So many reds!

I'm still working on Lust.  And my mojo may be making a come back.  Sometimes I just wish my kids weren't so busy and I could just pull out my stitching and stitch!

Her skirt stitches up fairly quickly since there are some nice big blocks.  I just have to find the time when there's nothing else going on.

Anyway.  We had a fairly busy weekend.  We had a birthday which meant that DS#1 got to pick where we went to eat.  My baby is getting so big!  He's only 3 inches shorter than I am.  For now.

We our normal weekend pick the garden which resulted in okra in the freezer and 8.5 quarts of salsa.  I still need to check my tomatillos to see if I can get another batch of salsa verde out of them this year.  I also have some mangos in the fridge to try some hot salsa for my husband.

Tonight is DS#1's first football game of the season.  He's been practicing for several new positions this year so I'm excited to see how he does.

August WIPacolypse

I had to look to see the last time I'd done a WIPacolypse post and it turns out to be May.  Where did this summer go?  In May, we were still busy with baseball and just getting started with the idea that school was out for 12 weeks.  My mom had just moved from 100 miles away to 30 minutes away and she watched my boys several weeks for me.  Our garden was pretty newly planted and hadn't started giving us much except for greens.

So lets start from the end of May.

At that point, I was working on Warrior Alice by Eclectic Bloke Designs.  I had just started page 2.  By the end of the month, I finished page 2.  There's not too much to see but I think page 3 starts the top of Alice's head.

Then Lust by HAED came out and I made a little bit of progress

before I got distracted with a shiny new start.  This is the model of Northern Expressions Needlework's Star Spangled Banner.

While it was out this time, I started on 28 ct Monaco dyed by Mo's Sale and decided I wasn't happy with it.  I did a little stash diving and came up with 40ct  Cauldron from Picture This Plus.

Much better.  Until all the blue got to me.  Or was it the jessica stitches?  Don't know.  This got put down for a little while.

And I pulled out Chatelaine's Heritage Sampler and made my goal on it for this year.  There was a lot of frogging over one stitching and I left some that I really didn't want to frog and redo, but I won't tell if you won't.

Also around this time, our boysenberry bush decided it was very happy and berries started getting ripe.  I made boysenberry jam, I froze lots and lots of berries and I tried some compound butter.  Not bad.

I also worked on a good sized home improvement project.  I have a narrow office that didn't have a very big desk.  We just had a little one that I bought after the tornado 12 years ago.  It was time to upgrade.  This is my first attempt at putting this beast together so it would come apart to come into the house.

After I put Heritage Sampler away, I pulled Star Spangled Banner back out.  I finished the blue and added the stars.  This is so pretty IRL.  There are so many beads and the specialty stitches give a great texture.

I also worked on the first couple of bands before I put it away again.

At this point in my summer, I started looking for my stitchy mojo and spending a lot more time reading.  I tried pulling Warrior Alice back out

Nope.  Wasn't feeling her.

Then I tried The Loneliness of Autumn by Love Thy Thread.  

Yep.  There is was.  At least for a bit.  I finished page 3 and got a good start on page 4.  I love how this one stitches up even if it is all confetti.

To try to tempt my mojo back, I pulled out my kit for Chatelaine's Hawaiian Mandala.

In this timeframe, the garden kicked into gear.  I made 3 quarts of pickled beets, 10 quarts of pickled green beans, 14 pints of salsa, 17 pints of salsa verde and 8 gallon bags full of okra, ready to fry.

I also finished by desk.  Here are some before and afters.

Here's the corner that gave me such fits.  I ended up building this as a one piece top and removing the legs to bring it in the house.  Even then, it was a close thing.

Currently, I'm working on HAED's Lust again.  I'm making slow progress but it is progress.

I've gotten a little further than this as this is Sunday's picture, but not a huge amount.

Happy WIPacolypse!

Lust

Hi there!

My stitching still leaves something to be desired but I did get a little accomplished.

Lust before:

Lust after:

Last weekend, we bought 1/4 plywood so I can ship lap by downstairs bathroom for my kids.  I'll have some before pictures soon and probably some in progress pictures.  It's something to suck my stitching time away.  But another functioning bathroom would be handy.

Summer

Since school started today, summer is officially over, right?

School started!  Yay!

I can just hear my kids.  Mom!!!!

Anyway, last week was kind of busy for us.  I finished my desk and DS1 helped me bring it in and get it together.  Here's a before with the little bitty desk we've been using since the tornado and the monstrosity that is in there now.  I think once I do some rearranging and clean up it will work much better than the old one did.

Before:

After:

Thursday was open house for the school district.  Since both boys were starting new schools, we went.  Have I mentioned school started today??

Friday, the boys and I went and saw Jason Bourne with my mom.  We don't usually go to the evening show because it's expensive, but we enjoyed the movie.  

Yesterday, we picked the garden.  I made 14 quarts of salsa and froze three and a half gallon bags of okra.  We'll repeat every weekend till frost more than likely.

I also made a little more progress on Hawaii.  

I think I've had enough of my very slow progress on this for now.  I brought Lust up with me last night.  I think she'll get some attention for a little bit.

Progress

Last weekend was busy.  I finished sanding my desk and applied stain and a coat of polyurethane.

I also made 17 pints of salsa verde and made a little progress on Hawaii

Blah

Over the last week or so I've just felt kind of blah.  My stitching hasn't helped.  I have barely picked anything up since last Thursday.  Here's my last picture of The Loneliness of Autumn.  It came off the qsnaps and went downstairs Saturday evening.

7/28/16

I went though all my kitted projects and a bunch of charts in an effort to find something that would catch my eye.

Chatelaine's Hawaiian Mandala came upstairs with me but this little start is all I managed.

For now I'm going to just go with it.  My kindle is getting a workout even if I'm not managing any stitching.