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

Finish in wood

I think it's been a long time since I shared any of my wood projects here.  I just looked and January 2013 was the last one.  I guess you could say that bug has bit hard.

My youngest son has been sleeping in our guest room since it is cooler in the basement.  Since our parents aren't getting younger, my DH and I decided we would move our son downstairs and move the guest room upstairs.  This involved my building a new bed frame since my son had a metal loft bed that I was NOT going to be moving downstairs and I have previously build my oldest son a bed frame.  Have to be equal but different you know.

So about three weeks ago, I started.  

9/19/15 - dry fitting

9/19/15-after stain

9/20/15 -starting to put it together

10/7/15-putting it all together

some support

one happy boy.

Tonight, we'll be moving the rest of his stuff in to make it his room.

A tale of two finishes!

  Last Monday, one of my kids stayed home sick from school.  So what is any self respecting stitcher to do when her child is sleeping?  Stitch!!  I finished page 23 Monday night.  Then there was that book that caught my attention and kept me from stitching a couple of days or I would have finished page 24 earlier.  Here's page 23.  I've personalized it with my name and the year started and finished.

I started building a doll bed for my niece in November.  Then Dad died so I really had no interest in it for a bit.  Friday, my MIL and SIL came to visit so finishing became a priority so I could send it back with them.  It was just a matter of screwing some things together, cutting and sewing some fabric to go around some foam and lots and lots of blanket stitch around some fleece.  I ended up with a fairly large piece after I cut the fleece for the bed, so I stitched around the larger piece to so Eden would have a blanket that matched her doll bed.    Here's the result.  Not too bad if I do say so myself!

 Once I finally had a chance to sit down with my stitching, I was not too far off from finishing 1900 ABC.  So just after midnight, I was able to take it off the q-snaps for the last time.

Yes, I actually had two finishes yesterday.

After a quick iron, here's the result.  I absolutely love how it turned out!

Wipocalypse update!

I just realized it's been a couple of weeks since my last update.  Sorry about that.  

I hope everyone had a great weekend!!  Since it was a three day weekend here in the States, I talked DH into making a trip to Menards since we were going to Sam's Club anyway.  It's only two ginormous buildings away!  I spent about $50 in lumber and a new can of stain and here's the result.  I now have a coffee table!  It's big but I have a pretty good sized space for it.  I stained it just this morning.  (It's nice to be able to play hookey since the boys don't have school today!)  You can get the plans here and build your very own!  It's modeled off the Apple store tables and is very sturdy!

That $50 also included lumber to build an end table.  I've been using a little stool and it just isn't big enough and doesn't have any storage.  This is another Ana White plan and you can find the plans here.  I shortened mine by about 10 inches from the plan.  It had to fit my space!  I just need to see what kind of baskets I've got and I'll be able to hide all kinds of stuff under there!

Ok.  Stitching stuff.  That's why you're here right?  Last week saw Window I again.  I've finished part 13.  Just three more parts to go and it will be finished.  I could finish it since the top is the same as the bottom, just reversed, so I could finish it, but all the straight lines get to me after a while.

And finally, here's Summer Knotgarden.  I'm going to go stitch the other butterfly on the right in a bit, get the jessicas done and get some beads on this bad boy before I move back to part 3 that isn't finished yet.  I'm hoping to get that done today and move the q-snaps to the right side.

IHSW!

Wow!  When my DH is home, I don't get a lot of stitching done!  

When I put Summer Knotgarden down a week or so ago, I had finished the first corner of part 5.  Next time I pick it back up, I'll finish part 6 and move onto the next corner.  It seems to be working really well for me to stitch by corner. I'm not getting bored with stitching the same thing over and over and over again.

I've been working on page 13 of Lust for the last week.  This picture is as of Thursday evening.  I've made some more progress but haven't managed to get another picture taken.  

and for my major time sucker, I've finally finished Jakob's bed!  Sorry about the blurry picture.  Jakob and I carried the parts downstairs this morning and put it all together.  He's happy, I'm happy, Josh wants a new bed.  It's almost a win win situation :)

Updates and a new start.

I made it through another page of One Nation!  Then I move the q-snaps and couldn't face more letters.  Don't know why.  They've very easy letters to stitch.  Maybe it's the straight lines that border each stripe?  Don't know.  Could't do it.  So I pulled out another WIP.

This one happened to be Window.  I think this will be my swimming lessons piece this week.  I can't see trying to stitch over one at the pool.

Cause I've been working on Lust again.  So far so good.  Those little flames are their own little bit of confetti hell...each and every one, but there is lots of solid stitching on this page too for mini breaks.  

Then yesterday, DH and I went and bought supplies for my newest WIP.  Doesn't look like much in this first picture, but this will eventually be a headboard and footboard for Jakob's bed.  I promised him I would build him one while he's in Oklahoma, so I have to stick by my word.  Haven't lied to that kid yet and don't intend to start.  You can find the plan for the headboard and footboard here.  But I'm planning on adding some storage underneath, which Jakob has approved, that you can find here.  The storage seems straight forward. I just have to change the size since I'm building for a twin bed and I believe that those plans are for a queen.  Shouldn't be too bad.  Build a box with dividers to determine the size of the drawers and go from there.

Famous last words...

Here's the main part of the footbard

Winter Watergarden and other updates

It's been a busy week since my last update.  Last week, my baby started Kindergarten.  Isn't he cute?  No his hair isn't red and it isn't in a mohawk.  My photography skills are what's lacking there.

Then you've got handsome big brother. who started third grade and is ever so protective of his little brother.

Don't they look cute together?

 

Friday night I finished painting my cabinet and added my hardware.  They're just simple chrome.  The drawers are painted the same color as Joshua's room.  I still have lots left so this will probably be the paint scheme in the office.  The white isn't white white, it's a color called silk lace.  It's just the slightest shade of gray.  I like it.  I sent a picture to my dad who has all the woodworking toys in his barn.  I was complaining that I couldn't make straight cuts with the saws I've got...that I want to get a table saw.  He offered me a table saw he got at an auction several years ago with a new fence that he put on.  He hasn't used it in a few years since he bought a bigger and better version that currently resides in the barn.  Only catch is I have to be very careful and make sure all my fingers and thumbs stay attached.  Not a problem...all my hobbies require those digits!!

Sunday, Ed picked tomatoes.  I tried roasting them, then canning.  Just making tomato juice year after year gets old.  These are just Roma tomatoes that were washed, halved, brushed with olive oil, sprinkled with some salt and pepper and put in the oven under the broiler till they looked just like this.  I've got six and a half quarts we're going to have to try now.

And finally, Winter Watergarden.  I got behind last month.  The border is part 7 which I'm half way through.  If I can get this part done in the next week, I'll move onto part 8 which is the gates.  Otherwise, there are other things starting to call.  Thankfully, Herbularius isn't an option...yet.  My silks haven't shipped yet and Vikki is away getting her daughter ready for school.  She'll be back Thursday and it is a few days from there to here even if she ships right away. 

My weekend...

The following picture is one I'm not proud of.  This is one of the desks in my office.  Since we moved back into our house after the tornado, this desk has been in this space.  I've meant to finish stripping the old finish off and restrip it but life has gotten in the way.  So, this desk has become a dumping ground for books I've read and just haven't gotten taken downstairs to the book shelves, bills that have been paid, etc, etc, etc. 

My to do list that I wrote this spring included this desk.  I was going to build a cabinet for everything that needs to be filed.  You can see my plans here.  I had planned on refinishing the desk and putting it in Jakob's room for homework.

Enter my husband...

He's decided that he needs to start doing his plastic models again.  So, he needs a desk to be able to them on.  Which is going in the spare bedroom so he can close the door and the cats won't be able to get to them. So we made a trip to Menards (a local home improvement store) and I bought a bunch of lumber.  By the end of yesterday, this is what that lumber looked like.

 Then I decided I was done for the day.  It's hot and sweaty in the garage! I much prefer the a/c!!

Purple Garden was still up and I finished part 5 last night.  I really like those darker flowers around the center!

This morning, I stitched on Winter Watergarden this morning and started some laundry while I wondered if it was going to rain again.  Can't hang laundry outside if it's raining, you know, it kind of defeats the purpose!

This afternoon, at Ed's prodding, I started putting my little cabinet together.  Here's what it looks like right now.  It needs a little tweaking so the drawers open all the way.  Ed helped me figure out how to install the hinges, but I need to change where they're installed to make them work the way I want.

I still need some paint after my tweaking is done, but I haven't decided what color to use.  I have some white, which is easy.  The walls in my office are called Seringetti Sands (that name has stuck with me for 6 years!)  It's kind of a tan color.  So white would definately work. 

Anybody in blog land have any suggestions?

What did you do this weekend?

Summer

We've finally reached the end of the baseball season.  This is Jakob on 3rd base in his last game this season.  I broke down and bought him a baseball pants that actually fit him along with some black sport socks to he could look like one of the big kids playing ball.  He looks really tall and skinny and is growing up too darn fast!

I pulled Lust off the qsnaps Sunday afternoon.  I'm just a few hundred stitches past half way on this page.  Next time I pull her out, I should be able to finish this page and start the last two in this row.  I really like how realistic the waterfall is starting to look.

Tonight I finished Friendship Heart through the Sticklounge group.  I don't know how this one will be finished, but at this point I'm assuming in a frame on the wall.  For now, it is put away.  I have pulled the next Sticklounge project.  But I've only got a few stitches in it.  Not nearly enough for a picture.

This weekend was really hot and humid.  Perfect weather for building furniture!  Not.  I tried to get the parts I wanted to done in the morning when you would think it would be cooler.  Didn't quite work out that way.  All weekend, if you walked outside, it felt like you were walking into a blast furnace, but more humid.  YUCK! 

Anyway, Saturday, I finished cutting my lumber to so everything matched up and had some help staining it.  These are stained in Cherry.  Sunday, Ed helped me to drill the pocket holes and put them together.  Then I got the dubious pleasure of painting on polyurethane in the sunshine...while sweating buckets.  I won't share a picture of that because I don't have one and that would just be gross.

Here's Jakob's new bookcase.

And here's Joshua's.  His room is a little messier because he's got most of the toys, but hopefully, we'll be able to get a better handle on them now that we have some more storage!

Once the weather cooperates a little more and cools down, I'll be heading to the lumberyard to pick up some lumber to build this  I have an old desk in my office that I started stripping down before the tornado in 04.  Right now it has lots of stuff just piled on top.  I would dearly love to be able to get organized in there with that cabinet and a new desk and the desk that everything is piled on would be refinished and given to Jakob so he has a place to study.