Sunday, January 17, 2010


I've been working on my latest project for two weeks now
and felt that I had enough done that I could show it off to
you all. The chart is Prairie Schooler's "Winter Wind" and
I've been stitching the bigger design.


I began by stitching the alphabet and as always I started in the
bottom, left hand corner. Once the alphabet was done I began
to fill in the white background. I wondered at the time if I
should have done it the other way around, and worried that I
might find the background boring to do. Fortunately I found
that it was actually fun to figure a "path" for myself around
each letter and was eager to get it finished so that the full
impact of the alphabet would be seen against the "snow" white
background. I'm now building the house and loving the DMC
#3777 that the design calls for.

I'm trying to stitch at least three strands of floss per night to
keep this project moving, and I'm also trying to do a couple
of blog visits per night to make some attempt to keep up with
my commenting. Some nights (such as Tuesdays which is
shopping/Weight Watchers night) I have less time at the end
of the day then others to follow this plan exactly, but I do
what I can.

Speaking of Weight Watchers....

Lost over two pounds between the 5th and the 12th of January.
Am currently on maintenance which means that I'm suppose
to be maintaining my goal weight. So my facilitator upped my
daily points to 29 and reminded me to eat more protein. This
Tuesday is my 6th week on maintenance and I'm suppose to be
within two pounds of goal. Um...not so much. We can adjust
my goal somewhat, but I still need to gain two or three pounds
to complete the maintenance program. Ironic, isn't it??

Last night a friend came over for tea and a chat. We were at
it until 1:00 am! We got into the chocolate biscuits that our
friends from Scotland brought me at Christmas. They are
Marks and Spencer's chocolate covered biscuits and I am
crazy about them. I ate quite a few of them. At least six!
DH and I took the rest of them over to my Mom today and
left them with her to be shared and enjoyed with her friends
and to get them the heck away from me!! Perhaps gaining
those two to three pounds won't be too much trouble after all.



I'm still waiting for two stash packages (!!!) to arrive
from different locations. One will be awhile because
of an out of stock leaflet but the other I know is in
the mail somewhere. I did receive my monthly
addition to my Threadworx collection this week,
plus a chart that I scored off of Ebay which happened
to tickle my fancy when I saw it there one day. Love
the colors in these two designs but I had no idea of
how BIG they are when stitched on 28 count fabric.
Oh well.


A book order did arrive in the mail this week as well. I've
got a wish list a mile long on Indigo/Chapters site of all
the lovely, tempting books that I want to add to my
library and these made a wee, tiny dent in that list. I
started "Girl in a Blue Dress" as my travel read and on
Friday night nearly read past my bus stop because I
was so absorbed in the story.

The book on the top of the stack "The Book of
Illumination" I casually picked up just to read the
first couple of pages to see what it was like since I'd
never read anything by these two writers before.
I'm over half way through it and can't help but pick it
up whenever I have a spare second. While waiting for
the dinner to cook, while eating breakfast, while
passing the time on the porcelain throne .... uh .... well,
you get the idea.

Actually, the only writer in this pile that I've read before
is Michelle Moran who focuses on Egyptian history for
her fictional stories. She's a brilliant writer.



I finished Men of the Otherworld this week and it was
fabulous!! I adore Kelley Armstrong. Her sense of
humor, her wonderful, colorful characters and the
mythology that she's created all make her stories irresistible
to me. An author who's books I buy without hesitation or
second thought as soon as they come out. And of course
she's from Ontario so I can take pride in helping to support
a fellow Canuck.


Rupert lazing under the Christmas tree. Dignity, as we all know,
is very important to a cat and must be maintained at all times.
More or less.

DH and I dismantled the Christmas tree and packed away all
the decorations a week ago on the Saturday. It took four and a
half hours to do that. Sunday I vacuumed, dusted and cleaned
the house and returned the every day knickknacks (once I'd
found them again in all the places that I'd stashed them in to
get them out of sight during the holidays) to their proper
places. It's kind of nice to have the house back to normal
again, but I do miss the Christmas tree, which seemed to look
especially nice this season for some reason.

The new Little House Needleworks and Country Cottage
Needleworks designs that are coming out next week have
caught my eye and got me itching to reach for my mouse,
my credit card and my "gotta have" list. "Rose Hill
Plantation" and "Liberty Lane" and perhaps "Mississippi
Riverboat" are the ones I love most.

Thank you everyone who commented on my last post
and were so generous in their compliments on my first
finish of 2010, and for my ongoing weight loss battle.

I'm off to stitch on "Winter Wind" for awhile so thanks
for dropping by. Hope you have a great week.

Cheers!!

13 comments:

staci said...

Love your new project! I really like the floss colors of the wording...it's quite pretty against the white.

Awww, how cute is Rupert :) Hope your new stash hurries! It's so hard to wait!!!

Siobhán said...

Your new project looks great! It's fun to figure out a path as to where to go next, isn't it? :)

I like your new book stash! I have been wanting the Illumination book but keep unloading it from my Amazon cart. I'll have to keep it in there next time. ;) Lovely new stitchy stash, too!

BrendaS said...

I love the PS design you are stitching. Before you know it all those little bits of time will mean a finish!

Congratulations on your weight loss.

BrendaS

Judy S. said...

Love your Winter Wind project; Prairie Schooler patterns are among my favorites. Looks like some good books on your pile..... One of our kitties is loosing fur and we don't know what's going on, but for sure a trip to our vet.

Maggie said...

Hey Judy, i think i've got a couple of extra pounds you can have before your next weigh in, sending them over to you now, lol.
I've not weighed myself yet, maybe at the end of the week, it's been too nasty to go walking with the snow we had, i did manage to go tonight though :-)

Your new project is lovely, i'm temped to get those when browsing on sew and so, have too many others in my 'to do' pile though at the moment.

Have a great week x

samplerlover said...

Hi Judy,
Your new project looks really lovely. I always find working around letter is fun as well.
Rupert looks like Sally our dog lol. She also loves to stretch out and lay on her back. Problem is though that she is so big when she does it that it is hard to get around her.
Congratulations with you progress at Weight Watchers. It is always really exciting when you get down to the maintenance part. - Sandra.

Lynn said...

I have Winter Wind in my stash and really like it. I just haven't got around to it yet.
Isn't it funny how all cats love to hang out under the tree? Clarisse is still looking for ours now that it's put away. I laughed when I read how you can't remember where you put away your everyday things. I spend days trying to find where I've put my things.

Jennifer said...

I love your new PS design! I have this one in my stash too. Your cat is so cute! Don't think I have seen a pic of him before. Congrats on your WW progress. Enjoy your new project Judy , looking forward to seeing more , I hope to get some stitching in this week too!

Kathy A. said...

Nice work on your newest PS.
Aren't their designs always so wonderful and detailed.

Glad that things are going well. congrats on sticking to your weight loss program. You will find your right spot and be ok there soon.

Cute snap of Rupert.

Take care hon. Sending hugs

Rebel In Ontario said...

WOW - what an inspiration that you can get to goal and if you are REALLY good, surpass it! Love all the photos...

Dani - tkdchick said...

Oh Judy I am just so jealous! You get to eat 29 points a day just to maintain!!!! I'm still down at 22 and even that's my loosing number and its such a challenge for me to loose. When I tried upping points for maintenance I gained so I've left it at my loosing number... also I would love to drop 10 more lbs if possible to get within my BMI range. I just don't understand how some continue to drop weight during maintenance. For me its like my body went "no way, no more!" and I hit a brick wall! I work so hard just to keep the weight off... let alone loose. Some days I get pretty discouraged but I try not to go back to my old habits. Some days I wonder am I doing something wrong? Am I not eating enough? Too much? Too much exercise? Wrong kind? There are just so many factors! I'm so happy for you that you've gotten to your goal weight and doing well at maintenance.

Your PS looks great! Sounds like you've got a bit of a plan there to keep up with the things you love, stitching and blogging!

Brigitte said...

Oh Judy, your new project looks so nice. I dearly love Prairie Schooler and have most of their books. This year I will stitch one of them after a whole yera without PS. I'm still leafing through my PS stash in order to find the one project that attracts me most.
Very nice new chart you won on ebay. It looks very spring-y so it might be the perfect project to welcome spring.
It's one of my plans for this year to have more reading time and read more books than last year. These books that you drag around everywhere in order not to miss a single free minute in which you could read another page are the best! Enjoy your to-be-read pile!
I can only say that I admire you for all the weight loss that you worked so hard for. Thumbs up for you!!!!

JOLENE said...

Rupert is soooo adorable!!! What a cutie!!! Aren't Prairie Schooler patterns so fun to stitch.....yours is coming along nicely. Congrats on achieving your weight loss goal....that is such an accomplishment. Have a lovely week and thanks for visiting my blog.