Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas to all!  And to all a Good Night! 
I hope you have a lovely Christmas full of memories to treasure. 

In the air there's a feeling of Christmas...

Hello Friends.

Christmas is rapidly approaching.  It's been two weeks since my last post...the days have been full with work, shopping, baking and getting ready for the big day.

I think the house looks it's prettiest when it is all decked out for the holidays.  I have been off work all this week, so I have enjoyed lighting the Christmas tree and enjoying the decorations around the house each day. 

I walked around this morning and took some pictures to share with you of other Christmas cross stitch pieces I've done through the years.  I love this Prairie Schooler Night Before Christmas piece.  This is the companion to the one I hung in the kitchen that I displayed on my last post.  Again, my husband made the frame for this one.  I don't remember where he found the molding, but would like to find it again, since the frames turned out so nice.

I love this little metal tree.  I found it at an auction this summer, so I chose some of the cross stitched ornaments to display on it.

This is my latest finish.  I worked on this little snowman for a couple of weeks.  I'm trying to decide how to finish it off.  I like the mini ball fringe I have laying beside it.  I just haven't decided if I should sew it into a small pillow ornament, or mount it on padded mat board.. Those are the two ornament finishes I know how to do best...  The pattern was a freebie I found online.  I'm sorry I don't remember where.  He reminded me of a Jim Shore design.

Here is another Prairie Schooler finish.  I did this one as a flat fold.  Love the houses along the bottom...

This little one is sitting in my kitchen windowsill.  I enjoy looking at these everyday.

Another little piece on my kitchen windowsill.  I have a collection of snowmen here as well.  And below it is a small wreath that a stitching friend made for me years ago.  She has done these cute small ornaments on paper.

This Winter band sampler from Little House Needleworks finally made it into a frame.  It was an inexpensive frame from walmart.  I was so happy to find it fit perfectly.  This is hanging in our kitchen.

This is another favorite Christmas finish.  I think I found this in an ornament magazine years ago. 

I guess I will have to add a picture of my assistant Joplin.  She loves to help with everything these days.  She was especially interested when I was wrapping presents!  I found her under the tree ripping paper from packages...So I had to do some emergency repair work.

I have some last minute grocery shopping to get done..now that I've checked the supplies and made my list.  We will be celebrating together on Christmas day.  Mike will be working Christmas Eve.  But I'm very happy to say he will have Christmas Day off.  That will be a treat. 

 I hope this wonderful Christmas season brings you joy with those you love.  Happy Holidays dear friends.

Deck the Halls....

What a busy season this is...I have been busy decorating the house.  We got our Christmas tree put up last weekend.  I have a few pictures to share.  Our tree is a mix of ornaments I've made and received through the years, along with some ornaments the kids made when they were little.  Each one makes me smile.  We place the tree in the corner of the living room near one of the bookcases.

We have also been putting up wreaths, garland and lights outside.  We had to take one of the garlands down today, because the lights quit working...so off to get another string of lights to wrap around the garland.  Our outside decorations consist of wreaths hung with red velvet ribbon in each of the large windows.  Simple, but pretty.  This Fall I picked up two small prelit trees at an auction.  I think I paid a whopping dollar for the pair.  So, we placed them on either side of the front door.  Can't beat that.  Then we ended up by doing lighted garland on the top of the railing around our deck behind our house.  So, all in all, not bad.  This year the house next door to us went all out with colored lights everywhere.  So, we're kind of living by the Grizwolds.

I have watched my absolute favorite holiday movie the other night to get in the holiday mode...National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation.  There are so many funny lines in the movie.  Our family loves to interject them into conversation for a laugh. 

Our Stitching Group is getting together tomorrow night for our Christmas party.  I've made the treats I am taking to share...  mini cheesecakes.  :) yum.  I've also got my ornament made for our exchange, I just haven't wrapped it yet.  It wouldn't be normal if I had it all done the day before...  At least the glue is dry on my ornament finish....  :) 

I haven't done any holiday baking except for a batch of rusks today.  However, these won't last very long around here.  If I want to do any for holiday giving, I will need to make another batch closer to Christmas.  For those of you that have no idea what they are, I'll share a picture.  They are a Swedish baked treat.  Best enjoyed with a cup of coffee.  The recipe is my Mom's.  She taught me how to make them when I got married.  They are a tradition our family enjoys.

 This is a picture of a Prairie Schooler Christmas sampler I did several years ago.  It's one of my favorites.  My husband made the frame for it. 

Next post I will share some pictures of other stitchy Christmas things around our house....

Happy Stitching everyone, that is if you have time for it this busy season.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving Everyone!

I have been busy doing some baking today in preparation for the big day tomorrow.  The desserts and salads are done.  So, that leaves the rest for tomorrow morning. 

We are planning to eat around noon since Mike has to work.  After the cleanup is over, I plan to relax with some stitching! 

I hosted our cross stitch group this past Monday night.  That is always fun.  I didn't seem to get much stitching done tho.  But, we all had a  good time.  I finished up stitching my ornament for our exchange in a couple of weeks, all that is left is the final finish work. 

We are experiencing some mild weather for a few days.  Mike got some of the outside lights up on our deck today.  They always look so pretty.  He put white lights around evergreen garland and affixed it to the deck railings. 

He is planning on doing the front of the house in the next few days.  Just hanging wreaths on the two big front windows and some garland with white lights over the windows.  Simple.  But I like that best. 

I do have something to share that I'm very happy about.  I recently (finally) got my two Hawks Run Hollow pieces framed.   *yeah!

The Village of Hawks Run Hollow was the first one  and then two years later I did,

Christmas at Hawks Run Hollow.  I am so glad to finally have them framed and hanging on the wall.  I am still thinking I might want to tackle the Shores at Hawks Run Hollow someday, and Autumn at Hawk Run Hollow.  But, for now, these are finally framed.

Hope all of you have a wonderful Thanksgiving tomorrow! 

And, Happy Stitching!

11.11.11

Happy Veteran's Day.

Today I am thinking of the date 11-11-11. What a unique occurance.  Kind of makes you want to go out and buy a lottery ticket.  I was just reading online how many marriages are going to take place today.  I guess it would make it easy to remember!

On Veteran's Day I often think of my Dad.  He was a Veteran of World War I.  I was his last child born to him from his second marriage.  Dad was 58 when I was born.  I have lots of sweet memories of Dad.  He was so proud to walk me down the aisle at my wedding.  I suspect he didn't think he would still be alive to do that.  He shed happy tears that day. 

Monday..monday...

Hello Stitchy Friends.

I finally have some current pictures to share with you! They are even pictures of stitching! 

Wow, I know?  This can't mean I'm getting it together so early in the week can it?  Oh well, here goes.

Finally here is the picture of the completed Prairie Schooler Christmas piece I finished a couple of weeks ago.  Black is not my color of choice to work on, but it did look great with this chart.

Another view...  I haven't decided how I am going to finish this one...maybe a flatfold.

This is a current photo of my progress on the Winter band sampler by Little House Needleworks. This has been a fun one to stitch, and is going rather quickly.

Finally, another finish.  This is a sampler I started several years ago.  It's by Sheepish Designs.  It's been tucked away in a bag for awhile.  I dug it out after I finished the Prairie Schooler on black, and decided there really wasn't much stitching left to be done on it, so decided to finish it!  I'm not so sure of the color choices I had made with this one.  I'm thinking that is why it was in the unfinished state for so long.  But, for better or for worse, I've finished it. 

That about wraps up my photos of current projects completed.  And, since it's Monday, the dryer is buzzing and the grocery store is calling...  so best get on with it.
Hope you all have a great week and...Happy Stitching!

Pictures of winter band sampler...

Hi

Here is a picture of my progress on the Winter Band Sampler.  This has been an enjoyable piece to work on.  I will work on getting more photos taken of my other recently completed pieces soon.

Happy Stitching!