Finished block 9 of Village of Hawk Run Hollow

But first, here's how far I have gotten on Summer House. Not to much but with me hanging out with my dad who was here visiting I haven't stitched in the evenings. I could have sworn that I snapped a picture of it but couldn't find it on the camera so excuse the quick scan.

And here's my block 9, I'm pretty chuffed that I'm done with it. It took me such a long time to finish up, don't know why really? I love the result at least.

So now I'm finally starting to get somewhere on this beast. Since this picture I have gotten a bit more done on Block 10. It would be great if I could finish this one this year

Dad's visit went great! We did get to do lots of things that he had on his list. He loves the Zoo, the SAC museum and we did go through the Wildlife Safari too. It's been a long time since we last did that so it was fun to see what they had changed. He also got a copious amount of shopping in, just like all other Europeans that you let loose in American stores.

This is a picture of Dad and my 2 oldest trying to spot the wolves at the safari!

Thank you for all your nice comments and just for visiting. Hopefully I will get caught up with blogs and my groups later this week. But for now I'm off for my desperately needed hair appointment. It will be a pure bliss I tell ya!

New Loose Feather's start!

Ranae and I started a SAL, we are stitching Summer House from Blackbird Designs. This is my little progress. Sorry about the blurry picture, it was dark when I took it yesterday.

My dad is here for a visit. It's been crazy here in between trying to get things done before he came, lots of graduation parties and my own kids finishing up with school.

Thank you for all your sweet comments on Spring Fling!

BBD LF Spring Fling finished!

Spring Fling from Blackbird Designs, Loose Feather # 13

30 ct Glen Ellyn Blend from R & R reproductions

GAST and WDW threads

I just loved stitching this one! So much fun and now I just have to find the perfect frame for next spring. Soccer season and school are almost over and I'm really looking forward to more slow going summer days. The kids are too but probably not as much as I do;).

Running around like crazy again!

My husband has been gone this week so it's been kind of crazy here this week. The poor thing had to leave for a meeting at the French Rivera and I had take the kids to soccer and Tae Kwon Do on my own. The good thing is that SPRING arrived for a couple of days!! My pear tree is blooming in front of my house and the tulips too, very pretty. Then we had 45 degrees and I had to sit through 2 soccer games in light rain today. It took a bucket of tea to warm me up. I'm so behind on emails and blogs, hopefully I will get some time tomorrow, we have a light schedule tomorrow, bliss.

Easter Chicky from Lizzie Kate

On to the stitching part of my week.This should have been an easy peasy thing to stitch up but since I can't count evidently it took me quite a while.

Autumn from Drawn Thread

A very strange choice I know, but I made myself finish this one since I had it started so it didn't take long to finish it actually. I found the most perfect frames for all this series and I only have Summer left to stitch. My reward for finishing this is a new start, Spring Fling from Blackbird Designs. I think it's number 13 in their Loose Feather series.

Thank you all for visiting my blog and your sweet comments!

Driweby posting!

Egghunt from Lizzie Kate

Snow form Heart in Hand

Or something like that! I just had 2 little quickie finishes to share. They were so much fun to stitch up, instant gratification is great.

It's warming up here again, the trees are ready to bud out which is wonderful. I have a Cleveland Pear by my drive way and it looks like it's going to be beautiful this year. And my allergies will calm down too.

I hope everyone out there had a blessed Easter! Thank you all for your nice comments, I appreciate all of them.

I think I might survive!!

It hasn't been fun here lately! I thought that I had managed to get through the winter without getting a bad cold for once. Seems like I always get really sick with one bad cold. So I was thrilled to have gone through the whole of winter penecillin free. Yeah, so I I though until I walked into a room with sneezing, coughing, and pretty sick kids at pre school. I knew I was doomed at that moment. Even the kitty had packed her bags when I started to feel better. The level of service in the house sank quite a bit.

I did get somethings done though. I put together this needlebook for an exchange. The lady that is getting is not reading this blog so I feel that it's safe to post pictures. I'm not totally sure about this finish now when I'm back to normal but the thought was that the middle would be like a big sunflower shape. Hmmm.

Here's the front of it. I'm happier with that. It's HIH Sunflower Sampler btw.

And here's another car finish. This didn't take long at all. It's Flowers Zipper kit from Bent Creek.

I got another square done for my Carriage House Samplers Village of Hawk Run Hollow.

And here's a picture of the whole thing. Just 4 more squares to go. Yup, that will only take another year or so.

Karin over at http://crossstitchgiant.blogspot.com/ was kind enough to give me a lovely award. I have such a hard time to pick only 8 blogs that deserve this award though so I'm skipping that part. Check out Karin's blog, it's awesome.

I had 2 takers on the little snowman chart so I just flipped a coin! And Karin won! I will need your address if you could email me at kajsa@cox.net

Thank you for all your sweet comments! I will have to do some serious catching up, I feel better now so maybe it's a possibility to do that this week.

More framing and finishing!+ chart give away!

I got my Nora Corbett Fairy framed! I just loved the way she looks in that frame, a bit gothic feel too it. She's not hung yet since I haven't had time to get the hardware from Michael's, the littel hooks I had at home were not sturdy enough.


This is another finish, Just Nan's September Song that I finished stitching 3-4 years ago so it was time to get it finished. I'm pretty happy with how it turned out, it took me a whole afternoon to put it together so it was pretty time consuming.

Then I finished I love Snow from Bent Creek! I used everything that came with the kit since this has been my car project for several months now. It's so easy to just throw a kit in the car and then I just work on it when I'm waiting for kids.

This is the chart give away! Nothing fancy but if you want the used chart let me know in the comments and I will get it out to you. If there's more then 1 taker I will just draw a name before I post again.

Emma was playing around with the camera and she took this picture of our kitty relaxing. They like hanging out together.

Thank you so much for your sweet comments on my last post. I really appreciate all of them!!

DH has been travelling so much lately that it feels like I'm slowly losing it here. I never go to bed before 10 pm but some evenings I've been up there at 9 pm. It's been totally exhausting and it seriously have been affecting my stitching too. Hopefully he will be home for a while now so I can recuperate for a while!

Ta da! Sweetheart Sampler finished!

Sweetheart Sampler LF # 12 Blackbird Designs
R & R 30 ct Kansas City Blend
GAST Threads

Here's finally the promised picture of my Sweetheart Sampler. I have had some things that I had to take care of that took up my time a bit more then expected. This was a pure joy to stitch up though. It's so pretty in real life.

I'm so happy that I have projects like this to work on at the end of the day. It gives me so much peace when I'm dealing with hard things.

Their song from Blackbird designs framed!

I love this frame that I found for this piece. It looks a bit crooked in the picture but when I'm measuring it it seems like I was able to center it smack on. One of those optical illusions I guess.

Fa -La -La from Shepherd's Bush finished!

I finished this cutie into an ornament. It's so small and dainty.

Bird from Birds of a Feather, JCS Ornament issue.

I can't remember which year they did this bird for the ornament issue. Maybe it was 2002?

Winter Angel from Lavender and Lace WIP picture.

This is how far I got on that Angel before I picked up the Sweetheart Sampler. I messed up when stitching with the whisper thread so alas, she and I needed a bit of a break.

Pillows for DD's bed!
I did do some sewing too. DD wanted some big colorful, flowery pillows for her bed so I pulled out my old Husqvarna sewing machine. In my opinion the one on the right turned out so much better then the one on the left. I'm no seamstress as you can see!

At the moment I'm working on doing some finishing along side my stitching. I have so many things that I love that I have stitched up and I just have to take the time to do the actual finishing. It's usually much more fun then I think it will be when I start.

Thank you so much for your lovely comments!

Dani - I think it's ITF that we do. All the kids love it so it's great. I'm hoping it will help my oldest daughter with her self confidence too.

Linzi - I never stitch anything more then once so I'm open to selling or trading.

About fabrics and counts, I have to confess, I love linen and lugana. Don't know why but they really feels right when I stitch on them. If you are a beginner and want to switch over from aida I would recommend trying out a couple of evenweaves first. Lugana is an evenweave and to me it's not as slinky and soft as some other evenweaves.

But as with everything else it's a matter of what you personally like so try a couple of different brands out and you will find your favorite!

Sorry for the long post! I will be back with more pictures of finishes soon and hopefully the finished Block # 8 of Village of Hawk Run Hollow.

Time really flies!

Fa-La-La from Shepherd's Bush

Bird House Snow Charmer from Mill Hill

WIP Winter Angel from Lavender and Lace

And not only when you are having fun! We'll I have had some fun but it's been busy mostly. January and February are always like that in this house because my sweetie is travelling so much those months. There's a 2 week long standard meeting this month so at the moment it feels like I'm a single mom. Seriously, I don't know how those ladies do it and I'm in awe of you girls! Give yourself a pat on the back.

Most single moms probably didn't sign up all her 3 kids for Tae Kwon Do (because you ladies are probably smarter than that), kind of realizing that they would all have to go to different classes (2 classes min. per week) and thought that the driving back and forth wouldn't be so bad. The kids love it but this driving thing is getting old.

Thank you so much for your lovely comments on my last finishes. I do appreciate them so much!

I have been good and are already in the process of framing Their song from BBD. I should be done with it this weekend I hope and will snap a picture to share. Lately I have been in a finishing state of mind so next post will probably be picture heavy. Makes me feel good though, I'm usually not a finisher since I like the stitching part better.

But for this time I just have an update picture of Winter Angel, Fa- La - La and a small ornament from Mill Hill.

I started stitching on Loose Feather # 12 Sweetheart Sampler and Faith from LHN and they are both so much fun. Update pictures will come this weekend too!!

Thanks for visiting!

January is upon us!

Their song LF Blackbird Designs
WDW, Sampler Threads
R & R linen

And it never fails, there's always lots of sick people in this house in January. I think the bacteria is just festering at the schools when it's so cold that the kids can't even get out and get aired out at recess. So far we have a bad cold and my youngest got a bad stomach flu.

So I can't wait until the warm weather comes back! I will get one of my latest finishes framed so I can pull it out this summer. At least working on this one gave me some hope, I know that I will be sitting under the ceiling fan thinking fondly of winter soon again;>.

Let us be Thankful from Bent Creek
WDW and Sampler threads
32 ct Mocha linen

I finally gave up on getting a better picture of this finish too. The turkeys are really cute close up but I with the sun giving up on us and it being gloomy and snowy all the time a close up will just not happen.

Thank you so much for all the nice comments! I really appreciate all of them. Marika, I got your address and will get the patterns out to you. Don't worry about sending anything.

Well, I guess that my constant companion, the laundry is waiting for me.

Happy New Year!

Ho Ho Ho from Pine Mountain Design


I know that it's already the 10th but we had so much going on during our break that it took me this long to post again.

Thank you so much for all your sweet comments on my little fairy. I really do appreciate them!!

The kids are back in school and I'm back to dealing with my laundry mountain (it never seems to go away, it's my worst enemy). I would have so much more time over for stitching and doing fun things with the kids if I didn't have to do laundry.

Since I started going through my stash I do realize that I HAVE to get some more stitching time too. Just some advice, don't start going through the stash! The end result of me going through mine was that I didn't get anything on the end of the year sales and now I kind of regret it. Maybe I need to go through that stash again to remind myself why;>?

I did finish up some small Christmas kits from Pine Mountain Designs, Ho Ho Ho and Keep Christmas. It was nice to work on something small and I got some more Christmas stuff to put out next year.

Keep Christmas from Pine Mountain Designs

If anyone out there would be interested in the charts for these little pillows let me know in the comments! I would be happy to pass them on.

Winter Angel from Lavender and Lace start.

And here's a picture of my New Years start with the STO group. I have to work on her some more this afternoon. Can't wait to get some purple into the mix.

Christmas time!

Halloween Fairy from CSN Sept 2008 issue

Designer Nora Corbett/Mirabilia

DMC, Kreinik Braids, Mill Hill beads

32 ct Sandpiper BOAF linen

I finished this design a couple of weeks ago but I just have been to busy to post on the blog. In between cookie baking, present wrapping and the dreaded shopping I have been so worn out in the evenings that I have just stitched. Pretty nice actually and I have quite a few finishes!

I will try to snap some pictures tomorrow, it should be good lighting inside after our snowstorm that is going to move through during the night. The kids might even get a snowday the last day of school this year. Bummer with all the winter parties that are planned!!

At our STO group we are all going to start something new on New Years Day. I have been digging through the stash and I think I will start Lavender and Lace's Winter Angel. I think that I stitched one of her designs about 8 years ago and then I got distracted by other designers. This angel has always been one of my favorites and I can't wait to start another big project.

I was able to finish block 7 of Villages of Hawk Run Hollow last Friday. I'm really excited since this one took me a long time. It was worth it though.

I hope everyone out there will have a great Thanksgiving! We are just having the dinner here with the family, I'm really looking forward to it.

Thanks for the nice comments on my stitching and Juni!

I love Halloween!

And we try to get to Vala's each year, it's the biggest pumpkin patch in Omaha. We had fun and the kids discovered the pig races this year. The kids are always hanging out in the pirate's nest for a bit, hence the picture!

I got this lovely exchange from Cheryl! I just love everything! Thank you Cheryl! There was a stitched scissor fob and scissor, some Threadgatherer silks and cute, cute note cards.

We got a new family member a couple of weeks ago. I don't really know what breed she is but Carol thought she might have some Maine Coon and persian in her. She's a real fluff ball at least, but the shedding isn't too bad. We adopted her from a small rescue here in Omaha, Lifeline (will change name to Heartlands Feline rescue) and it was a real good experience. Tammy seems to know her cats really well and found us a couple that would fit in with our family. And it has gone really well, she's a very good cat!

And each year I try to stitch something for Halloween, this year it was Funk and Webers Dead in the night. I really like it, haven't decided how to finish it yet. Sometimes projects have to mature a bit;). I also have to put the last bead on my fairy so I'm hoping to update with pictures of that soon.

I'm going to rush the holidays in today and start putting out some Christmas decorations outside. Just some garlands and wreaths, I might do the lights later. It's really cold here and I think it will be as nice as it will get until Thanksgiving so I'm taking the oppertunity to do it in some nice weather. Last year I almost froze my hiney off!

We got another family member a few weeks ago.

Finishes!

BOAF Christmas bird ornament from JCS 1999 ornie issue
WDW and Mill Hill beads
32 ct putty linen

Thanksgiving NR from Shepherd's Bush

Prairie Seasons winter from Prairie Schooler

WDW and DMC

32 ct Country French Mocha

I just wanted to share some pictures of my latest finishes. The bird looks a bit funny but you are supposed to fold it over and finish it to a bird shape. DS thought it was a fish and really, it looks like someone ran over that poor thing. I see a date with my sewing machine in my future.

Everything is well here, just a lot of things that are going on. Mostly fun so I'm happy.

Thank you for visiting and all your lovely comments!

Wonderful retreat!

It was so great to go to the STO retreat this weekend and meet up with my online stitching friends!

Some of these ladies I have known for 6-7 years and never met in real life so it was so neat to finally meet them. Lavon was just as I imagined her!

We worked on 3 great projects, I started Mar's from Midnight Stitchings Friendship Sampler and I got just a corner of Stephanie's from Nouveau Encore's purse done but with those colors and fabric I will certainly get to it.

I did get another start, Nora Corbett's Trick or Treat Fairy. I'm adding a scan of her!

We did quite a bit of stitching and I got really inspired by some of the shop models I saw. Some of those designs I would have never gotten until I saw the models.

Retreat and awards!!

Snowflake Hardanger Bellpull - my own design


I added a link on my side bar to the retreat that I'm helping out planning down in Kansas City in October. It starts on October 2nd and runs through the weekend. I'm teaching the Snowflake Hardanger Bellpull, it's a beginners hardanger class. Stephanie from Noveau Encore has designed a piece for us and are teaching a class and Mar from Midnight Stitching also has designed an exclusive piece for us that she will teach. I got a picture the other day and it's darling.

It's a really affordable retreat (can't rememer if it was $ 125 or $ 150 plus cost of hotelroom and that includes kits, classes, food etc) so check out the link in my sidebar. We still have a couple of spots open so let me know if you would be interested in coming. It would be so much fun to get together!











Kathy over at http://purplewildcat.blogspot.com was kind enough to give me 2 awards. Thank you Kathy, you are so sweet!

I have been wrecking my brain over whom to pass this on too and I just couldn't decide. So I did a real clean up of my sidebar. All the blogs that I read and love are there now and they are all worthy of these awards. Check them out, you will have a fun time reading them!

Otherwise it feels like life is going ahead 120 miles per hour here. The kids have started school so my hand is hurting from writing all the checks for food, pictures, booster clubs, book clubs etc. At least it calms down after mid September after the fundraisers are done. Our school is doing a walk a thon too and I'm helping out with getting food donated from businesses.

Then I'm trying to get items donated to the STO Retreat in October. I have sent out letters to stores that I have bought from in the past and I got my first envelope yesterday! Carolyn from Village Mountain Stitchery had donated a bunch of stitching magazines, charts and kits. She's always been a sweetheart when I have dealt with her in the past too. These things will be perfect for door prizes.

I also got a new car!! That's a big deal in my house! I drove my old one for 10 1/2 year so it was just time to get a new one before we ended up with a BIG repair bill. Neither my DH nor I are big car people and with a new house and 3 kids and me being at home we try to drive our vehicles a long time to get the most out of them financially.

The one that we ended up getting was 2008 Honda Odyssey and it's really nice. I even have heated seats in it so that will be great this winter when I drive the kids to school. Those cold winter mornings are the worst, at least my butt will be warm and cozy now!

Stitching wise I'm plugging away on Villages of Hawk run Hollow most of the time. I'm really having fun with it now and I have almost hit the halfway mark. Edgar from Blacksheeps Bit of the Web really inspired me to get it out again, his is so pretty .

Thank you for all the nice comments on my last post! Sally, I do have all the Loose Feathers actually and Rites of Spring is one of them. I'm thinking about pulling out one of the older fall designs though before I start Rites.

I finished some projects!

The Violet Sampler - The Drawn Thread

Close up!

A Loose Feather Design from Black Bird Designs

I finished a couple of things before we left on vacation. This week has been busy with 4 H things. The kids did good on the fair though, DS won the shooting contest in his class and snagged a couple of purple ribbons for his canned tomatoes, and pj pants. DD is going to state with her healty recipe book. So they were both happy! Can't say that we put a lot of time and effort in this summer since we were gone but maybe we can do more next summer.

It's super hot here, yesterday I sat inside and stitched away on CHS Village of Hawk Run Hollow. I started square five! With 100 degrees outside stitching under the fan is pretty great!