Friday's Stitching Ground 🧛‍♂️

It was a pretty quiet day and I was stitching this afternoon with my usual companions. I got up to do something and when I came back I lost my spot. Or maybe they were keeping it warm for me?!

I AM LOVING THIS!
The Haunted Mansion by tiny modernist.
Maybe it will be finished by Halloween?

Have you ever started something and didn't want to put it down... no matter how big it is? I know I'll need to stitch some smaller pieces soon, but I'm putting it off for now.

Scavenger Photo Hunt, January 📷

The holidays certainly flew by, I can't believe it's going to be February tomorrow! So after a December break, it's finally time for Katie's I live, I love, I craft, I am me ... scavenger photo hunt this month.

The words for January are...

Starts with M...
Moon! I do love the moon, always have.
DH is a rocket scientist, even better! 

Lunch

Well, maybe breakfast, but it is pasta! Spike and Scotch left this for Nathan to have and for some reason he wasn't hungry. 😖

Ends with ...T

FighT!

Although is it really a fight if they're not together and physically fighting?! This is our neighbour cat, Harley, who likes to tease our cats by showing off his freedom.

Print

Ming's sweet paw print from a past winter, we're still waiting on some real snow this season.

Lost/Found

I thought Ming was lost until I found her with the Odie collection in my craft room.

A true lost and found, this is from last Friday's Stitching Ground, when Maximus really was lost and found!

My Own Choice

Maximus helping Nathan while he was stitching Pikachu this week.

Are you going to join in this year?!

A Tribute to Judy 💕

Today would have been dear Judy's 80th birthday.
She passed away suddenly in November '18, and has been missed ever since. 

She was so crafty - sewing, quilting, crochet, and of course, cross stitch. You can see where Karen gets it!

We loved spending time with her whenever she was in the area.

Here is a sampling of what she's stitched. Christmas first since Karen had these displayed this past Christmas.
I'm pretty sure there's at least another one that need to be fully finished, maybe more?

Some ornaments on the tree.

Plump Santas!

More Santas to be full finished.

Some finishes, some still need help.

Karen needs to stitch these up.

This is one that was missing the chart, but luckily Karen found the magazine in one of the boxes.

This one is lovely, I hope she has the chart for this somewhere!

Ah, and here's a mermaid! I'm pretty sure she stitched at least one more, but I'm not sure where Karen has it hanging.

Another one for Karen to finish.

And another treasure.

She also stitched all these firetrucks, Karen's Dad is a retired firefighter.

This is one of her many amazing bags, Karen gave me this one for Halloween!

So dear Judy, we still miss you and treasure everything you've left behind... I especially treasure sweet Karen!

Friday's Stitching Ground 🧛‍♂️

Today's stitching ground has me at home, with my usual companions!

I decided to change it up a bit and start The Haunted Mansion by tiny modernist. I have all the patterns so I can go in any order. It's a slooow start, I'm stitching one over 32 and now I'm wondering why!

Last night was awful, Maximus got outside and we didn't know it. I thought he might have gotten out because I couldn't find him anywhere in the house. I can't tell you how many times I opened the front, back, and garage doors to see if he was out there, but never got any response. When I woke up after 7am, I thought to check Ring at our front door and saw this! He had been coming to the front door from 2am to 4:30am! I pretty much screamed at Paul that he was outside and ran to the front door to see if he was there. We called and looked for him for over an hour and I finally found him in our enclosed porch under the sofa. He was scared, but fine. I thought for sure we had lost him to an animal, the cold, or whatever. I never want to go through that again!!! And now I know to turn on the motion notification on my phone if one of them is ever missing again!

On a brighter note, I celebrated this evening by appreciating some cans! 🍻

And for my sweet friends everywhere, please don't forget that YOU ARE AWESOME❣ 🥰

Have you complimented anyone lately?
I had a special talk with Gman1 this evening and received some very loving compliments from him, I had some to give him too!

Friday's Stitching Ground 🐕x4

Today's stitching ground had me stitching with Karen, my "could have been sister-in-law, but this is better chosen sister!"
I guess you could say I finished this, if I decide not to add the word HOPE. I thought about adding something else, but I kind of like it as is. 

I think I might get another Koala pattern, I'm just not sure which one.

As we were sitting in the dining room, this was my view into the front room... three pups! Can you see them all?

And this little stinker was behind me. And I do mean stinker, he had some nasty gas that had me leave the room! Oh, Winston.

This is what Karen is working on, she just started it but was missing some threads. So off we went to The Stitching Post to get them, it's nice that's she's so close to it. I looked around while we were there, but didn't see anything screaming at me to stitch. No worries, I have plenty at home!

Are you able to restrain yourself from purchasing patterns knowing you have plenty at home? I tend to at least buy fabric scraps, but didn't see any I liked today. Not that I don't have enough of that either!

December fun!

Ah, another fabulous time with my chosen sister, Cori, for our pre-Christmas get-a-way at Peddler's Village!

It's hard to see, but while we were having dinner the first night, there was a beautiful snow squall going on outside.

This year her Mom and Aunt Jo joined us for the night and part of the next day. It was freezing cold that night, and just a bit slippery coming back from dinner.

So many beautiful light displays.

Have you ever played SORRY with 16 men?! OMGoodness, such fun and I think it took us about three hours to finish! Mom came in 1st, me 2nd, Aunt Jo 3rd, and Cori coming in last, but what a great time we had. Now I'm going to be looking for old SORRY games at thrift stores for extra men and cards.

All too soon it was time for them to go. We all had a great time together with plans to do again next December.

Then it was shopping time for us.
Wishful thinking there, Cori!

The categories for the Gingerbread competition this year were Traditional, Authentic Reproduction of a Bucks County Landmark, 3-D, Movie or TV set, Firehouses, Student, and Kids Only.

There were so many beautiful creations, I had lots of "favourites"!

Notice the one of National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation?!

One of the shops had this "lovely" frog display - just as long as they stay there!

You wouldn't know it from this picture, but Cori wasn't feeling well while we were there. Totally run down, feeling like it was the flu. These were our pick-me-up drinks that afternoon.

She felt eh, but was hungry for dinner later on and a spiked hot chocolate helped a little bit! My cranberry martini felt good too!

But later that night I was on my own while she rested, so I braved the cold and had a spiked cider to keep me warm out there.

After offering to take pictures for people for a good part of my evening, someone was nice enough to take one of me.

Photo shop is a great thing, she was with me in spirit!

More magical lights.

And look, one of my gifts from Cori was a mermaid blanket! It's so soft, I love it.

I did stitch while we were there, but you've already seen it in previous posts.

Once again I'm behind in my comment responses and reading, I'm planning to start catching up tonight and tomorrow.
Thank you to all of you who take the time to read and comment on this hodge podge of a blog, I greatly appreciate it!