Day After Day

It's raining. It's pouring. The old man is snoring. Bumped his head. Went to bed and didn't get up till morning. We used to sing this as kids whenever it would rain. I do love a good rain shower! It just makes everything feel new.

I spent the first part of the week getting ready for the family get together! Babies from my wild rose. Potted and given out to happy cousins!

We had a great time and it was so nice to see everyone again! Cousins can be so silly! LOL

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Creation Sampler is moving right along now that I have come to the words. There was a deer beside of Adam but I left it off so that I could put my initials on it.

I have been thinking that I may enter a cross stitch piece or two in one of the county fairs around here next Fall (2020). Give me time to get some special stitches done. I have never thought about doing this before and it just hit me like a lightning bolt! Why haven't I and why don't I do it!!!!!!

I had my last infusion for this round so I am done with that until December!

I have to play in my stash at least once a week. It is just fun to visit all the wonderful designs I can't wait to work on! I ran across Margaret Cottam by La D Da. Now how did I forget about her?? I have Part One and Part Three. Where did Part Two disappear to? OMG! After a quick panic I realized that Part Two was stuck to Part One! Whew! She will definitely have to go on the priority list! This picture is not my work. It is from the La D Da website.

After I finish my current stitching I really need to get busy working on my Stitching Bucket List. These are designs I have wanted to do for so long and I even have planned where to hang them on the walls! It is time to make them stop waiting! The hard part is that I keep seeing all of these other beautiful samplers that I want to add to my stash! I need a blindfold! LOL

Until next time may you have simple days and an uncluttered heart.

Beating the Heat

I finally got the X-ray results of my shoulder. No inflammation. No bone loss. No damage. She said it probably bursitis or the rotator cuff. The last bursitis flare I had lasted a month.

I am still making progress on Catharine Dickenson but it is slow progress so no picture this time. It seems like each time I get a good start on stitching, the hand cramps begin and I have to put it down for a while.  I love the colors called for in this sampler. The only thing that would make it perfect for me is if it had a short verse but I still love it! I am hoping to get a good bit done on her next week -- or even finish!

My infusion round begins next week so I will be working on Creation Sampler again. It should finish up quickly.

I have been scratching my head wondering whether I should buy some new charts I ran across online. They are all older charts but for some reason they did not catch my eye until now. I have a nice hefty stash right now that will take me years to finish but.......

Florida family is coming up to NC later this summer! It will be nice to get together, see everyone and share some fond memories. I like to find something silly to make our pictures more fun. Last time I bought some clown noses from Walgreens Red Nose day to take for pictures. I am thinking about some Red Wax Lips this time!

Until next time, may you have simple days and an uncluttered heart.

Same ol', Same ol'

The old saying tells us that bad luck comes in three's. So far this summer, our dishwasher has died so for now I am using the old standby method of handwashing in a sink full of sudsy water. Not something I want to do forever and we will get it fixed when we can but for now it has actually been soothing. As I stand at the sink and wash each cup or plate, I am flooded with memories of helping my mother with the same chore when I was younger. She would wash. I would dry. Sometimes I begged to help and other times she had to insist I get in there and do it.

Next on this round of bad luck, we got a flat tire that had to be repaired. We walked in to the tire shop, expecting some outrageous bill that would make us walk away mad and feeling like we had been taken advantage of. After the tire was repaired, we were handed the receipt. No charge. DH and I just looked at each other puzzled. No way. No one does work for free anymore. So we approached the counter and asked if they possibly made a mistake. Nope. They just smiled and said "tell your friends about us". Sure thing, you bet we will!

Bad luck #3 has yet to hit but if it's no worse than #1 and #2 we can say this was a mild round. But wait, maybe it already happened and we just didn't realize it! No harm, no foul.

Moving on to my hunt for family history, I hit a road block on my side of the family for now but found out some wonderful new information for DH's family history! I see a road trip in our near future! I could not wait to tell him all the news. He was just as excited to find it out.

We have another trip to make this month. It will be a hard weekend for me. The anniversary of my parent's deaths. The days fall side by side and I am going to visit the graves, make sure the care and upkeep is being taken of, put out some flowers and while there I always visit with my infant brothers buried just a few steps away. When I was younger, my mother would take me out to the cemetery with her to put flowers on their graves then she would go sit in the car and let me have some alone time to visit with them. I always missed not knowing them and having siblings. Little children commonly have imaginary playmates. Mine were my brothers.

Over the weekend we did our chores and errands. The lawn was mown just in time before a big wave of humidity hit the next day. The grocery shopping was done. No exercise program can beat this task for a good work out! Walking around the store, putting all the bags into car, taking them out and carrying them in then putting them all away when you get home! Stretch, bend, walk, lift weights (heavy bags of food), squat and repeat then fall into your chair totally exhausted and unwind with an ice cold beverage! And since we only shop every other week, we have twice the groceries and twice the workout! The rule of thumb at our house is that mom does NOT cook on grocery shopping day. Everyone fends for themselves. There is plenty of food and they are big boys. Make a sandwich, nuke some leftovers, whatever. Just don't ask me "what's for dinner". But they still do except for DH. He understands. Bless his heart.

Sunday was ours. No chores. No major errands. Just time. Time to sleep in a little later than usual. Time to get online and catch up on some reading or visit some favorite sites. Time to watch a movie. Time for doing absolutely nothing.

The picture posted is one of me and my dad taken years ago but brings back memories for me. Sorry for the lack of pictures again. I promise to make up for it very soon! Thanks for stopping by! Your visits and comments always make my day!

Another Friday

Thank you for the great comments on my last post about my family history search. I was asked what his relation is to me. Henry Hatton (his stage and pen name) is my GG grandfather. His father was a famous writer, novelist and play write of his day. I have read some of his work but get tired of it quickly. A lot of thee's, thou's and therefore's along with other words not commonly used anymore. I have continued my quest on this project as the mood hits me and every so often something interesting will pop up and make it worth while.

Oh, those nagging questions that have haunted me since March have reared their ugly heads once again. What to stitch? What to stitch? WIPs? Start a new piece? Why am I wasting time trying to decide when I could working on those poor WIPs sitting in my basket? I can hear their pitiful cries of "finish me, finish me". The year is half over with no finished pieces for me to show off so I think I will focus on the WIPs for now and maybe I can knock at least several of them out by year's end.

Each year, we put out several tomato plants and I usually pick another veggie plant or two to try my not so green thumb at but not this year. We just didn't. No real reasons behind the decision. Every year, I grumble to myself about the up keep of the plants but I have missed the bounty of them this season with grocery prices on the rise. Next year, we will re-join the edible gardeners club once again for sure!

We had that major heat wave move through our area of the south about a week ago! Temps close to 100 degrees. It was that humidity that did us in though. Luckily, it didn't stick around too long and after if moved on we had a weekend of awesome temperatures. Friday was pretty cloudy which kept the heat at bay and we only reached 69 degrees. I actually got chilly several times. Saturday and Sunday were equally as nice. A little more sun but tolerable temperatures and very very little humidity! But, it's back again. Ugh.

I wish I had more exciting news to write about. Winning the lottery or a free vacation to Hawaii. Something to perk up these days of summer but this year we are staying buried inside as much as possible to avoid the awful heat. Even my camera doesn't want to come out of hiding from it's cool spot so not alot pictures to share this time around.

Thanks so much for stopping by and not giving up me during this blogging lapse I am having. Until next time, may you have simple (and cool) days and an uncluttered heart.

Longer than Usual

What is wrong with Blogger? Is anyone else having trouble signing in and leaving comments? I can post but I am having serious trouble leaving a comment on other blogs! It's getting pretty frustrating! I have also noticed that pictures (on my blog and others) often don't show up!

DH is finally finished with those awful hours he was working.Yea for him and yea for me! When he works like that it really throws us both off our mental calendars! I think a giveaway is order to celebrate the return of some (not complete but I'll take what I can get) normalcy in life around here! I will post more about it very soon!

I haven't written much lately about my other love. Birdwatching. I need to catch up on getting my backyard island area (where most birding activity happens) back in shape but these extra hot days just leave me with the "I'll do it later" feeling. I have really ignored it over the past year and it looks terrible! Shame on me. Of course the birds really like the grown over look but I don't. It's not totally out of control. Just enough to urk me. The honeysuckle and Virginia Creeper vines take over in the warmer seasons. I know the birds feed on the VC and both make excellent ground cover for them to hide in while looking for insects or worms. I'll probably just yank up enough to please us both because weeding (along with frogging) is one of my least favorite things to do. I have enough bird baths and feeders for the time but I have plans to put out several more birdhouses this coming Fall.

Good News! I finally found the names and birth years of my GGG Grandmother and my GGGG grandmother so that I can add it to my Mother's Tree when I begin stitching it! Now that I finally found them, I want to find more names for the piece! Call me greedy. lol. So for now, I have 7 names for this piece but would love to have at least 8 (or more)! I guess I'll be spending some time on Ancestry.com for awhile!!

For the longest time, I was the only coffee lover in our house. I had full control of the coffee maker, the brand of coffee that was bought and drinking it. My husband usually just bought a cup of joe at work and that was it for him each day. Recently, our son has developed a taste for the wake up juice and a second coffee maker may be in our future! I don't care for the brand he buys but most of all, he makes way to strong for my taste! I like my coffee to gently wake me up over the course of several cups but one sip of his brew is like being slapped in the face! lol. Now it's a race each morning to see who can set up the coffee maker first!

Not much stitching to brag about this post. I was all ready to pick it back up when I got hit by the ever not so popular stomach bug! Ugh. At this point, I feel like any stitching I may do would be brag worthy since it has been so long since I held that slender needle with my fingers and gently caressed the fabric as I worked my x's.

Thanks so much for stopping by! Your visits and comments always make my day!

The Blahs

Once again I am unable to use my camera. I need some batteries and won't be able to get them until this weekend. I feel as though a part of me is missing!

Harold went to the hospital again over the weekend. He came home from work early in the day and said he felt really funny with chest pains so another ambulance made it's way out to our house. They took him to ER first then set him up in a room on another floor to moniter his heart for the remainder of the day. After a days worth of blood tests they finally decided to release him around 9 that night along with some medical orders and he came home.

I am still digging through my stash and constantly changing my mind on what to do! I need to just pull something and start it! I have an order to make later this week. Nothing big. Just several charts I saw that begged me to bring them home!

The past year since my Dad passed away has been a hard one for me. It was full of tears and memories. My mother died when I was 15 years old on August 12 and this has always been the hardest day of the year for me to get through. Now I have the anniversary of my father's death on August 13 to deal with also. Harold may take a day or two off to help keep me busy. Not that I would forget either day but staying busy would help some. August has always been a hard month for me and now it seems even more so. I don't know if it's because of the sadness involved with this month, the heat or a combination of both but I always feel a lack of energy and desire to do anything productive until September arrives.

I will be back after this hard week is over and life resumes back to normal. So until next time, may you have simple days and an uncluttered heart.

Long Time No See!

I wish I had a lot of news to share but alas it has been dull around here lately. Actually, I'm not complaining though because many of you have read my motto that "dull is good". Mother's Day was quite which was also good. Harold and I went out for a bit. He wanted to get some tomato plants to put out (but I will end up doing it and tending to them)! I have been wanting a nice herb garden. Maybe next year. I want to get speciality herbs. Especially mints but I also like dill, lavender, thyme and parsley. Later in the day he decided to take me out to eat. Maybe because I told him I wasn't going to cook and he could make a sandwich! lol. Every restaurant was super crowded or getting ready to close early. We finally ended up going to our favorite Mexican place. Beans and rice will really fill you up quickly!

I took a stitching break for several days. Yes, my hands were bothering me a bit but mainly because I am just getting really bored with working on Independent Mind. I keep telling myself what a treasure I will have, not to give up and to keep on plugging way since I am so close to the end! As much as I want a new start, I refuse to give up on IM now because this is definitely a special piece for me since it being stitched in my Aunt's memory. I will say though that this will be the last big piece I do for a good while! I hope to have another progress picture to share next time I post.

Flowers and bushes are blooming in our yard! I am hoping to take a few days in the near future and begin sorting out some family history pages. Thanks so much for stopping by to see me again! Your visits and comments always make my day! Until next time, may you have simple days and an uncluttered heart!

Almost the Weekend!

I worked on sorting out pictures the past several days. I have so many albums already done but I still have boxes and boxes just waiting for some attention. Not all of these will be scrapped so my job was to sort out which ones would and which ones wouldn't. I now have 1 box of photos not to be scrapped and 3 large boxes of photos to scrap! I also have a big pile waiting on several CDs waiting to be printed out so they can go into the scrapbooking pile. *sigh*

I had to pick up several colors I had run out of so that I can finish up My Home is Built in Glory. I am hoping to have it totally finished by November 21st which was my Dad's birthday. That is my goal. I have taken a break from stitching so far this past week and my hands feel great! I guess this means I will be cutting back on my stitching (but not stopping) during the colder months because I really don't want to take any of those strong arthritis meds.

I also worked on several more layouts. This is one I did from the pictures I inherited from my Dad. It is a picture of him at 6 months of age with his nanny, Rose.

Remember to sign up for the giveaway by leaving a comment on the Oct. 25th post. Until next time, may you have simple days and an uncluttered heart! Happy Halloween to all.