Wednesday 18 May 2011

Friends, Fun and Stitching Too!

This past weekend was the annual SAL at Dani's . I had been looking forward to this because it had been many months since I'd seen some of the ladies. I was unable to spend the entire weekend with everyone because we had a house guest. However I did mangage to spend most of the day on Saturday with everyone. We had great fun! I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. Our hostess Dani on the left and Kathy who is working on her Fairies on the right.

























Bonnie was doing some serious stitching on Ink Circles Cirque des Cercles. I wish I'd got a picture of it. If you follow the link from her name you'll see a picture of it on her blog. She also had the most amazing beaded fobs with her which she made. Naturally, I forgot to get a picture of them as well. They're awesome Bonnie!
Rebecca was stitching on a lovely birth sampler for a friend.














Beatrice brought with her some gorgeous project bags she'd made. I've posted a picture of mine. She's used the lovliest shade of blue for this one and it's lined with a pretty print as well.
They're wonderful and I thank you very much Beatrice for sharing them with us. I love mine!

















Christin is stitching Butternut Road's Earthdancer. It's a gorgeous design and I love watching her progress on it. Amy pulled out her current project which just happens to be the same design which Rebecca recently finished. I don't know the name or designer but it's of two cardinals sitting on a tree bough covered in snow. Very pretty!




Christin












Amy











The group surprised me with a cake to celebrate my retirement which took place on the previous Wednesday. Rebecca had heard that I like lemon and she brought the most delicious lemon treat! Thank you so much !! Sharing something as special as my retirement was made even more special when sharing it with all of you!

I spent most of my day at Dani's working on my Spring Quakers. I finished one large motif and started working on the next. Here's the one I finished off first.
It was when I returned home on Sunday that I discovered an error. This latter motif has two parts to it, each printed on a different page than the next. I had already stitched the bottom portion of the design and as I continued my stitching on the upper portion I discovered that the bottom was out by one line and would not match up with the upper. Curses!!! Kathy, those darn frogs followed me home from Dani's and I spent two hours Monday frogging out all of the bottom of the motif. Yesterday I restitched things and all is now well. I had considered a new start recently but I'm on a roll now with this one and the Wedding Sampler and I think I'll just let things be for now.
As I mentioned before, my retirement from work took place earlier this week. Although I'm not officially done until May 31, I'm now on vacation until that time and will not be returning to the bench. I've worked at the same hospital for just short of 34 years, mostly in the Chemistry lab, so it has been a big part of my life. As I said to my coworkers, I think I've spent more time with all of them than I did with my family. We've had our ups and downs, shared laughter and tears and they've been an amazing bunch of people to work with who I will miss dearly. On my final day, they presented me with an orchid corsage, balloon and a cake. A retirement dinner will be held in my honour in early June after my official date. My DH arrived at the lab on my final day which was also my birthday and took a few photos to mark the occasion including a group photo of those present. This is only about half of the actual staff. We'll get photos of the remainder during the upcoming dinner.














It's been bittersweet leaving but now I'm off to new adventures or at least I hope so!! I haven't had the time to respond to all your wonderful comments this week but I'd like to thank all of you . Please know that I may not always have the time to reply but I definitely love hearing from you and appreciate all your kind words.


Note: I've tried editing this numerous times so that this post lines up better but blogger is just not cooperating!

12 comments:

  1. Happy retirement and happy birthday Lynn, 34 years in the same employment is a fabulous achievement and being part of the chemistry lab I would imagine a very important one too. I hope your retirement brings you lots of lovely stitchy time and great times ahead xxx

    ReplyDelete
  2. WOW! 34 years! That's awesome Lynn. Happy Retirement and I wish you many more new adventures in the days to come!

    Dani's stitching weekend looks like it was a major success! Everyone looks like they are having a blast. Really sorry to hear about the frogs though.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Spring Quakers is looking beautiful!

    Congratulations on your retirement:)))) Lucky Lucky you! Enjoy!

    ReplyDelete
  4. Congratulations on your retirement, Lynn! That's quite an accomplishment to work at the same place for 34 years.

    Sorry to hear about the frogs in Spring Quaker! It does look amazing though, it's really coming along nicely.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Congratulations on your retirement, Lynn! 34 years at the same job is awesome!

    Check your settings, which editor are you using? You might try switching it and seeing if that helps Blogger behave.

    ReplyDelete
  6. I was so glad you made time to be with us on Saturday!

    Congratulations on your retirement, you deserve it!!!

    ReplyDelete
  7. What a happy, exciting time for you Lynn!! Can't wait to hear about all the adventures coming up. :D

    ReplyDelete
  8. Yeah well, you only took one frog home. One followed me home too!! Not happy!!!!!!!
    Congrats on your retirement Lynn. I hope we get to spend more time together now.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Happy Belated Birthday and a Happy Retirement. Enjoy!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Oh, you certainly had a great time together :)
    Your Quaker Sampler is so beautiful!

    Happy birthday and enjoy your retirement in a full way!

    Hugs,
    Tatyana

    ReplyDelete
  11. Awww, congratulations on your retirement! I am sure it was bittersweet to finish but I'm also sure that life holds many amazing things for yo to enjoy full time!

    Lovely stitching photos! Sorry to hear about the frogs.

    ReplyDelete
  12. Just catching up on my blog reading and commenting after being away for two weeks, Lynn! Congratulations on your retirement--I'm sure you'll be sorely missed by your co-workers. That is a long time to be at the same job--I've been at mine at the library for a total of 24, but I had a 10 year "vacation" thrown in there when my boys were small :)

    Looks like a great time at Dani's, too--glad you could at least spend some of the weekend with your friends...

    ReplyDelete

Labels