A late TUSAL and sweet Irina

I'm very late with my TUSAL pic this month. It's not that I forgot about it but I just didn't have the time to blog. I got tired of picturing my little jars of orts and decided to dump them in this bowl that sits on my coffee table. I didn't realize just how well they would blend in with the colours of the bowl. Most of these originated from BBD Awake The Dawning Day.

My friend Pam came to pick up Awake on the weekend. I forgot to take a picture of her with the piece but I'll take one when she gets it framed. I'm anxious to see what sort of frame she'll go with. While she was here she showed me a pic of her recent finish.
This one is Silver Creek Samplers Northwind.

I love the fabric she chose for this one. I have stitched Little House Needleworks version of the same verse but I also hope to do this chart someday and hang the two finishes together.

I was back at Viktor & Irina recently and put in the final stitches on Irina last night.

This little one has given me a ton of trouble but I can't figure out why. It's simple stitching but I had to frog out and restitch parts of her on three different occasions! I'm so pleased she is finally complete and I can move on in the design. The verdict is still out on my small flowers. They show up better in the real thing and I haven't had the heart to restitch them yet after all the recent frogging. I've chosen a different shade of fabric than was called for and perhaps this is the reason they fade away. I'll deal with them later.
Here's a photo of everything completed so far.

Our snow is completely gone and I've finally been able to make it out into the gazebo. Last night we wheeled out the barbeque from inside the gazebo where it had been stored and had our first bbq of the season - hamburgers. Mmm, mmmm!
The gazebo is still a little cold for sitting in mostly because we haven't seen much of the sun. However that bright yellow ball is supposed to be out in full force tomorrow. If that's the case, I'll be out there stitching in its warmth.

My heart and prayers go out to the residents of Boston and to all those who were involved in yesterday's senseless tragedy at the Boston Marathon. I can't comprehend such violence and I know the lives of so many will be forever changed after these events. May God watch over you.

Paradis Perdu - found once more!

As I mentioned in my last post, I decided to pull out some stitching which hasn't seen the light of day for more than a year. I started Paradis Perdu at the start of 2012. I made great progress on it but suddenly lost interest and put it aside after only two months. Here's how it looked when I last saw it.

This one is designed by A Mon Ami Pierre and is truly a lovely piece. The colours are all so pretty. I'm doing a silk conversion on this one using Vicki Clayton Hand Dyed Fibers. I have this one stretched on an 11 x 11 Q-snap and I think I just got tired of handling the frame. It's not the easiest piece to take on the road with you either. Despite it being so cumbersome, I took it with me this past weekend when I went to visit my mom. Most of the progress was made just prior to my going away. There wasn't a lot of time for stitching during my visit home.
Here's where it stands at this point.

I just finished Adam and Eve before bed last night. Eve is looking a little flat chested if you ask me! The silk conversion for their skin was just a little too light and faded away into the background so I decided to use the called for DMC. I'm using a Queen Anne's Lace as my fabric. I love those funky birds (peacocks?) although I'm not entirely in love with the colours used to stitch them. I still have to finish stitching the apple tree but since it's fairly large I just might stitch a few other smaller motifs first. 

This was the only piece I touched on the weekend. We travelled home to my mom's place to attend the funeral service for my uncle who passed away just before Easter. My mom was still in Florida so they waited until she returned home for the service since this was her only sibling. My uncle goes to join my aunt whose service was held last year on the same date. They were the only aunt and uncle that I had. My father was an only child. The trip home gave me an opportunity to see my cousins once again as well as my sisters and their families. We all went out for supper on Saturday night at a local Greek restaurant owned by friends of my sister. Here's a great pic of my Mom and Step-dad that Bob snapped. Would you believe my Mom is 82?!

Despite the occasion, it was wonderful touching base with my family. We also checked up on Bob's mom who is slowly going  downhill. She is now 94. 
I did nothing but eat out all weekend and now I feel like a giant beach ball. I've hardly eaten at all since we returned home.

Viktor & Irina are on hold at the moment although I will be taking them along with me to my Wed. afternoon gathering. Thank you for all the wonderful comments I received on this one. The verdict is still out on which colour I'll use for those small flowers. I think they're not showing up because I'm not using the called for fabric. I went with LSL Pearled Barley since I already had that one in my stash. It can take up to a month for me to receive fabric that I order.

I was fortunate enough to make a pit stop at Thread and Eye in London, ON during my trip home where I picked up some remnant fabric for ornaments as well as some floss and floss bags. Gosh I miss having a needlework shop in my area!!

That's it for now. I apologize for my lack of visits to the blogs lately. There just hasn't been enough time in the day. Hopefully now things will settle down some. I see that the snow has now melted in the back yard and I have access to the gazebo once more. If the sun would just stay out long enough I'd be out there now!

Springs arrival - sweet!

Good morning everyone and thank you for all the lovely Easter greetings I received from you this past weekend. I hope you all enjoyed your weekend as much as we did. Despite a drop in temperature over the weekend, we had a sunny day and enjoyed the company of good friends and family as we shared a meal. I had so much fun preparing my meal this year as my sons, Dan and Chris, stepped into the kitchen to help chop, dice, and slice the various ingredients for our meal. Bob prepared a fabulous leg of lamb! Chris is vegetarian so the two of us put together an awesome vegetable and chickpea stew. Following the meal the men cleared table, loaded the dishwasher and washed up the remaining pots so that I could sit and enjoy my coffee with my friends. Thanks guys! I really appreciated the help and enjoyed having your company throughout the day. I was thinking how different it was from when they were young and would step into the kitchen to ask, "Is it done yet? When are we going to eat?" Then they would conveniently disappear when it came time to clear the table and do dishes!

The preparations and many services during Holy Week left little time for stitching. I sing in my husband's church choir and we were gone from home from Thursday right through until Sunday evening in addition to many rehearsals prior to that. The only time for our meal was on Easter Monday. Between services I did manage to squeeze in a little stitching time on Viktor and Irina. 

I'm enjoying this one soooo much! I've only run into one problem so far. The called for DMC 950 for the blooms on 3 little flowers is not showing up at all. If you click on the picture and look at it closeup you'll see what I mean. When I look at the original that comes with the pattern, they don't show up either. I tried doing one with a slightly darker shade and it looked awful. I'm thinking of swapping out the colour to a yellow or gold of some sort. Any other ideas or suggestions? I'm just getting started on stitching the lamb next. I've put in the first few stitches on his ear just below the second flower.

I'm heading out to my Wednesday afternoon group today and I think I'll pull out something I haven't touched in ages..... Paradis Perdu! Yup, it's still hanging around and I don't think I've touched it for a year now. Definitely time to get this beauty out once more. I've also chosen my ornament for the April Ornament SAL. Once again I've chosen a Prairie Schooler and I've gone with a spring theme. Sorry but I just couldn't stitch a Christmas ornament when the sun is shining so brightly and our snow is almost gone. This little fellow dropped by this morning to sing a spring song for us.

The arrival of spring also means its time for a visit to the sugar bush!
For those of you who are not familiar with this tradition, the sugar bush refers to a group of Sugar Maple trees which have been tapped to collect sap for the production of maple syrup. When my children were young, each spring we would drive to our favourite sugar bush just over the Ontario border and into Quebec. Now there is one just down the road from our home! The photos below are of my granchildren on their visit to the sugar bush in Quebec.

A horse drawn wagon takes you out into the bush to see the taps on the maple trees with their buckets collecting sap. The sap flows in mid March to April, when the days are mild and the nights freezing. In a major operation, plastic tubing carries the sap through the bush, back to the shack where it is boiled down to produce the syrup. It takes 40 gallons of sap to produce just one gallon of maple syrup! 

The wagon follows the lines back to the evaporation shack where you can see the sap boiled down into syrup. One of the biggest treats of the visit is when they pour some of the syrup onto the remaining snow and then wrap the resulting taffy onto a stick. Mmmm, mmmm! 

The visit to the bush is usually followed by a meal of bacon, eggs, sausage, beans and pancakes all drenched in maple syrup. We usually have to peel the kids off the ceiling after all that sugar, lol! Ah, but it's only once a year, right? 

At some shacks, they have music and dancing as well. I can remember hearing traditional French folk songs at the sugar bush we used to take the kids to. If you've never been and the opportunity presents itself, go! It's a fun filled day with memories that I know my grown children have never forgot. 

Have a sweet week!

Happy Easter friends!!

Easter Treasure Hunt

Don't you just love a treasure hunt? I know I do! Many thanks to Jo for organizing this. We're getting near the end of the hunt now. Here's my letter:

S

Along with my letter, here's my Easter stitch.

I chose a Prairie Schooler design taken from Book 152, April.

It was stitched using DMC on 28 ct Lambswool. I did have it hanging on one of my cupboards at first but I just threw it in my bowl of Easter/Spring finishes and it looks pretty good there.

Happy Easter Everyone!

March WIPocalypse

March has just flown by but I think I've managed to do pretty well with my stitching this month. With the arrival of spring and Easter almost here I wanted to stitch some smalls or ornaments to add to my decor. I managed to stitch three pieces, two of which I also did the final finishing on. I'm unable to show one of my finishes since it's for an Easter treasure hunt taking place this weekend. I'll be able to post a pic of it at that time.

The above was completed for my commitment to the Ornament SAL. Then I continued on my Prairie Schooler kick!

Prairie Schooler Cheep minicard

The ornament for the Easter treasure hunt is also a Prairie Schooler design.

I also completed this handsome fellow just in time for St. Paddy's Day!

Heart in Hand Needleart St. Patrick's Bird

In addition to the smalls, I finished up two of my larger WIPs.

Heartstring Samplery Baby It's Cold Outside

and

Blackbird Designs Awake The Dawning Day

I'm so glad that I got the latter one done because I really want to get this housewarming gift to its new owner so it can grace the walls of her lovely new home. It's off to be stretched today and when that's done Pam can pick out the frame of her choice. 

As a reward for all these finishes, I started not one, but two new stitches. Both are Plum Street Sampler designs - Fruit of the Spirit followed by Viktor and Irina. 

That about covers it for this month. Watch out for some updated photos of the new starts over the next few weeks.

March Ornaments

I really needed a taste of spring around here after all the snow we received during the month so my ornament for this month was completed fairly early on. I chose this one for its pretty spring colours. Stitching it was like a breath of fresh air.

I ended up finishing it as a small pillow to display in my dough bowl with my other spring/Easter finishes.

This one stitched up so quickly that I moved on to another PS design. This is from the Cheep minicard.

This sweet chick is really quite small and I plan on finishing it up as a felt ornament. 
I've got a taste of Spring fever so next month's ornie could be another spring addition. I've got a thing for tulips so maybe I can find something with them in it. Hello sun, let's melt away all that snow!!