What a weekend!

What a great weekend. Saturday was my 9th or 10th ( does anyone know for sure?) annual Stitching Day and it was fabulous. This year we had an excellent turnout, with lots of old faithfuls showing up and a few new participants as well...

On this blog, I'll concentrate on pictures of the stitchers and tomorrow I'll show a sampling of the incredible stitching that we had on display. Paula

Sheila, Bernie, Rebecca, Trista, Judie

Trista, Judie, Christin and the back of Adriana's head

Colleen, Carmen, Isolde and the back of Anita's head... I am not sure whose arm that is!

Marg, Colleen, Carmen, Isolde, Anita, Marjorie

A headless person...maybe Kathy, Wendy, Clare, Dani, Marjorie

There will be a story later in the week about the kindness of Clare and her husband towards my father-in-law, who they don't even know...I am still so touched by their goodness.

Bernie, Laura, Sharon

The Stitching day is really only on Saturday but because some people come from a long way off, they stay over. Dan takes delight in making breakfast for us so here are Christin and Colleen and that arm partaking of french toast and bacon.

And here is Dan the chef doing his cooking thing. It was a very tasty breakfast.

The rest of the meals on the weekend were potluck and as you can imagine we ate very well! Some of these people are not only accomplished stitchers but they can cook too!

Next post...some of the stitching!

Dani, took a group shot of the gang and has sent it out to most of the participants for whom she has an e-mail address. It can be viewed on her blog here

along with her pics of the weekend.

This and that

My friend Fran recently completed Ink Circles' Peregrinations. She chose her own colours and thoroughly enjoyed working on Tracy Horner's interesting design. When she completed it, she sent a photo to Tracy who has posted it on her Gallery.

I have been working on my angel from The Cross stitcher magazine and she is nearly finished.

Even though the Peace angel is incomplete, there seemed to be no good reason not to start the love angel so I did and here she is...well part of her...

And last but not least, Marie Paule dropped in on Saturday to show me her latest creations. I have photos but will wait till after this weekend's Stitching retreat to share them with blog land. I'll let them be unveiled at Saturday's "Stitch-in". You will not be disappointed with her latest creative endeavours using cross stitch!

Back from a holiday

This is our friend's cottage where we spent a few days last week. Actually we stayed in our RV and only used their water and deck and dock!This is how the girls spent their days....

And this is how they spent their evenings.

Dan and I just relaxed, threw stitcks for the dogs and read.

I got out my stitching at some point to work on my Stained Glass landscape. Alas I did not get too far. I did have the chart and the fabric with me and was ready to go when I realized that I had packed the wrong box of floss so I had none of the colours I needed! Fortunately at the last minute I had added the pattern, fabric AND floss for this angel so I did a bit of work on her.

Holidays

This is as far as I have stitched on Merry Christmas by Lizzie Kate. Actually the rest of the charts have not been released yet so I am caught up...except for attaching the little buttons.
I am very happy with the way it is turning out.

We are heading out tomorrow for a few days away.

My MIL will be home from the hospital on Thursday so things are looking up there.

My turkey and her poults (thanks for supplying the correct terminology Tama ) have not put in another appearance so I have not had another opportunity to get a picture or them but I am optimistic...and I did scatter some sunflower seeds as enticement. I'll have to wait and see.

There has been little mention of our vegetable garden this year, mainly because it was so late before we even got the seeds and plants in the ground. Consequently they are taking their own sweet time producing anything. However, yesterday I noticed that there are little green peppers and little green beans starting to sprout, and they are even bigger today, so perhaps some will even be ready for harvesting when we get home on Monday. The tomatoes are coming along but are still small and green. I cannot tell with the potatoes but if the amount of green foliage above ground is any indication, they are doing well.

Merry...

This is the start I made after finishing Froth and Bubble. As you can see it is easy and is moving along at a good clip. I am really enjoying it. It's is good to get at something small and fast every once in a while especially when everything else I seem to have on the go is quite large and slow going.
BTW this is Lizzie*Kate's new Merry Christmas series. The first half has been released and I may just finish the next two letters before the rest of "ristmas " comes in. We had visitors yesterday and the day before... a Mama turkey accompanied by her 6 babies (chicks? goslings? cygnets? turklets? ) has been making the rounds from the field across the street, through our yard and into the woods beside the house. I tried to take some pictures, but my photo taking skills are very poor, even at the best of times and yesterday it was dark and rainy and the family stayed close to the fence and the woods so it was difficult to actually see them, never mind get a good shot of them. Perhaps they'll be back this weekend in some sunshine and I can get a photo. The babes were very cute when they jumped up on the fence rail and trotted along.

A Thank You and a TaDa

Kathy made me this little scissor fob. Thank You so much Kathy...the game now will be to see how long I can use it without cutting the ribbon!

And at long last ... Froth and Bubble completed.

I had worked on it last week while in Toronto staying with my FIL but could not finish it because I ran out of one particular colour of thread. This morning after dropping the dogs at the groomers and a quick trip to Tim Hortons I went to Adriana's for a visit and the chance to sit and finish it in good company. So Adriana was the first person to see the fnished product and you guys are the next!

According to Beth, when one finishes a project that gives one license to start 4 0r 5 more.... hmmm what shall I do next???

More purses

Life has been kind of hectic lately so I have no stitching of my own to share. These are some shots of a couple of purses Sharon has made for her motorcycle club. There is a big rally near here in a couple of weeks organized by Sharon and Harold's chapter of the club and she is planning to raffle or auction these off for the charity the club supports.

I have been away a lot this past week. My MIL broke her hip and I spent nearly a week in Toronto with my FIL. Then we went to the rodeo for the weekend. Dani came along and she and Dan sold over $8000 worth of 50/50 tickets. Three people left the rodeo with very nice baggies full of cash and the Optimist club has around $4000 to give to the various local charities that they support in the community. We came home very tired!

I am heading back to see my FIL today, to take him to a doctor's appointment and I 'll be back there for the same reason on Friday, so my little shop which already has sporadic hours now has even more irregular opening times. But hey this is family...

I am so close to finishing Froth and Bubble...actually it would be done but I ran out of thread while in Toronto last week...so this week for sure I will do those last 50 or so stitches in and will have a picture in my next blog!

Note to Anne in Australia...I have been meaning to e-mail you or even respond on your blog but I have been doing precious little of either lately. If you come to Canada...we will plan a get together. There is no doubt about that. We don't have to plan too far in advance and can ususlly get a good little gang of stitchers together on pretty short notice.