June 29/10

The amaryllis is almost done. The cross stitching and the backstitching are complete. Now I am finishing up the border which is a couching stitch. The final stitch is one I can not remember and am too lazy to go get the instructions to find out. That last stitch finishes the stamen (or is it the pistil?). Anyhow, it is the little bit that sticks out of the bloom and bees like to land on it for the pollen.

 A closer if somewhat darker look at my couching stitch:

While I do like the final effect, once again I must admit that working with metallic threads does not excite me in the least. The couching stitch does give it a pretty effect but I was in a tangle of needles all of the time despite my best efforts. Maybe it is something that I should not be attempting when I have worked 7 out of 8 days recently. Just maybe.

My garden mostly groweth! The beans and the peas have produced 1 single plant out of all the seeds that I sowed. I should re-seed those rows, but well, you know what they say about good intentions. As it is, I just mowed the lawn after a week and a half so the garden re-seeding has been a little low on the priority list.

In other news, my trip to El Salvador is officially a go! I have a trip code, the flyer is up on the Habitat for Humanity website and now just to get going on the details and recruitment of team members. I can not wait to build again!

Aug 22/09

The other night while I was sitting out on my deck, enjoying the summer weather that has finally come to this region of the country, I looked down to see this:


She freaks me out when she lays like this because I always have to check to make sure that she is still breathing as I think that she looks dead!

Once I ascertained that the cat was still alive, I tucked into this:


The tomatoes are the result of my first foray into vegetable gardening. I am inordinately proud of them as they are my first produce. As I chowed down, I thought about where I can grow more vegetables next year in my yard. Variables I have to consider: areas that get full sun that are not under the two clotheslines that cut across the corner of my property, that are not likely to be trampled by the neighbours kids (we do not have fences so 5 yards all open onto each other) and what I would to grow!

I have been working on some more bookmarks by Teresa Wentzler in the evenings because I would like to finish that set of projects. One of my little obsessions is to clear things out so when it comes to cross-stitch, that means using up as much thread as I can. I know that this sounds weird, but I actually get excited when I finish a skein while working on a project and have to go fish another one out of my enormous skein stash. Eight years ago or so, the drugstore I work at was clearing out the inventory from its venture into craft supplies so I bought up the DMC floss. Hey! It cost me about 20 cents a skein so at $1 000 later you can well imagine how many skeins I have in my craft room......I have made a dent in the stash over the years in between friends needing a skein, giving bags of skeins away to charity auctions and all of the stitching I do. Part of my obsessiveness stems from the fact that I am mulling over the idea of building a small cottage style house on my country property and all of my stuff has to fit into that house along with my three cats and the dog that I want to have when I move there. This little side line is related to the TW introductory sentence in that I have used up several skeins of thread in stitching all of the bookmarks in the booklet and a couple of pieces of fabric from my fabric stash!