Friday's Stitching Ground 🍻

This Friday brings me to the Brookeville Brew Farm. Again with three of my four "boys", but this time with Gman1!
I needed something small to bring and found this hiding in my craft room. I started it a while ago, but thought I would finally finish it to give to my Dad for Father's Day.
It's a Zweigart Ship in a Bottle that I got on sale at Hobby Lobby last year.

Gman1's turn to have fun... legally!

Gman2 is with the college youth group for Habitat for Humanity. We'll have to make it a full family outing soon.

As I started my second beverage, the stitching was put aside - no frogs allowed!

Oh my, drink #3, and my last.
The four of us played BS together, or at Nathan's school, aka Baloney Sandwich! 

Scavenger Photo Hunt, May 📷

Here we go for May, Katie's I live, I love, I craft, I am me ... scavenger photo hunt this month!

The words for May are...

Seat

Today was a beautiful day for walk, although we had to make a detour since the path we wanted to take was closed - maybe from all the rain and trees down? Anyway, this was a perfect little resting "seat" on our adventure.

View from Said Seat

I tried the panoramic mode, but it looked much better than this!

Lunch

I tried this for the first time and LOVED it! Now I don't feel bad for eating pizza.

Starts with P...
Pets!
These are our two adorable Tonkinese cats, Ming and Maximus. Spoiled rotten and love to snuggle with each other, and our family.

Transport

Handy, dandy shoes for walking today!

Would this be considered transport too? Our friend brought over his drone to take photos of our house and check the roof/gutters.

My Own Choice

This was my view walking the soccer fields while waiting for a Scout meeting to be over. Such beautiful colours!

See you next month!

Say, What?!😖 AND another Tornado 🌪

Per our county police... just a little scary!

Robbery
Columbia, 21045: JOANN Fabric and Craft Store, 6100 block of Columbia Crossing Circle, May 29 7:52 p.m.
A store employee reported that three male suspects entered the store and stole merchandise. When confronted by the employee, one of the suspects discharged pepper spray. One of the suspects also pepper sprayed a witness before all three fled in a vehicle with the merchandise. No serious injuries were reported. The investigation is ongoing.

*Comments*

*What kind of high quality yarn is JoAnns slinging these days?

*Sewing machines? Ottlites? Good scissors? Just trying to think what might have street value. Surely not floral stems or cards of buttons?

*Sounds like a bunch of heads doing these crimes. Who steals from a fabric store? 

*Really, people? JoAnns Fabrics is what you choose to rob? May be they had a crafting emergency and really needed the supplies.
*Scrap booking has been taken to the next level!
*Pretty much what I was thinking. What losers steal from a craft store? What did they take...glue guns, material, or pipe cleaners
*Those scrap book cutter machine thingies are pretty pricey. Can't imagine they have much street value though.

*I really need to know what they stole!!!
* Cricut machine?

Now this is just one of the craft stores that I frequent, but normally always during the day. I know some of the comment were funny, but what the heck were three young men stealing from there?! The cash registers are up front, so maybe it was just the money? Using pepper spray was scary too.


 In other news in our area, we had another tornado hit near us this afternoon. Last week it was to the east of us, this one was to the west of us. Nathan was at school and had to shelter in place, again. Gman1 was there to pick him up for me on his way home, and he had to shelter in the church.

There are some pictures on Scott E's Blog, and a video that was taken two miles from our house.

All those down trees all over the place meant traffic was a hot mess for hours! No batting practice for Nathan.

As far as I know, I haven't heard of any houses or buildings that were damaged, so that's good.

Let's hope the rest of the summer is uneventful!

Friday's Stitching Ground 🍻 and some weather 🌪

Today's stitching ground brought me to Elder Pine Brewing for a drink with three of my four "boys", where I was stitching a special something for someone and sipping on a Tropic Chaser, very tasty!

Gman2 was finally able to partake in a tasting, a belated birthday outing!

In other big news, we had a EF-1 tornado in our area yesterday! That certainly doesn't happen very often around here.
Per patch.com...

COLUMBIA, MD — A line of storms that originated near the Blue Ridge Mountains spawned an EF-1 tornado Thursday in Howard County. The storm traveled a path of about 5.5 miles, from Clarksville to Columbia, according to the National Weather Service. At maximum speed, winds were 95 mph.

The tornado made its way through Howard County from 3:27 to 3:36 p.m. on Thursday, May 23, weather officials reported Friday. At its peak width, the rotating column of air was about 150 yards.

One person injured in the tornado was believed to have suffered non-life-threatening injuries, according to the Howard County Department of Fire and Rescue Services.

The weather event was classified as an EF-1 tornado. Tornadoes are rated on a scale from 0 to 5. During an EF-1 tornado, gusts are between 86 and 100 mph in the area where damage occurs.

Here is what a survey of the storm damage and radar indicated, according to the National Weather Service:

• At the intersection of Brighton Dam Road and MD 108 in Clarksville, trees were uprooted, large branches were pulled toward one another and trees fell in all directions except to the west.
• An eyewitness in the area of Cedar Lane around Corina Court said the tornado knocked down trees and resulted in swirling debris. Most trees were uprooted, and a few were snapped, including both hardwood and softwood. One tree fell onto a house.
• Large trees were uprooted and a couple of trees snapped, falling to the north, along Shaker Drive between Seneca Farm Road and Wayover Way.
• The most significant damage was found near the 9400 block of Patuxent Woods Drive, according to the weather service. A grove of hardwood and softwood trees snapped at mid-trunk and fell haphazardly. The roof of a nearby office building was also partly taken off and blown to the east. "It is likely that this was due to straight-line winds as radar analysis showed the tornado vortex broadening rapidly," the weather service reported.

Savage and Highland also experienced "significant wind damage," according to the National Weather Service.

So even though some of this was literally just down the road from us, we only had the darkness, rain, and some wind. I don't think we had one branch come down anywhere in our yard. We did lose power for about five hours, and Nathan got held in school until it was over.

While we were out today, one direction had no damage, but the other direction in Highland and Columbia had trees and branches down all over the place! We were so lucky it totally missed us.

So how's your spring weather been?

A Hodgepodge 📂

I took a detour to a thrift shop after Nathan's dental appointment last week and found these treasures.

This was what was inside and why I bought it. I think St. Nicholas will be my first one.

I liked this one, so I got it too.

This one I bought at my LNS, The Stitching Post, it was on display and I couldn't resist it!

Then with Joann having their 40% off sale, I bought some of these since they finally had them there. I didn't buy all the colours, but all the ones I thought were pretty!

This was a quick one I finished. I needed to feel like I accomplished something and this was it! I just need to fully finish it.

Nathan was happy on Saturday, with this entourage cheering him at his game. And they won!

On Monday, DH and I celebrated our 24th wedding anniversary.
Here's a back view of my dress, you don't see that very often.

And one of my favourite pics, it was a little breezy!

A honeymoon picture on our cruise, so young!

Our photo in front of the chapel before heading out to dinner.

This is looking in through the door at the sun shining on the stained glass, just beautiful!

Not only did I receive lovely roses, but carnations too.

Friday's Stitching Ground 🍺

I decided I wanted a quick one to finish, so I started this one earlier in the week. Gotta love those Mill Hills!

Earlier today I did stitch upstairs with Ming on my lap, but this evening I was in the basement.

This was my actual view - DH cleaning up his brewing area, in preparation for brewing tomorrow with Gman2. He got to choose what to make for his birthday and he chose American Orange Wheat (GOW - Gman's Orange Wheat!) That sounds like one I'll enjoy and I'm sure Gman1 will pick something DH will like.

So your drink of choice while stitching?
For me, I'd say in the morning it's coffee, seltzer most of the day, buppa tea in the afternoon if it's chilly, and an occasional beer/cider/girly drink on the weekend. I think that covers it!

Mother's Day Love 💐

This is the hummingbird I made my Mom and she loves it!
Unfortunately she wasn't feeling well today because it was so damp and rainy, so Dad is hoping to get a picture of her with it tomorrow. 

I decided to sign it this way and glued it to the back.

Mother of DragSons! 😉🐲

Through the years with my beautiful Mama!

I've posted this before, but thought I would post it again for Mother's Day.

Although now she is no longer able to make me her German pancakes. I know how to, but they don't quite taste the same as hers. 

I hope you had a wonderful day, regardless if you're a mom.

I have several friends and family that have lost their Mom's this year, so I know today is extra hard. One Mom lost their daughter, so I'm sure it's hard for her too.

I honestly don't know how much longer I'll have my Mom around, she's told me she's ready to go and as hard as it is, I understand. But until then, I'm thankful she's here!

Friday's Stitching Ground 🛋

I finished my mom's Hummingbird for Mother's Day and posted it yesterday. Dad said it already came today, awesome! And I was worried it wouldn't get there in time.

Today brought me to the enclosed porch, before the rain showed up. I'm still working on the backstitching on Gathering Honey, it's so s..l..o..w! But since I'm not in a rush and have other projects I need to work on here and there, it's fine.

I had company, even though they weren't on my lap.

Do you have company when you stitch?

The People Chose 🌹

Confused? Take a look at Jo @ Serendipitous Stitching to see what I'm blogging about.

I ended up skipping last month as the only special stitches I've done have been French knots! I've got those down, no problems.

But this month it's flowers, I've got plenty of those!
Heart flowers - this was a gift but then found it for sale at the church picnic so I bought it back. Oh well, I like it.

This was made for sweet Karen.

A Mill Hill cutie.

A daffodil for St. David's Day.

This is one I helped Karen with, but I didn't get to see the total finish.

I'm still not finished with this series, but will be this year!

Lots of different flowers in these. And this was in the freebies month too.

I made this for my parents in '91, it shows the Maryland state flower, the Black-eyed Susan.

More monthly flowers, you can see them individually HERE.

I just finished this for my Momma for Mother's Day, I just need to shop for a frame tomorrow.

I'm sure I have some others scattered around somewhere, but this good enough. Happy Spring!

Friday's Stitching Ground 🏡

Today brings me to my parents house, or should I say Mom's Gartenhaus. I came to spend the night with them because I'm helping Gman2 bring his things home from college tomorrow. Yay!

I'm still working on this for my Mom for Mother's Day, so this was the perfect place to stitch it without her seeing it.

Hey look, Bridgend, where I was born!

Here's what it looks like from the outside.

Very cozy in there, that chair is comfy!

And behind the door? Mom's private comfort station. 
This was included for her so that it would be easier to use instead of trying to make it back to the house in time. Luckily I went before coming out to stitch!

Beautiful ceiling and fan.

I'm thinking Dad must be using this more often than Mom, this is what he likes to drink. And how rude, no glasses in there for me to have an afternoon refreshment.

This was my view from the chair, Mom's chapel.

And even though it was a bit hot and humid outside, it was really nice and cool in there with the fan on low. And when it's cold, no worries... there's an electric fireplace there to keep you warm.
Dad has informed me that when they're gone, I'm supposed to take the gartenhaus AND the chapel back to my house. Um, okay?