The Lizzie Kate SAL will be starting in less than 12 days now.  I ordered all my supplies on Monday from 123Stitch.  Their shipping is so fast that I expected the package in the mail yesterday.  It didn't make it.  I'm sure its now on hold at the post office.  We are making a fast trip to California for a retirement party and to visit with some friends we haven't seen in a good 20 years.  I picked a fabric that looks like the night time sky with come clouds.  Its a navy blue.  I decided to save my sanity I would grid this fabric out with one color thread and then stitch around each place where each chart will be placed in another color of thread.  I also bought all of the speciality threads to stitch it out with.  I was worrying about the threads not being colorfast and that problem was solved with the shoice of fabric I made.  I was so disappointed that my package didn't make it.  I've been bumed out all day.

Today it poured rain all day long.  We have had so much rain this fall/winter that everyone is just going nuts.  "We're sick of it"!  Its been so long since my Chihuahua's have seen the actual sun that they have taken to worshiping the heater dish.  One sits in front of it and stares at it and one of the others lays on the hardwood floor in front of it like she were at the beach sunbathing.  Seven weeks ago while in California the weather was so nice that my sister and I were walking on the beach at 8:30 in the morning with short sleeve tee shirts on.  Oh how I long for some sunshine and warmer weather.

Hope you're stitching to your hearts content!
Sandy

Who knew when I starting my blog last December that I would have 11 followers!  I started blogging for several reasons.  I started cross stitching again after a very long time. The mid 90's was my last real finish on a project.  I joined several cross stitching groups on Yahoo and I loved reading your blogs and other blogs and finding out about all the new designers.   Lizzie Kate became my favorite pretty fast.  Then I heard about Little House Needleworks, then her daughters designs Country Cottage Designs.  And now Brooke's Books.  And now they are all my favorites plus several others. 

Oh and the picture of the pink journal!  I bought that book about 3 years ago when I wanted to start writing down things that I remember about my childhood and on.  The book is still pristine,  the tag is still on and I could probably return it if the store where I purchased it still carried it.  But who knows maybe I'll use it for something else one day or I'll use it as I intended.  Right now I find that it's much easier to write my thoughts here.  If it doesn't read right I can take it out.  No scratch outs.

I want to thank you all for wanting to read my blog and see what I'm up to.  It really does mean the world to me.

Well darn I didn't think that out very well.  So this is it so far!    I better get busy stitching now!

Here's my second finish on the Lizzie Kate Basket series.  Its such a fast stitching project.
My only concern are the 2 white flowers.  Can you see them there right there where the
2 single gold x's are.  I thought about backstitching them with a very soft grey but since
there aren't any backstitchess in the series I think I will actually pass.  I'm going to start the
thrird basket "Atumn" tonight.  The alphabet stitches fast along with the checkered bottom
border.  Would you like to see a picture of the 2 together?  It'll be the next photo.

Hooray I finally figured out a way to get The Scissor Scamper logo onto my facebook!  Not sure it will do me a whole lot of good but it makes me happy!  Grace if you happen to see this could you message me I have something to ask you!  I couldn't use the outlook expresss to email you.  Its not set up on my computer. 

Grace are those little polkadot scissors mint green or lime green?

Don't you just love old photos?  This is a picture of 2 of my cousins and myself.  I'm the little
blonde with her finger in her mouth.  My guess is that I am about 2 1/2 in this picture so that means it was taken in 1954 or early 1955.  It looks like a spring picture to me.  Possibly an Easter photo.

Early last month 2 of my cousins Cheryl (the little girl on the top of the photo) and her sister Lyleen along with their husbands brought their Mom, my Aunt Katie to be placed with her husband, my Uncle Bob at Ivy Lawn Cementery in Ventura, California.  We have several family members there including Vicky's parents (she's on the bottom right in the photo) along with my parents and now Uncle Bob and Aunt Katie are there together also.  Not such a happy post but it does get better.

Since they were coming out from the east coast my sister decided to try and find as many cousin on the west coast and get as many of us together as possible.  We've found lots of our cousins on Facebook and luckily the facebook cousins knew where the others were.  It turned out to be a great get together.  About half of us cousins showed up for dinner in Ventura.  Its been so long since most
of us have seen each other.  I'd have to say for me it was before we were half way through high school if not longer.  We always went to Grandma and Grandpa's on Sunday's after church so that is where we saw each other.  As some of my cousins got older they no longer wanted to go to grandma's on Sunday.  I've always wanted to be with my family.  I would go up to see my grandparents every Sunday even when I was old enough to stay home.  I continued going even as an adult.  Since our get together we are staying in contact much better.  My cousin Larry calls me every Sunday now.  He was always my favorite cousin along with his sister Diane.  We all blessed to have family.  I hope your family members are as special to you as mine are to me.  I love you cousins!

 If this isn't the coolest thing.  I just found a blog; Threads, Thoughts and Other Notions.  Her name is Veronica and she is a new member of Friendly Stitchers.  I've been thinking about starting this set of designs pretty soon anyway.  One of the requirements is you can only stitch on it on Mondays.  No start date or finish date!  What could be better than that?  I guess I better check and see if I have the required threads and a piece of fabric the size I need to stitch it on.  I already purchased the charts and have already downloaded the border design from Lizzie Kate's site.
I'm off to check out my supples.

Sandy

Oh forgot to mention that I signed up!

Today I finished my little Irish fellow.  I think he turned out pretty cute.  Now to decide if I really want to have him framed, do it myself or do something like a little pillow or some kind of a wall hanging.  Now back to Lizzie Kate and her 4 seasons basket charts.  Spring is finished and I have summer ready to go.  All threads are pulled, the fabric is on the scroll frame and tightened up.  I was having such a hard time trying to decide what to do between the designs.  When I picked it up this evening I realized I didn't need to do anything because each basket is sitting on a checkered cloth.  Boy did I over think that one!

Happy Stiching, Sandy

Isn't this a beautiful Camellia?  I took this picture when my sister and I were on our "sister vacation" last month.  On our
way home we stopped in Solvang for a couple of hours.  I took this picture and wanted to share it. It's one of the flowering bushes my Mom had under her kitchen window.  It reminded me of her so much.

She was also a beautiful woman.  She was a daughter, a sister to 7 siblings, a wife, a mother of 3, a grandmother to 6 and a great grandmother to 6, then a widow. And then a great great grandmother of 4.  She passed away when my first grandchild was about 10 days old.  I wanted nothing more than to have my Mom meet my first grandchild.  Sometimes you don't get what you want.  I still miss her so much.  One time she said to me "your Mom" is always your best friend".  That statement was the truest thing anyone could ever say to me.  I realized when she said it, that it was true.  One day not to long ago I told my sister what Mom had said to me and she didn't agree with it. She didn't think your Mom could be your best friend.  So aren't I the lucky one to have a Mom and a best friend and that she was the same person.  Maybe it was because I was the oldest girl or that I was the middle child.  I'll never know and I'll never have another best friend like her but I've have many that are close.

That reminds me of something else.  One day when I was visiting I went out on the back porch for some reason and I noticed that the downspout from the rain gutter was smoking.  The spout was right next to the Camellia bush.  It wasn't attached but leaning against the house.  So I called Mom and we took it out onto the driveway and banged it on the ground.  Guess what it was full of?  My Dad's smoldering cigarette butts.  It wasn't on fire but what a mess!  Oh the memories of our lives!

Have a great evening!

I thought I would add a little comment on my St. Patty's stitching.  I've had to frog several times.
I'm actually futher along than this but have had to STOP again.  I have the word March finished.
The chart called for black so I stitched it in black.  When I started stitching the dark green (DMC 500) you couldn't see the Black letters.   So I'm checking out the picture on the chart and I realize that even though the chart had listed DMC as a substitute for Weeks Dye Works that DMC 500 wasn't a good substitute.   So now I have to figure out what color to stitch the letters in.  So far I'm thinking about a color darker than his beard.  That just may be the one. 

Now my rant for the day.  I went to my local cross stitch shop in town today to buy some Crescent Colour Threads.  I have a short list of about 8 colors.  I looked online to see who carried that brand and they were listed.  They had it alright but it looks like they aren't going to carry it any longer. Not one of the colors that I needed.  All the drawers marked as Crecent Colour Works were empty. That is the second time that this has happened at my local shop.  Last time and it was only about 3 months ago I went in for 2 different pieces of fabric for a couple of projects.  One, a pumpkin that is stitched on a piece of fabric that was  violet.  I think the actual color was Wood Violet.  They had nothing in any stitch count, any fabric/aida that would work.  The other color I needed was a gingerbread color.  Same thing nothing that would work.  I am to the point that I just can not support my local needlework shop.  That is so sad.  They won't go out of business because they carry lots of yarns.

Hope everyone is having a great day and getting lots of stitching done!

I learned to cross stitch in 1985.  I stitched for a good 10 years before I stopped because my eyes didn't
like the stress and I was having a hard time following a chart.  I then took up quilting.  I started quilting in 1988 (I think) and quilted until 5 years ago.  I still have tons of quilts to make and to finish.  Then I was introduced to basket weaving.  I still weave but not as often as I use to.  One only has so much display space and storage space which is very limited in the homes that are built in Washington State.  I also bead.  I made some jewelry but saw a beaded art doll and that was it.  I love the feel of a very small beaded object in my hands. 

So now I'm back to counted cross stitch.  This is my first finish so far.  It's a Lizzie Kate Chart Season Baskets.  This is Spring.  It's on a scroll frame because the plan is to stitch them vertically as one long picture.  But I tend to over think everything and I'm stalled.  I don't know if I should stitch around each one to separate them or not.  Maybe just boarder them all when they're done.  And I do still have th option to cut it and frame them separately.  The flash on my camea also washed out the colors.  Its really nice bight colors.

I think I've made up for not posting very often.  Now if I could figure out the whole blogging site so mine looks organized and pretty like everyone elses.  Hope you all had a great day doing what ever makes you happy.

This is part of my Ginger scissors.  I have large ones for sewing also.  I don't use these to often.
So as you can see I really have a thing about scissors.  I found another pair of scissors the other
day that I will order soon.  I'm certainly not a scissor snob I love most all of the.  The more unique
the better.  But the finger holes have to be big enough for my big fingers.

More on the Great Scissor Scamper

In this photo are some fun things.  The lttle red handled scissors are a pair of dog scissors.
They're really cute.  The little red square handled scissors I found on a cross stitch website,
the same website as the dogs.  In fact I think the pink polka dots scissors were from there
also.  I think I bought them at the same time.  The scissor fob on the bottom was purchased
at the Quilt Museum in LaConnor Washington.  The beaded scissor holder was purchased
in a little quilt shop near the Port Townsend Ferry Terminal.  For the life of me I can't remember
the name of the town.  Its leather lined and it is hard.  It's one of my favorite things.

I'm pretty sure there are some duplicate scissors here.  The needle holder in the middle was
made for me by one of my beading The little stubby blue handled scissors are the first pair
I found that were The gold scissors on the bottom were from a sewing basket I won on ebay.
I love to buy old sewing baskets with all the goodies still inside. 

It's time for some blog-hopping with the Great Scissors Scamper! 

Trica from Friendly Stitchers Yahoo Group has started the "Great Scissor Scamper" on her blog.
http://thestamperss titches.blogspot .com/2012/ 03/great- scissors- scamper.html
She has some great scissors on her blog and I am going to try and add the photo's I've taken of my own scissor collection.  I have been collecting all sizes of scissors for years.  I began sewing when i was 7 years old.  I don't have scissors from that time but I do have lots of scissors from my cross stitch days from the mid 1980's.  Some are older and some new as in less that a month.  So lets see if I can add my pictures.  I didn't get all my pictures to post so I will go back and try again.  There will probably be some duplicates.

Its Sunday March 4, 2012

I'm getting a little better at posting on my blog.  Its still cold here in Anacortes!  I hope that spring will show up soon.  I'm really tired of the cold, wet weather.  I'm looking forward to my husband's retirement in a few years.  We'll be moving back to Bakersfield California.  We lived there for 13 years.  Mike took a job there at Texaco.  We then transferred to Washington.  I thought we would retire here.  That was the orignal plan but I just can't take the gloomy weather.  I love rain but not non stop heavy drizzle.  Any way.

On March 10 my brother's youngest child will be getting married.  Sharene is a lovely young lady.  She has met a wonderful young man named Travis.  They are a great couple together and Travis is a wonderful dad to Sharene's daughter.  I'll be having a house full of company for the weekend.  My husband (Mike) and I will be hosting a family get together on Sunday for Travis' and Sharene's families to meet.  Sharene and Travis will also be opening their wedding gifts.  With the help of my sister (Debbie) we've planned a nice light lunch for everyone.

I had a great start on my 1st cross stitch project.  I was moving along and had nearly half of the design stitched.  I was working on 28 count even weave cloth.  The problem with my choice was being very careful counting.  I thought I was but all the sudden I was off by 1 thread.  So I took out some stitching and low and behold there was another single thread mistake.  So what makes me think after very little stitching in about 12 plus years that I could start back in with sitiching over 2 threads.  Its much nicer but sometimes we have to start from square one.  So after frogging for awhile I decided to just start over on 16 count aida which I don't remember from the 1980's and 1990's.  The stitching is going so much faster and I'd say as of today I am at least half finished.  I've decided to  to work these 4 designs which are baskets, one for each season into a long picture.  WIth that I will be able to have it framed or make it into a bell pull.  I've been shopping on one of the online cross stitch shops and have found some super cute things to stitch.  For some reason I'm into the 4 season's and there are plenty of charts out there.

Happy stitching my friends,  I'll try and figure out how to up load some pictures of my older cross stitch pieces and the chart I'm working on now.

Sandy