Weekend Update..........and a little finish

Keeping busy as usual.   I'm sure this happens to the rest of you - things around  the house seem to happen in bunches, don't they?  No sooner did I get everything clean and organized after our bathroom remodels but I had a visit from Mr Murphy as Heidi says LOL.  We had a big rainstorm about 2 weeks ago and had a roof leak in our bathroom - right over the new bathtub.   I was in there hanging a picture on the wall when I started hearing the drip drip drip.  Then the wash machine broke.....and the pool pump started making this awful noise.  So I've been busy making phone calls and entertaining service calls getting all of this taken are of.  Luckily both the wash machine and the pool pump repairs were covered by warranty services but the roof will cost about $800.  Then I took my car in last week for it's 60,000 mile service and discovered I had some "shredded drive belts" and "leaking struts"  (whatever those are) on the front end.  So it was a pretty big bill when I picked up my car but it's only 5 years old.  I would like to keep it a lot longer so I hope it will settle down now for awhile.  It's always something!

I did have a little finish last week. I saw this pincushion on Just Carol's blog last year and loved it so I picked up the out of print pattern on eBay and made myself one. I love pincushions and have more than I could ever use but they are fun to make.  I added a little stork scissor charm to the top.

"Stray Pins & Runaway Needles"

Theron Traditions pattern "Mom's Scissors and Stray Pins"

stitched on 34-ct Cafe au Lait Legacy Linen with recommended GAST threads

I'm also making some more progress on BRD's "It's Cold Outside".  Stitching all the boxes is a good task while watching movies as you don't have to watch the pattern much but it gets pretty boring.   I'm looking forward to finishing this piece in the next couple of weeks.   I had to chart my own initials - when you have two "M's" in your initials they frequently don't fit with what the designer gives you to work with.  Not to mention my last name has 9 letters which also can be a problem on samplers.  So I make it work however best I can.

I'm making progress on my WIP list at least.  I also got some more applique blocks done for my "Winter Memories" quilt. My goal is to finish the quilt top by the end of March.   I only have one more applique block to do but then I have a few pieced blocks and some embroidery as well.   Here's the center ice skates block which is supposed to look like an old photo with the wavy edges and photo corners. I'm sure a lot of you are too young to recall when photos looked like this but all my childhood photos are in this style (and they were black & white too LOL!).  The quilt is slowly growing on my design wall. 

We're having lovely warm weather here in Phoenix - the plants are all starting to bloom and the birds are starting to make their spring nests.  Every year we usually get one or two nests of baby birds in our yard.  Hope winter is starting to ease up for those of you in the cold spots.    And note it's been 2 days and we haven't had any new stories about Charlie Sheen - how will we get through the week?!?!    Unfortunately March Madness (NCAA basketball) is starting so from now until it's over the DH will be glued to the TV watching basketball.   I'll be hiding out in my sewing room with my boxed DVD sets of Boston Legal..........got the rest of the seasons for Christmas and I'm about to start on Season 3.  

Have a great week friends and I'm happy you stopped by.  :-)