itsy bitsy teeny weeny

As the title may suggest, I'm still working on cross stitch over one on the mini-sampler for Jackie du Plessis' Cherry Berry.

I'm on the last third. If I ignore everything I really need to do today, I could potentially finish the stitching on this part today. This would leave the laundry unfolded, the dishwasher unloaded, the furniture undusted,

Gee, would I rather stitch or be a Domestic Diva?

I think I'll stitch for awhile until I decide.

Trying to catch up

I feel like I've been going ninety miles an hour all week and I'm still trying to catch up with everything. Actually, at this point, with my current level of decrepitude, maybe I'm just going twenty miles an hour . . .

Anyway, last week-end Baby Girl and I traveled to Maryland so we could take classes at Salty Yarns. As the teacher has asked that I not publicize her events or projects, I won't--just know that, as usual, Salty Yarns is my favorite venue for classes. Again, the hospitality cannot be equaled.

And there was another phenomenal goodie bag--whose contents I dispersed and then remembered I hadn't photographed.  Just believe me when I say it was lovely and full of things that are completely usable and helpful.

There was retail therapy.

And this is my favorite thing I brought home from the shop:

Baby Girl and I were wandering around the shop when I noticed a cabinet I had not noticed before. This should not be considered unusual--that shop has more packed in per square inch than any shop I've ever visited. Anyway, it had lots of wooden items--and this wooden basket with the pineapple motif jumped out at me.

Well, I dithered. And dithered. And had just about persuaded myself that if it was still there in June, it was meant to be and I'd get it then. And, as we were leaving the shop, it suddenly hit me that this would be the perfect container to use to display Barbara Jackson's Pineapple Perfection project. So I sent Baby Girl back to grab it and put it in my bag.

That's a wonderful thing about Salty Yarns. When you attend an event there, you're given a big shopping bag with a tag for your name. While you're there, you can just add things to your bag as you see them or it occurs to you that you need something. Then you settle up at the end, with a nice discount as well.

So it came home with me.

We did have some additional excitement while we were there. At around 4:30 in the morning on Monday, my phone went off with a weather emergency alert--tornadoes in the area--and thunderstorms--and right after the alert, there was a clap of thunder so loud that Baby Girl and I both literally levitated off the surfaces of our beds.

I love to watch storms, especially at the beach--but it was raining so hard you literally could not see anything three feet from the window. It was an amazing downpour--and luckily, it ended well before we had to load the car and head home. It was still windy the next day, but not terrible.

And then it was back to reality.

I decided to continue working on Cherry Berry, and I finally made it through the alphabet and numbers--and now I'm to the fun part.

Once I accomplish a few more necessary chores around the house, I plan to stitch the rest of the week-end.

Happy Easter to all!

Welcome to Lilliput

I am stitching the tiniest, tiniest sampler for Cherry Berry.

It's all cross stitch over one.

It has alphabets.

Not only does it have alphabets, the child who stitched the original sampler from which this is adapted stitched every letter twice.

Twice.

If you're been reading this blog for any length of time, you know I don't like stitching letters. However, I shall persevere.

I'm even taking this with me this week-end because I really, really, really want to get to the finish-finishing part of the project while I can make sense of my notes.  After all, I will have time before my two week-end classes start.

And maybe I'll get all the letters stitched before then.

Twice.

New plan

Saturday I had the great good fortune to take another class from Jackie du Plessis.

And I didn't have to stalk her halfway across the country to do it! She came to our sampler guild to teach Cherry Berry.

It was another wonderful class with all kinds of ingenious ways to do things. I can't wait to work on it.

And I'm not going to.

Usually I take a workshop, then I go home, and then I look at the projects that are already in the workbasket by the chair, and then I put the class piece away and go back to what I was doing before. And THEN when I get back to the workshop project a couple of years later, there are times when I have no clue as to what I meant when I wrote some of my cryptic notes--assuming I can read my own handwriting at that point--and sometimes I have to punt.

This time, I decided I was going to work on Cherry Berry. After all, I know where I am on the other projects and can easily go back to them later.

Because of unforeseen circumstances, I had more time to sit and stitch than I normally do on a week-end, and I've already done this much on the roll that will fit into the box.

I'd show you the other end, but it's blank linen with an outline around it, so not much to see there.

Now, before I made this momentous decision, I had managed to get a good bit on the petite pin cushion:

And the birds and baskets on the Pineapple piece are done, except for the birds' beady little eyes, which, since they are actually beads, will wait until the embroidery is finished.

Tonight, however, I am sticking with Cherry Berry.

Except I just had a thought . . . Baby Girl and I are going gallivanting this coming week-end. And I'm taking two more classes.

Not sure how I'm going to manage all this, but I'll think of something.

Clones would be helpful.

Random mutterings

Just a lot of random thoughts . . .

• It snowed today. In the Carolinas. On April 2.
• This never happens.
• When the weather forecasters started  predicting this yesterday morning, I thought it was an April Fool's Day prank.
• It was not
• It didn't stick to anything and the sun is out now, but it was pretty while it lasted.

• Speaking of April Fool's Day, I almost pulled a prank of my own.
• I was going to announce that I was giving up stitching so that Dearly Beloved and I could start collecting toy trains. This would be a hobby we could share.
• To afford this new hobby, I was going to sell my stash.
• Then I realized that people might not realize it was April Fool's Day, and I would be inundated with requests.
• To avoid spending the rest of the year explaining that it was all a joke, I decided not to do that.

• There has been some stitching.
• I was rummaging around and decided to pull our Barbara Jackson's Pineapple Case

• There is more gold on the Spot Sampler

• The outer framework for the Petite Pin Cushion is stitched:

• Tsubaki hasn't been forgotten. I finished outlining the other two "chambers" but since the outlining thread blends into the color of the linen, there really isn't anything to see.
• And that's it for today!