Two weeks and counting....

Until I return to work. I've got a taste these past few weeks of what it's like to be at home and knowing that I have only one year left until retirement makes for a very looong year yet to come.

When I return to work I'll certainly miss my time spent stitching at home. Our Tuesday night group is on hiatus at the moment which is just as well since my DH is preparing a lovely meal for me here tonight in celebration of my birthday. Just the two of us and afterwards we're visiting with some friends. I'll see my boys later in the month. Number two is visiting with us later this week and my youngest is returning home on our holiday weekend this month. I've been told I'm being taken out for dinner at that time for a combination Mother's Day/birthday celebration. My oldest son is just too far away to visit and I did spend some quality time with him there just a week ago.

So since I had no family plans this past weekend, I did the next best thing. I spent it stitching with friends! Dani had a stitchy weekend planned at her place which is about an hour's drive from me. This was to have been my month to host but with my surgery and all Dani filled in. I'm on for July now. It was great fun! I caught up with Dani, Rebecca, Kathy, Beatrice, Christin, and Bonnie and made a new stitching friend, Lori. Lori moved to Ottawa from Calgary, Alberta a year ago and managed to connect with Dani through blogs. She was thrilled to meet other stitchers in her area.

It was great to spend time with these lovely ladies again. There is always so much talk, laughter and of course, eating. I fell off the wagon with my overeating all weekend. I was only able to spend the Saturday stitching but I'm so glad that I did. I got to see all their projects firsthand that I'd been following on their blogs... Rebecca's tulips, Bonnie's Kaleidoscope, Beatrice's China Blue, Dani's Celestial Dragon, Chritin's Giggles and Kathy's Mirabilia RR. Check out their blogs for some amazing stitching! Me, well I plugged away at Nantucket Summer Sampler as well as my Cat Sampler but I have very little progress on either. I made more progress on Sunday evening than I did all day Saturday! I think I spent way too much time catching up, lol. Since my surgery I'd spent too much time as a recluse and it was just nice to get out again. Here's some pics from all our fun. A big thank you to Dani for hosting such a great weekend.

From the top are Rebecca and Beatrice, Christin and Bonnie, Dani and Lori and finally Kathy with Rebecca listening to her vacation story. As you can see, Christin had to share her lap with Shadow who seemed to think that he should be occupying that chair!

Over the past couple of days I've had to frog and restitch the name and scrollwork on my Cat Sampler three times! If you remember, I replaced Colette's name on the sampler with the name of my cat which then meant that I also had to redesign the border on either end. The first time I stitched it, I wasn't happy with some of the letters in the name. So redoing them meant moving everything. The second time I screwed up because I started in the wrong place. Frog out, start again! Now it's finished and I'm not totally happy with how it looks but I'll be damned if I'm going to frog it out once more and restitch! Do you sense a little frustration here? Me and my bright ideas! Next time I'll leave it as it's charted.

I've spent most of today moving on and stitching the top part of this sampler. Pics to come next time, maybe even a finish. Although NSS is calling to me, my next LHN ornament has arrived and I'm heading off to find fabric for it in my stash. I'd like to get a good headstart on it before I return to work. With all this time off work I'd hoped to do a lot more finishing but I've been lazy about getting to it. Finishing is just not my forte and I've been putting it aside whenever I think about it. I'd just rather be stitching.
I hope all the Moms out there had a lovely day on Sunday and continue to have a great week. With lots of stitching included of course!