I can't think of a lively title for this post, so this is it! :-)

From what I've been reading on blogs, it sounds like everyone had a good Christmas. Mine started off fairly early with a visit to OH's family to see what Santa left his nephew, then up to my parents to exchange pressies, followed by brunch at my sisters (delicious) with lots of laughs (especially when my younger sister put a bebe gun pellet through my BIL and older sister's garage window - at least I always hit the target!), then back to see OH's family to play with nephews cool new toys, and then everyone gathered at my parents in the late afternoon for our usual evening Christmas dinner. A great time was had by all.

Here's my progress on my Long Dog 18th Century Band Sampler. There are still a couple of bands to go. I've found the bands stitch up quite quickly, even though it looks intricate it's an easy and pleasurable design to stitch.



And finally, here's a photo of JBW Designs French Country ABCs. I finished it the other week, but with all the festivities leading up to Chrismtas I didn't have a chance to post a photo. It definitely needs to be made into something, as it is a bit 'blah'.

Merry Christmas from me and my OH

Click here

Have fun, I'd love to see other stitchers 'elf themselves'! LOL

New stash and a small finish

Living in New Zealand good stash isn't always easy to come across and I often think the cost of postage is excessive when shopping online from overseas, so when I saw that MaryKathryn was doing free postage on all orders (international included) I jumped at the chance to order some stash. It arrived just over a week later too - I was very impressed!

So here are my new charts -



I have liked these charts for a long time, so have already finished up Faith by Carriage House Samplings. I changed the wording of 'Faith' to 'Hope', and am going to make it into a fob or pincushion for someone I know who is going to be trying IVF next year.



My cats really make me laugh - Tess came home with glitter all over her head the other night. I suspect she must have been snooping around in someone's house under their Christmas tree! Giggsy has FINALLY learnt to use the cat door - we only installed it in May 2006!! And wee Meg, who usually likes to wake us up by scrabbling around under the bed when she wants out, has started taking a more direct approach - walking over me, and then rubbing her face in mine!

Had better finish up, I'm off out for our usual Saturday lunch shortly. OH has decided to take a half day today (the joys of being your own boss) and will be joining us which is great. Hope you all have a great weekend!

Normal service to resume

Although I've been reading blogs, I haven't posted much at all over the past few months. Sorry about that, but normal service is about to resume.

We had houseguests for three months, which I found unbelievably stressful and suffocating. I'm so glad to finally have peace and tidiness restored in my house.

I have been up in Auckland on a work trip for the past three days. My boss and I stayed at a hotel on the Viaduct which was lovely, and on Wednesday night I went up the Sky Tower. I'm not a great fan of heights, so I did wonder as I was going up why on earth I was there. LOL. Unfortunately, I didn't take my camera to be able to share any photos (unless I figure how to get photos from my mobile to my laptop!) - but I will next time!

I found a cross stitch shop near our Auckland Office - but couldn't find anything I liked. I'm too fussy now that I can shop worldwide on the internet from my living room! :-)

When I got home from my trip last night OH had converted one of our spare rooms into a craft room for me. So sweet! I now have my sewing machine, stash, magazines etc etc all in one room. Yippeee. He stayed up really late both nights I was away cleaning the house, moving things around to get the room sorted for me, cleaning up the garden - and he even found time to wash the car! Here's for a relaxing weekend now that everything is done! And my parents are taking us out for dinner tonight (great!) which means no cooking.

I have been doing a little stitching. I finished up my square on Vonna's RR last week.



I've also put a few more stitches into Long Dog, and am nearly finished JBW Designs 'French Country ABCs'. Photos to follow.

Hope you all have a good weekend.