SBQ

I am late in adding my coppers to this question but it is a good one to ask, even to ones self.

Lee asked this in July

Stitching is an activity that tends to be solitary.  Sometimes I wonder if we choose stitching because we are more comfortable with pursuits that we do alone, or does our stitching cause us to be loners?  So what do you think?

My answer

A bit into my background.  I am a loner and pretty much have always been quite comfortable with that fact.  I will remove myself from a group if Im not enjoying myself, Life is too short .  I make sure never to lose my own arguments and have promised myself to get checked out if that ever happens.  So far so good.

When I got back into stitching 3 years ago, I really didnt have any friends outside work.  Just hung out with the boys and Man of the house and was content.  Getting back in brought a good friend back into my life and along with her, lots of new friends.

What brought me to finally answer this question is getting home from a fun evening at one of those friends stitching with yet more friends of all ages.  We come from pretty much all sides of life and I could not, would not change it (them) for anything.  Everyone has their niche of stitching, life references, and knowledge.  Its wonderful to get a group together as you never know where conversations will take you or what finishes will be brought to oh and ah over or that one piece someone started that you now have to kit up for yourself.

So to really answer – Stitching while comfortable to do alone can be great fun when in a group.

Its one of those days

Its a bunch of pondering and rambling thoughts today…

Free?  Ok people. There are time where putting furniture that should have been put down three life-times ago just should not be placed at the curb (or edge on lawn in this case) with a free sign on it.  I have a neighbor with such a “piece”.  This one is so bad I cant think of anyone who would actually take it to really use (large tape on one arm and along the side to keep stuffing in and I dont think it could be sat on without falling through).  Im waiting for someone (more like a group of someones) to dismantle and string it all over the street.

Im playing with new makeup thx to D. He liked the 'new' smoky eyes portrayed by Drew Barrymore in Cover Girl commercials so I went out and got some.  Its always fun to play around with make-up, be someone different for a bit or find a new way of coloring the face.

Finally finished watching "Bounty Hunter" with Gerard Butler (yumm) and Jennifer Aniston.  My rating?  Meh.  Yes there were some funny parts but it was a lackluster film.  Of course I basically watched it for Gerard (yum again!) and suppose I could watch it again, muted :P

Finally tried pretzel M&Ms, Oh My what a wonderful sweet/salty snack those are!

So ready for summer to END!!  The dog days of august are truly barking loud as temps soar in pdx not to mention how crazy they seem to vary. Yesterday was in the high 70s today and tomorrow are in the 90s and we finish off the week supposedly back low 70s and rainy!  MAX is barely able to keep up with the demands (ac is on but so far heat from outside and from the press of bodies crammed in for the rush home is winning).

I can't wait for the school year to start back up so I'm not stuck in the evening rush.

I would/could have gone on but the train ride is only so long (lol).  No stitching to share today, not able to on the train and lunch was quick.  Tonight I just vegged until I got a call of help from work (darn servers and their need for 5 sec naps!)

So Im off to bed to prepare the noggin for a fun filled Wed.

More Words!

I was hoping I would get more posts in the month of August but failed spectacularly.  I need to get into the practice of writing (read type) down my thoughts for blogging. I had such good ones last week and while trying to find a good way to pull them out of my head, I lost them.  Thankfully since then I found out to get to my gmail drafts from my iPhone and here we are!  Now to keep the wacky version of iPhone spell-check from completely messing up my eclectic way of "speaking"

I had a great week last week but didn't really know it until checking in with ms ratchet-scale. 2.2 lbs gone!!  Inches are slowly getting back to what they were before my trip to Cincinnati.  I'm more happy about the lbs than the slow tape

Now for some long over-due show and tell!

Cirque de Cercles - still loving lakeside's Kermit. And glad I have more to play with. Just need to find the right project

Bbd January house - lots of blends on this one which is making it very unfriendly for train stitching

Bbd May house - this is my new train stitch project, so far. Doesn't seem to have as many blends.

Fabric - caught again by Shannon (she helped with the CDC colors)with some help from P!  Sparrow b7 Linens by Design.  It is a wonderful shade and I'm afraid the camera doesn't do it justice. It's much different from past dye lots and more vibrant at 28ct than 32.  Will have to wait and see what projects sing with it.  And since its a color P likes the project will most likely be for him.

Well Im off to bed.  Have a date with a workout dvd and possibly a second with the treadmill, early!

A birthday, a trip, and a WIP

Happy Birthday Mom!!!

I wont say how old she is cause that just isnt good manners.  And I have no clue what her age was in the photo above.  I like this one cause I can see both me and my sister looking out.  We are getting together today with family and friends to celebrate.  Shall be fun!

The trip - Just back from 6 days in Cincinnati, Oh.  Good lord I was never happier to get back home!  Hot, Hot, Hot and very Humid (yes caps are needed),  Temps in the 90’s (we do get those here in Portland) but the heat index would then push temps up to 105-110!  Add in smog alerts and the whole lot makes it a bit difficult to breathe.  I was stupid and didnt really use my inhaler til later in the week.

I was there with some gals from work to meet people and see what we could do to make life easier.  That part was good.  Nice to place names with faces.

A bad part was to see the temps back home were going to be similar to what we were leaving (minus the heat index joining in the fun).  Other bad part was dealing with the Hotel, who ran out of wash cloths (yup, ran out) and left garbage in the hallways (eww)

The WIP – I took 4 projects with me to work on.  I was proud of myself that I was able to limit it to only 4 and only really worked on one!  Ink Circles CDC.  Going there and the one or two times I had time to work on it this week was spent on creating the circles.  Very easy, repetitive, non-brain cramping work.  Was very needed.  I finished all the circles on page 1 and started in on filling centers.  Still loving the colors.

And I this morning I read that BBD Anniversary House #7 is on the way to the printers! 

Included in this release is the first bonus.  I need to get cracking on the 4 I dont have done.

More starts

The scale started moving! 2.2 lbs gone last week.  So happy!  Also more gone on the tape measure.  Of course I almost blew it by going out to lunch Monday (Thai) and having way too much salt and not drinking water like a fish to flush out the salt.

Today was a bit drastic.  Took a day off, woke up wonderfully late (6am is late for a weekday) still ate on plan, added iced coffee with milk (yum) and drank WATER.  Tomorrow getting back on the grind with 30-day shred and walking.

So what does this teach?  Eating out means lots of salt, more than I can handle.  So Im cutting out eating out.  Well, where I can.  Thai and Chinese are out specifically for now.

Other starts

Yes, I tease - no pictures yet.  I did get started on Cirque de Cercles and have a trial of two colors (got to make sure it looks good) and so far love the combo.  Im still thinking of getting my color pencils out and going to town as that really helped the thinking process on Quaker Stocking by seeing the “finished” product before it was completely stitched.

Oh and more charts!  I picked up another part of the PS alphabet (not starting on that yet), BBD house #6 and the wonderful October JCS ornie issue.

I am planning on having pictures posted soon.  Not sure when but soon :)

Road Trip!

Road trip was to celebrate the 93rd birthday of a Great Aunt of mine (so Great-great to the kids?). Got on the road ok, pausing to get snacks. Most eventful item happened after lunch (or as, not sure which), a 12 car accident happened on the freeway after we pulled off. I believe it was with the same group of cars we had been with so by pulling off when we did could have saved us from being part of the pile up. Scary! Of course we didn't know anything except all the emergency vehicles racing by. Nice peeps at Starbucks told me what happened and wonderfully told me an alternate way to bypass the accident. Stories I heard during dinner was the backup was 12 miles or some such. Had couple relatives that left behind us get stuck in the parking lot of cars waiting to get through

We made it to the destination 2.5 hrs ahead of schedule and spent time at the local marina park. DL spent time looking at dead baby crabs floating in the surf and finding agates. He was trying to find shells, but I wasn't letting him bring any home. Now I have lots of rocks:p. Beautiful day to spend in a park by the water. On the fishing pier found a fisherman who caught a baby starfish. This one had 8 arms/legs. Again, after staying 2hrs in the sun, without lotion this time as I was not prepared, I have color. Not much that I can see but I can sure feel it on my face. Interested to see what I will look like tomorrow.

Thats all I have for the moment. No chance to get any x's crossed today. Did my best to keep eyes open for goofy drivers and seeing family.

Fingers are burning

Got a couple new things.

First

    The new Iphone 4.  I was so ready to replace my HTC Tilt.  Im getting used to the all in one, phone and ipod.  Felt weird not carrying around my clunky 4 gen ipod but nice all the same, one less item to carry around.

Next   that goes with this The thread on the left is outline for all.  Middle is for center circles and right is for all other center circles.  Fabric is Lakeside Linen 36ct Vintage Lime Zest.  Cant wait to get started on it.

I do have other updates

Cirque des Carreaux

LHN Neighborhood

That is all for updates now.  Tomorrow we are off to celebrate a great Aunt’s 93rd birthday and staying over with cousins we have not seen in a long time.  Then Sunday I may stitch at the county fair with a good friend and hopefully share the fun of stitching with new people.