45,000 Stitches = HAPPY DANCE

It is done. 45,000 stitches and two years later, on July 26th at 8:10 p.m. I put the last stitches in Noddy.

It was a long haul, not always fun but there is a great sense of completion now.

I am on vacation at our cottage deep in the bush of Northern Ontario until August 9th. Internet will be very sporadic but will check in when I can get in to town to the local library. We have our youngest son and his family with us for the first week. Assorted cousins and their families will be arriving with trailers and tents for the August long weekend. It should be a lot of fun.
The second week will be a more restful time with Leo's brother and his wife sharing some time with us. They have a new grandson born in Victoria, B.C. last week and so Leo and I have a new great nephew - welcome Owen Cooper!! and yes, that means another baby sampler. Now that Noddy is done I can start stitching the sampler.

A special thank you to Vonna for all her encouragement when I struggled to find the incentive to stitch on Noddy. Her quirky comments always made me smile and pick up my stitching again.

Well folks - our typical summer - another day of rain - and so we have all piled into the van are off to Kirkland Lake on a "road trip".

Till next time - keep those needles smoking everyone.

Emerald Mermaids and animals galore

Hello every one.
It looks like summer has finally come to the area. We have had a few days of wonderful sunshine and warm weather. We still get rain but just enough to send a busy stitcher scrambling to take her clothes off the line and drape them all over the house like some madwoman who couldn't decide where to hang her belongings. No, photos are not included lol.
It has been a very busy week socially. I have not had to cook a supper since Monday. Hurrah!!
We did Christmas in July with some friends this week that caused lots of hilarity. I did a Red Hat Luncheon with Beatrice this week and then to friends for a BBQ. Friday, it was golf day for DH. I joined him for supper at the golf course. Saturday we spent with our son Bob and his family and they BBQ'd dinner. Sunday we arrived at the grandsons and their parent's home to stay for a week. They cooked dinner and so the week has gone without having to make a single supper. Now, who can I visit next week so I don't have to cook again. Any volunteers?
On the stitching front, it has been a busy Mirabilia week.
I stitched Emerald Mermaid
on Deb's beautiful fabric. This is my first addition to the Mirabilia Round Robin. It was a great stitch. And the beads - I was surprised at how many beads there were in this small section - 30x70 stitches. I used invisible thread and that had me cursing at times. I love how it turned out. Deb has let me know she approves. I am looking forward to the next piece arriving.

Noddy has gotten some serious work. I completed the dog, cow, pig, boat, the blue sky and since the photo was taken completed the ostrich. And that pig, he is lucky I didn't make him into bacon when I discovered he was in the wrong place, after finished, and I had to tear him out and do him again. When I was out visiting this week, the owner of Noddy presented me with a substantial gift certificate to Knowledge and Needles to thank me for all my work. Now, the push is really on to finish it. I am hoping to have it done by the beginning of August.
We are at our youngest son's house for the week looking after our two grandsons as their daycare is on vacation. It will take Leo and I together to handle two very active, noisy, busy little guys. Thank goodness we are off the clock when their parents get home at 4 p.m. Let's hope the weather stays nice as they have a lovely pool in the backyard to help keep them occupied.
That's all for this week. Keep stitching everyone.

Snowy days and hearts galore

Well, hi there all. It has been another busy week for me. The stitching and finishing bug has hit hard so I have been quite productive.

I did receive a message from Melissa that she received the blogaversary package that I sent her.
Melissa and I had participated in the Winter Neighborhood RR together and my theme was snowmen. She is also a bunny lover so this is what I came up with.

A snowbunny to remind her of the RR and me and the bunnies because she likes them. This chart is from the Cross Stitch Calendar. I added some other goodies to say thank you.


I understand the package was a hit.

I took out the sewing machine and finished my Winter Neighborhood RR.

Beatrice and I find this lovely fabric while we were browsing quilt shops and I thought it fit with the little birdies in the blocks. I quilted it and added the buttons. I will add some tabs at the top to hang it but ran out of fabric.

Also this week I got a call from Donna - a member of my Friendship Sampler RR. We discovered that we did not live very far apart. Donna was camping in the local area so she and I chose to meet at Knowledge and Needles and she handed me over 2 RR's to work on.

It was a real pleasure to meet her and we are currently making plans to meet again.

Here is Simone's RR done and ready for mailing.

Simone chose to use red for the hearts and loves overdyes so I chose NN# 153 Razzle Dazzle Red and white to stitch my heart.

Here is Ann's RR done and ready to go in the same package.

Ann wanted us to use our favorite DMC colors so I chose DMC 991 and 993 to stitch my heart.

It had been a while since the Friendship Samplers have been on the move. Hopefully, now they will be moving well again.

I am currently working on Emerald Mermaid for the Mirabilia RR I am participating in. I will save a photo until I have more than a few strands of hair to show.

I also completed my Round 14 Fair and Squares and they will be in the mail flying to Finland by week's end.

DH and I took the opportunity this weekend to make a flying trip to Northern Ontario to celebrate Leo's uncle/godfather's 80'th birthday. He is a very special man and the only member of that generation still alive in Leo's family. We saw so many family that we had not seen in some time. It was wonderful to be all together. And the little ones, I think there were around 8 all under the age of 6. We sure are a prolific family LOL.

Thanks to all of you who have stopped by and left such lovely comments. I do appreciate each and every one.

Until next time, keep those needles flying.

Never too old to learn

Well, it has been one busy week. The constant rain kept me indoors a great deal and so the needles and sewing machine have been busy.

I finished "Nobody Loves Me" into this pillow.

I added a bee, a ladybug and a couple little dragonflies to dress it a bit. It was wonderful fun and I so enjoyed doing it.

I have my Winter Neighborhood finished stitching and the borders sewn on it but I will save the photos until I have it finished. It will be soon.

Thanks to the prodding from Vonna - see last week's comments - I dug Noddy out of the pile and stitched away. Well, I got the two giraffes done, two little deer and two bears. I am pleased with how quickly it went. I am now planning to make this my focus until it is finished. I hope you don't mind seeing quite a bit of it as a plod my way through.

Dani arrived late Thursday evening and we had a wonderful weekend. Beatrice joined us for most of the weekend and we travelled and stitched. We went to the Waterfront Festival in Cobourg - wonderful. We had lunch at a lovely Swiss Restaurant - The Matterhorn - we had schnitzel and spaetzle. I highly recommend this one. The rain held off until we got into the car to come home.
Next day's road trip was to Michael's and we stopped to watch the Canadian aerobatic Snowbirds do their show. Dani had her amazing camera and took some gorgeous photos of them and the rest of the weekend. Check them out on her blog.

A group of my stitching friends came for lunch and a stitching afternoon. What fun we had!!! and the food ----- delicious!!!!!

And the never too old to learn - Dani taught Beatrice and I how to make beaded scissor fobs.


The little yellow flowered scissors I found at a Fabricland and the black are a pair of Ginghers that I won at the Yuma County Fair. The pink scissors are a pair for my Mom who at 74 is a new stitcher. I decided she needed a pair of stitcher's collector scissors and of course, no scissor is well dressed without a fob so I made her a tiny little one. It will go in the mail to her this week. I made the same scissor fob for Dani - who hinted heavily when she saw what I was making - but I forgot to take a photo.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who stops by, reads my blog and takes the time to comment. I appreciate each and every one of you. I try to stop by your blogs when I can and comment too.
Have a great week everyone and keep those needles singing.

Edited to add: I forgot to add that my DH was away for the entire weekend. Dani's rent for the three day weekend - she did all my dishes. See, there is more than one way to get out of it - Trick #327a - invite a friend for the weekend LOL LOL LOL.

Tick Tock It's A Clock

Yep, I cross stitched a clock or rather the inside of a clock.

This was such fun. Taking the clock apart and inserting the fabric was not as much fun but I love how it turned out. This is intended for the Arizona house as it is all in blues.
The free design came from leblogdecathy.canalblog.com and is stitched on 28 count antique white evenweave. You can see a different color version on my BFF's Beatrice blog.

I received a gorgeous set of Fair and Squares from Susan P. for the latest Fair and Square round.


And "The Lovelorn Sisterhood" is finished and ready for mailing tomorrow. This was a fun stitch and caused much laughter and many comments every time I worked on it while I was waiting in someone's office. I picked out a lovely green fabric with some flowers and pots yesterday to make this into a pillow.

DH and I made a trek to Ottawa to celebrate our friend Richard's 60th birthday and visited them at their lovely summer home on Clayton Lake. The wildlife there was amazing. If you have never seen a baby loon floating on it's mother's back, it is just the sweetest ever.

And here is a photo of the little one taking swimming lessons with Mom and Dad hovering around.
Richard did not put his boat in the water while we were there as there were two little robins in a nest by the tongue of the boat. I tried to take a photo but the mother kept swooping at me. And to our surprise and delight, as we were leaving the last day, we met a doe and her newborn fawn on the road. They were gone in a flash but what a treat to see them. Mother nature has indeed been busy.

Dani is coming Thursday to visit for three days while DH is off male bonding. I am looking forward to her visit and she and I will have those needles singing. We will also have some of the stitching ladies come by over those three days so there should be lots of laughter and lots of stitches.

No dishes this week but.............

Well, no stacks of dishes to show this week. I managed to avoid most of them. DH and DIL did them all the only night we had a stack.
Our Jackson spent the week with us. What a fun week we had! He is such a cutie. He is trying to test his limits a bit and has learned to argue but all in all it was fun! We are in Ottawa today as we brought him home last night. We have some visits to do while we are here so will stay for several days. I love my son's wireless house - I can be online as much as I like!!!!

There have been lots of stitches lately.

I gave Dani her completed neighborhood last Sunday so I can post photos now. Every kingdom needs a coat of arms and so I added it to finish hers off.

I think her neighborhood is very original and quite attractive finished.


I put some more stitches in my Mirabilia - worked with some silver and grey for a change. It still doesn't look like much but someday.


I backstitched the elephants and around them and Noddy looks more complete.



I received my Round 12 Fair and Squares this week. Poor Nicky. Her first set of squares disappeared into mail neverland and so she graciously stitched me a second set.


I have been stitching or should I say counter-stitching on "Nobody Loves Me" I have restitched "oves me" three times now.I have been off each time. I have left it blank and moved on to a flower pot to give myself a much needed break. I will try the lettering again later! I love the colors in this one and would like to have better progress but those darn frogs!



Melissa's blogaversary gift is complete and will be off in the mail this afternoon. I hope she likes it.

Well folks, I'm off to stitch a bit - don't know what will strike my fancy this week. There is only one good thing about the lousy - rainy, gray, damp - weather we are having these days. I don't have to be outside pulling weeds so I can be inside stitching.

Until next week, I hope all is well and those darn frogs leap off!!!

Stack em high

I thought I would share this photo with you. It made me laugh when I realized what I had done.
Those who know me well, know that I HATE doing dishes!! The home we have now does not have a dishwasher or room for you. One of the things I negotiated with DH when we retired was that he would do the dishes - ALL of the dishes. He agreed. Yesterday he was painting the front deck and I was baking. I ended up with a huge pile of dishes. Well, begrudgingly I washed them - but dry them - absolutely not. And so, I stacked them as high as I could! And then laughed at myself - how foolish is that. But, those dishes stayed there and as one of my friends says "God dried the dishes" LOL.

On the stitching front.

Look what came home this week. My Winter Neighborhood RR. I LOVE IT!!!! I asked that a snowman be included in each square. It is easy to see that each person put some time and thought into their square. I will finish the snowflakes on each side and then make it into a wallhanging.

My Round 13 Fair and Squares have arrived at their home. I chose this design from an old book called 500 Cross Stitch Blocks to Stitch. It had been so dreary here that I wanted to stitch something summery and sunny.


I have added some stitches to my HAED and Mirabilia's Royal Holiday but they still look much like a blob so I will add photos another time.

Noddy came out of the bag and had some serious stitches added to him in the last few days. My friend Ann from Knowledge and Needles decided to give me a little heads up and calculated the stitches in this one - around 45,000 stitches! It is larger in stitch size than Paradigm Lost. What was I thinking! I can see a finish with this one now. I was beginning to despair that I never would.



It has been a busy couple of weeks here so blogging time has been short.

My parents spend the summer in Nova Scotia and left this past weekend. Before they go, I try to spend some quality time with them. They are in their late 70's and I know they won't be around forever. I only see them for a few short months a year - we are gone for 6 months and they are gone for 3 - so I try to squeeze all the time I can when we are together.

My bathroom has been painted and bordered and is looking lovely. It took 5 coats of paint to cover the green I had in the bathroom before. That does not count the coat of paint that I was covered in as I worked. It looks lovely. I did it around a lighthouse theme and am very happy how it turned out. Will post photos another time.

I have over 350 posts in my Google Reader and will do my best to catch up this week. I look forward to seeing what you all have been up to.

Happy Stitching everyone.