Do You Make New Year's Resolutions???

Happy New Year everyone!  I hope that you've had and are having a wonderful and healthy start to the new year!!!  Can you believe that it's 2010???  It feels like I just watched the ball drop on 2009 yesterday?  Where the heck does the time go???  I guess it's true what they say about time going faster as you get older.

Do you make New Year's Resolutions?  Do you start a new project on January 1st?  I'd love to hear what you've resolved to do in the coming year and any projects you hope to start.  I started a couple projects before the ball dropped on 2009.  On the day after Christmas, I started (or should I say restarted) the Sarah Pope sampler by Sheepish Designs (excuse the poor quality of all these pictures - it's a gloomy day here):

Sarah Pope 1773

36 ct. Reindeer Fabric

DMC Threads

I originally started this back many years ago and put it down because the dreaded Queen Stitches were used throughout the design.  I resurrected it again and posted at some point (back in May, I think), that I had her on my hit list to finish up.  Well, I pulled her out, but hated the fabric I originally did it on (36 count natural linen, I think), so started her over.  I also anguished over the colors used - mainly rusts and light rusts.  The chart reads more mauve, so I spent a few hours with my head swimming over that.  I ended up going with the original colors and like it.  Lots of different stitches (the border is Rice Stitch), and yes, those dreaded Queen Stitches, but I rather like doing them now so it should be a lot of fun.

And then last night, I started And All Was For An Appil by the Scarlett Letter for my New Year's start:

And All Was For An Appil

The Scarlett Letter

40 ct. Busy Bee Blend

DMC Threads

I really went back and forth on the fabric for this one.  The picture above doesn't show really any color but it's a yellowish fabric with some mottling.  I think it's going to look great when it's done, although it's going to take me a while.  I have to admit that I spent about five hours circling the floss toss I did and asking everyone's opinions on it.  All the fill-in is time consuming, although mindless, and think that I'll probably do a little section at a time and then move on to another project through the year.

I also got my A block done on the Prairie Schooler Alphabet SAL and a little bit of the B block:

This is a lot of fun to stitch.  I'm planning on doing one block a month.  Yes, it will take me over two years, but that's okay.  These look small, but there's a lot of stitching going on in each one.

As far as resolutions go - I'm only making two.  I usually don't stick to any resolutions I make, so I figure why embarrass myself even making them.  I have the true Gemini personality to be sure - I'm always back and forth with my stitching (among other things).  Stitching ADD is what I have.  So I'm just going to embrace it and go where my heart wants.  Who cares if there are a ton of scroll rods with half finished projects lurking in the corner - it's all about what's fun (at least I'm telling myself that - LOL).  Anyway, the first resolution I'm making is to stitch from stash this year.  Yes, I did order a chart and fabric for my New Year's start (which was to be Ann Rayner and which never showed up in time), but I realize that I have so many great patterns in my stash.  It's time to stitch those babies up!

The second resolution I have this year is to finish Ann Medd:

Ann Medd

The Scarlett Letter

DMC Threads

What a whopper!!  At this point she measures 32 inches long!!  When I unrolled her to take this picture, I fell in love all over again.  I think that having her wound around a scroll rod makes me forget just how wonderful a project this is (although so large).  I just have a little bit of lettering to go in this section and then it's down to the final section.  Looking at these pictures, I think I'm going to have to give her some love tonight!!  So there you have it - I've made two resolutions and I'm going to try like hell to live up to them!!!

Christmas was good around here.  I asked for nothing really (I'd rather the kids get what they want), but DH surprised me with a new IMac.  Seems that it was just too expensive to fix the old computer when we could have a new one for pretty close to the same price.  I just love this thing, but after having a Dell for so long, it's taken me a little bit to get used to - but it's so fun!!  And then DH also surprised me with this:

I've wanted one of these for the longest time! Perfect for the craft room!!  Ginger has one other plate that I've got my eye on for the bathroom in the basement (where the Mermaids are residing) and maybe I can scam that for my birthday (fingers crossed).

Well, that's it for me.  I need to get that Christmas tree broken down (yes, the one that's going to find itself on the curb this year for sure).

I want to thank everyone who has visited my blog and left comments or emails for me this year.  I have loved reading each and every one of your comments and wish I had the time to answer each one of you back.  I've met some wonderful and very generous people this year.  People I hope that I know for years to come.  Your stitching and blogs are a source of amazement and inspiration to me.  I wish all of you a healthy, peaceful, prosperous and stitchy New Year!

The Faster I Go, The Behinder I Get

Happy Mother's Day (albeit late) to everyone! Hope that everyone had a great day with their kids, grandkids, and families. I had a wonderful day. My DH bought me roses (pic is before I arranged them a little better)

and also the pair of trellises and clematis I wanted for the garden. And that's all I wanted. He thought that it was kind of a weird gift (you know, it's for the house, not me personally), so he bought me a trip to the spa too. This has kind of turned into an annual thing though. It started a few years ago when I had gone through kind a rough time with some things and my kids gave DH the idea. Since then, it's morphed into an every year kind of thing. Am I complaining - DEFINITELY NOT! I love having the whole nine yards done - the backrub, the facial, the lunch and manicure and pedicure. I always save it for when the kids go back to school because sometimes our summers can be daunting and exhausting with all their activities. Thank you guys - I love you all so much!

The past week has been an absolute blur. I have been flying around with my pants on fire trying to get things done, but I don't seem to be making as much progress as I would like. Almost like I'm going backwards, not forwards. But maybe that happens when you're trying to get things done. You think you're going to clean things out and make more of a mess than you started with. So my week has been a lot of spinning my wheels and not a lot accomplished. I got very little stitching done this week:

I got a little bit more done on the A&E sampler. I goofed up the basket - it's suppose to have dark brown in it. The symbols are small and difficult to read. When I realized my mistake, I just kept going with what color I picked and I think I like it better. I also got a few more motifs done and at least Adam is pretty much done except for his eye (a little french knot). Oh, I also got the snake in. I was going to stop working on this Thursday, but really didn't get much stitching done up to that point, so I'll just keep going until it's time to pull Shores out again (around the 15th). I did get a little bit of stitching done on my To Thy Self be True LHN piece while I was sitting through two recitals with my DD this weekend. Being a backstage mom when the girls are older does have its advantages. Actually I only sat backstage for one show - I watched the other one from the audience with DH and son. She was wonderful, by the way!!


Friday night, I did meet up with Terri and her friend, Julie, for Girls Night Out in Holly. It's a fun little town with antique malls, and prim shops.

That's Julie, Dawn (the owner of Holly Hills Primitives) and Terri. It was a fun time. Dawn's shop is so cute. She has so many things that will tempt you (and believe me I've been tempted)! I really didn't buy much that night, but I did come across a flower frog in one of the antique malls that I thought was a little different.

At first I couldn't figure out what it was because all the flower frogs I've seen have been made of glass. This looks like an artichoke. But I love it because it's deep enough to accomodate a variety of sizes of scissors. Obviously, I need to put a few more in here, but didn't want to shift through the mess in the craft room to get them out of the drawers. I think it's a great height too because the scissor fobs can dangle from the sides. I need to put scissor fobs on the ever growing list of things to stitch.

I also found this sock shaper (in Dawn's shop) that will look cute in my craft room, although I'm going to paint it when I reach the point of putting my room together. I've had a monkey wrench thrown into that though. But a good monkey wrench. The room I'm in is a great room, but there is also another bedroom in our basement which is larger. I gave it to the kids to do their thing in because there is a large L-Shaped table in there that is a monster to move (actually was an old secretarial workstation from my old job), but made for a great craft table when the kids wanted to paint or when DS was in his car model stage. Anyway, while I was down there cleaning out my room, my DH ventured in (something he never does) and mentioned that if I wanted he would move the monster table out and I could take over the larger room! Do you think I was doing a happy dance or what! So, the gears in my head take over. The room of my dreams. I proceeded to run to the book store for plans for a cutting table! And this is what I came up with:

Not the best picture (my FIL has the better one), but it's the cutting/craft table of my dreams. Actually it's the cutting table from Bunny Hills craft room (she has a blog). She was featured in this month's American Patchwork and Quilting. I gave my FIL the good picture and the plans yesterday, along with plans for a lower unit to sit on the adjacent wall. He said, "No problem", bless his soul. He's going to be 83 and goes like the Eveready Bunny! Anyway, it's going to be bigger than the one in the picture - about six feet long. As my kids used to say when they were excited - I'm Excidedly! Now I really have to ramp up my attack of the room and get the painting done!

This week in my adventures of cleaning out the craft room, I came across this sampler that I started eons ago, Sheepish Designs, The Sarah Pope Sampler.

It's a shame that I put this one down because it's so pretty, but there was a good reason. There is a lot of queen stitch in this sampler and at the time, I absolutely hated queen stitch. Since that time I've had more experience, through doing needlepoint and Chatelaines, with different stitches and they don't seem so bad anymore, so this is definitely one that I think that I need to finish up.

Well, that's about it! I've got to run and catch up on blogs. I don't think that I've had much time to catch up everyone else's lives since probably last Tuesday or Wednesday. Hope that everyone has a great week and thank you, again, for all your great comments!