Hands To Work

Saturday at home

We are just hanging out at home today.  It's beautiful...about 75 degress and the sky is the most awesome shade of clear blue.  Love it!

Lily and Elisabeth are spending the day with us.  Lily loves to be outside.  Especially with dogs.  And she loves the camera.  Can you tell?

Chuck had to clean up the yard since Chloe and Betty spent the week.  I'm sure you can imagine.  Well, Lily couldn't be happy until she helped her Poppa.  I know.  Not our finest moments as grandparents.  She carrid around a bag while Chuck filled it up.  She would pul it up over her shoulder like a purse.  Yeah, we know how to have fun around here!

Look at this beauty!  Betty is just about the sweetest dog I have ever known.  I love her.  Lily loves her.  Betty LOVES Lily.  And Helen.  I would keep her all the time if it wasn't for the slobbering, drooling, muddy footprints, shedding and lots of gas.  Eeeewwww.

Here is Helen.  She is getting so big.  He goal in life is to pee on each blade of grass and chew up anyting in her path.  Today it was the rabbit water bottle that was ready to go in the trash.  Usually she finds things that don't belong in the trash until she is done with them.  Sigh. 

Miss Lily is going to be 22 months old on the 21st.  She is growing up so fast.  Her voculary is unbelievable.  She spends a lot of time with adults and it shows.  She repeats everything and I mean EVERYTHING she hears.  That can be a problem. 

I need to get the sweeping done and finish up the designs for Shelley's retreat in a few short weeks.  Have a great one!

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Big and Little

 

John is big.  Lily is little.

 

Lily's hair is big.

 

Lily's dog  is little.

 

Gardening is a big job.

 

Gardening is a little tiring!

The end of big and little.

Catching Up

  this is what I was thinking about almost 17 months ago....waiting for a sweet little baby to fill our home with adorableness, wonderful (and not so wonderful) smells, cries and coos.  And what a blessing she has been to us.  We were so worried about what might happen....all the What If thoughts crowding out happy thoughts.  And then she arrived. And grew and grew and filled our hearts with laughter and joy which pushed all the worry away.  She and her monmy moved out two weeks ago.  How quiet the house is now.  I don't see her every day.  Chuck and I are learning to live without anyone else in the house for the first time in 28 years.  I'm so lucky to have gotten to spend so much time with my Lily girl.  It's time for Elisabeth to step into that full time roll of mothering and she's doing beautifully.  I'm so proud of her. 

This is Maggie.  We lost her to old age and bad hips a little over a month ago.  She would be 13 this month.  I am so missing her.  She was unable to get up the stairs for the last year and stayed in the living or family rooms unless she had to go out.  I'm still listening for her tail to rustle against the carpet when I walk into the house.  Expecting to hear her whine with anticipation of a meal.  Watch her faithful friend Pansy (one of our cats) clean her face and sleep with her.  My heart is empty. 

So with all these changes I have some decisions to make.  What are we going to do with the extra bedrooms?  Should we take down the glow in the dark stars on the ceilings?  Should I start unbaby proofing the house?  What am I going to do about designing?  That's a hard one.  I've been a sluggish designer ever since I found out Elisabeth was expecting.  Now I'm working full time and driving an hour each way to work.  Do I have any creative juices left?  I'm not sure.  So I think I'm going to take some time to enjoy my time....stitch when I want, knit when I want, leave the house when I want.  Spend more time with my husband.  Revamp my office and finally have a sewing room that I don't have to share with guests, a computer, hundreds of charts and baby toys.  I am so happy when I get a note encouraging me to continue to design.  I think I will.  We'll see.  I have a few classes to teach this year but won't be taking on any new commitments for now.  I also will not be able to fill any orders other than those requested by shops and distributors. 

Thanks for hanging in there with me.  I'm such a lucky girl....I have too many friends to even count!  I'll continue on with the blog but I'm shrugging off the guilt and enjoying what comes next!

Home Again!

This summer has been so incredibly busy!  I've not only done a lot of traveling but have had company several times as well.  I just got home from a trip to Indiana that I took with Lily, Elisabeth and my mother.  We had a great time and I can honestly say I have never seen so much corn in all my life!

Now that I'm back home, I'm working on finishing up my new designs that will be available for the St Charles cash and carry show in September.  I will update you with information about the new releases as they are done.

I am so excited to see Maggie Bonanomi's new book has been released.  I'm waiting for mine to arrive.  The advance buzz about the book is that it's fantastic!  I was lucky enough to see one of the projects in the book when Maggie was here for the retreat last year.  It's a small pocket with a bird stitched on the front.  She has also included the instructions to make the sewing roll that we made at the retreat.  So for all of you that were begging for a kit and couldn't get one, buy the book!  You can find it at Colonial Crafts.

Another fun book that has recently been released is Barb and Alma's new In Full Bloom.  This should also be arriving at my mailbox very soon!

Hope you all are having a wonderful end of July.  Don't forget to pick up your needle every day and stitch, stitch, stitch!

 

Where does time go???

I am shocked at how long it has been since I last blogged.  Paulette, my super good buddy questioned whether or not I had been abducted by aliens.  I'm sorry that I've been such a bad blogger.  But I have good excuses!

1. Company three seperate times since June.

2. Lily

3. Social Security work

4. traveling to CT to see cousins.

5. Lily

6. lazy summer days spent in the pool.

7. Lily

8. designing.  Yep, really.  I have two designs finished and more that I'm working on. 

9. Still Lily

So, do you get an idea of how my time slips away so easily?  I'm taking an online photography class with Karen Russell and am so behind!  I plan on spending some time by the pool this weekend with camera and notebook in hand so I can start to catch up.  To give you some idea of the amount of reading that is involved....the first four weeks have printed out about 1.5" of paper.  I haven't even looked at this weeks lessons. 

Last Sunday Chuck and I went to a beautiful wedding.  The groom is a coworker of Chuck and the couple has been together for a while and decided to have a small wedding at a restored historic hotel in Winchester.  It was amazing.  The best part was the reception.  A sit down dinner was served and the main course was a filet mignon, a very large and quite delicious crab cake, mashed potatoes and steamed whole vegetables.  Mmmmmm.  That's my kind of reception! 

Matt recently went to Turkey with the C3 planes that he works with and got to spend a few days there.  He brought back a beautiful hand made wool rug for my birthday.  I will take a picture of it once it is down on the floor.  It is so luxurious. 

I'm waiting on new redware plates to arrive and will let you all know when they are here.  I also have some scrimshaw rulers and thread winders available.  I will post pictures of those as well.  Off to work!  Have a great day.

A Retreat Extra!

I am offering a special class this year for anyone that is interested.  Liz Mathews, Kathy Barrick-Dieter's awesome daughter, is teaching a class where the participants will make their own semi-precious stone, sterling silver bracelet.  The cost of the class is $70 and will include the bracelet, tools and stones needed to finish your masterpiece.  If you want to add additional stones and/or charms, Liz will have those available for purchase.  Below are several pictures of finished bracelets.  The first two show an example with the amount of stones that are included.  Please note that Liz will have many different colors and shapes available. 

The next set of pictures is of a bracelet with additional stones added.  This is a much heavier bracelet. 

I was lucky enough to have Liz teach me to make a bracelet last year and I love it.  It's my Sexy Mama Bracelet!  Who doesn't feel fabulous with a cool piece of jewelry on?!!!

Please email me asap if you want to take this class.  Liz needs to purchase all of the supplies and it will take her some time to pick out an assortment of stone. 

Things are coming together for the retreat and we will be gathering together very soon!

Future of Web Site

I wanted to let you know about the future of my web site.  Since my web designer has decided to leave her at home business and go to work for a big business and I have no desire to learn how to update my site, I am going to be letting the site go.  I have the ability to post picture albums and information here.  And if you see something that you would like to order directly from me, all you have to do is email me and either pay through paypal or send a check.  This will work better for me and I think it will be easy for you to use.

Over the next week or so I will be posting pictures here of my designs and as new ones are completed, you will see them here as well.  I guess my site will still be up until my domain name expires.  But no more updates there.