Who's Afraid of the 13th?

Yesterday's library stitch-in was ill attended. Was it paraskavedekatriaphobia, we wondered? One woman, whose sister was born on Friday the 13th, reported that she claims she hasn't had a lot of bad Friday the 13ths, but an awful lot of bad Thursday the 12ths.

I almost finished the threadkeep by noon (our regular ending time). I had to wait a few more hours, but another one on the finishing pile! Yay, me!

More good news! Mabel will be coming home this weekend. She talked to our stitching librarian Thursday who reported that Mabel had been reading--and loved!--the book I recommended for her last time we were together. Another librarian had given her a book "that was all rapes and violence." It didn't look that bad from the cover, but I suggested she might like The Shop on Blossom Street. They didn't have it in large print so our librarian gave her A Good Yarn. Our library delivers to "shut ins," so Mabel will have more knitting adventures to delve into soon. I hope to see her back when I return from Maine.

On an entirely different, but still happy note, Sissy--who once complained she had been "dating for 20 years and was tired of it"--got engaged last night. Her boyfriend gathered as much of the family as he could and proposed in front of everyone. I think they'll be quite happy together, and I am over the moon with joy for my sister. I'm on the look out for an appropriate wedding sampler, so if you have an ideas, I'm listening. Her place is pretty stylish; I might say elegant traditional.

A Few Minutes on Friday

I was back at the library today with my old ladies. Happily Mabel is alive. She is not well, however. As of Sunday, she was still in rehab after a trip to the hospital for dehydration. The weather we have been having is such a killer (literally) because old people don't get thirsty in the heat like us young folks. So please, remind your mother or grandmother to drink at least 6 glasses of water every day*. Please note, if your grandmother, like mine, thinks coffee counts, slip some more water in her glass when she's not looking.

I have also had a request. One of the women can no longer cross stitch and needs a ghost stitcher. Unfortunately, she cannot afford to hire one. She is willing to barter. Let me know if you are interested, and I can hook you up.

We also had a return visit from one of the high school girls who sometimes stitches with the old ladies. I've seen her walking around town when I walk the dog. Today the old ladies especially delighted in how much she was talking--I guess she used to be quieter. She's a junior now; their baby's all grown up. Today she was writing a Buddhist prayer on her jeans with fabric paint. It looked amazingly cool. But once she left we had to delve into the question of her Buddhism. Sometimes old people can be remarkably close-minded.

I got back to work on the threadkeep. I'm almost ready for the pulled double backstitch that is the beginning of the end.

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Here's a seemingly random question: sympathy notes. We haven't written the ones we should have written (since May). Is it too late? Do we apologize for being slackers? At least two of the three notes go to people I'm not that close to, fwiw.

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*that's two words on purpose; I'm growing increasingly annoyed at the English speaking world's inability to distinguish "every day" from "everyday."

Threadkeep

The third project to make the trip to England was the Folk Art Threadkeep. I did a lot of work on it during the first week of our trip. I finished the willow trees while watching Agatha Christie mysteries with my MIL. Back in September 2008, it looked like this.

Unfortunately, I put the year on when I started. Maybe I can sneak the finish date onto it somewhere.

Camp Wannasew

Now with more wine coolers and beer...

My trip to Tulsa, which started painfully early on Thursday morning--my cab arrived at 4:15 for a 6:05 flight--is over much too soon. I was in denial until I stepped off the plane in Philadelphia, and even today my hands reject typing and long for the feel of fabric.

When bestpal and I first went to camp in 2003, I didn't even think we'd make it through the whole weekend. (I used to have a fear of the south.) I never imagined I'd still be attending, especially not "by myself." I've made new friends, so I can hardly say I'm going by myself when bestpal doesn't come along. Our original group of six dwindled to only two this year, but I think we may have managed not to alienate everyone we met to make new friends.

If last year's camp motto was "it's all about freedom," this year's started out as "that's part of the charm." We decided that the seemingly inevitable missing flosses and people getting lost on the way to Amish dinner was going to be a fun part of the camp experience. And then? No missing flosses. No lost campers. Not to say that camp was not fun. There was booze! There was raucous laughter! There was nude pillow fighting! (Not really.) Camp was down to 18, but let me tell you how much quieter it was in the halls while we were trying to sleep. Now if 18 people can manage to speak quietly in the bathrooms and not let their doors slam, what is it about the other 20 people who can't manage it? Let them stay home, I say.

Our projects were great! We got to choose a Quaker inspired sampler (Quaker Virtues or Quaker Christmas) and a whole skein of Belle Soie silk (is that redundant?) to design our own set of stitching smalls including a scissor fob, biscornu, and a scissor case. Maybe this year's theme should have been it's all about freedom. I chose "blue heaven" which is sort of periwinkle. You can see the results below. I didn't finish any projects this year but I'm really happy with what I have so far. This is a first. I think I was shooting my mouth too much. But there were new people to hear my boring old stories. The other project was Lizzie*Kate's limited edition kit, My Country. We got both a Silver Needle version (fuzzy fibers, large count fabric) and the original kit. I'm thinking of doing the latter for my cousin's kid as a birth sampler. Our helpful input was heeded and next year spring campers won't be making anything Easter or patriotic. Yay! I have only kept one of each; I usually give the finished Easter projects to my sister and the patriotic to my grandmother; they both appreciate them more than I do. My grandmother will just have to suck it up.

My choices for fob (acorn, monogram), biscornu, and the beginnings of her scissor case.

I bought a ton of stash. Way more than I planned, but I still spent less than the entry fee for a national chess tournament.

Not pictured: fabrics, flosses. It was the fabrics that put me over the edge.

Our goody bags were full of freebie charts, flosses, cookies, and Vera Bradley. I'm not a fan of chintz but I was really excited because we got a pair of VB slippers. I needed new slippers, and the pattern (Kensington) is attractive.

I worked on Hillside Samplings Threadkeeper on the plane and on Thursday night. Here's what it looked like before.

I finished Rose Bunnie by Liberty Street Designs on the plane. Stitched on the called-for linen with substitutions (GAST Harvest Basket for the bunny, Weeks Carrot for the carrot, and white whisper for the tail).

I had been thinking that we might want to do something different next year--it's our sixth camp in Tulsa and it's more difficult to get to Tulsa from PHL (I was up and down three times both ways). But I had so much fun this year, I can't wait for spring!

Dizz-ay

I'm home sick again today. I got up to go to work and took a shower, which was enough to totally wipe me out. Just now, I took some photos for the end of month report and now I am swirly-dizzy, and not in the good way.

My goals for the month were to finish-finish two projects and to stick to my rotation. That didn't work out so well. I didn't do the finishing, and I sort of abandoned the rotation (below) for all kinds of reasons.

Monday: Scissors Sampler Box completed, photo here

followed by Folk Art Threadkeep shown above
Tuesday: Anna's Bird progress photo below

Wednesday: Emerald Mermaid progress photo below
Thursday: Apple Sampler see progress here
Friday: Tall Flowers Sampler completed, see photo here
Saturday: marquoir
Sunday: marquoir I only worked on this a couple of times, but you've seen my most recent progress
Traveling piece: Monthly Mania I finished June and July

For March:

Monday: sewing class

Tuesday: Anna's Bird

Wednesday: beading class

Thursday: Apple Sampler

Friday: Emerald Mermaid

Saturday: marquoir

Sunday: marquoir

Traveling piece: Rose Bunnie

I'm going to blog every day in March as well. Lists! Woohoo!

Wonky

The dude and I stayed home today and rested. I was feeling well enough to eat lunch, but now not so much. Must need to get back on the couch. I've been working on this. Sorry for the wonky scan.