A little giveaway and blogging award :)

Hi folks - Barb over at "Stitching Again" kindly sent me the Fabulous Blog Award. Thanks Barb! It's nice to be noticed. As far as listing 5 of my addictions - well no problem with that!

- My stitching & quilting - definitely dual obsessions!
- Diet Coke - yes I drink way too much of the stuff but can't seem to give it up. I'm not a coffee or tea drinker but I get my sparkling caffeine this way instead. And no, Pepsi just doesn't do it for me.
- My computer/email/the internet - can't live without it and at one point many years ago I remember telling DH that I really don't need my own computer at home. So I blame it all on him, he's probably wishing he never set up one just for me. (not to mention online shopping.....) I feel disconnected when I'm not on a computer daily. We take our laptop on vacation with us - yes it's crazy.
- Amazon.com - Great service, good prices, and they have most everything. I love buying movies from Amazon because I like a lot of old ones you can't find in stores.
- Anything French - I'm a Francophile. I was there twice many years ago and loved it. Anything Parisian or French catches my eye. I love all the history and beauty of the country. Maybe I was a beautiful Marquise in Louis XIV's court in a former life, huh? LOL

I am passing the Fabulous Blog award on to the the following. I read tons of fantastic blogs so I'm grabbing 5. I love all the ones I list on my blog here and others I don't even have listed yet.

• Annette at Annette's Acre


• Hazel, Quietly Stitching


• Laura at Maude & Mozart


• Melissa from Daily Ramblings


• Amy from Amy Stitches

Now I have a little giveaway for someone. I have some charts I have duplicates of (yes I do buy things sometimes that I already have....). The charts are "Harvest Time" and "More Friends" from Prairie Schooler, and "Chocolate Box" from Little House Needleworks. They have never been used. There will also be a little surprise sent along that I haven't determined yet. Please leave a comment if you're interested and I will draw a name at random from whomever signs up.

Thanks for stopping by!

P.S. I will pick a winner Monday night and put it up on my blog on Tuesday. Thanks!

Superbowl Fever and sore hands!

Here in Arizona everyone is fired up about the Arizona Cardinals going to the Superbowl! Go Cardinals!! It’s truly unbelievable as the Cardinals have never gotten much respect and been such losers forever it seems. We’ve got our championship T-shirts and will be glued to the TV next Sunday cheering them on with beer, pizza, and Superbowl snacks. LOL My heart is mostly with the Chicago Bears but I also support the Cardinals. That’s the case with a lot of people here – when you live in a city like Phoenix where most of the people are transplants from elsewhere, a lot of sports fans have dual loyalties – to their hometown teams as well as where they live now. I think there will a collective faint in the state of Arizona if the Cardinals actually win it! I’m almost afraid to watch it.

The end of January is rapidly approaching. I did pretty well on my goals for this month but didn’t meet all of them. I was supposed to get one ornament stitched this month and didn’t do it, and I was supposed to get some time in on my French Alphabet Sampler and that didn’t happen either. I have decided to lay off from stitching for at least 4 days this week so that is also taking time away. My hands have really been bothering me lately so I am giving them a rest. I stitched a lot more than normal the past 3 to 4 weeks and my hands hurt and are stiff so I’m assuming I’m getting arthritis. I’m on a computer keyboard at least 8 hours a day and that plus stitching in the evenings is taking a toll. I have been applying heat, massage, doing hand exercises, and taking Ibuprofen – hoping it starts helping soon. It’s kind of depressing me though – I need my eyes and hands to hold out for many more years!

Here is where I left off with my Beatrix Potter SAL. The light pinkish thread came out looking a bit lighter than I wanted it to, but I will only be doing a few medallions in that thread so I think that will be okay. I'm really enjoying stitching on this and not having to change colors so often like some of my projects. It won’t be picked up again until February.

I’m trying to pull myself up onto the ‘stash wagon’ – but it’s painful!

I certainly don’t need any more but it is so hard to resist. I try to shop at my LNS and local quilt stores to support them, yet the husband and I both want to try to save more money "just in case". We both are a nervous about possibly getting laid off especially when you see the news every day. When you work in Information Technology, at a lot of companies you are considered “overhead” – never good in tough economic times. Just the other day I saw news on Vonna’s blog about the new Blue Ribbon Designs that are out on the website – yikes! I love them all! Guess I will just keep adding them to my “buy list” that I keep. For now I‘ll be concentrating on my 3 new starts and stitching from stash as much as possible.

Froggie came a courtin'..........

Meet my companion for the last week! Yes seems I’ve been living with a frog recently as far as my stitching goes. For every 2 stitches I’ve done I think I’ve had to tear out 1. I started with wanting to change out a few things on some recent starts. I decided my neighborhood border had too many colors and the the pink would clash with some of my planned buildings, so I took out all the pink flowers which then necessitated re-doing some of the other flowers in order to make the two colors of flowers alternate correctly. I wasn’t happy with my Peppermint Twist project either. I purchased the Belle Soie silk conversions from my LNS but I just wasn’t happy with all of them. The cranberry color used for the pointsettias was way too dark, it was more of a maroon-shade. The more I looked at them, the less I liked them. So I took those out and re-stitched them in a brighter red from my stash. Then the butterscotch color for the stars didn’t show up on my shade of linen so I took out the stars and tried a few golds until I found one that showed up. Just when I thought I was making progress I noticed that my stitched reindeer was one thread off. I particularly hate frogging out stitching where I used a hand-dyed thread and completed one stitch at a time – it makes it so much harder to remove. I even had to frog this week on my little lunch project I just started. Nothing seems to be going right this week at all!

But……I am excited about 2 new quilts I’m planning. I went to a quilt show last weekend with a friend and we had a great time buying some more stash (unneeded of course) and getting inspired. We are making this quilt called “Winter Memories”. I wasn't able to find a good picture of it online, in real life it's a lot prettier.

My friend already had a stash of the border fabric which really makes the quilt and we are working on finding the rest of the required fabrics from our stash and a few small purchases. It is an applique quilt and should be fun – I especially like the snowflakes and the ice skates. Of course this quilt goes with nothing in my house but that never stopped me before!

Then we both fell in love with this quilt kit from Moda called “Heritage 1846”.
It’s a reproduction of an antique quilt and sold as a kit from Moda. Imagine my surprise when I noticed on her blog that Kim is working on it too! Here's a few pics of some of the stash I bought at the quilt show. They had a wonderful button booth with these button packs for $5 each, and I picked up some great rickrack that I plan to use on some stitched pincushions (uhh...that is when I get them stitched!) I also was able to make a very quick stop at a stitching store in Tucson (only got there 15 mins before they closed) and I picked up one of Just Nan's tin sets. I've been wanting to do one of these and this shop had some of the older ones from last year. I also bought my first ever punchneedle pattern - I've been trying to hold off from this but I couldn't help myself! I did not invest in a hoop or punchneedle yet but the sample they had on display was just irresistable. Just what I need - another hobby!!

Week one and off to a good start

I'm finally getting arount to my first post of 2009. Seems like it's been more than a week basically since New Year's. I really enjoyed my 2 weeks off work during the holidays. I finished quilting 3 lap quilts and finished off my Prairie Schooler trio of angels. I mounted them on a black taffeta ribbon. They weren't ready for Christmas 2008 but I'll put them out for next Christmas. That was the last stitching UFO I wanted to get done last year. (excuse the shadows in the picture....)

I started 3 new projects last weekend, - the Peppermint Twist SAL, Beatrix Potter and my Pride & Prejudice Neighborhood. I had so much fun finally working on something new! Here's my progress on my Neighborhood and Peppermint Twist. Haven't take a picture yet of Beatrix but I'm on my 3rd motif for that.


I made a few goals just for January and will see how I do. I haven't touched my French Alphabet Sampler in over a year so that's what I've chosen from the UFO pile to work on for awhile.

1. Pride & Prejudice Neighborhood – finish bottom and left borders, work on tree with Jane & Elizabeth under the branches
2. Beatrix Potter – finish 4 medallions
3. Peppermint Twist – finish Pointsettia block
4. Book quilt – finish Donna’s section, get started on Betty’s chapter 8
5. Complete page 3 of French Alphabet Sampler. Here's where it's at presently: