a little stitching this past week, so I will wait to post a pic.  

This week has been busy with work and also catching up on my reading.  I have been reading Stephen King's 11/22/63, which is absolutely BRiLLianT!  It may be my favorite King book yet.  I am in the last few hundred pages or so and while I can't wait to see how it ends, I wish it could go on forever.  

Don't you just LOVE books like that?!

But now that it is IHSW it will be about the stitching this weekend! 

oh, and corned beef too! :D

Many thanks for all the great comments, I really appreciate your visits! :D

Wishing you miles of smiles and happy stitchings!  xxxxxx

Spring is in the Air!

It seems like spring has sprung here in Connecticut!  and I hope for all of you too!

The spring peepers have been peeping all week and the trees are all starting to bloom.  

Today I came home to a lovely package of goodies ordered from Nina!  All of her stitchings with her hand-dyed threads and fabrics were gorgeous ~~just had to have some!

 

Such delicious colors like cherry cola, champagne, cognac.  

I will have to find something special to stitch up with these  :)  

And since my last post, I got a bit further on Rachel Hyde, 

still going strong with the rice stitches in the grapevine....

Looks like I have plenty to keep me busy heading into this weekend's IHSW!

Enjoy the rest of your week!  

Happy Spring and Happy Stitching!! xxxx

Aloha!

This year's theme at the Philly Flower Show was Hawaii!

From the beautiful blue wave....

to the gorgeous orchids...

and the towering waterfall.... 

it was just a rainbow of colors....

You could almost feel the warm tropical breeze!  

So, needless to say, there has been little stitching done in the past couple of days.  I did attempt a little on the bus ride to Philly, but it is NOT easy trying on a bumpy bus ride!

So for the rest of the weekend I will try to put some thread to linen!

I did get something new in the mail though... two Berlin samplers from Sabine.  Her site European Reproduction Samplers is just chock full of amazing samplers.  :)  When I saw the new sampler of the month from Berlin, SG 1812, I just had to have it, and also picked up another, SM 1678, with the gorgeous flowers.  I wanted to have these as a remembrance of my visit to Berlin a couple of summers ago.  I can't wait to stitch them, but first I have to finish some of my WIPs!

I hope you are all having a wonderful weekend! 

Happy stitching!! xxxxxx

A Bird and Bloom

It is feeling like spring here today!  

I think March's lion has already come and gone.

This week I got started on Rachel Hyde with the center flower.  I am working on 32 ct LL vintage maple sugar with dmc threads.....

I am loving all the rice stitches in this design, it gives such amazing texture!

and I haven't forgotten about Mary Wigham, here is a new bird  :D

I hope you are all having a GREAT week.  

Today is my TGIF, well TGIW really, because I am off of work tomorrow and headed to the Philadelphia Flower show for the day :D  

So, I hope to have some pretty flowers to share with you by the weekend!

Thanks so much for all of your wonderful comments!!

Enjoy the rest of your week and Happy Stitching!!! xxxxxx

Happy Weekend!

I hope you have all had a great week.  In Connecticut, March came in like a LION when winter came again with snow and ice.  My thoughts though are with those in the Mid East states affected by the tornadoes.  It has been terrible news and I know many of my blogging friends live in those states so I hope you are all okay. 

For the past week I have switched over to working on my Mary Wigham SAL again, and happy I have reached the middle :D

I am loving the colors in this right now, so bright and cheery, pink, coral, purple, yellows...

A couple of days ago, I decided I needed a color check, so I laid out all of the colors where they were charted for so I could see the BIG picture!  It was difficult to visualize how the colors were going to be, every motif I was starting I kept saying to myself "really? this color AGAIN??"  

So I am glad I did this so I could do some swap outs....

I am looking forward to a lazy kind of stitch-y weekend.  I will do a new start on another SAL ~~ yes, another SAL I have joined.  I just can't help myself! LOL

It is The Rachel Hyde sampler with the Ellen Chester With My Needle and Pen yahoo group.  

Here is a photo of what the finished sampler will look like.....

Rachel Hyde 1775 Sampler by Threads Through Time

So back and forth, Mary to Rachel and Rachel to Mary I will spend my weekend.  

I am also going to try making eggplant parmagiana this evening.  For some reason, I have always thought eggplant was difficult to make but I have found an easy recipe to try.  I will let you know how it all comes out!

Also, for any of you who enjoy classic movies like me, Turner Classic channel is showing Some Like it Hot this evening... will be a fun one to stitch to!

Enjoy your weekend!  Happy stitching! xxxxx