Gifts from friends

I have been the fortunate recipient lately of some beautiful gifts from some very good friends.

 Bonnie made this lovely blue scissor fob for me. I was so tickled that I immediately had to go to the shop and find myself a pair of blue scissors to do it justice!

Bernie gave me the scissor frog for displaying my scissors. Don't they look wonderful in it?

Fran and I happened to be out for dinner with 20 of our closest friends recently when I saw a set of dessert tongs just like this. I had not seen anything like it before and was very taken with it. Fran decided I should have a set of tongs for myself and here they are. Aren't they beautiful?

Thank you to my dear friends  for always thinking of me and giving me such beautiful  gifts. I am humbled and honoured and very proud to have such generous, kind  people in my life.

At last I have finished the French Sampler from Jardin Prive. It only took 6 months longer than the SAL was set up for! It is stitched on 40 ct Shadowbook linen with GAST threads.

And  here is my most recent progress on "White Lilies on Red" from Mystic stitch.

New fabric and thread

Look at all the fabulous new fabric and Carries Creations thread I have new in the shop as of the end of last week. I have been waiting for this fabric for a long time and I am so glad to finally have some gorgeous fabric to sell again.

I got in 300 skeins of Carries Creations thread last week and am expecting 100 more within the next couple of week.s The colours are fantastic.

Ornaments

This is what we found when we looked out today. That little building under the tree is our garden shed.

 And these are the ornaments for my 4 little great nieces for Christmas. The red ones are over one on 25 ct lugana and the white ones are over one on 32 count linen. I have until Decemebr to find some finishitive. The design is called "Sweet Bouquet" by JBW designs.

Nashville 2013

I had to show a picture of the Nashville Market. This is from a couple of years ago  but you get the idea. We just found out that they will indeed be having a Nashville Market early in March of 2013 so I have already booked our room at  the  Embassy Suites in Cool Springs Tennessee for the event.  It is one of the highlights of year for me and Dan too, but he is relieved that this year it is not happinging on Daytona 500 weekend.

My garden is growing. All of the potato plants have sprouted and there are even  little green peppers growing on the pepper plants. I am quite pround of myself although I suspect the  nice weather and the recent rain account for more than my not-so-green thumbs.

I have been stitching Christmas ornaments. Next post will feature pictures of them.

Garden is planted

Suddenly I know people having babies. These three were Sunday's stitching output. That is more stitching than I have done in weeks!

I have managed to squeese in a couple of ornaments in the series I am working on and I am still liking them so I expect I will continue with them.

Yesterday we prepared the garden and this morning I planted it. Just potatoes, green peppers, carrots and tomatoes  went in this year.

On Saturday we went  crazy at the front flower beds. They are well weeded (for however long that will last), the bushes are trimmed and the  red geraniums are looking quite perky!

Home again

We are home from sunny Florida.

The holiday was a good one.It was very relaxing and consisted of a lifestyle doing very little which alas I could probably get used to. However that is not to be. We are home and the lawn, the garden, the house, and  the shop are all clamouring for attention.

While in Florida though I spent a fair bit of time on my White Lilies and as you can see accomplished quite a lot. I have finished page 10 so I am more than halfway through.

When I got home I realized that I felt rather White lilied out so I started on this series of Cgristmas Ornaments by Blue Ribbon desgins. They use both over one and over two stitches on 32 count fabric. I am enjoying the change  and have decided that the enjoyment is coming primarily from being able to do more than 3 stitches in a row  without changing colours!