Stitching and life updates

Howdy Folks!

It's Wednesday, it's my day off, it's hot and humid out and I'm cleaning house.  Anyone else have to turn the A/C waaaay down when they clean?  Since the advent of Menopause it's become part of the cleaning routine.  Furnace off in the winter and A/C down in the summer!    I'm about finished now though.  I should be, with the exception of an hour or so I've been at it since 9 this morning!  Gotta love a clean house!

Life was supposed to calm down after retreat but so far I haven't noticed a big difference.  I'm deep into bridal shower planning with some Retreat 2014 thrown in there for good measure!  I don't know why I have to make things so difficult for myself but somehow I always do.  Finally nailed down a venue for the shower this morning.  Next up is the the invitations.  I've got them picked out, just need to get the wording to my liking and we'll be set.

I've done some stitching here and there.  I decided I wasn't getting any younger and working on black wasn't going to get any easier so I've pulled out Golden Ice and am going to stick with it until it's finished.  I'm not sure how long it's been languishing in the unfinished pile but it's has to have been a couple of years anyway.   Hold the phone!  It took me a while but I found the last update I did on it and it was dated July 2010 so it's been almost 3 years.  This is what it looked like then:

and now it looks like this:

Working on this piece has caused a bit of hostility from Abby.  See, Golden Ice is for Amy and I have already stitched Fire and Ice for Amy also.  When Abby caught me stitching on it she said "Oh, I guess we know who the favorite daughter is."  She is referring to the fact that I was supposed to stitch 12 dancing princesses for her and I gave up.  I decided I was never going to live long enough to finish that piece.  I've asked her to choose something else that is within the realm of possibility but she refuses to do so.  My bad! LOL!

I've also been working this little piece that I picked up at market called Rites of Spring by Cherished Stitches.   It was a limited release kit, comes with everything to finish it into the pillow as shown.  It's a nice break from Golden Ice and has been a fun stitch.  Not much left to do now.

I also stole a bit of time away from my stitching to work on a craft project.  I love how it turned out!  Exactly like the picture on Pintrest!

In family news: 

Dan has been busy working on a border of rock around the edges of the back yard.  The dogs had run a rut in the grass along the fence.  When it rained, this rut would become a pit of mud.  The dogs would come in covered in mud up to their eyeballs, track it all over the house and furniture before you could snag them to clean them up thus making the above chore of cleaning harder.  And nobody needs that, right?   So taking our cue from the neighbors we decided to put rock all long the fence line, thus eliminating the mud.  The dogs would run on the rock and voila!  No more mud baths.  In theory this was a brilliant plan.  In reality, it's a total fail.  The damn dumb knotheads (one of my mom's favorite sayings...usually aimed at me) don't like running on the rock!  So now they run along side the rock.  How long  do you give them before they run a new rut in the grass??  I can see into the future now...the entire back yard covered in river rock.  No grass in sight!  Guess that would solve the mud problem for good!

How long do you think it will take Dan to remove that
pile of dirt?

Amy has a very busy summer ahead of her.  She's back here at the ballpark working during home stands.  Then in Lincoln taking summer classes, working in 2 research labs and studying for the GRE test to get into grad school.  I think her one class is going to help her with that last bit.  It's a class on addiction and she has to give up something she is addicted to for 28 days.  Only thing she's addicted to is watching TV so now she has plenty of time for studying!

Abby moved into a new apartment with her friend Maggie.  They are now mostly settled in and have it set up nicely.  Each of them have their own bathroom right off their bedrooms which is nice.  No sharing!  I had to laugh though when Dan and I were over helping her hang some pictures.  They have a huge TV in their living room and each of them have a TV in their bedroom, so 3 TV's in this not so big apartment! I was telling them when Dan and I got married we didn't even have a TV and when we did it was a small black and white one and we only got one station!  Times sure have changed!

Adam and Marcia are doing well.  Getting ready for their big day in November.  Adam played baseball this spring.  They've both run some marathons and now that it's pool weather Marcia will be poolside when possible.  They'll be here for a wedding that Adam is in come July, hence the wedding shower plans.  None of my family will be attending the wedding in November for one reason or another so we thought it might be a nice way that they can be involved.

And that should catch you all up.  Not too much exciting going on.  I'll try to post again this weekend.

Thanks for reading and commenting.  Love comments!

Take care till next time!

Julie