A Halloween finish

It's been one of those weeks. You know, the ones where you run around a lot but don't seem to accomplish much! Yup, I'm exhausted but when I take a look around to see what I've done it doesn't look like much of anything. Maybe I'll catch up this weekend. Yeah, right!

On the stitching front however, I do have a finish to share with you. Ta da! It's Halloween Cove!

I knew there wasn't much left to this one but because it mostly involved stitching in the spider webs and the fence I left it until I could sit uninterrupted and give it my full attention. Otherwise I knew the frogs would be stopping by. I also had to give a bit more attention to the ship in this one. When I started stitching the rigging things just weren't adding up and it was because I had stitched in an extra row on the back end of the ship. So some frogging was involved and then I had to restitch the rigging which of course I just loved doing (not)! I'm so pleased with how this one looks and although I can't possibly have it framed in time for this Halloween, I know it will grace may walls for sure next year.

As far as the pumpkin challenge is concerned, I'm almost done with the stitching on another small which I'm hoping to finish as a cube. Halloween Sampler has been an easy and quick stitch which was a lot of fun to do. After it's finished I think I will concentrate on getting some more of my LHN Christmas ornaments stitched.

I have one other new start to share. It's designed by My Big Toe Designs and is called Cast All Your Cares . This one is being done for a friend who I sing with in the church choir. She has always admired my stitching and asked if I could do a piece for her for her new home. We originally picked another design but I wasn't really happy with it and thought this would make a nicer gift. I'll use it as a housewarming gift which will be a surprise to her since she is expecting to pay me for it. I just don't feel right about taking anything from her. She is a good friend and I'd rather do this for her as a gift. I'm stitching it on the recommended Jobelan lambswool and WDW floss. Not much to show yet as you can see.

I've had three unexpected surprises this week. The first was from one of my coworkers, Karen. She also enjoys cross stitching as well as her niece. However it appears that her niece is giving it up and was looking to find a good home for some of her supplies. Karen asked if I was interested in taking the following patterns and floss. There is a lovely Thistle kit, an M Designs piece and 2 samplers from Butternut Road - Summer Sampler and The Rose Sampler. As well there was an assortment of floss including some Caron threads and WDW. I was thrilled and gladly accepted them.

The second surprise was from my friend Trish. Trish and her husband own a local store and she does all the buying for the craft department. It seems she placed an order and when it showed up there was a Jim Shore piece which she didn't remember ordering and which she didn't think would sell well in their store. She asked if I wanted to purchase it from her at a reduced rate because she knew I was a big fan of both Halloween and Jim Shore. Did I? Looky, looky and feast your eyes on Jim Shore's Frightful Halloween Tree. It comes complete with all the ornaments shown. I love it!! I have to apologize for the quality of some of the pics. They're a little grainy. It seems my camera battery is getting low. The little pieces in the foreground did not come with it but did come from her store. Thanks very much Trish for thinking of me!

As for the third suprise, I was the winner of a Halloween draw by Carol. Follow the link to her blog at Stitching Dreams and you can get a peek at my winnings. I was thrilled!! It was a very generous giveaway and I can't wait until my gift arrives. The fabrics she chose look so yummy!

We had our first snowfall here last night. I looked out the window just before bedtime and it was coming down pretty good. Wasn't long before the rooftops were white. Fortunately the ground isn't frozen yet and the temperature was warm enough this morning that when I woke it had all disappeared. I took our boat over to the fairgrounds this morning for storage which is another sure sign that winter is almost here. I can't believe how quickly autumn is leaving us!

Many thanks to all of you who drop by my blog for a visit. I love reading your comments. Thanks!

Some small finishes

It's a miserable start to the weekend here. Rain, wind, more rain, more wind! Sounds like a gale is out there. Perfect for cozying up with a cup of tea and a new stitch. And here it is, Helga Mandl's Halloween Sampler. As you can see, I haven't got very far yet. I'm in love with the fabric and wish I had more. It's a Limited Edition Silkweaver which I think I purchased on ebay several years ago. The colours in it are just perfect for an autumn or Halloween piece. And this one fits the bill!

I've really been enjoying stitching all these smalls lately. They give you more of a sense of accomplishment when you can see a finish so quickly. I have two other finishes, one which is finished as a pinkeep and the other will be finished into an ornament hopefully by the end of this weekend. First up is the pinkeep. It's another Helga Mandl piece called Autumn. I actually saw the backing fabric first in my stash and knew that I had a little stitch somewhere that would work with it. Little did I know that I'd find such a perfect match. Isn't it sweet? I'm getting better at these finishes with each one that I try.



Next up is the Boo Tree freebie by Rose Krizan. I've found a pretty cool fabric for the backing on this one too but you'll have to wait until my next post to see it. It's not quite finished yet. Here is a pic of the stitched piece. If you tilt your head to the left you should be able to see the little Boo which makes up the branches of the tree. It took me all of three days to finish it up which is a record for me!

It won't be long before Halloween is here either. I can't believe that the beautiful fall colours are already on their way out and that winter is almost upon us once more. Is it just me or does it seem like time is speeding up? I'm dreading the winter commute once more and according to the weather network snow flurries are forecast here for next Friday! But the weather's going to change, right?
Speaking of the fall colours, here's a shot that my DH stopped to take on his way in to work this past week. I never get tired of seeing those reds and oranges. Where I grew up in southern Ontario, you just didn't see those vivid reds. Mostly I remember a lot of yellow and browns. Living here is so much more colourful.




I've been invited to Rebecca's this weekend for our October SAL. I've been having sleep issues lately and knew that I couldn't do the whole weekend but I was really hoping to get there for at least one day. However Rebecca's is a little over 2 hrs from my place and I'm so wiped out after this week that I just don't think I can manage the drive. I know I could make it there no problem. It's the getting back that worries me! I commute so much each week that anymore I just don't feel like doing it again on my days off. I'm playing it by ear and going to see how I feel when I wake in the morning. If not I wish all my stitching buddies happy stitching! I'll catch up with you later. The kettle is whistling now so I'm off to make my tea and head down to my stitching chair for some quality time with Halloween Cove. Have a great weekend!

Thanksgiving Wishes

I just wanted to take the time to wish all of my fellow Canadian bloggers a very Happy Thanksgiving. As we take the time to give thanks for our many blessings may we be always mindful of the needs of the less fortunate.

It's a beautiful autumn day here and I plan on taking in some stitching time as well as the turkey. I'll have some finishes to show off in the next post.

As we prepare to sit down and partake of our holiday meal I thought I'd post this little ditty that I received in the mail from a dear friend this past week. I've seen it on other bloggers sites as well but thought that it was cute and I'd post it here too.

May your stuffing be tasty,

May your turkey be plump,

May your potatoes and gravy,

Have never a lump.

May your yams be delicious

And your pies take the prize,

And may your Thanksgiving dinner

Stay off your thighs!

Nearly done!

I picked up Halloween Cove again this past week and spent some serious time with it for a change. I'd neglected this one recently and getting back to it was so much fun! I really love stitching on this one and will miss it when I'm done which BTW should be very soon. I have one pumpkin left to stitch and after that what's left is one more spider web, the longstitching on the one spider and the fence in front of the one house. Not much at all! I also have a small repair on the ship. Somehow I managed to stitch an extra row on the hull. I discovered it when I went to do the long stitching on the sails and things didn't quite match up as I expected them to. How did I manage that? Who knows! That's what happens when you stitch when you're tired or when I'm too busy talking which is what often happens on Tuesday night stitching.

Speaking of which, we resumed our weekly SAL this past week at our new location. We're now stitching in a church hall not far from our previous spot. Having a larger area to meet in has resulted in allowing more people to join in the fun. We were running out of room at the bookstore and had to cut off any new people who wanted to join. Now we have lots of room in which to set up additional tables and chairs. After all, they can serve church suppers in the hall, right? So of course they can handle us! As a result we had I think it was 6 new additions including one brave male! Welcome to all the newbies and we hope we haven't scared you off and you continue to join us. The noise level for awhile was enough to scare anyone off, lol!

I started another small piece for the Great Pumpkin Challenge. This one is a Helga Mandl piece called Autumn which features a scarecrow with sunflowers and pumpkins. I'm hoping this will be a quick stitch. I'm on a roll now and I have so many fall pieces I'd like to get started on. Here's some pictures of the next pieces for consideration. I don't want anything that takes too long at this point because Christmas stitching is right around the corner. So that pretty well leaves out the PS When Witches Come Riding. I do love this one though!

It's been a pretty soggy week around here. Any of you living on the eastern seaboard will understand that. We caught the remnants of Tropical Storm Nicole on Thursday and ended up with some pretty serious rainfall. Although we didn't have the severe flooding that the eastern US did, many of my friends and coworkers ended up with flooded basements. Either the sump pump couldn't handle the volumes of water or a loss of power in some areas rendered them useless. We were so fortunate to have been spared. You'd never know what was coming after the beautiful sunset we had the night before. What's the saying....Red sky at night, sailors delight? Take a look!

Now I'm off to pack an overnight bag. I'm spending the night in a luxury hotel. No, I'm kidding! I'm spending the night at the sleep clinic in one of the Ottawa hospitals. Isn't that exciting....not!

Seems I might have sleep apnea. That would explain why I'm tired all the time. But what are the chances I'm going to sleep well tonight, all wired up?! Wish me luck!

More fall stitching

In keeping with the season I've continued stitching a fall piece, most notably one with a pumpkin for the challenge. I enjoyed this stitch so much and consequently I've done no other stitching except for this one. I think this is a record for me. I started this one late Tuesday afternoon and had it all stitched and finished by Sunday. Could it be that I'm starting to know what I'm doing with this finishing business? More likely the fact that it was a very slow week had a lot to do with things. As you can see I finished this one as a pinkeep and I just love the fabric! I've had it in my stash for awhile now just waiting for the perfect finish and this was it.
I found this chart in the Dec. 99 issue of JCS and it's designed by Cecilia Turner of Heart In Hand Needleart. I've stitched it on 32 ct Silkweaver Mocha Lugana using DMC floss.

I know I should be getting back to Halloween Cove but I'm having so much fun right now working on these smalls. I've dug out some more older magazines and I'm checking out my collection of freebies to see what else I can come up with.

Today is a perfect day for sitting and stitching with a cup of tea. My favourite at the moment is Tetley's Warmth which is a cinnamon spice with orange blossom. Mmmmm! Originally my DH and I planned on heading to Gatineau Park in Quebec to view the fall foliage. The weatherman said that this afternoon we should see the sun and the temperature would be cooler but pleasant. Wrong! I've not seen a peek of the sun all day and cooler is the operative word. It's pretty breezy too so that cold goes right through you. Definitely not the weather I'd hoped for during a tour in the park. So we've put it off for now which has meant more time for my needlework.


My Tuesday night stitching group is starting up once again in our new location this week. I'm really looking forward to seeing everyone again. Hopefully there will be some new faces as well since we have a lot more room than at our former location. The more, the merrier! Mind you we do get a tad rowdy at times, lol!

This September has also meant the start of school for the first time for my granddaughter. My DS sent me some pics this past week so I could see her. It's the first time I've ever seen her hair pulled back in a ponytail and it looks so much neater. Is that the mother in me talking? Her younger sister is more than ready for school but she still has 2 years to wait. In Quebec they must be aged 5 before the start of the school year. Here in Ontario they need only be aged 5 before the end of December. So that means she'll be almost 6 before starting! Seems ridiculous to me.
















A friend who saw these told me that the bus driver looked very much like me. For those of you who know me, what do you think?

I'll leave you with this photo of Clarisse. She was being a pest while I was trying to sort through stash earlier in the week, grabbing at ribbon, sitting on fabric, trying to chew on floss. So I shooed her out of the room or so I thought. Here's where I spotted her next, trying to look unassuming in the garbage can. I couldn't help but laugh. The quality of the picture isn't that great because I used a low light setting with the zoom. I didn't want to use the flash or I'd get nothing but red eye.
Has the devil in her eye don't you think?

May the coming week be a good one for all and with many stitches.

Challenged

This is what happens when someone challenges me. I joined in the fun on the Great Pumpkin Challenge on Becky's blog .
This way definitely a motivator for me since I seemed to have lost my stitching mojo and just didn't feel like stitching a thing. Stitch pumpkins you say? Well I do love fall and anything to do with it. Throw in the opportunity to win a prize package and voila! My pin pillow Peekin' Tom by Homespun Elegance. This pattern was charted for stitching on 10ct fabric which would have made a lovely large pillow but I decided to give it a try on 28ct. I used some Antique Ivory linen I found in my stash and since I didn't have the required Weeks floss, I substituted with some GAST from my stash. The little lace trim I found at the dollar store. I'm really pleased with the results especially since I don't consider myself much of a sewer. The pillow could possibly have used a little more polyfill but I'm learning as I go along. I also need some practice on my whip stitching.

Now I'm off to search for my next pumpkin stitch. This is fun!

Stitching continues on my Halloween Cove although I haven't much more progress to show at this point. As you can see, I got a little sidetracked. I did manage to complete my LHN Red House In Winter ornament, finally. I thought I'd never get that one done. I can't figure what took me so long either. In any case finished it is. I had to change the floss colour for the snow since it didn't show up at all on the fabric I was using. The white doesn't exactly stand out either but it is a heck of a lot better than what it looked like before. I find that it stands out much better IRL than in the picture I took.

Yesterday was a day off for me and it was a gorgeous day! Since my DH was also off we decided to go on a little jaunt to Ogdensburg, NY where we would make a pit stop at JoAnn's Fabrics for supplies. Gotta tell you, there's not a heck of a lot to see in Ogdensburg but the fall foliage alone made it worth our while. We found a small local cafe specializing in homemade sandwiches and soups where we stopped for lunch. It was a really cosy little spot and after filling our bellies with some awesome food we continued on our tour. The architecture in some of the older homes near the river was spectacular. I wish I'd had my camera with me. After driving through most of the town and checking it out, we headed over to JoAnn's where I purchased fabric, quilt batting and polyfill. Can you tell I'm going to give this finishing business more of a workout in the near future? Once I've retired from work in the spring I intend to slowly try to empty that drawer of unfinished stitches. Wish me luck!

I ran into a dear friend this week who used to teach me decorative painting many years ago. She's now teaching quilting and asked if I wanted to join in. Can I really afford another outlet for stash? I think not. I'd be broke if I was involved in both crafts, lol! In any case she did mention a quilt SAL which takes place every Wednesday evening at her home and has encouraged me to bring along my cross stitch and join them. Since it's practically just around the corner I just might do that. I'm having to step back from many of my extracurricular activites right now due to work commitments. I find I'm just too tired when I return home to head off into Ottawa which is where much of this takes place. I've already done one commute to work. So until I retire I've bowed out of the church choir and I more than likely will not be joining in on my Tuesday night stitching group as often as I have in the past. A walk around the corner is much less tiring. Living out in the country does have its disadvantages in this respect.

Speaking of our Tuesday night group, we have had to change location for our get togethers. In the past our dear stitching friend Sally had opened the doors of her bookstore to us after hours so that we could meet. However this past week her store has announced its closing. The bigger stores like Chapters and sites such as Amazon have made it too difficult to compete as a privately owned store. I shall miss their store very much. It was one place I always paid a visit to when in Ottawa long before I even knew Sally.

So instead, one of the members of the group has found that St. Michael's and All Angels Anglican Church is welcoming us to their church where we can have the use of the church hall on Tuesday evenings. It also opens the door to new members for us. Recently we had to discontinue allowing

new members because we'd run out of room at the store. Now we'll have a larger space which will accomodate more people. I'm looking forward to meeting new stitchers!

Okay so I've taken a lunch break during this post and during that time I've come up with a new project. Grateful Hearts is designed by Cecilia Turner of Heart in Hand Needleart. It's from the December 1999 issue of Just Crosstitch. It's already kitted up and ready to go. I may have accumulated a lot of stash but I really love it when I can just pick out exactly what I'm looking for and have the fabric and floss on hand to boot. I'm excited to get started on this one so I'll leave you now and hope that your able to cross an x or two this week!

Just give me a boathouse

I'm afraid I have nothing in the way of stitching to show you right now. The frogs have stopped in for the weekend and all the progress I made on my ornament the past couple of days now has to be redone. I promise I'll have some pictures to post in a couple of days. In the meantime I'll show you the pictures of the boathouses I mentioned in my previous post.

The title of this post is something I've said to friends many times. I don't care if I own a cottage in Muskoka, I just want one of their boathouses. After seeing these pictures you'll understand why. I'll let the pictures speak for themselves.

These are just a few of my favourites. They come in all shapes and sizes and as far as I'm concerned they're better than a cottage. I mean, who doesn't like to fall asleep to the sound of lapping water and the call of the loons? I think that's what I enjoyed the most about our rental this year. All of these particular boathouses are located on Lake Muskoka. I think I've accumulated about 75-80 pictures of these beauties. I told my DH that I'd like to head out into Lake Joseph and Lake Rosseau next year and see what I find there. I hope you've enjoyed my little peek into one of my obsessions. After all, you already know my main obsession. I think you're all afflicted with that one!