Whew!

What is it about being in a hotel that makes me so tired?  I don't know but I seem to be too sleepy to stitch.  The good part is we're done with the first half of our move.  Well the actual moving part anyway.  We're staying in hotels for the next few weeks while we figure out our move cross country to California.  We had most of our stuff packed up and is waiting in storage and the rest we were planning on taking in the car.  The bad news is we overpacked and now we have to decide what to do with the rest of our stuff.  Yikes!  All my cross stitching is in the car with us and fits in two small boxes not counting 9 fabric tubes.  I think I need more stash ;).  We donated a lot of clothes and I'm thinking about getting some space bags for our pillows and bulky items so everything hopefully fits in the car.  We're probably going to have to ship though.  

The packing was a mess.  My hubby and I are both procrastinators but he's worse than me.  The night before the movers came we only got 3 hours of sleep and about the same amount the next night.  We were packing stuff right up until we turned out keys in.  Luckily I have good friends who helped.  This is the first year we hired movers and I'm never going back.  Next time I'm paying for them to pack it too lol.

I haven't had much stitching time unfortunately.  I was expecting to have a lot of it in the hotel but we're still dealing with packing and hubby wants to go to all the parks before we leave which he just told me about.  *sigh* boys ;).  However, looking at my last picture I do have noticeable progress.  I've finished a page officially now and am about a third of the way into the next :)

Last time:

And now:

I'm actually a bit further than this but it's too dark for a picture tonight.  I'd say I'm down another 5 rows or so and have some stray stitches like 5 rows from the bottom.  Hopefully next time you'll see another page finish!  

SFS-B July Check-In, Progress and Volunteering

Hello all I'm back with another SFS update.  For those of you who don't know, Stitch From Stash is hosted by Mel of Epic Stitching.  The link is on the right for anyone interested.  We aren't supposed to spend more than $25 a month on stitching stuff with a few exemptions like frames and needles.  We can earn more money by stitching from our stash or carryover.  I'm not doing the stitching bonuses but I am doing the carryover.  This year was split into two sections so this is the first month of section B.  

Allotted: $25

Spent: $0

Carryover: $25

It's been a while since I've had a $0 spend month but I did buy some supplies that don't qualify.  I got some new rods for my scroll frame and bought some new supplies to make stretcher clips for the side of the frame to hold the fabric.  I held off buying floss but I was tempted :). I had a 20% off everything coupon too but I discovered it only as I was about to check out so didn't run back for more stuff :). I may have to get more soon though as I'm starting to run short on a couple of my colors.  

I have some progress to show too!

Last post Paradise was here:

And now I'm here:

I'm solidly into the greens now.  Just a reminder I'm now stitching 2 pages at a time now so I'm almost done with another page and am into the next one.

I haven't had a ton of stitching time between packing to move cross country and volunteering.  School's taken a break yet again but will start up soon.  So far packing is taking over and we'll be staying in hotels for a couple of weeks while we get everything in California figured out.  Hubby got a response back tonight about doing an interview for a job he really wants so fingers crossed he gets it.  It's a paid internship that only goes til December but it pays well enough to get us settled and time for him to look for something permanent hopefully at the same company.

Our volunteering was for a friend who got us into Club 33.  Hubby and I ran a silent auction for him while he was busy in California with another event.  The auction was for charity and people won some cool signed memorabilia.  It was all Disney stuff (of course) and it was a cool experience overall.  There were some hiccups and I wouldn't do anything with the lady that ran it again.  Out of all the staff helping out (it was a dinner with around 60 people) we were the only ones who didn't get to eat or sit the entire time (around 4 hours) because she didn't know us personally.  It was like since she didn't know us we were a complete non entity.  So we got to watch everyone eat steak and cheesecake and we for Wendy's that night.  Not a big deal but had we known that we would have eaten before we went and I wouldn't have worn heels.  I can usually stand for hours on end in tennis shoes but my feet hurt the entire next day too.  I was getting toe cramps when I was trying to sleep lol.  The funny part is that we had to leave for it right after work so I was doing my makeup in the car and had to change in the bathroom when I got there.  Luckily my hair stayed curled which was a miracle in the Florida humidity.  I had curled it in the morning and then put it in a bun at work.  I took a curling iron just in case but didn't need it.

The highlight of the event was that Jodi Benson was there and did a concert for us.  She's the voice of Ariel in The Little Mermaid.  She was lovely and we got a photo as well.  

It was fun watching her warm up and seeing behind the scenes.  

This is the memorabilia we auctioned off. The cool part is nobody wanted the picture of Mary poppins and the kids in the upper middle on the bottom picture that was signed by Jane so the guy who donated them just gave it to us!  He was a nice guy.  All in all I would do anything for my friend that we were helping but if it included doing stuff where the lady is in charge I'd know to wear flats and bring snacks lol.  

Thanks for stopping by!  Hopefully it won't be so long until my next update!  

New Frame!

Hey again long time no see!  Lol I know I just posted but I got really excited!  I didn't think I'd have my new dowels ready for at least a few days but I got the urge and pushed through the pain and I finished cutting the dowels for my frame!  I walked home from work today which sucked (I live about 2 miles away from work) because it was super hot and humid.  When I got home I took a quick shower to cool off and finished the sawing of one dowel which was about a foot and a half.  I was feeling really accomplished and figured I'd leave the rest for tomorrow or the next day.  Then my hubby took me to dinner (wings YUM!) and when I got home I just had the urge to at least start the second dowel.  Well I got so into it I decided to finish.  The last about 3/4 of it were a real pain (literally) but I finished!  It took about two hours of non stop sawing for the last one, I didn't time the first.  I even sanded them down and because I was so excited I framed up paradise!

Now my tension is tighter because my fabric isn't folded.  I'll have to get those clip things for the sides but that can wait.  I noticed it made the lines pretty much disappear but I know they'll come back.  I'm sorely tempted to blast it with some water to see if they relax but I'll wait until I'm done stitching.  

The grand total for today is 48" sawed, 2 sore arms and 1 good size slice on my finger lol.  Not bad though since it stopped bleeding after a short while but it's in s horrible spot.  It's on my right index finger on the side of the top joint which means every time I button my pants or shirt (I have to button my work shirts) or do a lot of other stuff it gets irritated and hurts.

Lol sorry couldn't resist.

The dowels are 36" long and 34" of that is cut so I can slide the fabric through.  That should be long enough for any future project unless I ever decide to do a super size in which case I'll find someone with a power saw lol.  But all in all I'm very proud of myself!

Thanks again for listening!  See you next time!

Gifted Gorgeousness SAL July

What is Gifted Gorgeousness?  All of the info is on the link on the left but it's basically where we stitch on something gifted to us or that's intended as a gift.  I'm stitching Paradise which is a gift for my cousin for her wedding in October.  It's nowhere near ready for it but hopefully will be done for her by her anniversary LOL.  I haven't made much progress this month because I've been focusing on school but I've made a bit. 

Last time I was only a little bit past Sea and now I've reached the halfway mark and started the next page down.  It's only a page in a half in a month which is really slow now that I'm looking at it but that's okay lol.

Last time:

This time:

Rather than doing one page on the bottom I'm just doing both pages at once.  I'm hoping this makes it go faster.  I also bought some bigger dowels and am currently in the process of sawing them in half (almost all of the way) by hand.  It's hard work but I don't have a power tool.  This will make it so I can insert the fabric in the slit and put it in my scroll rod.  I just hope it works well.  My current dowels are only 24" and my new ones will be 36" which should be big enough for any future projects I have. 

Speaking of which, I have joined a new SAL on Facebook which has 112 stitchers making the largest cross stitch ever.  We're doing an approx. 30'x20' piece of George Washington Crossing the Delaware.  I got assigned a piece which is almost all sky (except a bit on the bottom) and am thrilled.  It's going to be on 18ct Aida and will be around 220,000 stitches.  I'll update you all as I go but so far we're still waiting on our materials to be ready to ship.  It's a 5 year project so I'll definitely have a rotation.

Thanks for reading I'll see you all next time!

What Do You Call This Stitching?

Hi guys I'm just popping in with a quick question and apology.  The apology comes for my last post.  I really do like my job and the night ended up being super easy.  Maybe it was because they actually scheduled enough people to handle guests or because guests were all in a festive mood but I only had one, well-justified, complaint.  It even ended up raining for part of it.  But nobody tried to get a refund because the rides were down for an hour (one of my biggest pet peeves and something that happens a lot).  I didn't get to see any fireworks but that's okay I could hear them :D. So sorry again if my post made me seem bitter.

Now on to the question:  what do you guys call it when your stitching looks like this?

Is it considered confetti?  I call it checkerboard stitching and this part of the piece has a lot lol.  I'm stitching these pages a bit differently.  I'm hoping it speeds up my stitching with not having to change colors as often.  I'm still working in half pages but I'm doing a full page at a time if that makes sense.  This will keep my page breaks the same.  Then I'm going immediately to the bottom page instead of going by row.  I'm thinking of finishing this entire half piece before continuing to the other half. I think it will make me go faster.  After I'm done I'm going to try sewing behind the piece to make the lines go away.  I hope it works.  From my next piece on I'm going to cross country so I don't worry about lines.  But if I started now on here it would make the lines more obvious if they're only in half the piece.

If you have any other ideas for getting rid of them let me know!

Talk to you next time!

P.S.  I'm taking my midterm for my American history class tomorrow.  I'm hoping to finish the class in the next 3 days.

Hallelujah!!

I just put in the last few stitches on my page which has brought me to the halfway mark on the top row of my piece!  That means I've finished 9/42 pages.  As a reminder the piece is 14 pages across and 3 pages down so I'm making progress.  It feels so good to reach this point.  I finished like 3/4 of this page in 2 days. 

Last time I was here:

And now I'm here:

My needle marks the halfway point.  If you're wondering about the writing it's a show of solidarity against people who download/upload designer's charts for free.  Most people show a picture of the chart with the stitching but since mine are all digital I put the company and my order number. I realized I was messing up counting on a couple of numbers and so far I'm 5 stitches too far to the right so I'll have to fudge the lettering a bit in the rest of that line.  No biggie since I caught it now I'll just do the N and D one space left and then shorten three spaces until the next word.

I need to focus on school again.  I got an 86% in my first class which was Composition II.  I've started American History and got a 94% on my first exam but it was open book.  All of the tests are open book except the final and unfortunately I had to use it quite a bit because my brain just doesn't do history well.  I'm more of a math/science girl but mostly math.  I really want to finish History in my next several days off but I need to schedule my final with a proctor so we'll see how far I get.  I still have 12 more chapters to read and 4 tests including the final.  Then I have World History, Nutrition and American Government.  The only one I have confidence in is Nutrition. 

I was supposed to have 6 days in a row off which was going to be my major study session but I found out today they took off my day tomorrow and added the 4th.  Unfortunately it means a lot of people bitching about heat/firework viewing areas/anything else because people just like to complain.  I just hope it doesn't rain.  On the bright side they overstaffed the areas so as long as everybody shows up to work we'll have 7 people working which is more than double the regular staff.  Fortunately it means I have a day off tomorrow which is my mom's birthday but also starts QVC's Christmas programming so I'll be vegging all day tomorrow and I'm aiming to get at least 1 test done.  If I do the rest of the day will be stitching on the next page in the second row.

Well that's all in my life for now thanks for reading!  We've given a moving date of 8/8 so we need jobs before then (hopefully in Colorado).  Wish me luck!

See you guys next week and I appreciate all of the comments!

SFS June Check-In and Giveaway Goodies

Hello again my lovely followers!  Hope everything is going good in stitchy world for you all :). Today I'm sharing my SFS update as well as what I gave Katie for winning my giveaway!

SFS is run by Mel at Epic Stitching.  We are not allowed to spend more than $25 a month but anything we don't spend gets carried over to the next month.  We can earn money for stitching stash but I don't count that.  This year is in two parts so this is the last month of this part and I've got quite a bit left I didn't spend.  Yay!

June Allotment: $25

Carryover: $94.30

Spent: $67.67

Total: $51.63

Not bad but I'm glad I had that much saved up since the tilton sale nearly broke me lol.  What did I buy?  Well you saw the 6 charts already and I also got some new scissors for my travel project case and some new fabric.  

This will be dyed for Merida.

And the fabric I already dyed for Hocus Pocus which was the Orange and black from my last post.

When I dyed that fabric I dyed the pieces for my giveaway at the same time.  When I asked what colors you all liked she just said bright colors so that's what I did!  

I've decided to start naming my fabrics when I dye them and keep track of the colors I use in case I ever decide to sell them.  So the Orange and black I did is Halloween Havoc.

Pic is washed out.  Orange and black are much truer to Halloween shades.

And I sent Katie a piece of Sleeping Beauty:

  

A piece of Storm Clouds: 

And a piece of Under the Sea which is my fave of the bunch:

I forgot to take the pic until after I trimmed Storm Clouds but I was too excited lol.  I also sent her a puzzle, a China cat which is supposed to being good luck for her son Jeremiah who is healing from surgery and some Disney cell phone charms which she can use as scissor fobs.   And some floss lol.  I forgot to take pics of the rest before I shipped it but she has pics on her blog.

She was thrilled with them so I consider it a win :)

Thanks for stopping by next time we'll see some Paradise progress!  I haven't done much but I've been busy lol

P.S. One of the reasons we were busy was because we went to the Goo Goo Dolls concert at Universal.  Here's some pics:

I got video too but can't upload it from my phone.  Blah lol.  Ttfn!