Relaxing.....

I am so much enjoying my time away from work and the extra stitching time as a result of this! Mind you, today I've been rather lazy which could be due to the fact that I'm fighting a cold. It had better hightail it though because this Saturday is a stitching day at Dani's. Actually it's a stitching weekend, starting Friday evening through Sunday. I'm only able to join in on Saturday though due to prior commitments one of which is my DH's annual spring concert with the Seaway Valley Singers. I was supposed to have hosted a SAL at my place this May but Dani beat me to the punch which is just as well on account of my surgery. I'm hoping that several of our stitching buddies from Belleville and Kingston way are joining us. It's been a while since I've caught up with them.

As close as I am to a finish, I grew tired of NSS this week and pulled out Colette's Cat Sampler.
I'm just getting ready to stitch the name which I have adapted to Clarisse. I spent an afternoon graphing this out and hopefully it will look okay once I have it in place.

The rest of my past week has been taken up with baking and visits. In anticipation of my visit to my grandchildren, I baked a batch of chocolate chip cookies. It had been so long since I'd baked cookies of any kind. I ran out at the last minute when I realized we didn't have enough margerine only to find out that this particular recipe calls for shortening and not butter or margerine. How could I forget that? I can't count how many times I've made these over the years. I must be losing it! I used to know the recipe by memory but there's not too many reasons for me to make these anymore. Those grandkids just got to move closer!!

I had a wonderful visit with the girls on Friday. My son finishes work at noon so we were able to spend a good portion of the day visiting with them. We celebrated the oldest's 5th birthday which I'd missed due to the surgery. Then I spent the afternoon making "mud pies" (otherwise known as chocolate macaroons or chocolate drop cookies) with them. This is something that I don't often have the opportunity to do with them and the girls really seemed to enjoy it. Following a BBQ supper, we headed outside to blow bubbles which the girls found in their Easter baskets. Then the long trip home again. It'll be midsummer before we see them again. My son is hoping that the shop where he works closes down for vacation at the end of August rather than midsummer so that he can attend the 80th birthday celebration for my Mom. She's yet to meet her great-grandchildren.

The trip there and back took its toll on me but not until Sunday. This was another full day for us in Ottawa between church and my hubby's concert that afternoon. I had to drive myself there and back since Bob had stayed overnight in Ottawa following a late rehearsal on the Saturday night.
The concert didn't start until late afternoon so I spent the time until then wandering through the tulip gardens at Dow's Lake in Ottawa. The Tulip Festival doesn't officially begin until this Friday but the tulips are out in full bloom. They've bloomed earlier than usual this year due to our unusually mild weather. The gardens were lovely. A rainbow of colour as far as the eyes could see. I loved seeing all the different varieties and I got some ideas for my own garden.

By the time we returned home after the concert I was zonked! But do you think I could sleep?
I didn't fall asleep until after midnight and by 3:45 am I was wide awake. Clarisse joined me in the livingroom as I sat and read until the sun came up.

The past few days I haven't had a lot of energy and I've been fighting a cold so there really hasn't been a lot of stitching going on. I felt a bit better today and dug out my recipe for Blueberry Tea Bread. I have lots of wild blueberries in my freezer to use up. The bread has been a real hit around here and this loaf is earmarked for the reception following Bob's next concert Friday evening. I'm thinking this might go over well at Dani's on Saturday too.

Some of the results of my overactive clicky finger arrived today. One of the charts I've been trying to acquire for a long time . Blackbird Designs Sunflower House, one of the OOP Loose Feathers patterns, has been on my wish list for about 2 yrs I think and finally I won one of the auctions on ebay. Yaaay, now to get it all kitted up.

Two other charts were purchased on Kathy Barrick's Etsy site. Now that Kathy has announced her retirement from designing, I'm trying to get ahold of any of her charts on my wish list. Carriage House Samplings Pumpkin Farm and The Gilded Cage are two such wishes. I'd love to stitch one of her Village charts such as AaHRH but will I ever have the time? They're such big undertakings and until I'm finished working I just can't see it happening. Even then I have more than enough to keep me in stitches. I'll bet you're saying, "Really, I can't imagine having that much!".

The weatherman says that the next few days will be cooler with rain all weekend. Perfect weather for the SAL at Dani's. Keep on stitching!