Snowflakes

I stitched two snowflakes for a quilt being done around a donated winter themed square for WOCS. The snowflakes are being done on pastel Aida with patterns from http://blog.theflossbox.com/?page_id=156. I stitched #3 on peach colored Aida

and #11 on pink Aida.

December Stitching for WOCS

First, I stitched two squares for the boys general theme. The first is an ethnic lizard from issue 127 of the World of Cross Stitching Magazine. I added the border because he was just a little too small without it.

The next one is from the October 2008 issue of Cross Stitch Crazy, Crazy Kids School Rules! It's meant to be done on plastic canvas and mounted on a notebook or bag, but I decided to do it as a square instead--the colors are much more vivid in person.

The first challenge for 2009 is cards of all kinds for the Arkansas Children's Hospital. They've set a goal of 50 by March 31st, so I decided to get a head start!

The first is Motorbike Bear. This is a Challenge Lucy design from the October 2008 Cross Stitch Crazy.

The second is a funky robot, also from Challenge Lucie, this time from the December 2008 issue of Cross Stitch Crazy.

The last card I stitched is a cupcake that can hopefully be used as a birthday card. It's also from the October 2008 issue of Cross Stitch Crazy.

Christmas Stitching

I only managed to stitch three Christmas gifts this year, and amazingly enough, they were all for Kyleigh.

The first was an ornament. I wasn't able to find any first Christmas charts at the time I was looking, but I thought this one was cute enough. My plan is to stitch her one each year, hence the 2008. The chart came from the December 2008 issue of Cross Stitch Crazy.

The second thing I stitched was this chart from Dimensions. There are sparkly bits on the crown and the wand.

Finally, I stitched Hello Kitty on a bib I had in my stash. This is the Hello Kitty project I mentioned earlier, that I hated stitching, but it did come out okay, even if the backstitching isn't exactly what it called for. This is from the UK Cross Stitcher magazine, #208.

Merry Christmas

I spent most of Christmas Day with Janice and Kyleigh. I took a stuffed turkey and a chocolate cream pie over at 9:00 in the morning and we went to the Christmas Morning service at 10:00. There was no nursery available this morning, so Kyleigh had to stay in church--she spent a lot of time chewing on her shoe!

Chad's grandfather, his younger half brother and family (including his 2 1/2 year old son), Chad's mom, Uncle Dub, David, and Chad's cousin and his girlfriend all arrived around 2:00 so the condo was pretty crowded. More gifts were exchanged, the turkey, ham and trimmings were demolished and there was a lot of good conversation.

Kyleigh's babysitter who lives across the sidewalk came by and brought Kyleigh a couple of presents--a great big red and green Christmas bear and Elmo.

Janice and Kyleigh managed to share a quiet moment before all the guests arrived.

This is Kyleigh with her Uncle Dub. His name is Dave, but they know too many Daves, so they call him DW which they figured would be too hard for Kyleigh to say, so it's been shortened to "Dub".

And, finally Kyleigh with Mom and Dad. This Christmas dress was given to her by Chad's mom's boss.

Santa Came Early

Because Chad had to work Christmas Day and there were going to be a lot of people there, Chad decided they should open Kyleigh's presents on Christmas Eve. Chad's mom, David and I showed up to watch the proceedings.

Janice bought Kyleigh Christmas pajamas so she was dressed for the occasion. That's a Santa hat she's chewing on--she wouldn't let it stay on her head long enough to get a picture!

Kyleigh was fascinated by the ribbons on this package, but didn't mind posing for the camera.

Back in August, Janice had asked her father to see if he could find an Incrediblock on Ebay since she'd seen one in an old Fisher Price catalog. He found and purchased not only the Incrediblock, but also a train, shape sorter, giraffe, wagon and a set of alphabet blocks, all of which Kyleigh received for Christmas. Here she is, investigating the Incrediblock itself. You can see some of the rest of the presents in the background.

Picture with Santa

I'd read that Santa would be at Bergstrom's on Sunday afternoons, so today Janice and I took her to have her picture taken with him. Unfortunately, she's in an "I want my Mommy" mode so whenever she faced the camera and saw Mommy, she started to cry. Fortunately, she'd stop whenever she looked up at Santa. I think it's kind of a cute picture. She's wearing one of her Christmas dresses--this one Janice bought on sale because she was afraid she'd outgrow the black one before Christmas (she didn't). Although you can't really tell, this one's a dark green.

Stitching: I'm still working on the Hello Kitty project and hating it. For such a small motif, it's definitely not fun!

Christmas Party Pictures

Janice, Chad and Kyleigh attended a company Christmas party at Janice's boss's house on Saturday night and yesterday she sent me these pictures. If Kyleigh looks tired, it's because it's past her bedtime. They left shortly after the pictures were taken and before she got fussy.

Stitching: I continued working on the Hello Kitty project, but I'm not happy with it. It said it had whole stitches and backstitching only, but there are quite a few 1/4 stitches and the backstitching doesn't go from hole to hole, but splits the stitches. I stitched the six hearts tonight and then enlarged the chart which is making it easier, but I've discovered that it's not centered. Unfortunately, I have way too much done to rip it out.

A Very Special Christmas Card

In the mail today was an envelope addressed to Grandma and Granpa xxxxxx. It was a bit damp as it's been raining and storming all day (and did I mention, cold!). Inside was this card (I've cutt off the bottom to eliminate personal information). Isn't she just the cutest thing?



Stitching: I finished Get Fit by Margaret Sherry this evening. This is the first in the new series Sports & Hobbies in the UK Cross Stitcher (#208). It's stitched with Anchor floss on 14-count white Aida. I haven't decided what I'm going to do with this yet. For now, I'm setting it aside until I see some of the others in the series.

Then I started stitching a Hello Kitty design from the same issue.

Christmas Parties

The first Christmas party was our department lunch at work. This year the food came from Marie Callendars and I loved the pot roast, but there was also turkey and all the trimmings, plus way too many desserts. I won a $10 gift card to Walmart in the door prize drawing.

This was followed by a trip to the dentist for my six month checkup. I have one cavity that I need to have filled next week and the hygienist taught me how to floss my bridge--I didn't know you could do that!

While I was at the dentist, David cooked dinner--a very good lasagna. We only ate 1/4 of it so there's still lots more to enjoy.

The second Christmas party was Advent by Candlelight, a party put on by the women's group at our church. Several women volunteer to host a table for ten and provide the decorations and dessert. There's also a short program. Janice and I attended and had a great time--delicious red velvet cake and good conversation.

When I picked Janice up, Kyleigh was sitting on the floor about seven feet from the front door. As soon as she saw me, she smiled and took off like a rocket, crawling directly toward me with no stopping--really made my day! As soon as she got to me, I gave her a couple of hugs and kisses and passed her off to her other grandma who was babysitting for the evening. Angela's boss sent along a Christmas present for Kyleigh, a beautiful dress with a red velvet top and white lacy skirt. She now has four Christmas type outfits so she'll be well dressed this coming week! We're hoping she'll be able to wear this one to my nephew's wedding in January as well.

Stitching: I managed to get a little stitching done between the dentist and the Advent party. Monday, I received the new UK Cross Stitcher magazine and there's a new Margaret Sherry series called Sports and Hobbies. The first in the series is a chicken jumping rope called Get Fit. Since I'd just finished the lizard Sunday night and hadn't chosen a new start, I started this immediately.

Giving Tree & Ethnic Lizard

Today was the day all the gifts are turned in and are packaged up for each family. I helped man the turn in table both before and after the service. There's a lot of work to be done after the gifts are turned in, but they had more than enough helpers so I left around 1:30. After that, I did laundry, grocery shopping, desk work, etc.

Kyleigh was not a happy camper today. She was really fussy and only wanted Janice to hold her. Janice said she didn't sleep well last night so she thought she was just tired.

She has a new skill though--she can stand up with a toy in one hand while in the playpen. Of course, this means that periodically all of the toys have to be returned to the playpen. She's also now clapping and waving, although not really in response to anything.

Stitching: I finished the lizard for WOCS. This is intended as a boy's general square.

It's from The World of Cross Stitching Magazine, Issue #127. It's stitched as charted, except that I added the border and stitched it on tan aida instead of the called for white. The gold squares are light effects floss.

Busy Saturday

This morning I went to the church to help set up for the Giving Tree work party. We unloaded the presents that were brought to the church last weekend and set up stations for the various processes that needed to take place. We also distributed the gifts among the familes.

Janice and Kyleigh came by to deliver some cookies and pitched in to help distribute the presents--Kyleigh mostly just got carried along with the gifts. We let her crawl around the floor--she has the most interesting crawl; it's almost like she crawls with a limp--for a little while and she "tested" a couple of the wooden toys that had been donated.

After we finished, we went to Carters looking for some new shoes since she's outgrown her others. Carters didn't have any shoes, but I did manage to buy a jacket, two pant sets and a dress in the next size and got 20% off. Next we went to Babies R Us where we did find some shoes and bought her a pair to wear now and a pair to wear later. Then I came home and took a nap!

Stitching: I'm working on two pieces right now. During the afternoon, I stitched on a lizard square for WOCS and in the evening I stitched on another sunbonnet baby (Friday - Buy more stash) on a wall hanging. Below is a picture of the wall hanging before I started on Friday.

A Wizard

I found this little guy in the Challenge Lucy section of Cross Stitch Crazy #120 (January 2009). He's stitched on 14-count white aida with the called for colors and made into a card. I stitched him because he was a wizard, I didn't realize he was a "housecleaning" wizard until I was stitching the broom--I thought that was a torch, but now I think it's a feather duster. LOL

I finished him last night (12/11) and he'll be included with my next package for Arkansas Childrens Hospital.

Look What I Can Do

Approximately once a week or so, we need a Kyleigh fix so we usually arrange to take her out to dinner (along with her parents, of course). Tonight, instead of going out, we bought KFC and went to her house. After dinner, she decided to show us some of her new skills.

She's now crawling really well, but she still sticks out a leg straight like she's going to sit up frequently.

She can also pull herself into a standing position and support herself with one hand.

And, she loves to explore everything! She's also finally growing hair!

Ornaments for WOCS

Three of these ornaments are freebies from various UK magazines that were meant to be inserted in an included mat and framed. I decided to make them into ornaments instead.

The Snoopy was not a freebie and was stitched on 20-count silver sparkly lugana. The others were stitched with the threads and material in the kits. I backed them all with sticky back felt, but I'm not really happy with how the backs look--I'm a novice at this and it was much harder than I thought it would be. All four ornaments were stitched for WOCS and are on their way to Arkansas Childrens Hospital.

Ornament Finish

This is a chart from the Challenge Lucy section of Cross Stitch Crazy #120. I stitched it as charted on 14-count aida and finished it into an ornament by taking a second piece of aida and stitching around the sides, adding a hanger at the top and inserting a piece of cardboard to give it strength. I finished it on Monday (12/8) and added to a package going to WOCS on Tuesday for kids at Arkansas Childrens Hospital.

Sunday at Grandma's House

Kyleigh came home with us after church today so her parents could go to a movie. We really like having her visit and it gives Chad and Janice freedom to do adult things. We purchased the Port-A-Crib at a neighbor's garage sale and bought a few toys and a high chair so we're all set for our little visitor.

The outfit she's modeling is the one I got for free a couple of weeks ago. It was on sale for 50% off and I had a $10 coupon on anything over $10. The final total was a negative one cent so we had to combine it with Janice's purchases (she bought the shoes Kyleigh's wearing).

Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving with Janice and her inlaws at her condo. I went over early to cook the turkey and attend church with Janice and Kyleigh. I love the Thanksgiving services--the pastor reads the President's proclamation and we sing hymns that are only sung on Thanksgiving.

Since this was also Chad's birthday and he wanted ham, his mom brought over a ham. The food was delicious and everyone had a good time with the extended family. There were a lot of pictures taken and David even took a couple of movies with my camera, but I decided to just share this series of Kyleigh playing with her Entertainer in a new and different way.

Miscellaneous Cards for WOCS

Over the past couple of months, I've been stitching cards using the free kits that come with the Cross Stitch Card Shop magazines. I like these because they're small and self contained and are easy to travel with. All of these have been donated to WOCS and most have been sent to the Arkansas Children's Hospital.

This jolly skating reindeer is from Issue 62.

This is an All Our Yesterdays design from Issue 61.

Candy Floss is from Issue 55.

This pretty bouquet is from Issue 58.

Tom Mouse was from Issue 54.

Dancing Snoopy came from Issue 59 and will be used as the card for the Cartoon themed quilt.

This racing themed card is from the March 2008 issue of Cross Stitch Crazy, one of the hobby motifs.

A Day with Kyleigh

I babysat Kyleigh this afternoon. A neighbor sold us a porta crib so we'd have a place to corral her for play and naptime and as you can see, she really enjoys it. She has her own set of toys at Grandma's. The shoes are courtesy of her daddy!

Here she is practicing standing. She'll press against the sides for assistance in getting into a standing position.

She had her holiday pictures taken today so before I changed her, I took a couple of pictures in her holiday outfit. Janice is afraid it won't still fit on Christmas, though.

Friday night after work, we ran errands (the bank, pharmacy, gas station and grocery store) and also ate dinner out. We got home a little after 7:00 and after I did stuff like put groceries away etc., I participated in my first SAT (Stitchalong) for Let's Stitch Too. I'm stitching Kyleigh's birth sampler. I was almost 3/4 done when I put it aside in early June to do some deadline stitching, but since I joined Lets Stitch Too, I've decided to work on this every Friday, Saturday and Sunday evening.

Before:

After:

I completed two more motifs in the border, the outside border and some backstitching. I've since completed the entire border, but I haven't taken a picture of that yet.

Card Happy Dance

I stitched the card to go with Marley's card last night. I started at the top and aligned it without taking into account the stem of the top note and it also turned out smaller than I anticipated, so I added the border. Because this was a card and not a quilt square, I went ahead and used the light effects. I found the red card loose in my stash of card stock this morning--I have no idea what it was supposed to be used for.

I restarted a bouquet of flowers for another card yesterday at lunch. I'm enjoying stitching it, but I discovered they gave me the wrong green. I was too far along to rip it out though.

Janice called last night and she's trying to train Kyleigh to fall asleep on her own and she was trying to ignore the screaming. It took about 20 minutes for her to fall asleep, but Janice didn't give in. Saturday is picture day!