It's almost Spring!!!

In 2 days it will be spring! I'm really looking forward to it even though, unlike other parts of the country, winter around here wasn't too bad. Some people might disagree with me after seeing the following pics. These were taken on February 2nd, just a day after my last blog post. We got a whopper of a storm. But the biggest problem was the winds. Up to 60 mph gusts made the blowing snow a real hazard! This is what we saw when we walked out to the breezeway in the morning. The drifts were like this across the front of the house. When Jerry opened the garage door to blow out the driveway I think the snow blower might have been a little intimidated. :) He did have a bit of trouble cause the snow was so high. Josh had to help in some places with the shovel. I know Jerry wishes he had a bigger snow blower but even here in WI, this much snow all at once is kinda unusual.

We decided to use out tax refund (what was left after property taxes) to finally get a new tv. The one we were using had a lined bar about 4 inches wide slowing moving down from the top. It was an old tv anyway (one of the big old boxy things!) and it was time to move up in the world. :) We got the tv and then needed a shelf to put it on. The opening on the old shelf wasn't wide enough. Since the Packers were in the Super Bowl we wanted to get it set up before that day. Jerry ended up working the Saturday before so we went in the morning to get the shelf and then Amy came over after work to help me put it together. It took us several hours but here's the finished shelf. I think we did a pretty good job. :) When Jerry came home from work that night we moved the shelves around and finally got the tv set up about 3 or 4 in the morning. :p It sure looked nice though, even through blurry eyes! :)

We slept most of the morning so it was a good thing the Super Bowl wasn't on till evening. Amy, Louie & Little Louie came over to watch it with us. We had subs, chips etc. Here's our goodie table. We even had Packer cupcakes. :) The Packers WON the Super Bowl beating the Pittsburgh Steelers 31-25. Of course I had to take a pic of my man, Aaron Rodgers. It just happened that Jerry's guy, Clay Matthews was there too. :)
Something that is funny now, but wasn't funny when it happened...never leave a case of pop where it can freeze! We had a case of diet 7up in the breezeway. I thought since it's connected to the house it wouldn't get THAT cold in there. Apparently I was wrong. :p I went out to get something and saw this mess. I had to bring it in and put it in the sink. When the pop started thawing, it sprung leaks everywhere there was a pin hole!! I had it spraying everywhere (getting a visual on this? Lol) I had to throw a towel over it! I finally got it under control and realized the lid to one of the cans was missing. The one that had completely split open. I found it on the other side of the breezeway. Good thing nothing shot through the windows since most of the breezeway is windows! Btw, that's not ice you see in there, it's the 7up. I was really glad it was a clear pop and diet so there was no sticky sugar everywhere!

On Valentine's Day I woke up to the sound of mine & Jerry's song. He was coming into the bedroom with it playing on his laptop and carrying these things. (the balloon was on a long string. I just pulled it down for the picture) Our song is 'Keeper of the Stars' by Tracy Byrd. It's been our song ever since it came out. :) If you've never heard it, click on the name & it will take you to You Tube to hear it. Great song! I didn't think Jerry had a romantic bone in his body. Even after almost 31 years of marriage I'm still learning new things!

Three days after Valentine's Day it was Jerry's 50th birthday. I wanted to do something special but wasn't sure what to do that wouldn't cost a lot of money. On his birthday the kids all gave him cards and Amber brought him a sugar-free pie she made. It was so yummy! I had made a cake the night before but there were major problems frosting it (don't ask! we did eventually eat it cause it still tasted good). I had candles for the cake that said "Oh No the Big 50!" I put them in Amber's pie instead.

Thursday was Jerry's birthday. On Friday we went to a WI Badger hockey game. This was my first time at one. Not a hockey game, but a Badger game. Even though they lost, we had a lot of fun.

On Saturday I had made plans with all the kids for a dinner out for Jerry's birthday. Since they had all come on his birthday, he didn't suspect anything. He knew me and Josh were taking him out in Madison. But he was surprised when we walked to our table and he saw Amber, Nate, Amy, Louie & Little Louie sitting there! I had been texting with Amy & Amber all day about last minute things. I thought for sure Jerry would figure out something was up but he didn't. We took him to Cheeseburger in Paradise. :) These are the balloons & decorations the kids had on the table, the blinking '50' pin they made him wear and the name tags we were all wearing.

Since both my mom and Jerry's mom have passed, I was thinking of what to do with the only picture I have that has both of them in it. It's from our wedding in 1980. I saw these frames at Michaels and thought it would be perfect. They are layered like a scrapbook page. The pearls and flowers are 3D. It's much prettier than this picture shows.

A couple of days ago we decided to give my sister-in-law a break. We took 4 of the 5 girls she still has at home (3 are grown and Mercy is the other one at home) to Chuck E Cheese for a few hours. Not sure how much pizza they ate but they had a really good time. We live about 30 minutes from them and don't see them as often as we would like so it was nice to spend some time with them. Here are a few pics from that day.


Last but certainly not least, my stitching updates. I've finished stitching the February & March ornaments for the SAL I am doing with Lainey in Scotland. They are all going to be from the Just Cross Stitch ornament issues. We take turns choosing. I chose February & she chose March. Now I need to choose for April. This was the Feb one: And this was the March one:
I decided to stitch something for Ground Hogs Day. It's a freebie that I've had for a while. I think he turned out pretty cute. :)
Here's an update on my Monopoly board. One side done!
And here's an update on Willow. I haven't been working on either one lately cause I've been working on Amber & Nate's wedding piece and also on a surprise for a friend.

I joined a Yahoo group, Oakhaven Designs, that is doing a monthly OWL SAL. They are on March. I haven't had a chance to get any stitched yet but they're small so I shouldn't have too much trouble catching up. I'm anxious to start them though. :)

Well, I've been here way too long and it's time to get dinner ready. Hope everyone has a good weekend. If you stopped by and actually made it this far, (I know, really long!) leave a comment. I love knowing you were here. :)

Busy couple of weeks!

Yep, I'm back! :)

On January 22 Jerry & I decided to go to a Rockford Ice Hogs hockey game in Rockford IL. Amy & Louie gave us money for Christmas for something we wanted. So we decided to use it for tickets. It was so much fun! The only hockey games I have been to were for the Janesville Jets. They play in a much smaller place than Rockford! It was 'Pink in the Rink' night when we went. The ice was even pink! They raised over $10,000 for Breast cancer that night alone. We went early and spent the day in Rockford at the mall and having lunch at Sonic. We don't have a Sonic close to here so it's a treat to go. (love the tots!) We got to the MetroCentre early cause they were giving tshirts away to the first 2500 fans.
We stood outside and froze our butts off for a little while. They must have felt sorry for us and finally opened the doors about 15 minutes early. We couldn't go all the way in but we were inside anyway. :) Here are a few pics of the game. I took tons! :)

For about 2 years now I've been looking for a black tree to use at Halloween. I want to hang cross stitched Halloween ornaments on it. I haven't been able to find one anywhere since I first saw them....and didn't buy one. :p When we were in Rockford I found one at Borders bookstore! It was on clearance after Christmas for $3.99. So now I need to get busy with Halloween ornaments so I'll have something to hang on it when October gets here. :)

The Green Bay Packers will be playing Sunday in the Super Bowl!! I am a Packer fan but Jerry has always claimed to hate them. He's a long time Dallas Cowboys fan and recently a Houston Texans & Tennessee Titans fan. But this year he seemed to be converting a little more with each Packer game. For the last round of playoffs the Packers played the Chicago Bears. Jerry hates the Bears so he had to root for the Packers. After they won that game, they had him. :) We were at Penneys one day looking at the Super Bowl tshirts. We both decided to get one. This is the front & back:
Then I was looking at the jerseys and Jerry said "you can get one if you want". Well, I knew something was up and there must be something he wanted. I never imagined he would want a Packer jersey too! Lol He always claimed if he touched anything Packers it would burn him. :p I knew I could win him over. :) My favorite player is Aaron Rodgers so I got his jersey. (I have never in my life wanted a football jersey...not sure what got into me. I never even used to like football!) Jerry likes Clay Matthews so he got his jersey. :)

Last Saturday night we went to see the Broadway production of 'Mamma Mia'. Amber & Nate gave us a gift certificate to the Overture Center in Madison. The Overture is such a beautiful building. I took a few pics of the inside but they are on my phone & not that great. This was such a good show!!! The Abba music alone makes going to see it worth it! If you ever have a chance to see this one, please go! We went to Applebee's first for dinner. It was a nice 'date night'. :)

Yesterday I received a surprise in the mail from an online friend, Kim Ritchie that lives way up in northern Wisconsin. She knows I am a huge owl fan. She found this cute fabric and made me a pillowcase from it! She made it, but it's actually from Stewie the Pug. He sent it to thank us for taking the time to look for a Packers shirt for him in Janesville & Rockford. (which we didn't find but Kim found one on eBay) This pillowcase is so cute and I love the other fabrics she used too. :)
One thing that cracked me up when I opened the pillowcase was that just a few days before that I had bought a 'kit' to make a tote bag and the fabric was the same!! The kit isn't actually a kit, just the fabric & generic instructions. The fabric is also quilted and reversible but the green side is exactly the same as what Kim sent! Too funny! (the color is a little off but trust me, it's exactly the same)

Lainey and I have decided to stitch 1 ornament a month from the Just Cross Stitch ornament issues 2000-2010. Those are the years that we both have. We each take turns choosing an ornament and both stitch that one. We can use the suggested colors or choose our own. Lainey chose the first one from the 2010 issue. Here is my finished piece along with the fabric I will use to finish it into an ornament. Hopefully in the next few days. :)

Last Monday I didn't have an update pic of Willow cause it would have looked exactly the same as the week before. :p I have one this week but it doesn't look much different. I got more of the (boring) half stitches that make up the background done. Also a little bit of a twig. I think that's about it. I really need to get going on it.

Well, not much else going on here. Oh, except for the Blizzard raging outside! It's not snowing too bad yet but the winds are getting crazy! We got about 4 inches last night and are supposed to get another 12-15 at least tonight. Winds are supposed to be 40-50 mph and visibility zero. They closed school an hour early today and canceled tomorrow. All city offices & the library closed early and are closed tomorrow. Our trash pickup is tomorrow but they don't know yet if it will be canceled or not. We are supposed to get 8 foot snow drifts! Today was chili for lunch. I think dinner needs to be a huge mug of hot chocolate with lots of marshmallows! :) And we were just saying "this winter hasn't been bad. Not too much snow". We had to say something!

Until next time, Stay warm & cozy!
Let me know if you were here. Comments are always appreciated!
{{{hugs}}}

3 posts in 4 days?

What in the world is going on here? I'll tell you what's going on! Every time I post something stitchy on Facebook Kim gets on my butt to post to my blog too! Lol She's right of course. (and probably tired of me complaining about posting to my blog) If I did this all the time I wouldn't run into the problem of needing several hours to look through pics and update my blog. But...everyone seems to like the long blog posts with all the pics. So...do I post short posts often, or do I save it all up to post a few times a year? :p By the way, I think this post means I have posted more in 2011 than I did in all of 2010. Sad, huh? Oh, and Kim...don't think I didn't notice that YOUR last post was 12/21/10!! Lol

On Facebook I post a picture every Monday showing my progress on Willow. (to see the project pic read through the next 2 posts. I'm doing that because it's a big project and I have a tendency to let big projects turn into UFOs. I thought maybe if I have to show my progress every Monday, it will make me more aware of working on it to show progress. So far it's working. So I will try to remember to show it on here each week too. If I forget, I'm sure Kim will remind me! :) This is my progress as of today. It won't look much different then my last pic here on Friday. There was more of a difference on Fb because the previous one was the previous Monday. Next week should show more.:)

Last night & today we got about 6 inches of snow. Ugh...I'm ready for winter to be over. It's 9:30 pm and I'm still waiting to hear the snowplow go down our road. We live right in town! They haven't been by once yet. :p Tomorrow is supposed to be about 22F but Wednesday is supposed to have a high of 9F. Brrrrr... I hope the roads get somewhat cleared before then or we're gonna be driving over hard chunks. It was really windy today too. When Jerry left for work he opened the kitchen door to the breezeway and saw that the wind was blowing the snow right into the breezeway!

Well, I think that's all the important stuff. :) Oh, I just realized that I never showed all the pics of the monthly, year long SAL I did last year with my friend Lainey in Scotland. Well, I have Jan-Nov done. (head hanging in shame) I haven't stitched December yet. But...I don't think Lainey has either! I have mine kitted up, just haven't worked on it yet. :p Maybe I should get that one done before showing them. :)

Until next time! Could be tomorrow the way I'm going. :)
{{{Hugs}}}

Two days in a row!!!

Ok, pick yourselves up off the floor now! This has to be a first for me. Not only two days in a row but this will probably be a record short post for me! I posted this on Facebook and Kim told me I had to post it to my blog now too. Actually she yelled at me to post it! ::sniff sniff:: Lol! I'll get trained sooner or later.

Finally got 'Home of a Needleworker' in a frame! This piece has special meaning to me. It was about 3/4 finished when I broke my wrist & had surgery on it. I sat there looking at this everyday for about 6 wks. It was slow going when I got back to it! It hurt terrible to move my wrist, but I was determined to finish it. Good therapy though. :) Jerry helped me frame it today. I hate framing stuff but I can't afford to have things professionally framed so.... It was a bugger to get straight in the frame! Every time we got one side straight, another was crooked or off center. :p But, here it is and it's on the wall. :)

{{{Hugs}}}

It's a New Year...

...and I think one of my resolutions needs to be to update my blog at least once a month. I have gotten so bad about keeping it current. Facebook is killing my free time! :p But, I know there are quite a few of you that either aren't on Fb or miss updates so for you, here we go. :)

A couple of days before Halloween Amber emailed me to see if I could help her make a couple of Halloween costumes for her & Nate. I said sure, even though I was apparently the only person who had not heard of the Angry Birds. I think it's a game for your phone or iPod or something. :p Well, when she got here they had already marked out the design with masking tape.
We just had to cut it out, cut the white parts to fit and sew it all together. Took way longer than we expected it to. :) Here's Amber modeling the unfinished/unstuffed pieces. :)
After she got home they got the face on one and the next day the face on the other and stuffed both. Here are the finished costumes. I think they turned out great!

At our church bazaar in October we entered several of the mini raffles. The one I really wanted to win was the Family Game Night package. Well, Jerry won so that was good enough. :) Amy & Louie were there when they were picking the names and when they said Jerry's name Little Louie said "Grandpa"? Lol It included lots of games, munchies & gift certificates for Papa Murphys pizza. A few weeks later we had all the kids over for a Family Game Night. Fun! :)

Amber submitted 3 pictures to the Hedburg Public Library in Janesville for judging. They liked her pictures so in February (I think) 2012 she gets to have a solo showing of her photography. These were the 3 pictures she submitted. It was really hard for her to choose cause she wasn't sure what they would like, and she has so many good ones.

With all the painting on the house this fall we almost missed getting to Skelly's Pumpkin Farm. We finally made it the day before Halloween. I think I posted a lot of pics of that last year so I won't bore you with more. I did think this was cute though. Louie found this in the store there. I think it's his motto.

I have been doing some stitching! I finished this I think sometime in October. (a few more pieces below) I still need to get it in a frame. I loved working on this one. It's ABC Lessons from Lizzie Kate.

The day before Thanksgiving break Louie had his winter program at school. I think a lot of schools are trying to get away from the 'Christmas' program. He told us he had a solo, but it turned out that he was just standing up front with about 7 other kids for one of the songs. It was a very cute program. :)

The day after Thanksgiving, while everyone was shopping for Black Friday deals, we were making the rounds to 3 different cemeteries in Janesville (WI), South Beloit (IL) and Rockton (IL). We took wreaths to my mom, Jerry's mom & Jerry's grandparents. Every year I make the wreaths.

Amy has a friend in Minnesota that has a business called Fairytale Frosting She also has an Etsy page and a Facebook page. She makes the most wonderful cookies! Amy asked her to make some owl cookies cause Amy knows I love owls (as much as snowmen but I don't have nearly as many!. I was surprised when this package came in the mail! Aren't they adorable?

Of course it IS winter in Wisconsin and we had the snow to prove it. Not nearly as much as the East coast though! This was our only big storm so far. (knock on wood!) Most of it ended up in our driveway, and we never did find the paper that day. I did get some pretty pictures. Like this one of a cardinal at the bird feeder in the back yard.

Before Christmas Emma & Louie came over to make some cinnamon ornaments. I used a different recipe than I used before and they didn't turn out as well. Maybe next year we'll make new ones. They made gingerbread men and put holes in the hands so they could string them into a garland. Then we put them in the dehydrator for a few days.

For Louie and my nieces I made cross stitched ornaments for Christmas. I used the same chart and just made them in their favorite colors. For my two nieces with a significant other, I just put the year on the back instead of names. Here are some of my nieces with theirs. For those of you that have been following Mercy's story on my blog, that's her sitting on her mom's lap. :)

Jerry & I were in Penneys one day and I saw a Green Bay Packer snowman. It was on sale for $17.99 and I had $15 in coupons. There was no way I was going to NOT get it for $2.99! I am a Packer fan, Jerry is not. He told me that letting me buy that snowman shows me how much he loves me. :)
It didn't take long for the kitty to become a fan too.

On Christmas Eve we went to church. I love going that evening cause the beginning is candlelight while we sing Silent Night. Little Louie sang in the children's choir but he was too far across the church to get a picture without everyone seeing me.

After church the kids all came to our house for dinner and opening presents. That way Little Louie can stay home on Christmas day with his Santa presents. Speaking of Santa, here are a few. :) Jerry, Lil Louie, Louie & Josh
Since the University of Wisconsin Badgers were going to play in the Rose Bowl this year, we got everyone a shirt for Christmas (except Josh, he didn't want one) Here they are posing, Nate, Louie, Amber, Lil Louie & Amy. Can you tell by the poses and 'spirit fingers' that both of my girls were cheerleaders in high school? Lol! And then, after the madness ends, all that's left are the empty gift bags. Ready to be packed away till next year.

This is Amber & Nate on New Year's Eve. I stole it from her Facebook page. I don't get as many pics of them on here cause when we do things it's usually with Amy & Louie. So I thought I would add this one.

I wanted a quick finish one day so I decided to stitch this little blackwork owl. He's actually 2 different colors of green but you can't tell in the pic. I think he's cute. :)
Right now I'm working on a piece for my living room wall. I'm hoping to get it finished, framed & up on the wall before summer. It's an old DMC chart that I think I sent for from a magazine. I think it was free but it has a bar code on it so it may have been one that I had to pay $1 for or something. It's called Willow. This is the pic from the front of the pamphlet.
As of today, I have this much done.

On our Humane Society's Facebook page they asked for people to make fleece kitty beds for in the cages. Since I've made fleece blankets before and these were just mini ones, and since all of our animals have come from the HS I decided to make some. We went to get some fleece & I had enough for 18 beds (blankets). I used some of the leftover pieces to make some catnip toys to take along. We also had 9 garbage bags of aluminum cans in the garage. We stuffed them in the car and stopped at the recycling center cause it was on the way. We got $18 for the cans, added $2 and were able to give the Humane Society a $20 donation. :) They were really happy for all of it. :) Here are the beds.

Well, I think that's it for now. If you hung in there, thank you! Remember, comments are always appreciated. :) It's midnight and I just realized I forgot to eat dinner. :p I'm sitting here alone cause Jerry is working and Josh is with friends. I've spent the whole evening going through pictures & writing this blog. I'm hungry! Lol

Until next time, Hugs!