Finished!!

I am done - with virtue sheep!!! I finished the last two last night. Not sure why but the frogs were wild last night and I kept having to undo what I had done. It may have been because I was watching the Broncos get trounced. Guess this means Manning has to play another year. In their defense - the Seahawks defense was a MONSTER!!! Wow, I was impressed. I am not impressed with that little Sherman guy - ankle injury feels a little like karma to me - just saying. Anyway - back to my sheep. Here is a picture...

So I had said this year was the year of the WIP but then I did Easter by Renato Parolin - could not help myself!! I did order some new patterns this week - I have another Parolin coming and 3 Jardin Prive to add to my collection. I told Scott it was depressing to think that this year I would not be starting any of my new fun projects just working on old ones and he suggested I do a WIP and then a new one and then a WIP and a new one - that makes sense to me! I consider the sheep to be a WIP - there were 12 (24 because I'm an over-achiever) Scott didn't think so. I have one new and one WIP done this year. The next WIP is "A year in the life of..." it is from Historical Sampler Company Limited   My friend Joanie bought this for my birthday a few years ago. I tried to work on it at work but I kept messing up - and so far it was only squares - so I put it aside. It's a kit so I just pulled it out. You can tell it's from the UK because November is Guy Fawkes instead of Thanksgiving - fun!! 

This weekend we attempted to go letterboxing - I have been home for far too long!! Last time we boxed was in September of 2013!! The weather here has been atrocious. We decided to go see the covered bridges - didn't make it. We went to a state park first and did not find either of the boxes we were looking for. What a drag!! Here are some pictures though -

craziest holes in the trees here - wood bees? or wood peckers?

beautiful bridge

mushrooms!

Then it started to rain. The next two boxes we went after, we found but I was soaked by the time we were done. We went to an antique place - we were trying to find one of those big antique malls but only found a small one.

lovely fog

this little guy was snuffling around in the grass in a frantic manner - so cute

we scared him up a tree - on accident  - see his cute little face?

ice fishing? this is on the pond by our house!

look at the ivy on this tree - crazy!!

 I found this PB2 at Kroger in the health food aisle - it's really good!! It is powdered but has less calories and fat than regular peanut butter. They make one with cocoa in it - fabulous - especially when you are on a diet and would like some chocolate peanut butter on your toast!!

I put out my heart ornaments - the patterns is from Under the Garden Moon You'd have to email them and ask about the metal tree - I'm sure they know where to buy them!! They have ones for all seasons. I just took off the quilt ornaments - same company!
Over the last two weekends we have been working on the fireplace room. I only have before pictures

 Had to finish painting the walls - they are not suppose to be striped  - you can see that it's wood panels on the next picture. We also had to get all that damn paint off the wood floor. Scott used a razor to scrape off the heaviest spots and I had a paint remover spray to get the over-spray off. We pulled off the baseboards. We now have the walls painted brown.  The baseboards, doors and window trim repainted the ivory color we picked. All we have left is - we are going to find a wax to put on the floor so it still looks rustic but maybe richer, and we need to buy some quarter round trim to put in front of the baseboards - then we are done!!! We will move the living room into this room - yay!! Soooo close!!

 I saw this "Very Berry Coffee Cake" on another blog and decided to try it. It smelled like Christmas when it was baking - mmmm. If I made it again I would use mixed berries - the batter is really sweet so if the berries are tart it would taste better!

The news has been squawking that we are going to have terrible weather starting tomorrow - rain, ice storm and then snow. Bleh - I am tired of snow. Sunday morning we had to shovel our driveway which, I have said before is STEEEEEP, we had to shovel across and then salt to keep from falling  - it had ice under it from the rain the day before and an inch or two of snow on top. Here we go again....
For Christmas I got season 4 of Downton Abbey from my girlfriend Joanie. It came in the mail Friday and this weekend we watched the rest of the season - so cool to be able to watch it before it's on TV!! But I am sad that it's over - until who knows when!! So if it's snows I will watch season 4 again!!
Thanks for stopping by - stay warm and stitch on!!

a sale!!

Bush Mountain Stitchery sells a lot of European designers - like Renato Parolin , Jardin Prive and Sara Guermani. Right now she is having a 10% off sale - if you add the name of the football team you get 5% more off and if they win it's 10%. All the information on her Super Bowl sale is on the home page of her site - I've ordered from her and never had any trouble!! So, if you are looking to buy a Parolin - now is the time!!! I ordered two Jardin Prive - Joyeaux Noel aux Rennes and l'abre aux aseaux - How fun!!!! The easiest way to find the designers is to use the designer tab - she puts them in order for the first letter of the first word - so Renato Parolin is under "R"

TAAAA DAAAAAAA

I'm so excited..... my first finish of 2014 ... Renato Parolin "Easter"

Not sure why my camera is adding a red tint - I tried taking the picture in several rooms on several surfaces - always the red!! grrrr To get the whole picture in you have to be pretty far back so I added two close up pictures too!! Isn't it lovely? I almost ran out of 523 so it's the last color I did last night - when it was done all I had left was two strands about 18 inches long - whew!!!
 I have been a dreadful person - by forgetting to tell you that my lovely friend Chiara from The Grey Tail sent me a Renato Parolin postcard for Christmas - I was going to take a picture of it but it's a pattern so I don't want to violate any copyright laws. The post card is Nel Regno Silenzioso

 I took this picture from the internet - it's the one with three flowers - isn't that wonderful!!?? I think it's a brilliant idea to do pattern post cards!!! Thanks sooo much Chiara!!
My next project is - sheeeep ugh!!! The last of the 12 LHN Virtue sheep. I hope to be done with that in a week's time. My intention is to only do WIP's until they are all done but we shall see how many new patterns trip me up.
I also forgot to mention that Ryder made it to Santa Fe NM - to the college he is going to. His roomie is Columbian - how cool!! He started classes just this week so it's going well so far!! We are so proud!!
Today is the best I've felt in two weeks - still have a headache and congested a bit - but better. What a horrid virus this is!! It is so cold in Indiana today - what a crazy winter this state is having!!
Well I have to get to the grocery store and get some laundry done!! Thanks for stopping by! Hope you all have a wonderful weekend - stay warm!!

Hellllewww

Howdy folks,
Holy cow - I am sick - I have been sick for about 6 days. I am done being sick but I guess sick is not done being me. I haven't slept a full night in about 4 nights - that means Scott doesn't sleep either. I offered to sleep elsewhere but he doesn't want me too - sweet guy!! Last night I thought I would sleep but the horrid coughing portion of this cold has decided to descend and I had to prop myself up on pillows to keep from hacking. I decided to clean my house today - why? Because if I convince myself that I am no longer sick then it has to go away - right?!?!? This has been fairly painful - sinus pain and chest pain. My daughter brought this with her from Colorado. I already told her next time she visits she has to be quarantined for a month (in a cage) and any sign of sickness - back she goes!!
Scott is feeling better - this stupid cold just hangs on!! He still sniffs a bit and gets headaches from sinuses but doing much better. Scott got some stuff done this weekend and I have pictures!! First we went antiquing, didn't find much - just a piano bench with a coffee sack as a cover - cute

perfect to sit at the window

a little house - we will put a (non flame ) candle in it

 

 

 

bought some Park Designs chair pads - cute!!

 We also bought a few dish clothes from Park Designs. Soon we will get valences from them for the kitchen windows - yay!! My laundry room has a cute split door but I can't use it because of the cat - his litter box is in there and I'm not sure he can figure out that the top is open.

 Scott put up a shelf  and a bar to hang clothes to dry on - I love it!!Finally got my chickens up!!

 Because I have been sick - I have had a ton of time to work on my Easter tree - this is 3 weeks worth of work. I am almost done!!

 Scott puts a container in his chair because he doesn't like the cat sleeping in it - I thought this was amusing.

The cat has enjoyed my illness - he has someone to sleep next to all day while I stitch. What a lucky guy!!
Well I have laundry to fold and the sweeper to run. Hope you are all healthy and happy!!
Oh and

GO BRONCOS!!!!!

WIP

Hello,
I hope you all had a nice weekend. Ours wasn't bad - stayed home mostly. Scott has been sick - he is doing better but is still sick. We decided to re-watch Downton Abbey season 3 before starting 4. I love that show!! We are almost done and will have two season 4 episodes to watch - YAY!!
Here is the Sunday night picture of Renato Parolin's "Easter"

That is two weeks worth of work. When I added the second brown to the tree, I found a spot that I messed up - so I had to frog about an inch of stitching and redo it. I love it! The picture makes it look smaller - I know I said it in the last post but that is a 25x18 piece of fabric! It's a good size!!
Scott put tile up in the kitchen. I had a before picture but when I went to the airport to pick the kids up my phone said something about a fail - so I restarted it and I had lost all my pictures ALL OF THEM AHHHH. Luckily I had put all of the other before pictures on here already but still distressing to lose them all. So I have no ugly before picture. This tile is just a temporary fix since we plan on remodeling the kitchen in a year or so.

 It's very pretty. Don't mind the ugly cabinet - the contractor who sold the house repainted the cabinets because they are so horrible. There used to be a microwave there - which was dumb because the cabinet is too low to have a microwave that close to the oven top. When we took it down it was covered in mouse poo so I'm glad we ditched it anyway!! The holes are covered but I don't want to redo the whole section if we are just going to remodel. You don't really notice it - unless it's pointed out and the tile draws your eyes away anyhow. It will do until the big redo!
We had rain this weekend so most of our snow is gone! I was going to do some step aerobics but the VCR ate my tape - guess that is what you get for still have tapes right. So, I went for a walk - man is it windy!! It was surprising to see the damage from the snow. I only took one damage picture.

yikes

still snow in the valley

Steep!! It's hard to walk down it!!

I walked 2.58 miles in an hour - boy is this area hilly!! Tomorrow is a yoga day!! It's a disc - not a tape!
Hope you all have a lovely week! Thanks for stopping by!!

Happy New Year!!

Hello!!
I have been gone - I meant to post on Monday but life got in the way!! My kids made it back to Colorado - in spite of Indiana crazy weather! I'm sure everybody has heard about the weather woes for this side of the US. This is a picture post - ready....

my adorable people

winter fruit and walnut pie. Not pretty but tasty.

art in Indianapolis seen from the library

West Baden Angels - neat exhibit in Indy - the link has the article about these angels!!

Ryder does this to our to-go containers

see all those tree limbs down - ugh

Framed - gift for my mom's birthday

lots of wet snow

more snow!!

I am keeping these ornaments from escaping

one week progress pic for "Easter" by Renato Parolin  - don't be fooled that is 25x18

my boys - took 20 pictures to get one I could use

Taylor was a knitting machine!! 7 dishclothes!!

attempt to thaw pipes  - could not get to the frozen part though

I am watching the wall destruction from a safe distance~

trees down - bad roads

like this ALL the way to the airport - even on highways!!

kids on the other side of security

Eastern Towhee

sunset

look at all that snow!!

my people

The washer pipes froze right up. We had to tear that wall down as well. Got them working and now we unhook it at night and let them drip too. What a pain in the arse!! The bathroom thawed itself without breaking thank goodness - we can not figure out where it is frozen - finished basement and all. We lost power for a few hours on Monday - got down to 52 in the house but we had a fire going. I got the house cleaned (and unChristmased) and all the laundry done. Holy cow my house was filthy! It was nice to have the kids here. We had a good time.
Hope you are all staying warm!! Thanks for stopping by!!