The Easter Racoon?

Well I've heard of the Easter Bunny, infact he was out scoping my new bulbs...twice. The tame little bugger let munched away defiantly until Alex was 2 feet away and then bolted. Then he had the nerve to come back while I was at the store picking up some coke so we could try out the rum mom and dad brought back from us (which is sooo much bette than the captain, I'm not a rum drinker but it was divine!!). Anyway, when I came back and noticed he was again in our garden I had a little converation with him. It took alot of talking to get him away from my arbor...then he took up camp back where my new lillies are planted, grr... It took a good 5 minutes to scare him off and he must have been ticked as he got the forest muscle to come knock over our garbage can.

Enough about bunnies and racoons, my other favorite subject my monkey. Alex is a flourishing fashionista. Thursday he had his first dentist appointment and we had some time to kill so I headed to the mall to pick up some more carpet deodorizer and stopped in The Children's Place to pick up a shirt for easter and Lisa's wedding. Well...he wanted an argyle knit vest (which he didn't get) but did talk me into the hat...

The trip to Grand Falls was uneventful. We made a pitstop in Centerville so I could meet one of our World of Warcraft buddies/Matt's Groomsmen, after mainly grouping with his dwarf and gnome he's much taller than I expected ;) We had a nice visit, eventhough that involved me going to a baby shower. Thankfully one of Eleni's friends husbands knows Matt's cousin and she ended up at the babyshower so I had someone to talk to (it's hard to fit into an enormous family). We headed back home Sunday after dinner with my wedding dress in tow, yay!! Unfortunately my monkey was a sick one by the end of the weekend, it's a good thing he had today off to play with grammie and pappy.

I did get some stitching in this weekend. After Matt and I watch the season finale of Battlestar Gallactica tonight I should be finished The Time I Spend Stitching up until the non gold Kreinik that I need to order, sigh... I can't wait to put that up in my craft room :) I also kitted up Bent Creek's angel (JCS 00) for my lunchtime project.

In other news dad thinks he may have part of our water problem figured out. He noticed when he was out walking the dog that most of our neighbors have their downspouts routed far away from their homes, and ours wasn't... and hitting some concrete patio slabs that are creating a negative slope pushing all that water against the foundation. You could just see the water seeping all along the wall that's had the problems. I put our wheelbarrow out under the downspout until we could head to Kent's and it was full in less than an hour! Now thanks to dad we have a nice new pipe that extends a ways away from the house. I really hope that solves our problem. While at Kent's I noticed their bulbs were on sale so I picked up six Hostas for one of my gardens, a black eyed susan and 5 japanese lanterns. I think the bulb budget is at it's max for this year ;)

Adding Some Bling

Just so people don't think that all I do is complain about my incredibly horrible luck...I have a picture of the instock 'bling' that I added to my Merry Christmas Bellpull. I can't wait until the new cream magnifica beads arrive so I can finish it :)

Today got off to a crappy start, I seriously thought the IT conference was today but when I dropped by the Delta it was the registration was due today ;) So I had no lunch packed, no stitching and was too late for free parking. However I managed to turn some of it around and accomplish the following tasks.

• Dropped two more invitations off in the mail
• Addressed the remaining invitations from my side
• Resheduled girls dress fittings
• Scheduled my dress fitting
• Got groceries, although I got stuck in the parking garage due to some idiot who tried to drive out of the automated parking building without paying
• Applied for and received our marriage license
• Went to Newbody

With all that said it's time for this red head to head to bed ;)

Some Quick Updates

First off my HD Dragon Dreams Proof!

And now the Sweetheart Tree WIP

More Bad News...

Oh my goodness, just when we thought we were having a bad year Matt's mother called early (Matt doesn't usually get in until 6:30 or so) and sounded upset. I could tell from what I was hearing from Matt's end that it wasn't good and it wasn't something he was expecting (very shocked). To digress a little, Matt comes from a very large family and with his mother being the eldest we're actually more in the same age group as the youngest (their youngest child is a year older than Alex). Anyway, I guess his 38'ish uncle had a heart attack at work and passed away. Absolutely terrible, especially when there's children involved.

The contractor was over last night and he wasn't helpful at all. It was buy a sump pump, jack hammer a hole and I'll install it when I have time, WTF??? Do I look like I'm storing a jack hammer in my cross stitch closet? I know I'm crafty but do I look qualified to do it?? Anyway, I'm going to call insurance as we do have a sewerage rider but it's worded like it's possibly not covered but I thought I'd double check. He was more interested in excavating half the back yard and putting up a french drain...well if our drainage system hadn't frozen we wouldn't be having this problem, especially where we're already scraping to find enough money to go to the wedding at the end of the month. The water has been going down since Matt dug his trench so I'm hoping this is a sign of better things to come. I can't wait for my dad to arrive back in the country so I can ask him a whole bunch of questions.

After the contractor left and the lunches were made (minus mine). I picked up Proof intent on finishing it (well except for the one little square of 322, until I find it) and where was the pattern...at work. I did as much of the back stitching as I could patternless, all of the non detail backstitching, played a little warcraft and then Matt and I went to bed as we were both physically, emotionally and financially drained.

This morning I got to work on time, which is a miracle as we left for work late (I needed to write a note to school as Alex heard about Matt's Uncle passing away suddenly and where the whole death subject is still processing in his head post gram's death I wanted to let them know that he might be more agitated or have a bunch of questions). I had exactly 9 minutes between getting to my desk, yay for having to arrive early just to get a free parking spot, and when work started and I managed to finish Proof!. Now to finally take a pic tonight and upload it at home :)

When It Rains...

It pours!! After having a super busy week with rescheduling gym time, dentist, having to go to blue cross to get the money to pay off the dentist bill, and the invitations I had a wedding course to look forward to friday and saturday, which involved preppiing for the MIL and a baby shower announcement, arghh...So I'm thinking already that's it in my already stressed out little world, WRONG! With the weird weather we've had this week we got up to a flooded guest room and laundry room! So we were late this morning as we spent 4 hours straight vacuuming and pailing in vain. After the course we decided to have our septic cleaned a couple months ahead of schedule which alleviated some of the problem as well as digging around a spot were we suspected the water was coming in through the wall. So we're going to have to rip off some dry wall downstairs and patch the corner, yay! I wonder how much that new wonder foam costs...my parents would know but their off in Cuba...

There were a couple bright spots this weekend though ;) My Kreiniks arrived to finish Proof....hopefully doing that tonight and I finished the stitching portion of my Sweetheart Tree ornament. I'll post some pics tomorrow (although I'll still be waiting for a bead colour to come in for the ST)

Wedding Burn Out

Last night I lost my get up and go. Feeling a bit oversheduled I picked up some groceries and headed home. I put the maple pork and sweet potatoe fries in the oven and did up a couple more invitations and out of town packs. I had another 20 people distributed today and wave 3 should go out tomorrow morning when the addresses we didn't know come in from Matt's side of the family. I went through my e-mails and sorted them trying to find the addresses when I found a group of e-mails from my grandmother, that brought on some tears and tuckered me out so I headed to bed early.

However, with all that said I DID get some stitching in throughout yesterday (a trip to the dentist helped that). My Sweetheart Tree ornament now has all of the satin stitching up the side done and has Merry Christmas stitched in, not alot by my usual standards but getting there slowly but surely. Where the addressing the envelopes is all I really have to do wedding wise tongiht I think I'll probably finish the stitching portion :) Although I do have to tidy up the house some for Matt's mother's arrival tomorrow.

I also had a decent mailday yesterday, my Stitch'em girl came in from www.downsunshinelane.com. I'll have to take a picture of her when I get home. I can't wait to stitch her! Now if only my materials from Traditional Stitches would arrive, then I would be able to finish up Proof! and bead the Merry Christmas bellpull :)

Feeling The Burn

Oh my, with the insanity that is the month of April I'm getting really tired really quickly. Last night I started my 'new' gym night of Tuesday where I can't get there Friday's for body pump due to Lisa's upcoming wedding and easter, sigh...Thankfully it's only for a month. Then I arrived home to do up the out of town information for the guests and did up about 20 invitations to send out (the rest are waiting for addresses or are for Matt's coworkers and aren't deliverable until Thursday so there was no rush)...oh I did shower first so the invitations didn't get stinky ;)
No stitching for me last night....sigh...This morning I got up late as Matt has a horrible habit of shutting off my alarm on the day's he works from home before I 'wake up', then I got out to the kitchen, dishwasher hadn't been unloaded and the supper dishes were everywhere....grr.... so this slowed down the prep for tonight's supper. The clothes also hadn't been sorted after I went to bed so I ended up digging through them to find something to wear, grrr.... It's a miracle I made it out the door by 7:30!

This morning I have a dentists appointment and Newbody after work, is that dedication or what?? ;) Hopefully I'll be able to wrap up the invitations and locate the thank you cards tonight and thursday I MAY just have a little me time after doing a 'make up' session of body pump where the gym is closed this sunday for painting and new carpets.

The Frustrations of 'Intuitive' Software

Sigh, no stitching for me last night L Nor did I get to attack the side garden, for some odd reason Word was possessed last night and would not print the invitations properly. After fighting with it resetting my margins, playing with the advanced settings on the printer I finally gave up, went low tech and had wonderful success in word pad, go figure! Now I only have about 10 reply cards to write up, and then it’s onto addressing envelopes and sending/delivering them ;)

Now, just because I didn’t get any stitching done last night does not mean I didn’t get any stitching in at all ;) I did start stitching in the lettering to the Sweetheart Tree Merry Christmas Bellpull Ornament from the 2004 JCS. It is going to be so pretty when it’s done.

I didn’t get out to wash the car or garden last night as planned, the sky started looking iffy while I was making the quiche so I decided against washing the car. Fighting with ‘intuitive’ software took up my gardening time but now the invitations are 80% done, and the thank you cards are ready to mail out as well. We did get out for a nice family walk after supper though so the night wasn’t a complete washout.

I’m looking forward to heading out for lunch with Eleni and Jackson today, it’s hard to believe the number of weeks we’ll be able to do this is getting quite short (well to at least have Jackson attending). I’m going to try to arrange something with Matt so I can get to the 7 pm BodyPump class tonight as well, with the hectic schedule on the weekends I can’t make it to my usual Friday night class until May so it’s going to take some sacrifices during the week to keep on track. Hopefully I’ll be able to sneak a little stitching in though before bed!

Leaping Into Spring

Wow, for a weekend that wasn’t supposed to be busy ours sure turned out that way! Alex had the day off school Friday for parent teacher so Matt worked from home (I can’t wait until the probation period at work is over so I can take some flex time on those days) and he got a call from the parents of another little boy in his class who was supposed to come over this weekend to go visit instead. Well Alex was thrilled :) I was a bit anxious as I wasn’t there to take him, and remind him of proper manners but he did get an invite back, yay!! Saturday he was invited by Kayla to the end of session free swim at the YMCA which he really enjoyed. We also had tickets to the 1pm showing of Ice Age 2 which we all enjoyed :).

The weather was so beautiful Saturday that we spend the remainder of the day outside doing some spring work. The trees are all trimmed, I’ve planted 75 new bulbs (hoping I didn’t kill any old ones in the process), tilled up some of the garden area and cleaned up more garbage from the woods. Tonight I’m hoping to tackle the side garden and get it prepped for some bulbs ;)

I did get some stitching in this weekend. Proof! is now just waiting for the Kreiniks (I really need to take a progress picture) and I started The Sweetheart Tree’s Merry Christmas Bellpull ornament from 04’s JCS. I had started Dragon Dreams The Time I spend stitching but have a question out on e-mail that I’m waiting for a response on before I continue ;)

Last night we had mom, dad and Jazz over for a visit as they were on their way to drop Jazz off to the kennel this morning and then off to Halifax and Cuba…who on earth will I e-mail for a whole week???

Bye Bye Betty

Well, it is done...Betty my beloved Buick was sold for parts and taken away. Sigh, I've never sold nor traded in before and she's been in the family for over a decade, poor old girl. But now at least I can park Vanessa in her spot ;)

In other news Alex had a glowing parent teacher review, which was a relief as the last one had me almost in tears! He still needs to work on blurting out answers (he's one smart cookie and just wants to help kids that don't know) but his Math skills are way beyond what's expected of his grade level and he's already reading at the level they need to be in June. All that one on one work over the holidays paid off and he's less frustrated with printing, which means he's much happier the rest of the time :)

As for stitching Proof! is on the shelf waiting for some Kreiniks, sigh...I was just to Moncton where I could have picked them up but thought I had them...but had the non vintage colours and I really don't think the red is the right hue without it being vintage. I also picked up the 'stitch'em collection' from Hobb Knobb designs from www.downsunshinelane.com for the craft room. I can't wait to see her.

We've had some lovely weather lately (somewhat explaining my lack of posting), I even got to wash Vanessa last evening and do our first bbq of the season :) I also did some spring cleaning around the yard and gathered up some of the dead stalks from last years plants and broken branches, I love being outside again!

I Saw The Sign

Yay, after fretting last night about how on earth I was going to get Betty (my beloved old buick which is sans reverse gear) out of my driveway as the recommended junk yard wouldn't take her...I saw a sign. The road out to my place is 4 lane and there I was waiting at the lights when a tow truck pulled up. Now normally having a big vehicle drivers tick me off until I saw a "We'll buy your clunker" written across the back, yay!! So they're coming over tomorrow to take her away. Now I don't need to park so far from the door ;)

In stitchy news I have a happy dance to report, Girlfriends Forever (click here for chart) is complete yay!!

Now onto Proof!, I'm kicking myself as I was JUST in Moncton at the LNS and didn't realize I was out of 2 Kreiniks, zut alors!

In monkey business, the monkey is sick, sigh... Thankfully not the stomach bug of doom again, just a nasty head cold that had him running a slight fever and had him going to bed early....without prodding. So here's fingers crossed that he feels better soon!

Stitchy Night

Yay, last night was a stitchy night. A long time before Friends That Count Angela, Eleni and I used to get together, then life got hectic, houses built, kids born and our monthly girlie night went on pause. Last night it was revived :) Alex was very excited to have some company at the house and had to show off his whoopie cushion ;) I got to see Eleni's Funshine bear and Angela's Love is Patient, I love seeing everyone else's projects :)

This week just gets crazier. The junk yard doesn't want to take my car so now I'm left scrambling to get it out of the driveway (I don't know why everything on it's new besides the transmission). The school asked for our preference on a parent teacher apt and then made one up out of thin air that goes head on with another commitment on the schedule >:( I sent a note today requesting an earlier apt. Speaking of school I found out why Alex is having such difficulties breaking from a girl that he's polar opposites with, a mother that believes that with work any two people can get along. The school hasn't let her know about any of the problems (or the fact that her daughter has been sent to the principal's office as well). So here's Matt and I pushing him to find new friends and another pushing them to be friends and work on it...no wonder the poor 5 year olds are confused!!

Today I'm hoping to finish Girlfriends Forever, there's only a couple little spots left to do (30 stitches maybe). yay!

Where'd The Weekend Go??

We had such a good weekend. Mom visited with us Friday and then on Saturday we went on a much deserved girlie trip to Moncton to look for wedding decorations. Lets just say we were shoppers on a mission! A mission so intense we didn't really stop to eat until supper at 5:30. I'm so glad we didn't have any plans with anyone else. We headed to Because You Count in the trip and that turned out to cost some $$. My goodness, one sweetheart tree ornament material wise was more than a Mirabilia pattern!! But I'd already bought half the supplies already and it will look mighty pretty on the tree so the paillettes and sterling silver charm (which cost less than the paillettes) made their way home, I just had to pass on a Diane Arthur's pattern for now.

Sunday we headed over to Gram's to attempt to find a cross stitch I'd done for Christmas in 2003, a little Precious Moments chimney sweep. I'd actually forgotten I'd stitched it and was feeling bad that I hadn't stitched her something nicer until I saw it on my cyberstitchers gallery. We couldn't find it though :( After a farewell lunch at McDonald's mom headed home and we headed back to the house. I did the zig zagging on the throw, fringed it and had a good talk with Cathey :) We also had some really good maple chicken for supper. I was pretty pooped from shopping so I vegged to Cold Case and stitching and taped DH.

And without further ado, my finishes and progress (well one piece will be on cyberstitchers until mid may after all the giftable occasions are done, so if your expecting a gift you'll have to work to ruin the surprise)

Happy Dance

Yay! The DMC hogging afghan is done!! Now I just need to go to the local sewing shop and pick up a thread appropriate to zig zag the edges in and fray it. Where it was an early morning finish while waiting for Alex's alarm to do go off I didn't get a chance to take a picture of it just yet.

I'm feeling a bit better today, it's mostly in my head (and not mentally ;)) now, not enough to justify another sick day for certain. It was tempting to crawl back under the covers. Today is a really low key day, no gym (maybe some pilates or yoga at home tonight) and Alex and I are probably going to head to the coop after work to pick up a new spring jacket for him as their Columbia's are in stock, yay!! (plus I forgot to pick up Cheerios when I was there Tuesday and 1.97 a box is too good a deal to pass up ;))

Sick Day

Well, I guess I did get the bug the boys had :( I think it was a bit aggrevated by all of the cleaning we did on the weekend too and all the dust. So I took a rare sick day as I was stuffy and the rest of me wasn't feeling that great either. Although this did mean some much needed sleep and a little stitching on the afghan ;) I'll be so glad to have that DMC hogging project done!

Last night we went and looked at flowers for the wedding, picked up some great deals at the coop and then mom and I headed to Frank's Fish And Chips, yum. The next three house were spent cleaning out two desks at Gram's, the house just doesn't look the same anymore :(

For supper tonight I was going to make a beef and broccoli dish but I was out the thai sauce I needed so I made Spinach and Cheese Ravioli and Maple Tomato Tortenade with some My Yammy Spice and some steamed broccoli, yum++ Tonight I'll be taking it easy and frogging some flowers on the afghan and maybe finishing it up :) Here's hoping!

Just Another Manic Monday

What a night! After having Alex's cookies sent home (stuffed under his homework and lunch, thankfully they're pretty robust moist cookies that don't crumble) with no reason why, nutritional redflag/ wrong day I don't know as there wasn't a note I was pretty steamed. I put them in the freezer after all that work and will call the school today. Alex did have a very successful homework night, he's really getting the hang of printing and actually looks for times to practice (this coming from the kid who not even 4 months ago broke into tears of frustration when asked to even hold a pencil). Homework that used to take 30-45 minutes is now done in 10 or less. yay! After that I went to make supper and while making the sauce for our salmon (4 ww points, somewhere between 170-180 calories) I found out that the superstore had the wrong cans above the sticker price and had tuna instead of shrimp, it's a good thing the sauce doesn't rely on the shrimp, it's just a bonus for us seafood lovers :) Matt came home sick and I think Alex had a touch of whatever he had as well, but when he went out to pick up some medicine he did come home with some movies. I really enjoyed Walk The Line and we have Lord of War for another night or two to fit in.

I did get some stitching in last night thankfully, I made some real progress on the afghan. I need to run to Singer on break to pick up the remaining threads. I can't wait to have that project done and out of the way.

In other news I had a call on my answering machine stating I'd won 2nd place in the 'Win Your Fantasy Cake' at Sarah's Sweet Delights, I have my choice of a champagne flute/serving set or a gift card. Where the ballot that probably won was from my purchase of my champagne flutes I'll be going for the gift card. There's so many other things there that I'd like ;) I had to listen to the message again as the first pass of hearing part of it over talking kid made me think it was one of those telemarketing wins because I never win anything! I also found a seamstress to alter my dress, yay!!

Salmon in Lemon Shrimp Sauce:
2 lbs salmon fillets
1/4 cup dry white wine
2 tsp reduced calorie margarine
2 Tbsp flour
3/4 cup chicken broth
2 Tbsp lemon juice
1/2 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp rosemary
1/4 tsp black pepper
1/2 cup shrimp (I used canned or chop mine if it's just matt and I)

Bake salmon fillets at 350 for 20 minutes, at about 10 minutes in add the white wine to the pan (the recipe says to put it in in the beginning but I find it burns off too quickly). Melt butter in a small sauce pot, add flour. Gradually add chicken broth, lemon juice and remaining spices. When salmon is cooked add the pan juices and shrimp to the sauce. Goes great with a side of sautéed or steamed baby spinach.

Getting Back on the Fly Lady Track

Gee, another weekend another stitchy weekend lost :( Well it wasn't completely lost, I did start Proof! by Dragon Dreams while taking a two hour off of cleaning to watch some Stargate with Matt. The cleaning over at Gram's has caught on at home and we were so motivated that we started tearing up our bedroom and computer room late Saturday. Matt finally started going through all of the boxes that his parents sent up and turfed quite a bit of his old clothes :) I worked cleaning out my bedside table and the pile of stuff that kept growing beside my bed (seemed to be the place to move stuff when we had company). I went out and dug out the boxes at the bottom of the garbage (the new sanitation guys suck, everything has to be bagged or they leave it in the dumpster). By the time we were 'done' cleaning our dumpster was full++.

In exercise news I finally got back to classes on Friday, training threw off my normal gym schedule so I couldn't get there at lunch. My triceps were soo sore Saturday but I was back Sunday afternoon for more toning. Definitely couldn't slack off after having beer and Irish Cream cake in the house for the holiday!! After hearing what a big success the applesauce meatballs were at Faith Ann's we made those last night, and they were a success with my boys :) I also had to make cookies last night for Alex's cookie day fundraiser, I'm just hoping that his don't get flagged as unhealthy. I sub'd out the oil for applesauce and used 1/2 cup mini chocolate chips instead of a cup of regular sized, plus it had pumpkin. After learning how to cook healthy I know looks can be deceiving, so I'm hoping that the 'nutrition experts' at the school are actually knowledgable to accept that there's a big grey area of good nutrition. There's less fat in mine than the average 'healthy looking' oatmeal cookie, all the healthy goodness of pumpkin and we don't even need to go in comparing the miniscule amount of chocolate chips to the large amount of raisins in one of the 'healthy' recommendations. I get a good laugh when the wellness commitee sends out their 'Smoothie Day' promotions, Booster Juice may add vitamin supplements but when you look at the calorie counts, oye! If I were going to have a calorie splurge I'd rather take a supplement and a can of real pepsi (and still be 100-200 calories ahead). Now to step off the 'nutritional grey area' soap box. :)

Now don't think we forgot about Alex all weekend ;) We actually tackled his closet this weekend as well. Ideally we'd purchase one of the toy bin shelves for him but until the wedding's over the current system of containers will have to do. We did however go and sort all the toys, GI Joe's here, Star Wars there and Sunday when he did go to play the mess was minimal as he wasn't going through 10 containers to find the pieces for one theme of toy. Matt had him cleaning his room before for speed but really it wasn't that speedy if he had to clean up even more toys per session because he couldn't find anything, I brought that up and the two of them are going to make more of an effort.

And in closing, some new 'Alex-isms' & signs that he's really a big boy now:
On receiving 20 minutes on the timer to go play some nintendo ROMS on my old P120: "Thanks dad, you're cool"
On sneezing just before eating his meatball that had a bit of rice on it, which he doesn't like: "See dad, I'm allergic to rice"

Stitchy Night

Yay, last night was stitchy night. Faith Ann and I went early to get some good seats :) There were some very pretty projects completed, Angela made a shoe bag, Karoline had a tonne of finishes and we got to see the Fiddlestitch Cottage Christmas ornament, I love it! Speaking of Fiddlestitchcottage Tracy had her latest pattern in and I of course HAD to get one for the stitching room

I forgot to bring in my candlewrap as it actually got put away while I was looking for my ring.

In other news I had an interesting discovery yesterday. I went to clean up some bottles that had been disposed of in our woods and clean up the garbage that the unsanitary sanitary department left loose and in my ditch (I wish they'd pay more attention to how they dump garbage into the truck) and picked up a particularly dirty bottle which turned out to be a makeshift bong! Good friggin grief. I put it right back down and called the RCMP immediately as goodness only knows what happens when your prints are on that crap. Matt called neighborhood watch while I was out and then we're going to pay 'mother who needs to crack down on her 16 year old son' a visit to show her our discovery. We live in a nice neighborhood, tow the line and keep it that way!

Now it's time to walk up to Sobey's and get some groceries, yay!!

Lost and Found

Yay, I can blog again. I was soo preoccupied yesterday. To start off Matt worked from home Monday as his car pool buddy had the day off as he became an official Canadian citizen (congrats Sarma) and extending his time 'on call'. I went to bed at 10 and heard him trip on something on his way in later, waking me from a deep sleep...then the stupid pager went off (where's my pager pay??)...now for the last 28 years this would simply have been annoying but now that there's a big ring on my finger (especially one that's loose) as I have been known to get up and get a drink or go to the bathroom without any recollection. So just imagine the panic when I woke up to no ring on my finger or by my bedside table!! I tore my side of the room apart as best I could (it's a bit of a disaster at the moment...haven't had any flylady time lately) and couldn't find it by the time I had to go to work, sigh...After about 15 minutes of searching (and hoping to goodness I hadn't had it slip off in the bathroom in the middle of the night) I saw a little sparkle and it's back on the finger, phew...so if I didn't e-mail anyone yesterday that's why, very preoccupied!!

Yesterday at lunch though I met mom and went to the newly renovated Burrito Loco, yum++, it looks so neat in there. It's so hard to believe it was once a converted Hertz rental! Mom and Jazz came over for supper, some yummy curried chicken and linguini :)

Tonight is stitchy night :) I can't wait. I have two projects on the go, one afghan and the other is a kit that Cathey did up for my shower basket (Janlynn's Girlfriends Forever). Now to decide which to stitch :)

Back To The Grind

Poor Alex, march break is all over. I think he enjoyed it a little too much as he had to be put down for a nap by Sunday afternoon he was sooo crabby. Sunday was great, we went swimming with Matt's parents, then headed over to clean off a deep freeze of my brother's that I sold for him while he was away. After that both dad and Matt's father were sized for their tuxes, one less thing to do :)

I went home and found out where the annoying ants were getting into our bedroom and blocked that off, then I went and poured what ant killer we had left out on the nest (ants in March?? Definitely not the norm). After cleaning that up and going a bit DH Lynnette on poor Matt (episode with the rat anyone??) I chopped up some veggies for Looney Spoons Starvin Guy Chicken Pie, chopped up the chicken I'd put in the slow cooker that morning , set out the good silver and my new wine glasses and laid down. After a brief nap I put supper in and waited for mom and dad to arrive. We had a nice supper with some very delicious green apple wine from the Ryan's...now if only I'd had enough energy to make some chocolate waffle fingers for dessert...another time I guess.

After Alex was in bed and our company had gone home I pulled out the afghan and a little chardonney, and stitched. I decided my post Da Vinci code book would be Framed In Lace, started a chapter of that and headed to bed (I'm soo exciting)

Today is shaping up to be a pretty lax day, due to training I can't get to the gym at lunch so instead I'm going to Scoop and Save with mom to look at wedding stuff. Then tonight mom and Jazz are coming over for the Teriyaki Chicken Vegetable Toss on Spaghettini, yum.

I Got Punk'd

Well, I didn't think I'd ever be surprised before but Eleni pulled off a surprise shower today ;) Matt's dad called Friday before he got home and asked if I was ready for my big day...and then asked if Matt had mentioned taking me to Moncton. I thought that was odd but didn't mention anything to Matt as if he was planning a surprise I didn't want to let him know it was spoiled. He did bring something like that up after his father called again but said he wanted to go to Market , something nice for the family to do without spending alot of money so we went. Then we headed up to the mall and I wondered why my non shopping future hubby was willingly going through walmart to look at stuff to register for. We then went out for a drive to find a new 'affordable' development on the southside (239000-275000$ which may sound cheap in some areas of the country, not in Atlantic Canada) which was taking us near Oromocto...and if we were that close to oromocto I was hoping to get to Frenchies but my shopping luck was running out and Matt turned towards Lincoln. He suggested dropping by Eleni's which I was all for, but feeling guilty as the kids were probably napping and I know what my little guy can do to the house and it always seems to be before an impromptu guest shows up! Meanwhile the whole trip I kept noticing a purple camry around and was joking that his parent's were stalking us...which he found slightly amusing until the time I spotted a car at the convenience store near Eleni's....Anyway, we showed up and as I was walking up the stairs I could hear people and I'm thinking great...we've woke up the kids and she already had company...then I noticed it was MY friends and mom and Matt's mom were near the railing, I must have had the dumbest expression on my face. The shower was fun++ and I really appreciate all the thought Eleni put into hosting and my friends for coming :)

Tonight I'm wearing down from the excitement, and just finished the Da Vinci Code too boot. We had dinner with mom and dad and now I'm stuffed and ready for stitching and bed ;)

Eye Spy

A whole lotta dove's eyes...

Now it's in the wash and then it'll be ready to have the burgundy silk satin hearts stitched in, words two hearts one love stitched in as well and the charm attached, yay!

Nothing too much on the agenda tonight, maybe some reading (getting close to finishing The Da Vinci Code) and maybe working on Lisa's afghan. Newbody was awesome tonight and I really worked up a good sweat. I'd screwed around with my oven this morning trying to see if I could figure out the dials to autostart it and ended up disabling it so poor Matt couldn't put the maple pork (Marla's Maple Pork-Crazy Plates) before I got home so I had time to make My Yammy Spice except with half the spices so Alex would eat it tonight, what a yummy meal, the sweet potatoes were awesome with the maple sauce!!

Tomorrow I have my first conference call to attend, yay!!! Then it's groceries at lunch and a night off of the gym. What ever will I do?? ;)

Cutwork

Yay! I moved on to the cutwork phase of the candle wrap and reaquainted myself with the Dove's Eye last night

So, a dozen or so more dove's eyes and then I can wash it and stitch the satin hearts and wording on it, yippee (the hearts are a burgundy silk and I need to wash it before it goes on, just in case it would like to run).

Sigh, I didn't get to read a single page of the Da Vinci Code last night :( Making my dove's eyes look right and doing it with an eight perle was something else, in the past I've used 12 and find the 8 bulky. For supper we had the Chicken Burritos out of Life's on Fire and we loved them. Matt was also very receptive to the Loafstyles meatloaf, yay!!!

Tonight I'm hoping to finish the guest list and start on the invitations...after a Newbody class that is :)

Flying Under the Radar

Yay, we flew under the assessment services radar this year!! I was reading Eleni's blog about how her assessment went up but ours only went up 700$, much better than the 4000$ the first year we were in the house. And no, I don't live in a shack, nor in the sticks, just a very popular underrated bedroom community just outside city limits...and the edge of city limits that actually has places we go to frequently ;) Considering the amount of flyers I get from real estate agents trying to buy/sell in our neighborhood I'm by no means insulted by the assessed value ;) DS gets very upset when he sees these come in, he never wants to move and thinks these people are mean trying to sell our house, we've had to explain a number of times that someone had to sell the house for us to get it. Things work out in the end.

In stitching news I have the buttonhole stitch all done on the candle wrap and have half the algerian eyes done. I find hardanger so relaxing. I also started a wedding gift for Lisa, LK's Two Shall Be One on a Canterbury Cross Afghan. The Da Vinci code has been such an interesting piece of fiction it's been cutting into my stitching time!

Tonight we're making some Loafstyles of the Rich and Famous (turkey meatloaf) and some Miami Spice (baked sweet potato fries). Getting closer to the weight goal makes motivation to cook healthy so much easier :)

My Grammie Always Said...

Somedays you need eyes in your a** ;) Today after a one way webcam chat with my parents (we don't have on yet, it's still out of stock) we decided to video tape with my digital camera Alex and I making some cookies for them. Well...let me tell you, watching it was interesting. Especially the segment where I put the flour and sugar back under the cupboard. The camera was propped up so it caught Alex taking, not one, not two, nor three, nor four but five swipes of cookie dough while I wasn't looking!!

Today I also took at trip over to Gram's garage to take a pic of my brother's deep freeze which he's trying to sell. That was different, not being able to just walk in and chat :( I then headed to the bottle depot and then walmart to look at stuff to register for for the wedding. We started a registry at Sears but they haven't had as much stuff there that I want/need. With all that said, I still managed to find some time to stitch ;) I'm almost done the buttonhole stitch and should finish it up before bed.

In other news I weighed in after Body Pump Friday and was down 2 more lbs, bringing the grand post engagement total to 25 :) Now just 10 to go til goal no. 1!

Hasta La Vista February

My goodness what a month February was! With Gram passing away early in the month I was hoping that the end of the month would start to quiet down, hah! Then we lost (although definitely not as big a deal) our beloved ‘Betty’ a 94 Buick Regal, well she does go in forward, reverse is just shot but essential. As I was driving her back from the garage I saw the signs about ‘Shrove Tuesday’ and pretty much lost it. I didn’t realize it was so soon. This was something very special to me, Alex and I used to go with my Gram to her church supper. To top all of that off we found out Monday that there will be a full inquest done which reversed most of the ‘healing’ of the last 2 weeks. Then this morning we found out at work that one of the gentlemen in our group had a mild heart attack (being in IT this just isn’t something I’ve even considered dealing with, we all seem so young). Needless to say it was nice to see February go away!!!!!+++++

Last night we went over to Gram’s house to have spinach basil lasagna that Gram’s tenant makes, it’s sooo good. Alex got a full tour of the house, he saw the basement, the ‘bomb shelter’ and the number off nooks and crannies that would make awesome hiding places for present! Matt picked him up and I helped mom get together another bag of stuff to toss last night and headed home.

This morning I took my ‘new to me’ vehicle named ‘VANessa’, only appropriate for a minivan over to have a squeaky belt looked at and just have an overall assessment of the frame and mechanics done. I might hit the gym at lunch instead of going to Newbody just so I can get some stitching in tonight after I unload the van with the stuff I brought over from the house. Most of the items are a Christmas Village (or the original village that started it off in our family) which has a lot of fond memories, another is my Great Grandmother’s silverware which takes my breath away.
Now to get psyched to stitch ;)

Carless Weekend

Sigh, the transmission is toast :( Now we're waiting on the assessment value of my gram's mini van to see if we'll buy that or something else, lovely. Sure Matt has a car, but I can't drive it...yet...

We had a quiet weekend, I spent most of the weekend doing some long overdue tidying. My craft room is back to normal!! The desk could still use some cleaning but the rest is all sorted and put away properly, even the fabrics are folded and in the baskets again. Mom is down this week driving my sorry butt to work (and DS to school) until a car is straightened out so we wanted the place to be in tip top shape ;)

I also finally finished Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince Friday as well, not that it was a long or difficult read, it's finding the quiet time with an active 5 year old ;) I was so excited to start the Davinici Code, I'm even on track to finish it by the time the movie comes out, yay!!

In stitching news I finished the Klosters on the wedding unity candle wrap, I forgot the pattern at home so I won't get to work on it until tonight. I also heard that we're losing our Lewiscraft, not that it was the best place to shop but after losing our little semi servicable LNS (the better ones are in Moncton) it still hurt a little. Although the announcement came with the fueled gossip that we're finally getting a Michael's like Saint John and Moncton. Not that it's the best place for stitching stuff, but LC wasn't either, floss and beads...at least now the floss will be cheaper and the beads in stock.

Highs, Lows and Threes

Good grief, yesterday was one of those days! I walked into the office and saw a familiar face from the gym, it's been several week since we moved our desks up to a different department which had room for our team and with training and bereavement leave I actually haven't been here that much. The second time I saw her she asked me if I was still going to the gym where she hadn't seen me. I've been going at night due to the new job's locale but the free parking situation requires walking a block then driving across town so lunch hasn't been an option. She actually offered to drive 3 days a week!! Yay! Now I can take the Sunday body pump and only have one week night that I have a class on or have to go after work, yay!! So I was feeling pretty good...then it all went bad.

Left work and picked up the boy, did groceries at lunch so it was looking to be a nice early peaceful night, NOT!! After talking with Tracy for a bit (Alex's caretaker and my friend, babysitter sounds so impersonal), well half an hour, Alex mentioned that his sneakers were in his book bag and that he needed new ones. Thanks for the notice, I can just imagine if I got home and found out I had more running around to do on a thursday, the day Matt gets home late so anywhere I go I have a monkey in tow, let alone the extra gas...so this involved a trip to the mall. Sears prices on the sneakers that fit the school criteria were insanely expensive (no lace ups until grade 2 and from those slim pickings most velcro shoes have too much plastic crap on them). Then we went all the way through the mall to the walmart/payless corner, and Payless had their BOGO event so Alex got some new indoor shoes and some outdoor sneakers for the spring from their Smart Fit line (decent arch supports, real leather and a decent price to boot). So after shelling out for those we headed back to the car, where I noticed he'd ripped his good columbia ski pants >:( The lack of snow but occasional freezing temps have made it hard to dress him and they don't seem to use any judgement and put him in his lined splash pants when it's warmer. 2 things down.... We then drove home. I went to back into the driveway, no REVERSE!! Darn it! I had to drive down to the cul-de-sac, turn the car around and drive in. I got half way in and though well...I should park it so if we have to push it it won't be to far, then I remember Matt wasn't in yet so I'd have to drive it up at least to the point where the driveway was officially doubled. I then sent the kid in because I was upset and was likely to be a bit snappy, brought in the groceries, put some transmission fluid in and called home.

That was helpful, I think. I felt a bit better, it's one thing knowing that you need repairs but when it's a possibly big job if it's not just a simple leak issue and you're in the works of buying a new to me vehicle it's really hard to know how much to give the garage the ok for. After supper Matt and I pushed the car out of the driveway which was a workout in itself (anyone that's seen my driveway, although straight would no why, it easily fits 4 full sized cars in lengthwise if not five). We also learned that the driveway isn't completely level! I then called dad as I'd calmed down some (knowing that at least I didn't have to spend the 80$ to tow it to find out what was wrong) and he was very helpful. The forward gears work like a charm so I drove it over to the garage this morning.

Now although I got my three breaks done I wasn't about to chance screwing up my hardanger candle wrap (Wedding Glow by Nordic Needle) so I called Cathey and then read more Harry Potter, less than 100 pages to go!! Today I'm waiting on hearing what the garage has to say and then hopefully having some stress reducing stitching tonight as I should be able to make an even bigger dent in Harry over the noon hour and finish it up quickly at home. Here's hoping things get better!

Twenty Three!

Yay! I'm now officially down 23 lbs! I'd been down 25 earlier in the month but that corresponded with being sick and having my gram just pass away so I knew it wasn't one of those lbs that was going to stay off. Although to make myself feel even better that number is more like 28 which was me at my highest. ;) Just 12 more to go until this goal. My BMI is back in the healthy range so I expect to really have to work on this last 12.

Last night I didn't get a single stitch in, although I did get quite a bit in over breaks during the day. Newbody was awesome, and there's been a new release so it wasn't boring (which after weeks++ of doing the same routine was getting a bit monotonous). I logged into MSN just as Smallville was coming on and there was mom and Eleni so I set the VCR to tape ;) I had fun watching mom's new webcam, even with it's hiccups in sound and inverted horizontal display. I guess we won't be going home this weekend, our slots in the car have been usurped by the dog ;)/:( Oh well, I tried...I can't wait until the day I have a 'highway worthy' automatic vehicle again.

For supper last night we had Salmon in a white wine shrimp sauce out of the weight watchers cook book with some spinach, yum! We kind of od'ed on it last year until I pulled my other healthy cookbooks back out, the night before we had the Teriyaki Chicken Toss in Spaghettini out of Life's on Fires which was amazing, I even sub'd in some low sodium soya sauce and some whole wheat noodles, yum! Tonight's the curried chicken again, I can't get enough of it, and its quick to prepare on grocery night. Grocery night shouldn't be too bad, I still have stuff in the freezer from the last time I was actually shopping but didn't end up cooking that entire week due to the funeral and other family related activities. Yay!!

It's a Tough Job....

MMM....Today I headed over to Sarah's Sweet Delights to check on a message, instead of calling. Apparently the supplier of my ring bearer pillow found the discontinued one that I wanted (exactly one) at the back of the supply room, yay!!!! I wanted something that I could use in my home if I wasn't going to stitch something up (and I didn't need the stitching deadline).

In stitching news I think I have stitcher's ADD! Last night I started the unity candle wrap from Nordic Needle...must have been motiviated by my wedding nightmare....thankfully I find hardanger goes pretty quickly.

Nothing on the agenda for today with the exception of my Newbody class, I can't wait :)

PJ Day!

I envy DS this morning, he got to wear PJ's to school, it was quite a sight driving in and seeing the principal out in flannel pants and bathrobe holding a big stuffed frog (their mascot). Why can't we do that at work??

Last night I got some stitching in on ITAOAA, the blueish purple section is really coming along. I'll have to post a pic tonight. I got to stitch and get caught up on Battlestar Gallactica as well, good night in all. Although last night I had another wedding nightmare (showing up unprepared) so maybe I'll start on my unity candle wrap tonight! I have my side of the guest list done and I just need to dwindle Matt's down some, yay! After that the invitations can go out :) And one less worry off the plate!

Only 3 months away

Oh my, how time flies! Only three months until the wedding!!

A Date With a Monkey

This weekend went by fairly quick and was much more enjoyable than last weekend.

Friday we were without power for about 9 hours, the lighting (candle & LED flashlight) wasn't good enough for stitching but I did get some reading in ;) Saturday, the monkey (ie: DS) and I packed ourselves into our fridgid car and headed to the theatre only to find that even showing up an hour early was too late to get tickets to Curious George, so I bought tickets to the 4 o'clock show and took him to toys r us to use part of his gift certificate. I really enjoyed the movie, it's a great first movie for little ones. I was kind of concerned walking in as there were alot of 2 and 3 year olds but they all seemed entranced with it, even Alex was. I'll pay the 13.75 anyday just to have him cuddle on my lap uninterrupted for an hour and a half though ;) Saturday night we introduced Matt to Wallace and Grommit as we picked up the Curse of the Were Rabbit, I'm kind of kicking myself as I didn't even think to look for widescreen, oh well.

Sunday morning the boys were up early and didn't shut the door nor attempt to be quiet so I was up when Matt's mom called. His father has a bad habit of calling WAY to early in the morning but not his mother and she sounded upset so I knew something was wrong. Apparently Matt's cousins husband (they live in the same subdivision as us) was in a really bad ski doo accident, but as of last night was stable. I was looking out the window when Matt told me and thought to myself, where on earth did he find any snow! (only half of our back yard has snow). I cracked a rib once and can only imagine how painful having 16 broken ribs is.

I did get some stitching in this weekend, In The Arms of an Angel is coming along nicely. I like that it has all the divisions in colour so you can work on a block, get sick of it and work on a completely different block of colour. Tonight I don't have any plans besides maybe spending my 15 flylady minutes in the craft room attempting to tidy it up, the house cleaning kind of went to the wayside last week and things are kind of everywhere, yay! Oh well, plenty of time to clean up...and leave some stitching time ;)

Friends That Count

MLI's- Katie's Eggs

I am eternally grateful for all of my friends that have made this week bearable. I appreciate the beautiful cards, some chicken a la king, e-mail's, friends at the wake, hugs, help with Alex, being lent the latest Monica Ferris mystery and even a MLI cross stitch to cheer me up made by Cathey. I am so thankful.

Last night was stitchy-Friends That Count-night, I was unsure of how long I was going to stay but I stayed until the very end. It felt so good to be out and about and laughing again. Now if only my stitching hand was moving as fast as my mouth ;)

I started In The Arms of An Angel yesterday, it just felt appropriate this week. Today we go meet with the hotel about the wedding reception, it's kind of bittersweet, something fun to look forward to but at the same time it'll be hard not to miss Gram's presense. After that there's going to be some stitching and sleeping and then it's back to trying to have a relatively normal workday tomorrow.

Happy Birthday Mom

Well, its a day late but in light of all the running around that had to be done yesterday we'll be doing a little party tonight. I've felt and looked better but thanks for all the virtual hugs, prayers and e-mails or I'd probably look much worse. Yesterday was draining, I went to the Miramichi with dad to pick up clothes for mom and attempt to find her birthday gifts. I also spent most of the day trying to figure out how to tell my son his great grandmother to whom he was very close had passed away. Thankfully we were late getting back and it was to close to bedtime to tell him. Yesterday was also his hundredth day of school and I didn't want to dampen his celebrations, the news wasn't going to magically change unfortunately. Thankfully the autopsy that the hospital insisted upon was brief and not drag this out any further...morons, they couldn't admit her all the times she'd been in since christmas but now that she's passed away NOW they're interested in conclusive answer.

Last night mom informed me that they were doing a collage (sigh...most of the pics are on the miramichi) and when I went through the scrapbook I found my Grammie's Crab Apple Jelly day spread and started crying. It's also how I managed to tell Alex this morning without being 'cold' or distraught...eventhough no one intends on coming off that way as most people are in shock, I just wanted to give him a really happy day to look back on when I told him, instead of my mascara streaked face. Much better than how I found out, although that's primarily my own efficient self's fault. Mom e-mailed me to tell me she had headed for te hospital as there had been a call saying she'd taken a turn for the worse and that she'd call if there was a change. I was in training at a different building so instead of going over and checking my messages I walked to the government lot, picked up the car and headed up. I ran in to the minister coming off the elevator and he looked grave so I thought we'd gotten the bad diagonosis that I was expecting...when I walked into the room mom and my uncle were off in the corner crying and gram was asleep, I thought they just didn't want to wake her. It was only after walking back there that I found out she'd passed away :(

Today's a sort of day of rest. I need to find some clothes and we're doing a big family dinner with mom's brothers and their families (topped off with a Bailey cake ;)) Then it's the long haul, two wakes tomorrow, 2-4, 7-9 with an additional hour for family at 1 and the funeral Monday at 2. I'm off work until Friday and probably actually need it that way. Haven't stitched too much but that's to be expected.

Thanks again for all of your prayers

Helen Willis 1920-2006

We lost a great beacon of light and spirit in our family this morning, rest in peace Gram.

Speaking of Power...

We got estimated...grr...For those not in on NB's latest WTF news story, NB Power doesn't have enough 'manpower' to check meters so they estimate them 4-8 times a year (but have enough to pay their employees a salary way off the regular scale for this area). Good grief. In the last month we've had our heat on even less, in fact turned off completely some days, and our power bill was higher than it was last year (100+ higher than last month) when it was -20 every day. They're going to get a NICE phone call today...I'll even drive their lazy butts out to the house so that they can properly read my meter, idiots. What ticks me off the most is that they don't even offer to compensate the overpayment with interest and charge interest if you don't pay that full amount, it seems highly unethical to me.

Yesterday was quiet otherwise, I didn't get a single stitch in :( I did sort the threads for a Mill Hill kit and that was it. We had a new dish from healthy family, curried salmon and egg noodle bake with peas which we really liked. I won't eat peas as a side dish so I measured out half the amount and mixed it in with the casserole, very good. After Alex got to bed and I tidied up some stuff I took a shower, logged online for a little bit and got ticked after I read my power bill, called mom to see how Gram was doing and headed to bed after a little cooking reading ;)

Today should be pretty quiet, I remembered my lunch so I should be able to get some stitching in at lunch instead of waisting time picking lunch up. After work I'll be getting groceries and then having a pizza/leftovers night before we head to the Math night at Alex's school. Stitching to ensue ;)

Change of Power

Well the conservatives were sworn in yesterday...reminds me of another change of power 26 years ago from Feb 6, happy birthday little brother ;)

Nothing too much to report besides the previously noted happy dance last night. I did get caught up on battlestar gallactica last night while stitching but that's about it. This morning after making some pumpkin chocolate chip muffins (sigh...forgot my chicken curry that was supposed to be for lunch at home) I grabbed one of my mill hill kits (I'm on course this week so I'd rather pull one of those out while I'm on break) and headed out. It's been so hard to figure out what to dress Alex in, snowpants or splash pants. It's so cold in the morning but it's usually warm and muddy by lunch, meaning many extra loads of laundry to keep his snowsuit presentable...

Today doesn't have anything on the roster, yay!! I love Tuesdays. Monday I try to head to the gym after work, Wednesday Newbody, Thursday groceries, friday body pump...except for this week where there's a math night at the school and I can't show up all sweaty ;) I may get groceries though and give myself a free night (well not so free, doing some pilates at home) on thursday ;) Mi Vida Loca!

What a Day

Today started off on a sad note, reading that fellow blogger Laura passed away suddenly over the weekend. I'd read her blog on and off and was amazed by her work (her Titania is what inspired me to do mine on wedgewood as well). From her pictures and stories she seemed like a very vibrant person even if I hadn't met her personally (I don't get the opportunity to actually meet too many bloggers living off on the Canadian East coast). Life definitely is too short.

Although amoungst the sad news there was actually some good news filtering out of our house, a) Alex's Christmas concert clothes finally made their way home (brand new size 6 Children's Place Khaki's and polo oxford shirt, had just cut the tags off and sent as back up clothes for that concert)
b) Booked a DJ for the wedding
c) Stitching Happy Dance on Heart In Hand's Christmas Medley

I've Been Tagged For Five

Yay, my first official tag, thanks Faith Ann. I must be a real blogger now ;)

What were you doing 10 years ago?
10 years ago I would have just transferred to UNB from Acadia (I was homesick and the boyfriend was up at UNB). Because I was a poor student I wasn't up to anything overly interesting though ;)

What were you doing 1 year ago?
Still unpacking the house and getting my craft room in order and was very dedicated to Flylady. I really need to get back to that. We (I) did alot of outdoor work this summer restoring some of the wood fixtures and flower beds so the indoor work kind of fell to the wayside.

Five snacks you enjoy
Theatre Popcorn with real butter (not that artificial flavored oil crap that Empire has now)
Rippled Chips (large ripples, not small)
Jalapeno poppers
Potato Skins
Cinnamon pretzels with caramel sauce

Five songs to which you KNOW all the lyrics
Welcome To The Blue House (theme song from Bear In The Big Blue House)
Hollaback Girl-Gwen
Oh Canada
My Happy Ending-Avril
And 99% of the english songs Celine Dion has recorded (about 50% of the french ;))

Five things you would do if you were a millionaire:
Pay off the house
Grace my city with an LNS
Put some money away for Alex's education
Buy myself a reliable puddle jumper
Buy a house on my street for my parents to have as a retirement home ;)

Five bad habits:
Leg shaking
Leaving the laundry in the dryer
Stash buying (I have enough in my craft room to live 5 lifetimes as a millionaire)
Leaving my stitching stuff in the computer room
Misplacing my purse

Five things you like doing:
Cuddling at the movies with DS
Stitching
Scrapbooking
Soaking in the Tub
Checking out online stitching specials

Five things you would never wear, buy, or get again:
Skin tight ikeda's
Perms
Jumper
slouch socks
ear muffs

Five favorite toys:
Digital camera
Cheer Bear
Strawberry Shortcake
Sizzix Machine
The entire room of stitching, stamping, scrapping and sewing ;)

Another Finish

Mill Hill's Ginger Cookie

Yay, another little finish. Nothing to dance about though really, she's been sitting downstairs mostly finished with the exception of the red and green in her dress for a year now. I LOVE Mill Hill kits but have a bad habit of grabbing one that requires stitching for a car trip and then forgetting about beading them (can't quite bead in the car), now I have a goal to finish up one a month (the mitten was first, then ginger, and I think there's at least 4 more). It seemed like a good weekend to do so, I forgot my chart for DD's Summer's Magic at work, d'uh!! Now to go attempt to finish Heart In Hand's Christmas Medley...Can I have a 2 finish day??

Does Fur Count As A Specialty Thread?

Before I go to the dogs...I thought I'd share my progress on Summer's Magic.

Today was a quite day, not alot on the wedding front, some training at work, an awesome lunch with mom and dad at the Snooty Fox and then tonight after groceries and homework I got to meet the newest edition to the family, a 3 year old Nova Scotia Duck Toller who's going to live with mom and dad.

I'm a big dog person and immediately fell in love with this guy. Alex wanted to make sure he knew his commands and tested him on 'sit' multiple times. After he got used to the fact that Jazz is about 4 times the size of Tanner, Tracy's Pug he was ready to hug and pat him. While mom was playing with Alex and Matt was showing dad some partitioning stuff on the PC I went out to play with the dog (who currently isn't allowed on carpet where he was kennelized at the breeders), 7th heaven!

I think it's the most relaxed I've been in a long time.

Now to avoid weaving in some dog fur while I stitch ;)

Stitching Bloggers Question of the Week

Q: With the exception of your online stitching friends, do you have any other stitching buddies?

hehe, why yes I do ;) Although I must say, I was surprised to find an online stitcher just across the main road from our place who's now one of my best stitching buds ;) We have a local 'guild', non affiliated with any official guild, just a really fun group of girls that get together once a month (and sometimes when we're on the ball arrange workshops or most recently a baby shower), and since I've started going I've found a whole new set of friends. We also head up to a retreat twice a year in Bouctouche, NB which is soo much fun, simple but just what this mom needs. Also two of my very good friends at my old job were stitchers as well. And to put it all in prospective 2 out of 3 of my bridesmaids are stitchers :) It also amazes me how many techie girls stitch, alot of the girls I know through Computer Science are also stitchers...I thought we'd all be in the Arts faculty ;)

Turn On A Dime Tuesday

Yesterday was going good until about 8:30. Found out alternate church was available, got to look at my awesome piece of fabric for Firefly Fairies from SMF which came in Monday, Cathey brought my BYC order with my LK Snippits for this year, buttons for Official Snow Guide, fabric for DD's Magic in My Needle and some WDW to finish up my HIH Christmas Medley, even my opalescent 25 ct lugana for the unity candle hardanger needle wrap and doilie arrived finally (another BYC order) but alas that was all to crumble :(

At dinner I told DFH that the church was indeed available and how grateful I was for my family helping me, then after DS went to bed and I asked for a flat out yes/no about switching then everything stalled and enter the first mention of 'I want our own church' reared it's ugly head, I don't swear much, if any in the last 6 years but after all the stress I've been under and the fact that I or members of my family have been doing all the leg and $$ work, I was probably a little less composed than Bree's famous meltdown and Rex's second graveside ceremony on Desperate Housewives.

But today's a new and hopefully better day, with hopefully some visitors arriving from the North ;)

Monday Madness

Did you ever have one of those Monday's that just makes you want to crawl in bed and wish it was the weekend again? Well I did, thankfully I had some stitching along to keep my hands busy and amp me down a bit. ;) As previously mentioned, the cost of the church for the wedding is a HUGE issue and after talking to numerous friends a 4 times more expensive than every other church in possibly the province so on goes the hunt for a new location and new church home for our family. This upset me a great deal, and really feeling trapped with so little time before the wedding. That was before I got home and found the pamplet for the 'marriage course' in the mail, I could deal with the 80$, but the hours definitely weren't what we were told making them very difficult to arrange for childcare (and the fact Matt doesn't even get home, let alone eat until a half hour after it starts). So this led to LOTS of stitching last night ;) I plugged away at Summer's Magic, watching a little Battlestar Gallactica and passing out at 9:20 from exhaustion.

This morning I was up early as Matt left the door open meaning the second he turned on the hall light my face was blasted with light, grrr...so I got up and ready and arrived at work nice and early to get some more stitching in. Very therapeutic. At lunch I need to run over to singer and pick up a colour that's missing but that's absolutely it for my plans today. Yay!!

Progress Pic

Dragon Dreams Summer's Magic

Posting BP would have been bit frustrating considering how much I have to frog....sigh....  However, switching projects and temporarily distancing myself from my stitching for a couple hours meant I finally started the baby rag quilt who's materials have been sitting in my craft room for the last year, until I ran out of thread on the bobbin and had I replenished it would have had no thread left on the spool ;)

Another Weekend Bites The Dust

Wow, weekends have really been flying by. This weekend was the Dragon Dreams stitch along over on the Needle and Thread board. I diligently pulled out my Blackwork Princess at 9 am, stitched some, then played with DS. I snuck in a little more stitching in the afternoon before we went for a nice walk around the subdivision then headed to Hoodwinked, that movie cracked me up++. After a little sub from subway for supper and playing Ninja Turtles with DS until bedtime I got out BP only to discover an error in my stitching. I was so ticked off at myself I put her in a pouch and got out Summer's Magic. I was between that and There's Magic In My Needle but my fabric at the remainder of my Because You Count order is at Cathey's so Summer's Magic it was. I did take a little stitching break and logged into WoW, with DH and one of his friends from work. We had an Ogre ask to join our little group and couldn't believe there was an online couple (Bettycrocker and DuncanHines ;))...now if only DH would take an interest in stitching like I have his golfing and online gaming ;) It would only be fair right???

Today I got up and DS and I spent some more time playing Ninja Turtles. After making the Cheesy mushroom soup from Life's On Fire and griping to mom about my parish I headed to Body Pump and on my travel's passes Faith Ann from what must have been the photo session ;) I picked the wrong day to up my weights...a new release. My legs were aching but Bad Boys was on tv and they were just about to the scene with Will Smith running around town with his shirt all open so I hopped on the treadmill and ran for a good 15 minutes...until he put on the bulletproof vest. When I got home I worked on Summer's Magic while DS and I watched Toy Story 2. Santa brought him Toy Story on DVD and he loved it and the VHS version of no. 2 will have to do until the easter bunny comes around. He laughed so hard, especially at the Star Wars references.

For supper we tried out the cheesy asparagus lasagna from Life's On Fire, very good, although mine didn't look as good as the picture. Tonight should be relatively low key, some stitching and hopefully a new Cold Case as Desperate Housewives isn't new :( Hope everyone had a great weekend and thanks for all the support on this crazy stitching and weight loss adventure :)

Weigh In Happy Dance

Yay, the official count is now up to 22.5 lbs down since the engagement ;) I had newbody on Wednesday nights which really worked up a sweat. I had one of the not so fit women ask me how come I was sweating so much where I was relatively more fit but I also watched couldn't help but see her form through out the session and knew why her workout hadn't been as effective. Newbody was designed by a physiotherapist and relies alot on the Pilates priciples, control in all movement, not flinging weights around with momentum.

Yesterday was interesting to say the least. I was coming out of the government parking lot on my way to work and noticed it was really quiet in front of the jr high, until I saw the pile of kids out back. I got a glimpse of three bigger boys beating up a little fellow, I promptly crossed in hopes of finding a teacher as goodness only knows what else you can do anymore with all the silly lawsuits. But being a mom I couldn't stand back and watch or walk away from someone else's little boy be beat up either... Some of the kids saw me crossing (the only time in about a year that I've J-walked) and warned the 'bullies' and they dispersed. Not before I took down a description of what they were wearing, heights, etc and called the office the second I got to my desk. Groceries last night was also INSANE, it was one of the big sales at the coop and getting stuck behind one of those 'I'm paying by Visa but have to have a perfect pump' people I was already behind. Inside was crazy and I ended up getting in line when I'm usually leaving and the line up was back to electronics...thankfully 75% of everything I bought was on some sort of sale ;)

I was so zonked after supper (thankfully the boys didn't complain too much when I served left overs) that I logged into WoW for a bit and headed to bed, no stitching for me. DS was up at 4 with an accident, which seems to be more prevalent since the incident at school last week and DH turned off the alarms thinking it was Saturday. Thankfully DS's alarm is set 15 minutes after mine so it woke me up. I've never seen DH get ready so fast in all my life, although I think he might have been running for his life as he has been told on numerous occasions NEVER to touch my alarm (I don't know how many times he's turned off my alarm on work at home days).

This morning I did get to work 15 minutes early and worked on BP, I'm hoping to finish her this weekend, if not by next Wednesday ;)

Today there's nothing on the roster except BodyPump, yay!

Rule of Four

Rule of Four
There, Faith Ann had an 'open' tag so I'll consider myself tagged

Four jobs I have had in my life:
1. Playground Leader (summer program for kids)
2. Tim Horton's coffee chick
3. DFO secretary/self appointed computer specialist
4. Programmer Anaylyst

Four movies I would/do watch over and over again:
1. Star Wars
2. Ever After
3. Mr and Mrs Smith
4. The Notebook

Four places I have lived:
1. Miramichi, New Brunswick
2. Wolfville, Nova Scotia
3. Moncton, New Brunswick
4. Fredericton, New Brunswick
5. where I currently live :)

Four TV shows I love to watch:
1. Lost
2. Smallville
3. Desperate Housewives
4. toss up between Bones and House (they're paired so well together)

Four places I have been on vacation:
1. Kingston Ontario
2. Charlottetown PEI
3. Halifax, Nova Scotia
4. Manchester, New Hampshire (I don't travel very well)

Four websites I visit daily:
1. TVGuide
2. MSNBC
3. Needle And Thread Bulletin Board
4. Stitch and Stuff

Four of my favourite foods:
1. Estey's Fish and Chips (Miramichi)
2. Lonestar Fajitas
3. Lobster, cooked by people that actually fish them and use enough salt!
4. Mom's Strawberry Squares

Four places I'd rather be right now:
1. At the Nashville Market...one can dream
2. Disney
3. Yankee Cross Stitch New Hampshire
4. In bed stitching

Four people I am tagging:Anyone who wants to answer!!

Beat The Plateau

Yay, broke through any of my previous post preggie weight loss lows (and in probably the best shape of anytime I've attempted to slim down thanks to the mix of classes offered at the gym) Yay, now just 14 lbs to go before Matt owes me 350$ towards a new wardrobe, which in my head I have everything picked out now that I'm downtown where the nice stores are ;)

I worked on BP over the lunch hour, blackwork can be fun although next time I'll definitely do it on evenweave. She now has an empty lower part of the sleeve, her left hip and some chest ;)

In cooking we tried the sample curried chicken recipe from www.cookingfortherushed.com and it was amazing. I'm fussy on my curry and this hit the spot :) My two cookbooks also came in today, yay! Tonight I put Marla's Maple Pork from Crazy Plates into marinate, I can't wait to have it tomorrow, it's a personal favorite :)

Two Finishes

Well, there were two finishes this week on the stitching front, Snowman and Joyful Santa, both by Mill Hill. I can't wait to get the Christmas tree out again...

No progress as of yet on my Blackwork Princess though :(

I went to a kick butt Body Pump class on Friday, skipped the Sunday one though for Eleni's Mary Kay get together which was fun. I really needed a pampering session after this week. DS got in trouble at school on Thursday, swinging around and coming into contact with a grade 2 girl. I checked my phone messages (he's good about telling me when he's been punished for something) and the teacher left one at work (I was in training) and it was more of a "well they said", so we laid out a big restrictive punishment. Friday however I was talking to my friend Tracy (and coincidentally DS's after school care provider) about what had happened while he was outside and her ten year old piped up that these two grade two girls had been tormenting him all lunch hour and knocking off his hat. Don't get me wrong, he shouldn't have done what he did but I'm quite frankly disgusted at how, I dare say, gender biased the discipline has been in just his first year of school. So much for the anti-bullying initiative !!>:(

This week we also had a visitor to our lot, a nice big fox went flying through the back yard. Not what I was expecting to see stepping out of the shower! It was so nice Saturday we went for a walk through part of the subdivision and I'm now thankful we're on high ground. The street behind us is much lower (we have a sliding hill at the back of our property) and many of the homes on that street have severe damage to their culverts due to the unseasonably mild weather we've experienced lately.

Well enough of me rambling on...Blackwork Princess Awaits!!

Stitchy Night

I had so much fun at stitchy night last night, just what I needed after last week's headache of trying to find a photographer and track down our minister! There were a tonne of completed projects and I was kicking myself for forgetting the digital camera. I almost had a finish but realized that the charm I needed was sitting on my desk as training got out late and I didn't have time to go back to the office. I felt like an idiot this morning when I went to pull my needle out of my other mill hill kit and there was the snowflake charm I needed, included with that pattern too which I'd had one me, d'uh. After flip flopping between stitching the christmas elf fairy and the blackwork princess the girls convinced me to start the blackwork princess ;) It's my first go at blackwork and will look cool in the future home of the computers which we plan on building downstairs with a medieval theme (some day...some $$)

Faith Ann brought her Cooking for the Rushed books last night and I'm sold...so sold they were ordered first thing this morning. I like having a good repository of healthy recipes that the whole family will eat. Well...now onto training..

Back Down to Pre Christmas Weight

Yay, I made it down to pre Christmas weight again (actualy 1 oz under)!! Faith Ann's success has been a real re-motivator ;) It's been hard with the new job to feel that successful where my normal gym routine has taken a big hit, thankfully I have a stockpile of exercise videos to help supplement until my probation period at work is over.

In other news I'm getting really close to another happy dance, this time a Mill Hill Charmed Mitten. I was so surprised to see the progress at the end of just my lunch hour, very motivating ;)

Today was just one of those days, the roads were crap and my wipers froze up. When I reached the nearest red light I reached outside to flick it and the next thing you know it was off and in my hand! Yikes. Thankfully it's kind of on (no heavy duty work though...) until I can get to Canadian Tire tomorrow, roads are just too crappy at the moment. Then when I got in the parking lot did I not reverse a little too far into the little barrier...thankfully the snow hanging off my bumper started scraping before I did any damage.

Today I got in for a 25 minute run at the gym, a far cry from my 40 but it'll have to do. I did end up doing the 4 flights of stairs up and down 3 times today and the stairs to training in the other building (8 flights) once, that and the walk to the government parking lot has to add up to something. We've also been eating much healthier ;) Tonight was Little Chickens out of Eat Shrink and Be Merry, tomorros is Chicks on Sticks out of Crazy Plates, Wednesday Tartlette O'Hara's out of ESABM and Thursday is Awe Shucks out of ESABM (tacos on friday are non negotiable ;)). I also have a batch of Pumpkin Spice and Everything Nice (CP) muffins set aside for breakfast/snack the next couple of days, how's that for planning? ;)

Wild Weather Weekend

Wow, it was so nice out Saturday! What a treat to have above zero temps (and how scary that we've damaged our climate so), this is the first time we've been able to take our christmas lights down/out in January (usually the deer and the spiral tree are frozen into the ground). Matt and Alex took this opportunity to dig out the cinder block that had managed to find it's way into the center of our sliding hill so we'll be able to use it this winter. Yay!

Saturday night I found my GAST Straw Bonnet so I could work on my Heart In Hand Christmas Medley again...only to realize that in our travels over the holidays the two WDW's I need to finish it have gone missing. sigh... I guess I'll be calling the LNS in Moncton this week. After I finished the sections I could today I moved to my Mill Hill charmed mitten that I'd been working on at lunch, it should be done by the end of the week :) This weekend we also got back on the Flylady wagon, the house is finally getting back on a normal cleaning schedule (and supper is mostly prepared for the week, veggies chopped, meats marinating, yay). I had planned on going to Body Pump today but the roads had a different plan, the temps dropped and made them quite slick, I turned back. It's not really good for the body if it lands me in a body bag... So while Matt was taking care of Alex's bath I did some more fat burning pilates :)

It's stitching week with the 'Friends That Count' and I can't wait to bring in some of my finishes and see what the other girls have accomplished over the holidays :) I really look forward to our monthly meetings :) Well, I should hit the sack.

Second Happy Dance of 2006

Jeannette Douglas Needlerolls 2003-2005

Yay! I just finished the Love Needleroll, after a sewing machine issue. It's amazing how a little thread remnant can make it jam sooo bad! I couldn't believe how LONG the petal stitch took, it looked so easy but by far it was the most time consuming row of all the needlerolls (including the hem stitching!)

Yesterday was busy+++, at lunch I went to check out gym prices downtown then stopped in the bank to transfer 75$ into Alex's RESP account, that ended up taking half an hour, sheesh (profile update, paperwork+++, had I have known I just would have called online). Then afterwork I got stuck in traffic going to Body Pump and the class ran late as they were having technical difficulties with the stereo, arghh...I rushed home only to have Matt's carpool end up right in front of us and stop in the middle of the driveway >:( Then I rushed out to my hair apt only to have the 3rd occurance in a year of them booking in the wrong week and my reaction was not good, especially considering it took about 20 minutes to drive there. The southside location accomodated me but I really missed MY stylist and fired off a letter to the manager today.

Today I just stitched, ended up getting up a bit earlier than normal as Matt didn't turn off Alex's alarm last night >:( Lots of vegging. Here's hoping everyone is having a great weekend!

Girlie Night

Oh my goodness yesterDAY wasn't alot of fun, attempting to find a non overpriced photographer that wasn't already booked was insane. This was worsened by the fact that pushing 30 and having a 5 year old gives one some sense of practicality, asking over a thousand dollars for an album that would sit in my closet and paying and arm and a leg for reprints, no go!
Finally on my afternoon break I had some luck and now we're paying less than that and getting the negatives :)

Although the day wasn't all not fun (I wasn't in official training either so yesterday was kind of unstructured at work) I did get out to lunch with Eleni and picked out my wedding band (just need some bigger diamonds in it ;)). We rushed home, had some awesome chili from Eat Shrink and Be Merry then headed out to order the girls dresses. I had SO much fun. Eleni went first and modeled quite a few, all looking very nice then Cathey went in, tried one one and we sat back for a little fashion show when the next thing you know she came out in white and lavender (not my colour, just the demo size), it took us a couple seconds (or me at least), to figure out she came out in a t-shirt! I forgot she was a power shopper and just wanted to check the sizing of the skirt ;) I had a really good laugh at this! After the dresses were ordered Eleni and I headed to Tim's on the way home and had some girlie, mommy talk time which felt so good. So my disaster day turned out pretty good after all ;)

Tonight is going to be hectic again, hitting body pump at 5 then dropping Alex off and heading over the the Avalon for my hair cut as it's soooo unstylable at the moment, yuck!

Long Day

Today turned out to be a long day, I work less hours but today I took a bad traffic turn on my way to groceries and it took forever! After two days of hitting the gym after work doing groceries was the LAST thing I wanted to do but with the girls ordering their dresses tomorrow night (can't wait :)) it was a necessity. I spent part of my lunch figuring out the weeks menu form Eat Shrink and Be Merry and the rest working on the petal stitch of the Love Needleroll.

When I got home I had to unload the car myself as Matt wasn't home, start supper, put a load of laundry in as Alex managed to get his ski pants dirty, put him in the tub, start homework and then Matt got in so we had supper. I finished Alex's homework and the boys disappeared, leaving me to start tomorrow's supper, unload the dishwasher, load it with new dishes, prep lunches and throw the laundry in the dryer *somebody shoot me*. I collapsed in front of the computer and read that Faith Ann lost another 2 lbs (CONGRATS!!!) and suddenly found motivation to exercise, and did Fat Burning Pilates for 40 minutes :)

Now to go set up the VCR (yes we still have one, no PVR yet) for LOST and do a little hem stitching as I'm dreading doing the frogging on the stitching over one, YUCK!!

Did the Alarm Really Go Off

Ughhh....I could use some more sleep! Monday 5:00, kerpow! toenail first kick to the shin, couldn't get back to sleep, Monday 10:20, finally asleep when big ruckus from computer room (DFH way too into teamspeak in WoW), Tuesday morning 5:10 thunk, elbow to the forehead, yet again...no returning to sleep. Next stop, purchasing a straight jacket until Matt gets out of whatever sleep cycle he's in ;) I expect snoring tonight, it always seems to come in threes ;)

I got to work super early yesterday and did some stitching while I waited for my Oracle training to begin (and the work day). I even got some stitching in at lunch. Where I've moved locations I'm going to be heading to the gym after work for the next little while so I guess I'll be able to get some stitching in over the noon break.

Last night was kind of crazy, I made super in advance for tonight and the roads weren't pretty making it a long drive. I was pretty tired so I headed to bed at around 9:30 after a failed attempt to located my package from Traditional Stitches, oh well.... hopefully some more stitching tonight ;)

Cake

Here's a preview of my cake, without the flowers of course...changed the verse to Happily Ever After, now just looking for a topper that I can actually put somewhere in my house...need to check out willow tree for something small enough.

Back to School

Well, tomorrow's back to school for the monkey, here's a peek at the amount of homework they sent home for the week I took him out of school before the holiday...and he's only 5 >:( This weekend was nice, mom and dad were down and mom and I hit the bridal shows. It was fun and also a little depressing, so far it's been shopping at places I know I can afford, but 600+ for a decent video and 500+ for portraits (the nicest photographer was 1100-1600). I just want one nice picture to put up on my wall but they want to put them in unchild friendly albums and then you need to order decent sized pics at extra $$. I've been really stressed out of the whole maid of honour situation as well, the time and cash its taking to be a part of my MOH's wedding is becoming a real strain mentally and budgetwise, especially where my car is for city use only. It wouldn't be so bad if they weren't so close together. I really don't know what to do.

Work so far has been good, I really like the people that I've met so far and must look into this 'hockey' sport. Not really my thing besides watching a university game or the olympics (after years of playing basketball and watching all school funding go into hockey, and a whole other bunch of bureaucratic bs it was hard to not harbor just a little anomosity) but I think I'll have to look into it so I can converse abit more. It's hard to when you're on probation to feel out just when you can start being a little more social.

We investigated our sliding hill today and after a good 40 minutes it looks like we'll have to get a sledge hammer if we want to use it this year. Somehow a cinderblock that was in our woods is now imbedded in the ground in the sliding path of the big hill :(

I did finish some stitching tonight while we watched Sideways, it had it's funny moments but not the kind of funny I was needing tonight. And now presenting Santa's Garden...

Christmas Tree 2005

Ok...so we're one of those families that keep their tree up for the full 12 days of Christmas (I'd keep it up all year if Matt would let me ;))

First Day of Work

Yay, the first day of work went great, of course it wasn't the same without all of my old work friends. Thankfully the city isn't too big and they aren't too far away ;) I'm really excited about the opportunities my new position is going to provide, the amount of training is phenomenal, I feel so blessed to be given the opportunity to update my skillset, that's for certain.

Stitching wise nothing too much on the table for tonight, I'm pretty beat after having the pre-work antsies all last night and not sleeping too much. My threads from Traditional Stitches finally came in though so I may at least look at my Love Needleroll and imagine putting the final stitches in ;) When I say 'finally' I in no means am upset with the length of time it took to get them, one of them was pretty 'rare' and I'd been figuring it would take quite some time.

Tonight on the 'back to healthy eating' front we had 'Awe Shucks' a pan seared scallop dish with alfredo white wine sauce and surprisingly my 5 year old LOVED it, I had to beg him to try a smidgeon of scallop but after that he ate half my supper (really low cal/fat after that ;)) So far so good with Eat, Shrink and Be Merry! Now to check the gym's group fitness schedule to see what I can do this period, especially where I don't think I'll be able to make it to the lunch classes while on probation... small sacrafices ;)

Happy New Year

Yay, it's 2006 already! Where does the time go? We spent new years eve fairly low key, some munchies, beer and checking out Matt's new Jade Empire for the Xbox (moi stitching away). New Years day we actually had our appetizers (we'd been too stuffed from supper to eat any new years eve) and then had a beef fondue for supper along with a bottle of red wine after Alex was in bed, a very fun night (obviously NOT a stitching night though)

Today was fairly quite as well, we shoveled the accumulation of snow and unpacked more from our recent journeys. I also got to stitch on Santa's Garden and he's nearing completion (although I had to frog the tree pots upon looking at the model, yet another poorly explained part of the piece). Tonight we tried out two recipes from Eat, Shrink and Be Merry! which were very good, Ponderoasta and Darth Tater (which Alex ate after he confirmed that I hadn't cooked his Darth Tater toy ;))

Now onto some stitching goals for 2006:
-Finish Mirabilia's Guardian Angel
-Stitch Flower Girl on L&L's The Wedding (this is going to be more of an anniversary project)
-Stitch 1 Mill Hill Santa
-Start L&L's In The Arms of An Angel
-Stitch this year's DD JCS ornament and Christmyth
-Stitch Lizzie Kate's Snow Days
-Stitch Fiddlestitch Cottage's Friends That Count
-Stitch and ornamentify at least 6 ornaments

Reading Goals:
-Harry Potter and The Half Blood Prince
-The Davinci Code
-Sue Grafton's "I" Is for Innocent
-Monica Ferris' Framed in Lace

Gardening Goals:
Thankfully this will take less of my time this year as the majority of the beds have been rescued and have had new perennials/bulbs/shrubs put in. Also after two years of extensive pruning our lilacs are in tip top condition as well as the mystery shrub out front. Although I still need to: -build up the beds to either side of our arbour, two hosta plants are in order for sure and I'm uncertain on what else I might put in there
-add additional bulbs to the back garden and maybe some phlox
-continue building up the flower box around out maple/birch
-add another pjb rhodedendron to the side garden to complement the orange and white varieties (white added in 2005)

Limmerick Entries

Yay, the deadline has passed for the Dragon Dreams Limmerick contest. I'm sure there are hundreds of fab entries but that prize of all the Nashville releases would be soooo sweet, here are my entries...

I've cleaned my brick chimney of red
Hoping Santa will bring me thread
No gift cards or cash
Lord, I 'need' some stash
I pray this as I head for bed

From the chimney I heard a great crash
So, to the parlour I made a dash
Santa was covered in soot
Our fireplace was now kaput
But at least he had brought me some stash!

Now here's crossing the fingers