Slow like Molasses update!

I am so slow lately. And I just had a 4 day weekend last weekend. Not much stitching done, as you can see. 

Slow as molasses it seems. Progress is progress!

I re-visited the crochet daisy puffs, and have been stocking up on them when I go to bed at night. I'll do 3 or six of them a nigh. I plan to make a dresser scarf of sorts with them. Hopefully it'll work out!

These colors are so yummy. Now that I've gotten the hang of them, they are really fun to make!

Made a couple additions to my witchy wall in my bedroom. I'm just adding things I love and going from there.

Let me talk about my favorite things! The print below is the Sanderson Sister's cottage from Hocus Pocus. It's hard to see here, but there are there tiny brooms (one is a vacuum!) to the left and Thackery Binx on the front stoop.

The print below is of the Owens house from Practical Magic. You don't wanna know how much I love this movie.

The next one up is a one of a kind. My son's girlfriend painted this for me last year and I received it as a Christmas gift! I was so shocked and delighted to open this! I knew I wanted to feature it with a print of the home they lived in, and I went about hunting for just the right one.

Those lovely prints are by Emily of Fox Burrow Designs. If you have traveled or love movies and books, I highly suggest you check out her stuff. She has homes from all kinds of movies, travel art and other goodies. I know I'll be buying something else from her soon, I just don't know what!

This isn't a paid advertisement either. I just love her stuff. She has a sale going from now until 9/15 where you can get 30% off with code “birthday30” !!

I sincerely hope everyone is well and happy. I will check back soon, and I wanna have a finish next week. We'll see! Until next time,

 

Stitchy update, DIY projects, and birthday catch up!

Hello there! I am moving at a snail's pace it seems. Time just going to other things and work, but here is my tiny bit of an update on Know Thyself.

The flosses are quite pretty, but don't seem to be as vibrant as the model. However, I do love the delicate look it has and I will be excited to frame it in a gothic type black frame and hang it in my bedroom. I have black furniture in there and my husband just stained a wall of shelving black for me and made me a black stained jewelry organizer--it's gorgeous.

This past week, I made a little plaque for my bedroom as well. Um, HELLO. I will be doing more of this.

I loved every bit of doing this project! Took a page from a pretty planner I had, and voila! Whole thing was about 15-20 minutes of time spread over one day. I let the stain dry overnight and mod podged it all to seal and give a nice glossy glow. LOVE!

 

Also worked on a bit of a crochet thingy. I am not sure I enjoyed making this puffagon crochet square, even though it is totally adorable.

 

 Working the puff stitches into that tiny little ring just drove me crazy. I was thinking about making a dresser scarf (remember those?) by joining a bunch of them, but I don't know if I'd make it till the end of the project. Hmmm, I'll have to think about it some more. 

I had a birthday since I last posted. I had a nice lunch with my kiddos at Longhorn-one of our favorite places. It was perfect. I received an entire Tiramisu cake from them! They got me the sweetest and most thoughtful gifts, including a bag of orange, cream filled Twizzlers (heavenly), a porcelain hand jewelry dish, and a jointed figurine of Sam, from the movie Trick 'R Treat. I think he's gonna stay out all year long.

And yes, his hood comes off to reveal the horror underneath. If you haven't seen this movie and you love all things Halloween, please please watch it!

I was also treated to Hocus Pocus themed birthday gifts by my hubby, and my mom got me goodies from my Amazon wish list-as did my nephews. I am so fortunate to have these people in my life. And not just for the presents!

Well, it's been a long post, and if you've stuck this far, thank you for being here. I hope you and yours stay well and safe, and I'll see you soon on the way to a finish for Know Thyself, hopefully! Until next time,

Update on Flag Folk and New Food Tries!

I spoke too soon in the previous blog entry. Maybe a day and a half later, someone in my family was rushed to the hospital with the virus. All I can say is that if anyone thinks this is some overblown flu------boy, they are sadly mistaken. Sadly mistaken. It's vicious, and made all the more cruel because you can't be with your loved one when they are suffering the most. My family member is recovering, slowly, after a week of hospitalization and a return trip to the ER after that with a complication. Please, please wear your masks and use your hand sanitizer. None of us knows if we are asymptomatic carriers and may cause someone, like my family, another life-threatening situation, or worse! Rant over. On to the cross stitch!

I am amazed I got anything done on it the past week and a half after all we've been through. I think stitching took my mind off of it all for a tiny bit. Still plugging along, even after I type this entry up.

The weather has been just glorious summer type weather. And sitting outside just makes me feel peaceful. Soaking up the heat and sun for a while makes everything seem wonderful for a while. We also had a weird storm here last night.

I love that we have so much open sky in this neighborhood. It allows for some great sky watching, which I love to do all the time.

This past week saw me making a couple new recipes. I made a super tasty chicken teriyaki dish, which you can find HERE.

And this morning, I made a coffee cake, which I've never done before. You can get the recipe HERE.

It was just a tad dry. But overall, it's a nice vintage type coffee cake recipe! I will definitely be doing it again. I had the oven at 425 degrees (off of a Bisquick box picture), but the recipe above has the over at 400, so maybe that will help!

Try something new, appreciate what you can in life, and hug your loved ones. All the time, but especially in these times. There so much going on now. We will get through it, but things will most likely be changed.

Until next time,

Pineberry Lane Christmastide progress and photo wall update

I changed over to aida. Story of my life these days. I liked the linen, but wondered how in the world I was gonna count up and over that many. Oy. Not sure I'm liking it all that much, but I'm going to continue a bit more and see how it goes.

The dye left little blots of dark color around in a few random places, but it makes it look old, so that's ok! I love the snowflakes-so pretty.

I ordered prints (I had too many to choose from) and we finally got the photo wall up. I'm pleased. I really hated that big blank wall for the past couple years. This was just what needed to be there!

The next couple of days will be spent trying to figure out what is left for me to get for Thanksgiving dinner and hopefully be able to get it! I've been reading about brining the turkey. Anyone have any advice on that matter? It seems to come out fine just the way I cook it, but apparently soaking it in brine for a day and then letting it rest for 30 mins to an hour after cooking is THE thing to do. I don't ever remember my gran doing that, or my mom for that matter.

Gimme your best turkey hints, if you got 'em!

May you all have a wonderful holiday with your families and those you love. Hang on to them. And tell them. We never know what life will bring us at any time. So if you are healthy and have those you love around you, then you definitely have things to be thankful for. I know I do.

Until next time,

Stitchy update and before and after home improvements!

Here is just a quick stitchy update on my Pineberry Lane spooky stitching:

I'm having fun with this one!

Meanwhile, my husband worked on bringing a vision to life for our house. We had a huge blank wall that I had been curating ideas of what to do with for two years now. It's been realized finally!  We went from this:

to this:

I could not be happier! My husband worked so hard on this for me. He hand picked the boards, stained them with the stain I picked out, polyurethaned and waxed them, and painted the Ikea brackets a satin black. Love that guy. We want to do a picture gallery above it. I purchased the frames, and it should be done as soon as I order the pics and figure out how I want it configured! I'll update after that.

The weather has finally cooled off and it's been so nice. I need to get out and start walking and taking care of myself again. It's been too long, and I've gotten out of my habits that helped me get into shape. Life is like that sometimes. Time just seems to fly and I just want to enjoy it as I go along. Make time for the little enjoyable things in life, like dinner with your family, listening to the rain, walking in the crisp air, savoring the fall flavors of apples and pumpkins. Get out there and enjoy life!

Until next time,

A Miracle - I have a FINISH!

Ok, first things first! I have a freaking FINISH!!!!! It's Pineberry Lane's A Sprig of Holly. Best News? It took me only a week! Now, if you've been reading my blog for any length of time, you'd know just how big a deal this is. I mean big. Real big.

And I dyed my own fabric. I saw a woman do this same color scheme and copied the heck out of it. It was just so pretty on the blue! I think I have my MOJO back! My goodness, it felt so nice  from start to finish.  It's been so long since I finished anything. I would get discouraged over the littlest thing. I needed a quick win to get me back on track. It was wonderful! Still crocheting too. I have a lot of Project Life to catch up on, but I'm doing it!

This won't be the last time I dyed my own fabric. It was fun and easy and oh, the possibilities!

I trust everyone had a lovely Christmas and new year. Our first holiday in our new home was great.

 

It was cozy and warm inside as we celebrated. Visiting with family and friends, yet still missing what we don't have. I'm not sure about this new normal, but I have no choice. Ever grateful for what I do have however!

Spring is nearly here now. It's hard to believe. I do look forward to the warmth and being able to spend more time outside. I will hopefully be updating soon with a new start!  Until then,

Thanksgiving Memories and Crafty Stuff

We hosted our first Thanksgiving in our new home this year. I realized after everyone left that I hadn't taken one photo of any of us.  I did take a couple snaps of the food. Yikes. Like I said, it's been on of those years, and I'm off balance in so many ways.

It was wonderful having people to the house and we had such a nice time and a huge over abundance of food.  I truly am thankful for so many things, but there have been great losses as well, and I'm trying hard not to let them overshadow what I DO have and what I AM thankful for!

So, first some food.

Line up everybody!

Turkey was perfection

Home Made Mac-n-Cheese

Pineapple Fluff Salad

Sweet Potato Casserole, Mashed Potatoes, Deviled Eggs

We were all so stuffed!  That's the whole point I guess, right?   It all turned out great and we had nice conversation around the table (put both leaves in!). Just loved it. I was still full the next day.

One thing I'm always thankful for is my mother teaching me various crafts and always indulging my interest in them from the time I was just a little girl. Keeping your hands busy crafting means you you are less able to throttle people. That's probably why I always have something to do.  This is a sweet little cowl I made one night recently while trying to de-stress!

 

My mom and I went to The 29th Annual Fall Fiber Festival in Montpelier Station VA back in early October. It was fun, a bit warmer than we expected, but overall, just a lovely time. Petting lots of yarn has become a favorite pastime for us.  And the animals were a bonus! Love me a good llama.

My little Jenny has transitioned well to our new home. She brings me lots of comfort and happiness. Don't know what I'd do without her.

I leave you with one of my favorite quotes about handwork and a couple projects I'm working on.

Be good to one another and happy stitching!