A New Framing Addition

I'll start off today's post with a picture of a finish I completed back in March of 2013.... Baby Its Cold Outside. This is designed by Heartstring Samplery and I started stitching it last year during one of our final storms of the season. I knew that I wanted to have it completed and framed to hang the following year during the winter. Courtesy of a Christmas gift, I am pleased to say that it returned home from the framer a week ago and is currently adorning my dry sink.

The frame isn't white as it appears in this photo. It is a lovely mix of grey and cream and is textured to give the appearance of barn wood. When we were looking at different frames for this we tried out a pure white frame and it just didn't do the picture justice. 

There, I gave it one more try and this is closer to the look of the actual frame. You can see a lot more of the texturing in this one too.

As for stitching, here is what I've been up to recently.

With Thy Needle and Thread - A Pink Sparrow update:

Saturday I put this aside and went in search of something else for a change and found Hands To Work -This Is The Day which I'd started last fall. When you last saw this I only had the house completed.

I've also been working on some smalls for February's Smalls SAL. I've completed two already including the final finishing which is amazing for me. Here's a peek at one of the finishes. I've chosen an opalescent fabric for this one although you can't tell from the picture. Can you guess which design this is?

I also wanted to show you a lovely card which I received early in the new year from Chiara in Italy. 

Chiara sent this to me with Christmas greetings. It is actually a postcard with the greeting and address on the reverse. Each of these words is the word Beauty in English, French, Italian and Spanish. I think it is actually a lovely stitch for Valentine Day and I hope to have time to work on it this month. Thank you so much Chiara for your wonderful greeting!

One of my step-grandchildren has shown an interest in learning to cross stitch. Although all the grandchildren like to watch me and inquire as to what I'm stitching, Yanie shows much more interest in how to accomplish my design and is always complimenting me on the many framed works in my home. So for Christmas I found some beginner kits on Ebay and ordered one for each of the kids, although I knew that Yanie might be the only one who completed her design. She's 10 and has the concentration to stick with it.

On Sunday I spotted this post on Facebook announcing her progress.

Yeah Yanie! I'm so happy that she was able to finish this and in such a short time. I haven't talked to them lately but I can only hope that she enjoyed it as much as I do and that she didn't just complete it to make me happy. The kit I had sent for Summer was a stamped one. She's 7 so I figured this would be a bit easier for her until I opened it. All the other kits came with Aida but her design was stamped on a cloth similar to evenweave but the weave was quite tight. She was unable to see the holes in the fabric so I mailed them a piece of Aida when I returned home and told them she would have to follow the chart like the others. So much for making things easier!

Yesterday was a beautiful, bright and sunny day here. My son Daniel had been visiting us for the weekend and I was heading back to Cornwall to take him home. He has been quite interested in my owl sightings and inquired whether I had seen any lately since he would love to see one up close. I told him that if he didn't mind we'd take a longer way home and see if we could spot one for him. Luckily we didn't have to go far. This fellow was sitting on a post just outside our village on the main highway. This is the closest owl I've seen to us yet.

We also spotted one other during our travels, sitting just around the corner from our local Tim Hortons coffee shop.

The sun seemed to have drawn the wildlife out just as much as the people. On our return from Daniel's place the sun started to slowly sink in the sky and the deer suddenly started to emerge from the woods and the cornfields in our path. We could only inch along this one portion of the road for fear of running into one. There had to have been between 40-50 deer in this area crossing the roads back and forth at various times.

After leaving the deer, we rounded the corner and in the distance near the rail tracks we saw another owl.

I was driving and my hubby was snoozing during the latter part of the drive. Suddenly I saw a large dark mound in the top of the trees as I drove towards the woods. Was that a hawk? It seemed a little too large. No, it's an eagle!! I made a quick U turn (we're on the back roads at this point and there is very little traffic) and headed back to the spot. Bob woke up and quickly grabbed the camera. He was so thrilled and in his haste he didn't focus properly when he took this shot.

Unfortunately it was the only pic we could get. I think we spooked the bird a bit and immediately after this he flew off further into the woods. This is the first time I've ever seen one of these magnificent birds anywhere near our area. I've seen them when we've been boating on the St. Lawrence River but never this far ashore. I would love to return to the area again and get a better pic but I'm sure that's the last we'll see of one for quite awhile.

I've been watching the weather reports and I know that many of you received more snow on the weekend as we did and are expecting still more in the next few days. It seems our Ontario groundhog, Wiarton Willie emerged from his home only to discover his shadow, immediately signalling another 6 weeks of winter. I not sure exactly how accurate rodent predictions are (LOL) but from the long term forecast in my area it appears he may be right! Keep warm, keep safe and keep on stitching!!