Family time

I knew it would happen. Ten days of family time meant very little crafting time. I wouldn't trade it for anything. Hubby and I had our son and daughter (and for part of the time our son's girlfriend) together in our home for seven days! 

We went to the Long Island vineyards, the outlets, the beach, played mini-golf and UNO. We cooked, ate out, had ice cream, doughnuts and home made desserts. We visited with the grand-parents. Whew!

Now the house is quiet again and we start looking forward to the holidays when we will see our kids once again.

I start teaching my college math classes on Wednesday. I should have a little more free time than last year as I don't have a full-time position. I will have time to craft, I hope.

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching today and Super Mom - No Cape for the Stitchery Link Party on Monday. I will be working on my Prairie Schooler Santa.

He is close to being finished. Maybe I will be sharing a finish next week. Then I have to figure out how I want to complete it...little pillow, ornament? I don't know yet. 

Thanks for stopping by!

Yarn Along

I am still knitting my mom's vest. It is growing slowly, but it is growing none the less. This will probably going on for a while. I am a slow knitter.

I am joining Ginny today for Yarn Along. What are you knitting/crocheting? What are you reading? Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are up to.

I still have Craig Wilson's It's the Little Things on my night table. I am enjoying reading one or two small stories each night before bed. I am also still reading Barefoot by Elin Hildebrand. I haven't decided whether or not I really like this book yet. I find the story line interesting, but right now it doesn't seem to be going anywhere. We shall see.

Hubby and I are enjoying having both of our children at home this week. We received these pretty flowers from my son's girlfriend as a thank you for staying with us for a few days. 

Sunflowers say summer!

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Cross-stitching

I have had a little down time and I have been spending it with my cross-stitch. A little progress on Baker Beach. Last week:

This week:

I have also been able to work some more on my Prairie Schooler Santa.

These came in the mail Friday. I used some birthday money (from February) to purchase these. My children (and maybe me) will be the recipients of the finished products in the future.

Since the designers have retired, I didn't want to miss out on getting some more of their charts.
I am joining Kathy for Slow Sunday Stitching today. I am not sure how much stitching will get done as Hubby and I have a full house. Maybe in the morning before everyone rises I will sneak in a little stitching. Tomorrow I will be linking up to Super Mom - No Cape for the Stichery Link Party. Pop on over to these sites to see what other stitchers are working on.

Bunny came back to munch on a piece of raisin bread that I threw out for the birds. We feed them seed also.

He/she stayed away when Hubby and Son were playing a game from one long ago Easter. Oh the memories....

It is so nice to have our son home for a while.

Thanks for stopping by!

Yarn Along

I haven't made much progress on Mom's vest.

Do you ever get to a point in a project where you just get nervous? I am there. Those of you who have read my blog a while know that I made a vest last year for Mom that was way too big. This is that same yarn (I frogged that vest), but the pattern calls for DK, not worsted, so I have to adjust how many rows to knit. Although I can easily do this in crochet, it seems that trying this in knit gives me pause. So I am knitting slowly to avoid having to sit a figure it all out. I do have a vest of Mom's that fits her well so I am trying to match its length and width as I go.

I am learning to use a new computer application in order to write and compile my assignments and tests for the university course I will be teaching come Fall. This is severely cutting into my crafting and reading time, but I want to be prepared. 

Speaking of reading, I just finished 

I really liked this book. It was an easy read. It is a mystery inside a tragedy inside a story about a woman finding out who she is and what she is made of all set in a small town with plenty of quirky characters and a faulty legend. This author has many more books that I am now looking forward to reading.

On my bedside table is this little gem.

Each small chapter is an anecdote from the author's life. Perfect reading for right before bed.

I think that the book below will be my last summer read. This is a new author for me. 

I hope I like it. I probably won't get to read that much in the next week or so. My son and his girlfriend arrive tomorrow for a 10 day visit. I haven't seen him since Easter. My daughter will be coming on Saturday. We will have a full house for a week.

I am joining Ginny for Yarn Along again this week. What are you knitting/crocheting? What are you reading? Pop on over to her site to see what other bloggers are up to.

Finally, this little bunny was visiting this morning on the deck right outside our living room. 

I got a couple of pretty good pictures through our sliding doors.

Thanks for stopping by!

Quilt Dilemma

Here we are in mid-August and I am wondering where the summer has gone along with all my big crafting plans. I have a dilemma. A few posts ago I shared this jelly roll 

and this quilt 

as my next quilting project. All I needed was to find some fabric to use where the white is in the picture. 

I went shopping and came home with two options.

Looking at the fabric in the jelly roll, I realized that it is almost all either medium or light in value. Although I originally wanted to use the cream color (which is actually a small pin dot), I'm seriously considering the maroon (which is brighter than in the picture) to give the quilt some needed contrast. Any thoughts? I would appreciate your input.

I will be joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching today. I plan to concentrate on my Prairie Schooler Santa. I hope to finish this one and maybe start on another.

Monday I will join the Stitchery Link Party at Super Mom - No Cape. Please visit these sites to see what other bloggers are stitching.

I will leave you with a beautiful rainbow outside my home that was the result of a brief and surprising sun shower.

It was actually a double rainbow, but the second one was too light for my camera to catch.

Thanks for stopping by!

Days of Math

I have been stitching a little bit here and a little bit there. My stitching days are waning as I will be working long days at the end of next week and the beginning of the following week grading August Regents exams. For those of you who are unfamiliar with regents exams, they are New York State's standardized final exams that are mainly given in June. The August regents are for those students taking summer school and/or who failed the June exam. 

After that my son will be visiting for over a week. My daughter will visit a few of those days also. I am so looking forward to their visit.

I have made more progress on my Prairie Schooler Santa.

I am deep into stitching green right now with my vintage floss. 

Baker Beach is definitely moving along. I try to spend a solid half hour or more at a time so that I see some progress. This is where I was last week:

I have finished most of the black stitching and have moved on to a variety of browns, rusts and maroons. This is where I am as of Saturday.

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching and on Monday I will link up with Super Mom - No Cape for the Stitchery Link Party. Pop on over to their sites to see what other bloggers are up to.

My cherry tomato crop is ripening quickly. These orange tomatoes with red striping are pretty tasty.

I have also been spending quite some time with this book. 

Yup, it is a Math text book. I have been hired as an adjunct instructor at my husband's university alma mater. It is part-time and requires some brushing up on my college math. I have been busy writing lesson plans, homework assignments, review work and exams. Hubby is part-time Computer Science and Mathematics professor at the same university.

Thanks for stopping by!

I Won!

I have been waiting to get the items I won before I posted this great news. Nancy over at Victorian Motto Sampler Shoppe hosted multiple giveaways during the month of July and I won. I won a $25 gift certificate to her shoppe. I chose these as my gift:

Just some more cross-stitch projects to keep me busy. I don' think I will start them for this upcoming year, but they will keep me busy in the future. 

Be sure to check out Nancy's site for some great cross-stitch and other projects.

Thanks for stopping by!

What to do, what to do?

So what shall I concentrate on now? I am anxious to get another WIP completed. I got such a great sense of accomplishment from my finished table runner (see post here) that I really want to finish something else now. Unfortunately, few of my projects are even close to that stage.

Let's see. Baker Beach is a long way off. This is how it looked last week:

This is where I am as of Saturday:

I concentrated on finishing the table runner, so this hasn't been touched all that much.

My Prairie Schooler Santa is languishing also. 

I so looked forward to working on this and I am just not feeling it. Perhaps it is the fabric....not loving it...or perhaps it is because I am not sure how I want to finish it later. Sigh...

I took out this bit of loveliness. 

 I am planning on making this quilt with it, but I need to get to a fabric store to buy 2 yards of solid cream fabric. 

Unfortunately, Joann's didn't have any fabric that worked with this jelly roll yesterday. That means a trip to a quilt store, none of which are close to home. Hmmm....

I am linking up with Measi for the Late July WIPocalypse. She asked: What makes you pick up a long-abandoned UFO rather than beginning a new piece?

Usually I go back to a long-abandoned UFO when I am bored with what I am working on and don't want to start yet another project. Sometimes it is a feeling of guilt that makes me return to it. You know how it is. You say to yourself: "I really liked it when I bought it. I really should finish it. It really isn't that difficult. So and so would really like to have this."

With that question in mind I was wondering if I should return to this:

I haven't worked on this since last summer. It is a project my Mom started and really didn't enjoy. It is pretty, but the fabric is difficult to cross-stitch through and the chart somewhat difficult to follow It is much slower than counted cross-stitch. Maybe...

I am joining Kathy for some Slow Sunday Stitching today also. I haven't yet decided which of the projects above are going to get my attention. Maybe none as we have a BBQ to go to. Tomorrow I will link up with Super Mom - No Cape for the Stitchery Link Party. Feel free to pop on over to any of the site links to see what other bloggers are up to.

Thanks for stopping by!