August TUSAL with a finish to boot!

Yes it's August, can you believe it! Summer really must pass by quicker than all the other seasons. With the beginning of the month comes TUSAL time.

Look closely and you can see my ort jar hiding out above the tablet in this pic. Most of my stitching in the summer takes place in our gazebo which is where this little plaque hangs. It was a retirement gift from my younger sister and is just so appropriate for a morning or evening of stitching in the gazebo.

My orts have lots of blacks and whites from my Wicked Plant stitch. Fruit of the Spirit contributed most of the other orts. 
Here's a pic of my stitching spot in the gazebo.

I wouldn't want to be anywhere else at this time of year unless it's  Muskoka!

The cooler weather we've had here for the past week has been so pleasant that I stitched up a storm and finished up A Wicked Plant on the weekend.

Barbara Ana Designs A Wicked Plant
stitched on 32ct PTP Ancient
using DMC and Gentle Art Sampler floss

I love the way that this one looks on the fabric. I think it's going to look great when it's framed. See if you can spot the little mouse. I hadn't even noticed him until I got to that portion of the chart. He's adorable with his curly tail!

I needed a change after stitching with all that black and the neutrals so I hunted through my freebies and came upon this cute, summer project. It's a freebie from Eszter over at Sub Rosa and it had all the light, summery colours I was looking for. I just started it Sunday night and here's my progress so far.

The white on the bee wasn't showing up on my light fabric so I did a little backstitching to highlight it. I'll be concentrating on this for the next few days since we are travelling unexpectedly to attend a funeral in Sault Ste. Marie. It will be a good travelling companion.

Each year our church holds a silent auction as a fundraiser and my DH offers a boat ride as one of the items for bidding. The Civic Holiday Monday was a perfect day for this ride so he contacted the winning bidders and we headed out to the St. Lawrence for a tour.
Here are a few of the sights along the way.

We spotted this osprey nest first thing and then I noticed Mom approaching in the distance.

She posed very nicely for us. I don't think her young were in the nest any longer but she seems to be hanging around the area so perhaps they were flying nearby.

Next we heard a plane overhead and I suddenly realized it was a biplane!

I didn't realize until later that there is a small airport just outside Morrisburg which offers rides in these planes. We'll have to check them out on another venture.

After leaving Morrisburg, the next location we passed on the river was Iroquois, Ontario. At this location there is a dam over the river and the freighters must use the locks here. The dam isn't often in use and when it isn't, they open a couple of the gates for the smaller boats to travel through.

It doesn't look high enough to pass under does it? However, this is the very gate which we had just passed through. From Iroquois we next approached the village of Cardinal. When we got to this point we decided to continue on up to the International bridge crossing at Prescott. This bridge will take you over to Ogdensburg, N.Y.

At this point we decided to turn around and head back. We had been travelling for over an hour now.
On the way back we had to switch gas tanks and when we did there seemed to be a problem with the connector on the new tank. We couldn't get the motor going at all. This happened last year and they replaced the connection on this tank but obviously it didn't help!
After several tries to get going we decided to transfer the gas from said tank into the empty one which we knew had a good connection. Success! We were underway once more.

You may not be able to tell, but those are dairy cows on that island. Yes, it's an island! Each year they are brought over to graze on this land. I'm not sure how they transfer them over or even if they have a barn on the island. Obviously there must be or how else would they get milked? The island is on the American side of the river and I've yet to see them being moved. This particular day the cows were hanging out at the beach!

For me, a long boat ride always results in a great night's sleep. I woke refreshed and ready for today.Tonight I'm heading into Ottawa to hook up with my Tuesday night group. We are being joined by our contact for the Torah project. I have a few questions to ask her and then I'm afraid I have to head home early and get packed for our short trip. See you in a little while and keep on stitching!

Monday's Mail

I've been rather fortunate lately to be the winning recipient of not one but two giveaways! They both arrived in Monday's mail.
First up is my winning chart from Sherry. She has been cleaning up her stash and giving away some gently used charts. This one has been on my list and I was thrilled to receive it! Thank you so much Sherry!

Next are my winning charts from Kaye. Kaye and I are members of the Random Acts of Stitching Kindness blog. I was gifted by this RAK. Being a cat lover it was absolutely perfect! Look at the pretty card she tucked in the package. Love it! Thank you Kaye!

I can't seem to make up my mind as to a new start so I've continued to work on A Wicked Plant. It's really coming along and I'm enjoying it a lot. I'm stitching this on PTP Ancient linen and it's perfect for a Halloween stitch. The grays do show up much better in person. Pictures never seem to get the colours right.

I have some questions regarding the starting point for my Torah stitch so it has been put on hold for now. The contact person in our area for this project  will be joining our Tuesday group in a week so I will wait to start this until after I've checked some things with her.

I really need to get moving on another project though. A Wicked Plant won't take me all that long to finish. In fact it could be done before I leave for my holidays. I need to have another project or two waiting in the wings to pack for my dockside stitching in Muskoka. I should be starting some of the other projects on my WIPocalypse list but none of them is calling to me right now. After all, that list is just a guideline. I tend to stitch whatever and wherever my mood takes me.  After completing Wicked I only have Paradis Perdu remaining on my list of incompletes and I've stitched many other projects up until now. I'm pretty pleased with what I've accomplished. I'll have another quick post tomorrow with my Ornament SAL photo too.

I hope you all have found a few quiet moments for stitching. We all need some time to ourselves and what better way to occupy that time than with needle in hand?

Ghoul Returns

After waiting a few weeks for more floss to arrive, I'm finally able to get back on track with Ghoul. It's been fun working on this one again and I've made some good progress. Here's where I am up to this point.

I must admit, I am tiring of stitching with black especially since I went and started another Halloween piece. I know, I know, it serves me right! I just couldn't resist. I just couldn't resist when I saw this pattern on the Creative Poppy website. It's a new release by Barbara Ana  called A Wicked Plant. It had a wicked effect on me alright because I ended up purchasing not only this one but also October 31st and Wicked by the same designer. Follow the link and have a peek. I know you'll be tempted!

I love the fabric I'm using for this one. It's one of Picture This Plus' lovely overdyed linens and is called Ancient. It's perfect for this design!  I'm already playing around with some of the floss. One of the called for floss was just too washed out on this fabric so I found a substitute in my stash. As you my have noticed from the picture, the frogs have also paid a quick visit already. I've had to stitch that branch three times now! That's what I get for stitching when I'm tired, lol! I know this won't be done in time for Halloween but that's alright. It will carry me through the gloomy month of November which is only fitting.

I'm giving up on stitching anymore Halloween smalls with my latest start so now I'm digging out some Christmas ornaments to get started on. After all, Christmas is just two short months away. Help!