Project Saturday

Today was the Saturday put aside to do some more work on the ongoing remodel of our kitchen. Some of you may remember that we got new counter tops a while ago. And by "a while ago" I mean over a year, in fact I don't even know when it happened. There has been more then a few debates on what to use for the back splash and how to finish out the window. Finally a decision was made and today we put the plan in to action. Except we also kind of changed the plan when we got started and thankfully we over bought the amount of glass tiles we'd need.

So, this morning we started with this.

And then we started debating where to put the glass tile and where to put the stuff that looks like tin tiles but is really plastic. We had originally thought to put the glass on the bottom and use just 3 or 4 rows of it, but then we started playing around with it and totally changed our minds. By 7:30 or so tonight we had this. (Sorry for the bad pictures but it was dark and the flash and the lights distorted the colors, the actual color of the counter top is what it looks like in the before pictures. I'll try to get some more tomorrow in the daylight.)



It's still not done. I have to tile all around the window, put in the window sill and also grout the tile. Plus I need to find covers for the plug and light fixtures. I know I've seen ones that are "glass" so that's what I want to use. I think it will end up looking really great. Plus we're going to finish the top and the bottom with quarter round since there's a bit of a gap between the wall and the counter top. I'll take more pictures when I get more done. Hopefully not in another 2 years!

Last night I finished a small ornament that's been in my bag for awhile. Just a cute freebie that I received as a kit during one of the Ornament exchanges.


I felt like stitching some more last night so I pulled out my Christmas Fairy and went back to work on it. As of last night she looked like this...



One final picture of our fireplace all decked out for fall.



A little bit of everything, but it covers the entire season.

Really....I'm alive

I know there must have been some discussion, but I'm here to put that to rest...I'm alive, and I escaped the kidnappers so don't send that ransom you were asked for. Seriously, I've been a very bad blogger and haven't kept you all up to date on what's happening in my life. So, I'm going to try and quickly bring you up to date and then try very hard to blog more then once every 6 months.

First, I got a contract job and that seems to have taken up more of my time then I'd like. Maybe time isn't the right word, maybe energy is. I'm coming to realize that the RA doesn't always allow me the same energy level that I think I have. So some things fall by the wayside. However, I've loved working at this job and was excited when my contract was extended to the end of March. Of course that means I now have to start looking for the next job, but that's ok too.

Since my last post I've seen
With my friend Kathe. We had a blast! What a great show.

I've managed to finish a few knitting projects, including a cute beret that I wore to work yesterday but that I don't have pictures of it yet. I also finished a stole/scarf and no there aren't any pictures of that. I've been working on a "super secret project" for about 2 weeks now. It's coming along, but slower then I had hoped it would.

As usual I went to hang out with my friends at a stitching retreat in October. We were back in Hilton Head again and had a great time together. One of the classes we were supposed to learn how to make scrimshaw. I learned that I'm not going to be making much of it myself and that I now appreciate the cost much more. While there my DF Heather helped me do the finishing for Halloween Fairy. Isn't she pretty?

Christmas was our usual decorating craziness with our open house on Christmas Eve thrown in. Then Christmas Day we went down to the church to have dinner with at the community dinner and hang out with everyone down there.

New Year's Day found me down at the Gator Bowl to say farewell to my beloved Coach Bowden. We had a great time and I admit I got teary eyed several times. The city did a fantastic job of sending him off in style. AND the team pulled together and got a win over WVU.Did I mention it was cold and rainy that day? It was, but we bundled up and had fun. I even managed to wear a new hat I'd knitted that week AND my HP/FSU scarf. (Jill & I above at the game.)

In January I took a trip up to Atlanta to spend time with my friend Jean (a.k.a. Doxietrek) for her birthday. It snowed, and more importantly the roads iced up so we spent a couple of days just hanging at her house. Our friend Ann had come in from TN so we stitched, knit and played some Wii games. Apparently it was news to Jean that I'm a tad bit competitive. But it did let me figure out that I like the Wii, so when I got home I ordered one as a late Christmas present. Having fun with it.

That's about covers the high points. I'll leave you with a gratuitous picture of my fireplace this Christmas. Had to put new lights on the garland and went with LEDs. Love the way they look, especially with the flowers I used.

Christmas fun

Christmas Day has come and gone, but the season continues for a few more days. Hey, haven't you sang that song at least a billion times? So, to catch you up on the decorating this year I bring you some eye candy.
First the spiral trees. For Christmases past these have been filled with houses from my Dickens Village collection. This year they were all alone and just pretty with the white lights. Interestingly everyone ohh'd over them.
Next the mantle. Again, it's very minimalist this year without all the flowers and birds and such. I liked it though so that's all that counts. I did add a little spice with the wreaths from a couple of years ago.
A view of the kitchen with the goodies ready for friends to arrive on Christmas Eve. Even that was a little smaller then normal, but still we had fun and enjoyed having something before we headed to church for the 11PM service.

Christmas Day we went to church to have dinner and found a surprise in the form of friends.That's Frank and Angie who moved away a few years ago to TX for Frank's work. It didn't hurt that Frank's a "Texas boy" either. Now they are moving again, just not as far this time. They've bought 25 acres and will build a "small" house and be able to keep their horses and maybe even a few cows. I voted for alpacas, but I'm not sure they were convinced.

That evening we took a drive to St. Augustine to look at the lights. St. A is one of my favorite places and I haven't been in way too long. I really need to go down on a Saturday and just walk around, maybe do a little shopping and have dinner in one of the many great restaurants.

Yesterday I went to my DF Melody's house for some lunch and a little stitching. I decided to work on "Little Green Acorns" and see if I can't get that finished. It's such a beautiful piece and I would love to have it finished and framed. (Not that I don't have a few others that need some framing done mind you. I really do need to go pick some frames out and get them done one at a time and get caught up.)

Today wasn't such a good day. I woke up with a terrible headache and it's taken most of the day for it to go away. I'm ready now to do a little more stitching and then get things ready for work tomorrow. Another short week, which is nice, and then it's off to Savannah for New Year's Eve!

It's almost Christmas!

And we do have a few decorations up. Enjoy some pictures.My hand-made ornament tree.My "Garnet & Gold" tree, or "The Angel Tree" as it's also been called since it has both all garnet & gold and loads of angels.

This is new. It's actually a 4' tree planted in an old wheelbarrow with some new LED lights. I love how they look, and will be switching to them as my old lights give out.
Finally a look down the back walk to the sun porch. I realize it's very blurry, but I was trying to get a picture so you could see the lights and I don't have a tripod. I need one, but don't have one. So, this is what you get. Still, you get the idea.

This year is a very tamed down version of our decorating. We got a late start and with me working and everything else we just didn't get as much done. Oh well, it's still pretty. I'll get pictures of the other rooms tomorrow before everyone gets here for Open House.

In other, very wonderful, news...it seems my contract is going to be extended after all. I'm extremely happy. I truly like the work and, for the most part, the people. Plus I already knew a few people which is great. They are extending for another 3 months, but hopefully some other good things will happen during that time. I'll keep you posted.

Thanks everyone for the words of encouragement after yesterday's news. I'm still trying to process what it's all about, but I've already taken some steps to feel better, and it's not just the medicine. I've scheduled some time with my previous personal trainer and we're going to work out something so I can get in better shape. It's not like I haven't been procrastinating enough, but this is a great motivator.

So, that's all. Big day tomorrow and then it's Christmas! Stay safe if you have to be out and about tomorrow. I'll be going to work myself. Should be a fun day. Enjoy whatever you're doing tomorrow.

Florida Snowmen

Wow, you all have some good eyes. Yes, that is the head of a snowman. I'm not sure I understand it but I'll try to explain it as best I can.

A couple of years ago my mom and dad went to WV to visit her sister. Apparently my aunt had found these "heads" at a store up there and had made "snowmen" to line her stairs. Mom thought they looked so cute so she came home with one. The tree you see is her blue and gold, WVU, tree. We haven't figured out where the snowmen stuff is going this year, so I'm guessing she put it there until we figure out where it's going to be for the season.

So, that's the deal. Nothing exciting. Actually kind of boring. Maybe I can do better tomorrow. There will be much decorating this weekend, so stay tuned for additional pictures.

It's an official contest and more decorating

Ok, it's official, "Name the Snowman" is a real contest. I'll tell you that the winner will be getting a hand-made ornament of my choosing and if I were you I wouldn't be surprised if it had something to do with the contest. So, you have until Christmas Eve morning at 9 AM to post a comment with your suggestion or suggestions. I will then put all the names in a hat and have my mother choose the winning name. That seems fair. This means that multiple suggestions gives you multiple chances to win. I'll post the winner's name Christmas Eve and will send you an email as well.

Ok, that's out of the way, now for pictures of decorations. Yesterday mom and I must have thought we had all the time in the world because we decided to head outside and cut some branches from one of the magnolia trees and use them on a table in the Family room. The idea was simple, but we got a little carried away with our cutting and ended up with lots of branches and leaves, much more then we needed for this.It doesn't really show up that well, but some of the leaves I painted silver, so in person it looks much better. (To the left is the snowman who shall be named later.) To the right of this table is the fireplace.
I liked this picture, even though it's kind of dark, because you can sort of see the lights.

You may be wondering what we did with the left over magnolia branches, since as you can see I didn't use all that many. Well wonder no more...There it hangs in all it's glory. I added in some boxwood, since mine needed to be trimmed a bit anyway, and of course painted some silver. Decided it would look wonderful hanging outside the Sun Porch. You can see my father inside enjoying a good book while I did work. Must be nice to be retired.

I actually managed to send out almost all of my Christmas cards this evening. I have a couple that didn't go out. I ran out of cards with just a couple to go. That's just my luck. Went shopping for most of the food I'll need for Christmas Eve. We still haven't decided on what to have Christmas Day. I'm leaning toward either a pork loin or standing rib roast. I'm going to take a stroll through some recipes and then decide what might be the easiest.

Tonight more cookie baking ensued. I need to get up early and start back at it in the morning, plus do any prep work for Christmas Eve. I almost forgot that mom and I have tickets to see "The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee" in Jacksonville Sunday night. I can't imagine having a show that close to Christmas, but it's part of our series, so we're going. That means Sunday I won't get any cooking done. But I'm sure I'll enjoy the play!

A Snowman in Florida

That's right, we have a snowman right here in north Florida! He may not look like any snowman you've ever seen, but just remember, he's going to be different since he's a southern boy/snowman.
He's all decked out and ready to have a good time with some bear friends. (On a whole other note I realize that on some level it's kind of sad that I have no children and that many bears. Plus there's some you can't see scattered around. So, yeah, I like bears...and rabbits...and the occasional penguin.)

Mom says he needs a name. I've been trying to think of something really interesting, but I'm tired so nothing is coming to mind. Feel free to make suggestions. If I choose your name, I'll send you a surprise (but it will take a little while to get it to you because first I have to make it so bear with me. No pun intended...I really am tired.)

He's sitting in the rocking chair my grandpa B. gave me right before he died. I was just a little girl, but he wanted me to have it. The chair was his mothers and she rocked all her children, then he got it and rocked his kids and me. I had to have the seat rewoven several years ago and was lucky to find a man here that could recreate the original fairly closely.

Today was a lot of clean-up work. Going through a room and picking up things, sweeping and dusting one last time. I have some pictures of the lighted pieces on my piano. I realize that in the real London these three pieces would not be this close, but work with me here, this is pretend.
Tonight was the children's play/musical at church. They did a fantastic job. My friend's daughter L. had a huge part, in fact, she was one of the main characters. She did a great job. She's only in the 1st grade and she had a lot of lines to memorize. I was very proud of her and all the kids. No pictures, since I completely forgot my camera.

Tomorrow I have to finish those small details and then put together the menu for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. I keep trying to talk my family into having pizza on Christmas Day so I can stitch and knit all day, but I don't think they're buying it. Oh well, at least if we do turkey there'll be leftovers and some good soup at some point!

What a weekend!

Seriously I had a really great weekend. It was busy, but there was some fun thrown in so it was worth it.

Friday evening mom & I went shopping for a few things we needed, nothing spectacular, but I managed to find some goodies to finish up my gifts for some friends here in town. Just in time too. Now I have to put everything together and hope they enjoy the combination of handmade and cool bought things.

Saturday I got up early and headed over to KnitWitz for class with Annie Modesitt. What a wonderful teacher. You can see pictures over on Yarnfinder's blog (or as we know her Kathe). I'm in a couple of pictures for the Universal Mitered bag class, but all you can see is my back or the top of my head. I love the project, but even more I love how Annie talked about making patterns your own. She shared some cool tips and tricks and encouraged us to take what we learned and put it in our "toolbox" to take out later. I like when that's the attitude of the teacher. For some reason I totally didn't get that I needed yarn that would felt. If you've taken a look at my Ravelry stuff lately (for those on Ravelry I'm GirlWithNeedles, and if you knit and you aren't on Ravelry or signed up to get on, what are you waiting for???) you can see I have some felting yarn. And that's not all of it. I have great scraps that would have worked for something this small. But that was not to be. I guess the yarn fairies wanted me to purchase more yarn. The colors I chose are kind of interesting, see...That color on the left, that's kind of more orange then I would normally like, but I was so drawn to the multi yarn above it that I thought it would work. It's actually kind of more like a coral color in a way. But still, not my normal color choice.

Saturday when I got home it was time to start cleaning the windows on the sun porch. That room is wonderful, and I love it, especially this time of year, but cleaning those windows isn't all that fun. Luckily it doesn't involve a ladder. The decision was also made to not put up the 9 ft. tree this year. It's getting late in the season and it's a bear to put up, so no big tree. Oh well. I also did some work on the mantle decorations. That carried on into Sunday before it was done. No pictures yet though, there's still stuff in the way so I can't get a good picture. Soon, I promise.

Decorating skills in demand

Maybe not "in demand", but they sure got used while I was in WV. My aunt Nora took advantage of my arrival to have me finish her decorating. But let's start at the beginning shall we?

The trip up to WV was fairly uneventful. We left early enough and the weather and traffic managed to cooperate, so we made it in one day. I think we managed to leave Cracker Barrel at the airport exit in Jacksonville at 8:45 AM and pulled into my aunts around 7:30-ish maybe. I don't know what time it was, I was driving, it was dark and I was dang tired by that point. All I really wanted to do was sit quietly and maybe have a nice drink. That completes Wednesday's activities.

Thursday I slept in. I mean I really slept in. I didn't manage to get out of my nice warm bed until around 11:30 that morning. Just in time for my aunt to return from her hair appointment and a few errands with some makings for a sandwich. That was a nice surprise. After she left again mom and I went downstairs, to where I usually "live" when I visit, to start the decorating we had been tasked with the night before. To my aunt's credit she normally does all her decorating, but this year she needed some help. Our cousin Kathy helped her decorate upstairs and for some reason I didn't manage to get pictures of that. Let me say it is beautiful. Nora's living room is mauve so her tree there is a pretty white tree with pink lights and all pink and mauve and gold. Very pretty. In the dining room there was a lovely arrangement on the table, her big Bethlehem nativity on the sideboard and some trimmings on the china cabinet. Then in her "family room", or as we call it, "the room where we watch t.v." she has one of those fiber-optic trees, that turns colors. Anyway, she has all this red and white, candy-cane stripped ornaments and stuff in there, so the tree was all in red ornaments with about 4 white birds and some red & white stripped ribbon with bows at the top. I kept looking at it, and decided that I knew what I thought it needed....white ornaments. (You'll hear more about this on Friday.)

But, back to downstairs. My aunt basically has 2 houses stacked on top of each other, it's very nice. Downstairs there's a "game room", or more likely a music room since there's a really nice old upright piano and an old pump organ in it. That's where I had to work my decorating magic. The tree was set up, but nothing else. We finally got lights on it that managed to stay working, then of course came the decorations. Like us, Nora has lots of decorations that are just all kinds of lovely Christmas goodness. So that's what I put on this tree. My uncle had stacked some boxes of floor tiles under the tree to elevate it off the floor so we could then put her lighted houses under it. The result was pretty cool.
Sorry for the picture. I was really trying not to use flash, so you get that yellow incandescent look too. But you get the idea.That's a little better looks at the left side of the "village".
Right side look, with a bit of the piano showing.

So, that was my Thursday, and some of my Friday since in putting all this together I figured out she needed some lights and a couple of strips to plug the lights in to. That brings us to Friday when mom, Nora & I headed out to pick up the things needed for decorating (remember the white ornaments I mentioned?) and for her 50th Wedding anniversary party on Saturday.

First, JoAnn's Fabrics. Unlike here, the JoAnn's there is not one of the huge mega-type stores. It's small. But we did manage to find some pretty white ornaments and the strips to plug the houses in to, as well as a couple of multi-light strands for the houses. That was a good stop. Then we went to the dollar store to score some pretty, and less expensive, gift bags and tea lights. Another good stop. Then lunch. Yummy! We went to Bellacinos, it's a franchise, owned by local guys and is excellent. I opted for their house grinder (and for those who don't know that term, it's basically a hot sub). And the scenery in there isn't too bad. (The owners are twins, and as my aunt said, "There's living proof of a God right there walking around, and not just God, but a loving God because he gave us TWO of them to look at!" That's right the owners are basically identical twins and very nice looking men at that.) So, score again for lunch, both for the food and the scenery. Then they dropped me off at Lowe's to try and find these candles, and that's where it started to go wrong, but luckily not terribly wrong.

Let me back up a little. My aunt and our cousin Kathy, mainly Kathy, had made these beautiful centerpieces for the tables for the anniversary party. They were all pretty gold, pink and garnet poinsettias. Lovely. Nora, my aunt, had found these really cool, battery operated (I guess) tall, slim candles to put in the middle of the arrangements. This was good, she bought them somewhere in VA I think at a Ben Franklins. She bought enough, or so she thought. However, they ended up breaking one and needing at least 2 more. So, here we were, hunting these things that all I knew were what they looked like and that I think they were called "candleiers" or something like that. So, back to Lowe's (which BTW is not my uncle Jim's favorite place to shop and he builds cabinets for a living, I think he's jinxed the place for me). Mom and Nora drop me in front of Lowe's while they park the car in front of Sam's Warehouse, which is right beside Lowe's. I'm tasked with going to look for the aforementioned "candleiers", purchasing them if found and then going to Sam's to meet them while they start getting the many food and paper items needed from there. To make a long story short, not only did Lowe's not have said "candleiers", but they barely had any Christmas decorations left at all. It was kind of depressing.

But a trip through Sam's trying out all the food they were handing out helped my mood. Yeah, I know, I'd just eaten a nice lunch, but hey, it was good and they were handing it out and we might have wanted to buy some of it. We did manage to get the stuff we needed from there and headed for our next stop....Wal-Mart.

You see, a few days before Nora had been in the big "Mart" and had spoken to some man about those pesky candle things. He assured her he had them, but that they were in a box up somewhere near the rafters and he didn't have his machine-thing to get up there to get the box down so she could buy them. Now, here's a little thought, if you have something to sell, and you want to sell it, shouldn't you have it somewhere so people can get their grubby little fingers on it and take it to the long lines at the check-out counter to hand over some form of payment??? Is this really too much to ask? But I digress. So, this kind employee said to give him a couple of days and he'd get them down for her. So, we head there thinking we're sure to find them. First, nothing in the Christmas decorations, which for some reason is where these little monsters pretty candles apparently like to live in stores. Then we make our second mistake of the trip to "Wally World", we ask an "associate" for help. They don't know anything. So they finally ask their "manager", who looks to be about 19 and barely able to think (not that all 19 year olds can't think, but this one wasn't looking to swift in my eyes). He said he'd check. Now I'm fairly certain that 1) he had no idea what my aunt was talking about and 2) could have cared less if he found the item for her or not. In no time he was back to say they didn't even have them in stock. Now, somebody's not telling the truth. Either the 1st man who said he could get them if he had his little machine was full of it, or this "manager" was, but either way we walked away with no candles. Well, we did get candles, those kind you are used to seeing, but that run on batteries and one of them was defective when we got it home, but they made it work. The rest of the trip there was spent hunting stuff to make "hammy sammies" as mom and I call them, for the Sunday party. We didn't have any luck finding the right rolls, so thought a stop at Kroger would fix things. It did and it didn't. We found some rolls to use, but they aren't the kind we normally get. Sigh, sometimes I just like to be at home and be able to walk into my favorite grocery store, Publix, and find what I want, or have some nice person ask can they help me find something or order something I want that's not stocked...sigh....

So, that's Thursday and Friday. Tomorrow I should some of the party pictures and a slightly compromising photo of me and the "big guy". Stay tuned!

Two more trees done!

So that's three trees down, about 4 more to go. How exciting! Of course that doesn't include various other decorating things that have to be done before completion is declared.

I have gotten a picture of the 2nd tree finished, which is my Garnet & Gold tree.Yes, it's hanging on the wall. I've had this tree for a long time, at least 12 years, maybe more. Each year I bring it out and it's shedding all over the place as I'm putting it up, and each year I think it's going to shed so much it will look like Charlie Brown's tree. Each year it surprises me. Of course I put so many ornaments and decorations on it You can barely see the green tree part anyway, but still.

After the weekend Monday brought decorating madness back. I had brought in 2 boxes from the garage on Friday that were marked "Santas" and "Christmas Santas". We had planned on working in the dining room and that's where we've been putting my mother's Santa collection, or as much of it as possible. So, Monday morning we're unpacking the boxes and mom's pulling things out of her box and saying things like, "Oh look, my Arizona Santa." Or, "Wow, I don't remember this one, isn't it cute?" This goes on for awhile, until I hear, "Well, look what I found."

At this point I need to back up 3 or so years. Picture my mother and me prowling through one of the large craft stores and spying a small, maybe 2 ft, wall tree with a cute basket at the bottom as if the tree were planted in it. We buy it thinking we have a few "kitchen" ornaments and can find some more and put it in the kitchen. We do this, everyone ohhs & ahhs. The next year we find all the ornaments, but no tree. No tree right up until Monday when mom says, "Well, look what I found."

Yep, the missing tree! There it was in the box marked "Christmas Santas". This will not happen again. There is no reason to put it in that box when there are perfectly good boxes with trees that can be marked "kitchen tree". It's ok though, we've found it and we've figured out where to hang it. Just have to get the ornaments down to decorate. But we aren't in the kitchen yet, so for now it's laying waiting.

We have made our way to the living room. It's all clean and the furniture has been moved to allow for some of my Dicken's Village houses to be put up. I may work on that some this afternoon.

I want to thank you all for the kind words about "cubie". The further from the pain of putting it together I get, the more I like looking at this piece. It really is pretty.

Finally, I want to think my Hogwarts Swap year 2 pal. I received my package and it was filled with lots of great stuff. She and I both had some things happen that kept us from getting our packages out on time. Thankfully she's very nice and was ok with my tardiness. (BTW, I mailed it out Monday...without part of it included I might add. Figured that out when I got home from the post office and found some goodies laying there. I'll send the rest the next time I head to the PO. I'm such a bad pal!) But my pal, well take a look at the goodies....
The yarn was dyed by my wonderful pal "Dora Dumbledore". (That's her wizarding name, not her muggle name.) It's beautiful and is called "Mediterrania". (You too can be the proud owner of some of her yarn by visiting her Etsy store. I love the names of the yarns in her store, not to mention the colors.) The socks are perfect and fit perfectly and feel wonderful on! The cute stripped and polka-dot item to you is a sock project bag. I don't have one so this was a special treat. The Udder Cream is for my hands when I stitch and of course the candy is self-explanatory.

(I had this all typed up and ready to post before I left to shop this morning, and completely forgot to hit Publish. I'm a goof!)

It's not just retailers who do it!

That's right, I've started decorating for Christmas. Now I know that all the major retailers have had their Christmas decorations out for awhile, so I'm actually behind, but still, for many this is early. I have an excuse though...I put up A LOT of decorations. I mean, A LOT. So, this is just a small beginning.I'm giving you several different views, so you get the full effect. This is my newest tree. I started it last year, as some of my friends may remember, so I can put all my handmade ornaments on one tree. There are mainly stitched ornaments on this, but there will be some knitted ones as well and a few other techniques.

All the newest ornaments are on this year and I figured out I have 12 more to do the finishing on.
So, I've got some work to do before Christmas comes. I had planned on having a lovely hand knitted tree skirt. Please note, I haven't even begun said tree skirt, although I purchased the materials last year. If I get my sweater finished any time soon, I'm going to cast on that piece. Then I'll have to work on it some. Probably won't have it for this year though. That's a good idea though, plus the bag of yarn is taking up a lot of room in the sewing room so getting started would be a step in the direction of the bag becoming if not gone, at least smaller.

Stay tuned for more seasonal magic as things progress.