Happy Thanksgiving!

Hope you all have had a wonderful Thanksgiving. Made a pecan pie(pea-caan peye) for desert and way too much of other real foods. We had a small gathering of my mom, step-daughter, son and myself.(also 4 dogs if they count in your world) DS and DH left at 3:30 to go deer hunting and came home empty handed and hungry.Menu of turnip greens, sweet potato casserole with nuts, brown sugar coconut and corn flakes on top(I know it sounds weird but it is the only way to top the sweet potato) dressing, turkey, pork loin with mustard sauce, fresh cranberry relish, and giblet gravy. I wanted to get a picture of the table but they started eating before I could snap a shot. So here are my left overs instead! lol

Close your eyes and imagine a table with an antique blue and white china and pipping hot food. Don't blink or it looks like above photo before you can tell them to wait.


 I managed to get some beading done on a exchange piece and hope to complete the finishing work tonight.I just love this one and hope to post a pic soon and they will allow. 


I do hope that amid the stress that family can sometimes bring and hopes for perfect meals we put on ourselves, you were able to find time to celebrate all the goodness in this life God has given you. If it is not a holiday in your country be a trend setter and start making it one. A day to be thankful without the stress of gift giving or other expectations is a nice day. 


Thanks for stopping by,
Pam

Pie & Dandelion

My mom came up to stay through the holiday. She loves lemon meringue pie so I made her one today. The center is like lemon curd and if you have only had a lemon ice box pie this is a much more intense lemon experience in my opinion.The recipe has been in our family for 5 generations that we can count. It came from my great aunt's grandmother. I cannot even count how old that would make it, my great aunt is 83(and still a handful) I got the baking gene in my family so this pie always falls on me to make. It is make with a double boiler and a good deal of whisking to temper the egg yolks but well worth the resulting taste explosion.

 I was able to get 4 bands and part of a fifth completed on Dandelion Sampler this weekend. I was looking at the signature section this morning as I was working and realized this piece is from 1992. At least it is timeless in my eyes. I hope to have it completed before the end of the year just short of its 20 year anniversary. How sad is that? I am stitching it on Days gone By linen which is pretty appropriate don't you think?I have actually on the had chart about 10 years so I am really only about 10 years behind in my stitching. :) It is in an old Just Cross Stitch if your interested in it when I'm finished drop me a comment. 


Hope you all can find something to be thankful for this week. I think I have too many things to count as God has been very good to our family this year. If you have had a rough year and it seems He isn't blessing you it is still Him teaching you and being good to you.(have had plenty of those years in this life as well)


Thanks for stopping by,
Pam

Spun Silver

This my my lament of Spun Silver Belfast linen. You are looking at my last piece of it. It is about 7 inches by 3.5 inches. I have been hoarding a larger piece for years but recently stitched a little something on it and now this is all I have remaining. It was discontinued many moons ago but being a skilled stasher I was able to use it wisely on pieces which it really enhanced. Blues, purples and greens really sing to me on this fabric. And the way it feels in hand is something just short of heavenly. I hope always for its return but with all the tans and coffee colors being so popular I fear we will not see a recovery of this gentle beauty. The grays linens are too heavenly and deep in color and the blue linens are just too blue and overtake the other colors. Spun silver allows the design to be highlighted and enhances the threads rather than overpower them. Platinum is the sister fabric to this if you are trying to picture it in your mind the subtle tans versus the subtle silver grays and a loose silky weave of fabric. I am sure by now you have figured out I could go on about this for a while. I'll stop so as not torture any remaining readers but I just felt my favorite linen deserved a fond fairwell.

Thanks for stopping by,
Pam

baking, shopping and more

The weekend began with a day of baking. I made a family favorite, Italian Cream Cake. It was my step daughters 21st birthday last week and she requested the cake. I then woke up at 4:30 Saturday morning (UGH!) and since I could not go back to sleep I decided to make some pumpkin bread and banana nut bread. Then, you guessed it, off to the LNS for a fun day of stitching and stashing.

Isn't this the cutest tree. I got it in black so it could be used year round for ornaments. I am shamefully lacking in Christmas ones. I pulled my stitched ornaments out and only about have of the branches are filled. I do have several needing to be finished to help fill in the gaps but I will have to get busy to have a proper showing for the holidays. I thought it would look nice with the hanging pincushions or other small pieces in the off season.

Not a great picture but I picked up Fredrick and Fredericka by CHS. I got a lovely piece of Weeks linen called linen. Thy will look great on it. Opted for DMC rather than NPS. LNS doesn't stock them and I am too lazy to stalk them down on the Internet right now.

I also picked up the LK 6 fat men series. I think they will look so cute done up. Who knows when but they are hanging with the rest of the stash now. I worked on my retreat pieces while at the shop but didn't take any pictures of that. I am almost finished with the Blue Ribbon Designs piece and just need to add the ribbon leaves to the VS piece so hopefully by next week they will be finished. I also got my exchange piece ready to be finished. So all in all a productive weekend. And best of all no cleaning! My DSD is working just a few hours a day (3) and will be helping with that until she finds a full time job.

This was my first veteran's day with out my veteran Dad. It was hard and sad. We are just a few days away from the anniversary of his death and it has been a hard year. You will just be fine and then all the sudden something happens and makes you remember him and I have to fight back tears. Guess it goes on like this for a while.

Pam

Exchange piece

This is the exchange piece from he PS exchange I sent to Melanie. It was from G is for Garden of the PS alphabet. The back of the needle book has the garden that sits under the house on the main graph. Melanie sent me a wonderful piece in a different exchange so I felt a bit of pressure while stitching.

The weekend holds a break between my sons sporting life. I hope to spend it hold up stitching. Cleaned really well last weekend so I think this may be the take a day off and stitch weekend. Yesterday I stood in the pouring rain for 3 hours at a cross country meet selling concessions for sections held at his school.We were there for about 5 hours so not all of it was wet. I was amazed that people were buying stuff in the pouring rain. I was so cold when it was over I had to take 2 showers to get the chill from my bones. I really think I earned a stitching weekend. What cha think?

Thanks for stopping by,
Pam

Not until the New Year

This is the exchange piece I sent to Tina.(no blog) This was on the Stitches with Love Exchange. The inside of the piece has all the usual goodies for the lover of smalls.I had a hard time letting parting with the little acorn salt and pepper shakers.I know that is sad but true none the less.

I was the lucky recipient of a amazing finished box from Angela.Hooked on Stitches Got a cute LK fall chart and DMC , great fall pumpkin bow and orange ribbon, a fun fat quarter and orange tape measure. 

My last realization is that it only 2 months away from the new year. I have several projects started that I would really like to complete. Why this weekend I managed to work on one of them .... I stitched and entire word(silver) over one. I was so disappointed in myself for not stitching more. I have this shinny new ott lamp and fantastic magnifier that changed my world, or at least set it back 10 years to before the bad eyes over took it, and all I could do was stitch one tiny word. SILVER. SO......... my not until the new year resolution is that I will not start another piece until I have completed some of these pieces in waiting or we hit the 2012. I still need to put the binding on my quilt. I seam to stall each time I get to something new on the quilt but I'll have to get that done soon. It has turned chilly here and I need a new lap throw. The 3 fairly large pieces hanging out in my world will hopefully show progress soon. I did join the Christmas Exchange on the above blog so I guess that will be my exception to the rule. (gotta have one) So if anyone would like to join in please let me know and we can encourage one another along in the not until the new year resolution.


Happy Stitching,
Pam

Fast Finish and Exchange piece

This is my travel piece from my trip home. The chart was in Gail's blue tote of charts from the retreat and she kept the gift going and gave it to me! I did make the flowers a bit brighter for me. I think it is going to finish into a little pocket for my closet. (yes I even decorate in my closet and laundry room) My DH gets a little tired of the stitching in every room so I put it in places he cannot see. We all know the laundry room is male free- if you have on of the rare specimens that will do laundry consider yourself a lucky lady. 

Next up is my lovely exchange piece from the PS exchange. Melanie did an amazing job. I am lucky enough to now have two wonderful pieces she stitched. She got tagged with me in 2 exchanges. Finishing job is fantastic.


The house is quite and DH had a work dinner after work so I get to spend some quality time with stitching stuff. Can it be true? Stitching time and its not even the weekend. Better run and play with the needle and thread.


thanks for stopping by,
Pam