Happy New Year

Happy New Year

Happy Holidays

Merry Christmas

I hope all the shopping is done, list checked off and complete, and packages wrapped. I hope your home smells wonderful with the scent of spice and cookies from the warmth of the kitchen. I hope your family is well, and your Christmas will be as peaceful and joyous as you planned.

…with love and hope, from our home to yours!

Secret Santa Revealed

Today - just before Christmas - how timely?? my Secret Santa delivered a package to me! Oh, Lindy, what a grand Secret Santa you have been!! I have loved every piece of every wonderful piece you have sent to me. Thank you SO much!



If you can't see from this not so great scan, there is a packet of cards and notes, a packet of holiday buttons and bits, a snow/star pin, a bookmark requesting my fabric fairy to keep my stash supplied, a birthday candle set, and a gift certificate to the Pink Bunny. What fun - helping the fairy!!

This has been a great activity, thanks to Candi who had the inspiration and initiated it all. I only wish I had been as timely as I should have been, and when I get that final box in the mail to my recipient, I hope she will forgive me for being SO late.

December 15

Tomorrow is December 15 - my birthday! Want to celebrate with me? Turn off all your demure, controlled behaviors and get ready to let loose. I mostly dance in my seat, but if you REALLY feel like a party, get up and click here.

Rock Hill Weather??

December Weather??

Locally it has been around 80~ this week while I was out of town. Came back last night - today it was about 60! DS said I brought the cold back with me.

Secret Santa

I received another great gift from my Secret Santa today! Really pretty red and green fabrics, beads, buttons, and gold floss. Won't this make a beautiful block? Just in time for the season! Thank you so much, Secret Santa. You've been a dear one!!

Follow-up to Catching-up

Since I've been doing a lot more Cross Stitch than Crazy Quilting lately, I did the follow-up to Courtney's questions about the storage units I use for threads over at my Needle in Hand blog. There is also a link to it on the left if, when you land here, you'd like to see what's going on on that side of my brain. If you're like me, there's not much going on on either side of our brains except Christmas preparations.

I'm leaving town tomorrow for a training class in the Virginia/DC area. It had been snowing there earlier this week, but today it's supposed to be about 75~ here. Earlier this week the highs were high 40's. It's hard enough to pack for a trip without two seasons being involved!! But after I return from this, back to work on Monday, December 17, we get finished on Thursday, December 20 at 3:00pm and won't go back until Tuesday, January 2, 2008. WooHoo! I can hardly wait!!

Catching Up

It's December and Christmas is approaching quickly, but I'm not ready! I've done a bit of shopping, but no decorating. I don't know if it's age, not having little ones in the home, or if it's all the commercialism, but decorating just isn't so important to me any more. Oh, I will put up a tree and a little more for DS's sake, but my heart isn't really into it. I can't get the un-decorating out of my mind - that's the part I truly don't like! I see all the chatter and love of decorating beginning after Thanksgiving, and do think it is beautiful, but just not my cuppa tea. So there's another example of my being in the minority - could be read as weird!

Yesterday was a day with such beautiful weather here, sunny and around 60`. I spent a little time outside, but had promised myself that before the weekend was over I'd have my bedroom/closet straightened up. What a mess it was! When the season's change, I typically just switch clothes from the extra closet (sewing room) into my BR closet. Since I'd had change of sizes there were big, middle, and smaller clothes stuffed into the closet. I'd started putting the bigger into clear storage boxes, and getting smaller ones out. Then I brought down from the attic a rack of things I hadn't worn in years - the bar holding the hangers broke! So all sizes and seasons were here, there, and yonder! And the actual closet had shoes all scattered on the floor, along with hangers, tags, and dust bunnies... yuck - BUT - it's all sorted and put back into shape. I'm so glad it's finished - about 2:00 am, and it was a JOB. There's a big bag of trash and a big bag for donation. It doesn't look like much to really wear now, but plenty enough!

I've been taking a break from Crazy Quilting recently, but have gotten totally engrossed in Cross Stitch again after years of being away from it. During one of my organizing frenzies I had sorted all my DMC into color groups thinking since I wasn't doing CS much, it would be more convenient for CQ and used the little cabinet for buttons. Well, yesterday I got a 60-drawer storage cabinet and sorted it all back into numerical order! Now I'm ready to pull threads for CS patterns, and will have to scramble through when looking for a specific color, but pulling drawers open will be easier than looking through for those tiny numbers! If you want to see what I've been working on, take a look at my Needle in Hand blog.

Most of you who drop by here know that my dad had been scheduled (twice) to have a growth removed from his kidney. The last time, they had him in the pre-op stage and realized he has an atrial fibrillation. They decided at that point (EKG) he needed to be evaluated by a heart specialist, so he went for stress and others tests. That doctor says he is fine for surgery, and after that they will prescribe some medication to regulate his heart rates. I'm so thankful that they were cautious, but WHY hadn't they done this before? Who knows - perhaps it didn't present while he was having check ups. He goes back to the surgeon on December 11, and I imagine they will schedule the surgery. I'll be in a class for work in Va/DC during that week, so hopefully he won't want to do it the next day!!

Off to do a little blog visiting, then more stitching :-)