List #5: 1991

After I kvetched about the computer issues, I sat holding the a/c cord into the computer, adjusting it every five seconds to keep it mostly plugged in. First, I retrieved the tax documents that were on the old computer so I can run Turbo Tax 2007. {Priorities are straight!} Then I started scanning pictures. Things were going so swimmingly, I went to get myself a glass of water. {So cocky!} And the computer was done. So I left it overnight, and it seemed to juice back up. You can see that I have managed to get some photos up. The lengths I go to for you people! My big plan is to bring in the old computer on Sunday. Or to convince my husband to get the new printer-scanner-copier-fax that is compatible with the new brain. I'd put my money on no printing-scanning-copying-faxing until the old computer comes back from the doctor.

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• A Wedding Sampler Carolina Cross Stitch, for my cousin. The first one to get married in the family.
• Christmas Angels Laurie Craven—either in the America's Best Cross Stitch or Better Homes and Garden's Seasons in Cross stitch; they're packed up in the basement. My mom keeps this up year round. Can you see that big stripe of 504 that got stitched in the hill that called for 503? That's when I learned the value of good lighting! But I left it in because only god is perfect. Or something.

• April: Peony baskets, Quilts in a Day or Two. Stitched for my mother's birthday when I was poor and living in NYC.
• April: Double Wedding Ring, Quilts in a Day or Two, Canterbury Designs. Stitched for my parents’ 25th anniversary party. A horrible boyfriend drove me up to NH for their party. I kept putting off writing my toast and at the last minute I stood up and said, "To a couple who has been together through fat and thin," a reference to the fluctuating weight of both parents. Everyone laughed so I was off the hook.
• Christmas 1991: Irish Chain Quilt, Quilts in a Day or Two. A gift for my paternal grandmother.
• Christmas 1991: Grandmother’s Fan, Quilts in a Day or Two. A gift for my grandmother you all know and adore. She was going to throw it away when she moved from her trailer to an apartment, so my aunt rescued it.

• Christmas 1991: Bear Sweater, Leisure Arts Book One—my first waste canvas project. I used 14 ct instead of 8ct—the design was small and stiff, but it went through the washer okay!

I loved that book Quilts in a Day or Two. I wonder what happened to it...that may have been sent on my first disastrous round robin. Take a lesson, people.

List #4 Stitching, the Early Years, 1990

Now with 100% more pictures
Wherein things don't always go to plan...I know none of my lists so far have been blog relevant and tonight things were going to change. I had taken out my book "A Stitch in Time: A Treasury of Works Crafted by Me" to show you some of the early projects. Digital cameras hadn't been invented back in those days, so I was going to scan some of the photos that I glued into the book--it's okay, scrapbooking hadn't been invented yet. (Not true, but it wasn't all photo corners and appropriate adhesives back then.) You know about the new camera and computer. Well tonight I went to load the software for the all-in-one printer-scanner-copier-fax, so that I could scan the photos for your viewing pleasure. My new computer has the new brain which is incompatible with the old peripherals. Grrr. I'd use the old computer except the battery is now dead and the reason we got the new computer is that there is something wrong with the hole the a/c adapter slides into, and it won't accept electricity. So, until I figure something out, no photos of these old projects. Which was really the point. Sigh...

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I began stitching in 1989 when best pal got married the first time. {It's all okay, she has her best husband now.} I started the stamped piece to learn how to cross stitch and the wedding sampler was my second piece. On 22-ct fabric over one. Because it's not brain surgery.

• January: Welcome sampler, stamped. Stitched for my aunt as a Christmas gift.





• August: Wedding sampler, America’s Best Cross Stitch, Maureen LoPresti.





• New Hampshire, Sue Hillis. A gift for my father, I added two green beer bottles where my father has/had his businesses.



• My Family and Me, kit by Alma Lynne, a gift for my mother. Amish dolls! How late 80s



• Christmas 1990: A Christmas Sampler from Leisure Arts Spirit of Cross Stitch, book 2, stitched for my aunt.




• Christmas 1990: For the Sportsman: Fish, David Sweet. This was in Leisure Arts: The Magazine. (Remember the days when LA had two cross stitch magazines? I subscribed to that and Celebrations in Cross Stitch.). It's a fisherman with a fish head, and the caption reads, "They said this would happen!" It hung in my uncle's office for years. Now it has pride of place behind his bar right by the giant salmon that won him the Winnipesaukee Derby.


• Christmas 1990: Hearts by Mary Scott in Leisure Arts. Stitched for my sister. I mounted it in a stained box and got stain on the piece (groan!). I restitched it.

I hope I can get this computer situation figured out because this is much more interesting when you can see the pictures.

List #3 How Bizarre, How Bizarre

Frankly, I am a bit surprised at the aspersions cast on my reading! I don't know where this list came from but it does weigh heavily with Oprah book club selections and science fiction rather than the kinds of books I enjoy reading. I may not have read the two Dickens novels on here, but I have read four others; is that good enough for you? I am a proud product of progressive English literary edumication, one that moved away from canonical literature so quiz me on the Caribbean lit I know. But don't get hung up on the fact that I haven't read Anna Karenina. Actually, I did read a paragraph or so of that in my Russian class in Russian. [raspberry] (I have had to edit the list slightly; I missed a couple the first go round.)

One of the series of lists that I planned for this month was a list of older projects from 1990 until I started this blog because I don't think I've shared that many (if any) with you. Unfortunately, I didn't have a chance to scan the photos to accompany those. Instead I offer you a list I made while I was sick on the couch watching loads of Travel Channel.

Things Andrew Zimmern has eaten that I have too:

• Haggis—I liked it, but then I had it battered and fried at a fish shop in Berwyck. I’m pretty sure that it wasn’t just the frying that did it. It’s just meat parts and meal. They do that in other cultures too.
• Deep fried pickles--I can’t wait ‘til Tulsa!
• Cracklings—I really should have been southern!
• Conch
• Chopped chicken liver—this is a bizarre food? It’s my favorite thing from the deli!
• Gefilte fish
• Sea cucumber—the dude and I can’t agree on this. We used to have it in a soup in Chinatown. He said it was unlikeable. I hardly remember it being in the soup!
• Blood sausage—Zimmern had black pudding in the UK and I think he’s had other types of blood sausages in other places. I used to have it all the time; it’s a French Canadian staple. Very different from black pudding, though, which I have also eaten. The canuck version is much more like a blood bratwurst. Black pudding contains meal and is more like an American sausage patty.

Things Andrew Zimmern has eaten that I want to try:

• Turducken (which I don't think is bizarre at all. I've had turkey, duck, and chicken and find them all pretty innocuous)
• Boudin
• Baby eels at Casa Botín
• Criadillas--and other testicles, I love organ meat.
• Grasshoppers
• Scorpion
• Cha Ca at Cha Ca La Vong

Travel Channel tells me I'm daring. Are you?

List #2: Sunday Books

I have a book group meeting today (Food: The History of Taste) so I thought this book meme would be an appropriate list for today.

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Look at the list of (100) books below. Bold the ones you’ve read. Italicize the ones you want to read. Leave blank the ones that you aren’t interested in. (Movies don’t count.)

1. The Da Vinci Code (Dan Brown)
2. Pride and Prejudice (Jane Austen)
3. To Kill A Mockingbird (Harper Lee)
4. Gone With The Wind (Margaret Mitchell)
5. The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King (Tolkien)
6. The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (Tolkien)
7. The Lord of the Rings: Two Towers (Tolkien)
8. Anne of Green Gables (L.M. Montgomery)
9. Outlander (Diana Gabaldon)
10. A Fine Balance (Rohinton Mistry)
11. Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (Rowling)
12. Angels and Demons (Dan Brown)
13. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (Rowling)
14. A Prayer for Owen Meany (John Irving)
15. Memoirs of a Geisha (Arthur Golden)
16. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (Rowling)
17. Fall on Your Knees (Ann-Marie MacDonald)
18. The Stand (Stephen King)
19. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (Rowling)
20. Jane Eyre (Charlotte Bronte)
21. The Hobbit (Tolkien)
22. The Catcher in the Rye (J.D. Salinger)
23. Little Women (Louisa May Alcott)
24. The Lovely Bones (Alice Sebold)
25 . Life of Pi (Yann Martel)
26. The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (Douglas Adams)
27. Wuthering Heights (Emily Bronte)
28. The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe (C. S. Lewis)
29. East of Eden (John Steinbeck)
30. Tuesdays with Morrie (Mitch Albom)
31. Dune (Frank Herbert)
32. The Notebook (Nicholas Sparks)
33. Atlas Shrugged (Ayn Rand)
34. 1984 (Orwell)
35. The Mists of Avalon (Marion Zimmer Bradley)
36. The Pillars of the Earth (Ken Follett)
37. The Power of One (Bryce Courtenay)
38. I Know This Much is True (Wally Lamb)
39. The Red Tent (Anita Diamant)
40. The Alchemist (Paulo Coelho)
41. The Clan of the Cave Bear (Jean M. Auel)
42. The Kite Runner (Khaled Hosseini)
43. Confessions of a Shopaholic (Sophie Kinsella)
44. The Five People You Meet In Heaven (Mitch Albom)
45. Bible
46. Anna Karenina (Tolstoy)
47. The Count of Monte Cristo (Alexandre Dumas)
48. Angela’s Ashes (Frank McCourt)
49. The Grapes of Wrath (John Steinbeck)
50. She’s Come Undone (Wally Lamb)
51. The Poisonwood Bible (Barbara Kingsolver)
52. A Tale of Two Cities (Dickens)
53. Ender’s Game (Orson Scott Card)
54. Great Expectations (Dickens)
55. The Great Gatsby (Fitzgerald)
56. The Stone Angel (Margaret Laurence)
57. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (Rowling)
58. The Thorn Birds (Colleen McCullough)
59. The Handmaid’s Tale (Margaret Atwood)
60. The Time Traveller’s Wife (Audrey Niffenegger)
61. Crime and Punishment (Fyodor Dostoyevsky)
62. The Fountainhead (Ayn Rand)
63. War and Peace (Tolstoy)
64. Interview With The Vampire (Anne Rice)
65. Fifth Business (Robertson Davis)
66. One Hundred Years Of Solitude (Gabriel Garcia Marquez)
67. The Sisterhood of the Travelling Pants (Ann Brashares)
68. Catch-22 (Joseph Heller)
69. Les Miserables (Hugo)
70. The Little Prince (Antoine de Saint-Exupery)
71. Bridget Jones’ Diary (Fielding)
72. Love in the Time of Cholera (Marquez)
73. Shogun (James Clavell)
74. The English Patient (Michael Ondaatje)
75. The Secret Garden (Frances Hodgson Burnett)
76. The Summer Tree (Guy Gavriel Kay)
77. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (Betty Smith)
78. The World According To Garp (John Irving)
79. The Diviners (Margaret Laurence)
80. Charlotte’s Web (E.B. White)
81. Not Wanted On The Voyage (Timothy Findley)
82. Of Mice And Men (Steinbeck)
83. Rebecca (Daphne DuMaurier)
84. Wizard’s First Rule (Terry Goodkind)
85. Emma (Jane Austen)
86. Watership Down(Richard Adams)
87. Brave New World (Aldous Huxley)
88. The Stone Diaries (Carol Shields)
89. Blindness (Jose Saramago)
90. Kane and Abel (Jeffrey Archer)
91. In The Skin Of A Lion (Ondaatje)
92. Lord of the Flies (Golding)
93. The Good Earth (Pearl S. Buck)
94. The Secret Life of Bees (Sue Monk Kidd)
95. The Bourne Identity (Robert Ludlum)
96. The Outsiders (S.E. Hinton)
97. White Oleander (Janet Fitch)
98. A Woman of Substance (Barbara Taylor Bradford)
99. The Celestine Prophecy (James Redfield)
100. Ulysses (James Joyce)

I guess I'm not very interested in the books that other people enjoy?

List #1

Patti tagged me and it works out that she wants me to make a list! Perfect for day one of NaBloPoMo March.

Here are the rules:
1. Once you are tagged, link back to the person who tagged you
2. Post the Rules on your blog
3. Post 7 weird or random facts about yourself on your blog
4. Tag 7 people and link them
5. Comment on their blog to let them know they have been tagged

Here are the facts:
1. I know a rocket scientist and a brain surgeon. This makes for lots of opportunities for the Simpson’s joke, “It’s not rocket science; it’s brain surgery.”
2. The dude and I sometimes speak an English-American-Scots dialect all our own. Sometimes we can’t tell what idioms other people don’t understand because we’ve forgotten which are English and which are American. (You can always tell the Scots.)
3. I prefer beverages at room temperature.
4. After a pick up game between the cheerleaders and the Pop Warner team the football coach told his wife, the cheerleading coach, that he wanted me on the team. (I had straight armed one of the star players.)
5. I learned how to shoot a gun before I learned to ride a bicycle. (This is probably only interesting to people who didn't grow up in the country.)
6. I don't understand people who eat clam strips. That is just so wrong.
7. A woman from Tennessee once told me that, for a northerner, I had a surprising appreciation of southern delicacies.

I'm not tagging anyone. If you want to do it, go for it.

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!

Beading Boot Camp II

Here's my "Not an Illusion" necklace. I used vintage beads, small periwinkle beads (it featured in this necklace too) and some pretty expensive blue Tiger's eye. I always seem to make the most expensive jewelry in the class. But they told us for next week to bring our leftover beads; we're making a fringe bracelet.
And the rest of the schedule...
Week 3: regal chain necklace
Week 4: chain drop earrings
Week 5: knotting II

Sorry, my neck model is ill and even her neck looks sick. It's a nasty sore throat and body aches.

Homespun Elegance Fans

Fans of Homespun Elegance, and cross-stitch fans in general, will be happy to see that Sandra Sullivan was interviewed in her local paper. It's mostly about being an area business woman, but there are fun bits of trivia too.

I was cleaning up my google reader, and I realized that there are a lot of blogs I don't know by their names. Oh, that's her blog. Others haven't formed enough of a personality in my head that I can remember them. Some probably never will, unfortunately. I also realized there's a lot of crap out there. And there are people who haven't blogged in millenia who I miss and I keep on the reader just in case they come back, even though their blogs have been taken over by spammers...


I'm starting my beading class tonight. You know what that means...

Traveling Man

The good part of traveling and being stuck in airports for five extra hours is that it gives me more time to stitch. {You have to see the bright side.}

I managed to finish July:

Monthly Mania
Heart in Hand Needleart
Stitched on 28 count antique ivory
with the recommended flosses.

I started Rose Bunnie. I realized that I had only kitted a few of my traveling projects (Monthly Manias), and that I would finish the last of them on this trip. So I grabbed a smallish project. It’s so cute.

Rose Bunnie
Liberty Street Designs
Stitched on 32-count hand-painted La Fern Liberty Fabric
With lots of color substitutions: WDW Carrot for the carrot; GAST Harvest Basket for the bunny; DMC 3740 instead of Anchor 894/DMC 224—the DMC was too shell pink to match with “light wineberry” (DMC 778). I’m going to use white Whisper instead of light brown for the tail because that’s the kind of bunny that roams these parts.

I also had a little time to work on the Apple Sampler.

Another good part about traveling (outside the airports) is that you have the opportunity to meet people who you never would have known existed if it weren’t for stitching and blogging. I got to meet Jacque. I don’t know how it works that I have enjoyed meeting so many different blogging stitchers IRL. For me, the real wonder is that I have truly enjoyed it. Meeting new people is sort of difficult for me. I never know what to say…but you wouldn’t have guessed it Saturday night! What’s really sort of a marvel is that all we all have in common is making little exes on fabric. And yet…

I called Jacque after we got to our hotel and we made dinner plans. She took the dude and me out to a nice Italian place where I ate as many vegetables as they would give me (you have to do this when your main goal is to eat lots of Q). The dude—why he lets me drag him out with so many strangers I’ll never know—enjoyed himself too. Then we tried to find some nightlife—there was lots of it, but not so much parking. We ended up back in our hotel in the Drum Room, where Frank Sinatra used to hang when he was in town. Jacque promised to come to Philadelphia so that we can take her (and Mark!) out to dinner. Note to self: research Philadelphia nightlife. (We are so lame.) Thanks again, Jacque, and do let me know when you’re coming to town! Full report on the Q here.

New (to me) Blog!

Marie Claire Idées, one of my favorite magazines, has a blog. {via CRAFT Magazine} If you're like me and your French could be better, they still have all those pretty pretty pictures that make you wish you were more creative, or more French, or both.

Thanks for your comments about Tall Flowers. I plan on framing it, probably in a plain black frame to echo the blanket stitching.

I have a full report on the trip to KC, just need to upload some photos.

Oh, Fudge

The weather, though not as severe as expected, forced Sissy to postpone our night out. This works out well for us since we are heading to KC to eat barbecue tomorrow (and I'll get to meet Jacque--if all works out with babysitting). We're leaving first thing in the morning--actually, even before first thing. So I don't have Sissy's analysis of the fudge, but the dude and my boss have both raved about memere's recipe. I think you can tell from the above comparison shot that her recipe (on the right, the chocolate) is drier. I can't describe the texture, almost gritty, soft and yet hard.

Her recipe:
1 can evaporated milk
1 lb brown sugar
1 lb confectioner's sugar
piece of butter, size of an egg yellow
2 1/2 heaping t Hershey cocoa
2 1/2 heaping t of marshmallow
3/4 cup walnuts
Put milk, sugar, and butter in a deep pan. Stir continuously until you can drop a bit into cold water and it's kind of caramel-ly in about 1/2 hour. Keep stirring. Then put in marshmallow, stir, put in nuts, stir. Pour into butter greased pan.

Here's my interpretation: butter, 1 T; about 4 teaspoons of cocoa; and I used marshmallow fluff for the marshmallow because this isn't the kind of fudge that has marshmallow chunks in it. I put the pan on medium heat because who knows what it is supposed to be. At about 20 minutes, there was a definite change in how it felt to stir it and lo, and behold, when I dropped some into cold water it didn't just seem "caramel-ly," it tasted just like caramel. I put the cocoa in when I put in the marshmallow, because it doesn't say when to add that. (I love that kind of recipe the best!) I probably should have taken it all off the heat at that point, and with future attempts I probably will. You should probably switch to a whisk when you put in the fluff because it's a lot of work to get the lumpy marshmallow incorporated with a wooden spoon. I think it was smart to use a glass pan, but grease it within an inch of its life because this stuff is hard to get out of the pan!

The recipe on the left, came from my friend, DD. You'll have to ask her.

May I Present

In the Tall Flowers!
Liberty Street Designs
32 count starlight pink hand painted fabric, Liberty Street Designs
recommended DMC

You may remember that this piece caught the attention of a little boy on public transportation. Tonight, a four year old who told me that being married was "nasty" (I think because it involves kissing) was very taken with this piece. We were trying to decide what the beads on the leaves symbolized; we went with bugs, even though they "live in the grass." Even after he told me how gross kissing girls was, he said to his dad, "Look!" and then he plopped himself in the seat next to me. (Apparently he's not so keen on girls but he loves him some older women!) They are going to have their hands full with him in ten years.

I made the fudge tonight. If Sissy gives it her stamp of approval, I'll post the recipe. I will warn you, though, it's one of those family recipes that includes precise measurements like "butter about the size of an egg yellow." (An egg yellow? What's wrong with the word yolk?)

Hold onto Your Hats

I've been challenged, sort of, to do the NaBloPoMo thing in March because the theme is lists. You know I love me a good list. I started trying to think of 21 blog-relevant lists. I know March has 31 days, but I thought I'd give myself weekends off from the relevancy thing. When I got to about 15 ideas, I decided you deserved for me to blog in list format in March. Aren't you lucky?

I haven't been following my rotation because I am two leaves away from finishing Tall Flowers. And I plan to finish it very soon. But I've started this exercise regimen and I have fewer minutes to stitch each evening. And there's no point in showing it to you now and then again when the only difference will be two leaves.

Sissy has made reservations for Friday at Rae. Check out the prices on that menu. She thinks pretty highly of herself! At any rate, her message ended, "Gifts are required...I mean optional.....no, nope, required. " Man, I was almost off the hook.

February 22

Sissy's birthday is Friday. Friday. How did it get to be late February? I am no closer to finishing the Amy Butler Weekender Travel Bag than I was before Christmas. We're having dinner in the city with her on Friday, so I have to bring her present to work with me that day. I have three nights. What can I make in three nights? I think I have an idea. I just hope someone has the recipe...

Okay, I just wrote to my great aunt to see if she has memere's (my great-grandmother) fudge recipe. That stuff was gritty with sugar, but Sissy's favorite candy is circus peanuts... Memere made mean fudge and even better brownies. She called all the great grandchildren "brownie" or "cookie." I always thought she just didn't know our names. I may have been right: she was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease in 1987 or so. In the 1970s she drove a pristine forest green bug with white leather interior. Yes, I said pristine and white in the same sentence. This is the same woman who helped my grandmother with her cleaning every week for as long as I can remember. She ironed everything: sheets, underwear, money... Another thing I remember about her was how she used to draw on an upper lip with orange lipstick. I photographed her 75th birthday party with my brand new black and white polaroid camera. (I'm so old.) She'd have been 108 this month and I haven't thought about her in a very long time. Thanks.

If I find the recipe, I'll happily share.

Puppy!

Here is the puppy quilt that I made for my niece. It was a very successful present. She didn't shriek like she did over the stocking I made, but she did jump up and give Uncle Dude a big hug. Clearly, she has no idea which side the bread is buttered on. But that runs in the family; when sissy was little, she always flipped her toast* as she brought it up to her mouth and ate butter side down.

I used the directions that Wendy over at Knit and Tonic shared. In the future, I would make one change: Some of the squares fell apart in the washing machine. However, the edge was double stitched--straight stitch then zigzag over it. It held much better than the straight stitch. (I spent a lot of time repairing holes after I washed it.) Even better, the zigzag looks cute! So next time, I'd do a zigzag stitch instead. The most exciting part for me is that the squares on the back actually match up square. I must be getting the hang of this sewing thing. (It was a good idea to back it in horses, XMaryX, but this is a self backing "quilt"...)

Good news, CinDC found her floss box. Thanks for taking the quiz. It seems I should have added another option, the question my mother always asked when I couldn't find something: "did you try looking with your eyes open?" And you wonder how I got to be a bitch?

Can I make 31 lists? Surely. Could I make 31 blog-relevant lists? That might push me off the deep-end. I'll think about it, Diane.

*Or blueberry toasties, remember those from Howard Johnson's available in your grocer's frozen food aisle?

Threads from Down Under

I received my threads from Sharon B on Friday. Very exciting. Saturday we bought a camera and new computer, so I can show you all the fibrous goodness.

I have ideas for the green and blue wool and chenille. But I'm afraid this is going to be like a lot of my ideas...something you'll see eventually.

But aren't these great? Hand-dyed by Sharon herself! Lucky me.

Thanks again, Sharon!

Can I Really Talk about My Niece and Pamela Anderson in the Same Post?

If you ever have to use the word "classy" to describe something, it never is. And I don't care if it is your outfit, Pamela Anderson stripping, a brass objet, a dame; if you use the word classy to describe it, it most certainly lacks it. Trust me: I'm from New England, and I went to women's college.

I stitched a dot on Anna's bird last night before I packed it in at 9:30. (It's okay, the doctor said I couldn't um, you know, what every other married person in America did last night.) But the meds have kicked so I should be able to stay up like a normal person. This is good because I have to finish the blanket. Today is the little one's 7th. Not so little; I still ended up feeding her lunch today--she gets so distracted--when we went to Jones. She had the Thanksgiving Dinner. I had calamari salad. (Just for a full report mom had grilled cheese and tomato soup, and Lala had chicken parm with plain pasta on the side. The dog pretended to eat the bread and some fries, but I saw him eyeballing the turkey.) This time the green glow is from the banquette and shag carpet.

Brain Dump

Random things:

• I have an infection which you don't want to hear about (Rhymes with TMI.) and is making me cranky and sleepy. Last night I went to bed at 9:00. Sorry, Michelle, no mermaid.


• My bil (really cousin's husband but that takes so long to write) keeps hounding us to come up with inventions.


• One Saturday morning while we were lying awake in bed, the dude asked me what kind of a restaurant I would open. After much thought, I went with a meatloaf restaurant called Loaf. Because it's short for meatloaf and who doesn't like to loaf? My bil was completely perplexed by that last part. He really needs to learn how to relax.
• The dude's restaurant was a pie restaurant--he's a huge pot pie fan. And he likes the idea of eating pie and then more pie. We're calling it Pie Hole. We're not sure if we should add a "Shut Your" or a "Fill Your" to that. So for now...Pie Hole.
• In coming up with the meatloaf restaurant, and the meatlof of last week, (which you have to try--and with that particular brand of soy sauce) I realized it's really hard to get the first slice of meatloaf out, so my invention: a springform meatloaf pan. (Of course, you could just turn the meatloaf out of the regular pan before you hack away at it but that would be inefficient in a restaurant.)
• The airedale (over there --->) is my cousin. His name is Jameson, after the whisky. When I put up the "blog for choice" thumbnail, I lost the self-portrait I had up there. I found this picture on my drive. I stuck him in because the photo totally shows his personality. I'm not really a terrier person; they have too much energy (see above). Labs are my dog of choice.
• At Naked Chocolate today the line was almost out the door. What was I thinking? Then some joker says, "you'd think it was Valentine's Day or something."

• There's a horrible greenish hue being cast in my office (and the photo was taken with a phone). My favorites are the truffles with the word "naked" on them--how is that not a brilliant gift?

Good Juju

I'm totally off the rotation this week: working on the quilt for my niece and making Valentine's day cards for my grandmothers--still trying to write to them every month! And our home computer is having "issues" which are stressing me out. I told the dude to go buy a new one last weekend, but he'd rather just yell at this one. Why not? So it takes ages to get two photos onto the blog. Anyway it's sapping my low energy.

However, CinDC blames my lost poll for sweeping her box of floss off into the great wide open. Let's help her find it.

Promises, promises

I promised you a photo of the marquoir , but I have to admit that I didn't work on it at all this weekend. I spent much of Saturday working on a present for my niece's birthday. It's a rag quilt made from puppy flannel fabrics. Of course, I bought this fabric in December, and they're changing her room decor from puppies to horses (her other obsession) this month. Of course. We're also going to (God help me) take her to Strasburg when Thomas comes.

Then the dude called in one of his Christmas presents--a monthly trip to a new-to-us restaurant that was packaged as "around the world on your stomach, without ever leaving home." We went to Vietnam on Saturday night. There's a Vietnamese place of that name in Philly's Chinatown. We started in the third floor 40's style lounge. The dude thought it reminded him of "that movie...the one with Michael Caine." "The Quiet American," I said. Then we noticed it was playing in an endless loop on the flatscreen. We were sitting in a location where we could mostly ignore it because it's one thing to sit in Philadelphia's Chinatown in a 40's style French-colonial-inspired Vietnamese lounge, and quite another to sit on a fake Quiet American movie set while you watch the movie in an endless loop. We had some delicious food. So no stitching on Saturday.

Then on Sunday, I went to an alumnae club craft group. It was mostly knitters but one woman was spinning cotton and I stitched on Tall Flowers. I couldn't bring the marquoir and my travel piece is just cute, not very impressive. So I brought something that I hoped was funky to encourage people to see the possiblities of cross-stitch. It was a great group. Two students showed up (we met on campus) and we had alumnae from the 40s (dedicated argyle sock knitters as undergrads), 60s, 70s (the first class who could wear trousers to class), and 80s (the first computer users). I'd tell you more about the woman from the class of '62 except that she asked if anyone could show her how to do cables, and the woman in the most beautiful cabled sweater I've ever seen could. She spent two hours concentrating on that but she promised to come to our next meeting and participate a little more. We meet again in April.

After Sunday dinner I went back to work on the blanket which is due next Sunday. I sewed together three rows of seven squares. Six to go. Then it's on to Sissy's overnight bag.