Three SALs and some Sippen & Stitchen

If anyone is still taking the time to visit me after such a long absence - it is good to see you.

The past months have just been very hectic with various trips to the US from March through the beginning of May. In between it was catching up around here and of course enjoying life in general with DH and visits with our kids, relatives & friends. Many evenings were spent just relaxing with either a stitching project or a good book. I did manage to visit you now and again but never got around to posting myself. Anyway - here I am.

Let's start with the SALs. A year ago Berta, Felicity and I started our "Four Seasons Chairs" SAL. You may remember these wonderful women from my experience with "Frederick the Literate" - which I would have never completed without them. Again SALing was great and I am pleased to show you a year's work. Yes indeedy - my SAL is complete. Can you believe it? I've already purchased the frames and now only need the right vibes to actually mount & frame them. Thank you so much ladies - I hope we can SAL again.


The next SAL is our Halloween friend 'Scary Scraps'. Love! Love! Love him! Brenda, Juls and I are working on him but have no set finishing date - just a joyful journey. Scrappy is such fun to work on that when we first started I had a hard time putting him away. He also accompanied me on our trips and I must say is a wonderful traveling project. When we arrived home in May I finally put him away for awhile so that I could concentrate on some other things.

Finally my brand spanking new SAL with Annemarie and Heidi and - Mary Wigham. Please visit this site as the pattern is simply amazing. The three of us are all using different colors so it will be very interesting to see them side by side as we progress. Harmien & Heidi helped me toss my floss last Saturday (more about that day further down in the post) and this is what I finally decided on. For the first time I will attempt stitching 1/2 over 1 on 28 ct (yes Adele I'm finalling taking the plunge) antique white Monaco evenweave. The DMC colors I'll be using are: 333, 340, 905, 906, 907, 975, 976, 977, 3805 and 3806. Playing with these bright colors on my own is certainly out of my comfort zone but I think I'm up to the challenge.

...and some Sippin 'n Stitchin.

Last Saturday we had our SnS get-together at Harmien's. It was a perfect day - the sun was shining and the company was great. There were only three of us (hopefully there will be five of us next month - we missed you Annemarie & Barbara) but boy there wasn't a minute in the day where a moment of silence occured. Excuse me - yes there was - while we were eating Harmien's delicious chocolate cake and the Broodjes Mario we managed to dim it a bit.(LOL) It was such fun to see Harmien's house, meet her DH and kitty Kisse as well as see all the wonderful things she has stitched.

Since Harmien is always so creative I just had to get a little creative myself when making her a gift. I painted the box (purchased at Michaels) with Metallic Bronze paint. The stitching is a 2005 freebie from Aion Designs. I stitched it 1/1 on 25 ct creme lugana with Gloriana Red Clay silk (so lovely to stitch with - thanks An). Last Wednesday the stitching was complete and I was ready to mount and insert it in the box's window. That was when I made a horrible mistake - I cut it TOOOOOO small. Actually I stayed pretty calm, cool & collected (must be getting old) - no tantrums, no crying, no throwing. I just put it away for the day knowing that within 48 hours it would have to be re-stitched between cleaning house, shopping and cooking for dinner guests Friday evening. Just before our company arrived the stitching was complete and after they left at 10:30 pm and DH & I had done the dishes I mounted the sampler and viola - here is the finished product. I'm pretty pleased with the result and happy Harmien liked it. No I didn't throw the original stitching away - it will make a pretty fob.

Well folks, that's it for today. Hope your first day of summer (or whatever season this may have been the first day of for you) was as good as our's and a good indication of the coming three months.