Plugging away....

I'm still plugging away on LHN Family Sampler.  I have most of most of the bands finished except for a few little touch-ups (one more band to go).  Then I have most of the border to tackle.  I'm enjoying this project but will be glad to finish and move onto something else.

I felt the need to have a finish AND was in a patriotic stitching mood so I stitched up this little beauty (a freebie at the Janlynne website) designed by Sandra Cozzolino:

 A quick little mom brag....DS received his AP scores this past week and scored 5's on both of them.  Yay, T!

Also, our baby barnswallows reached a milestone this week;  they've taken flight!  They still return to the nest in the evenings and mama and papa are still feeding them.

Tomorrow I'm meeting with some stitchy friends for a little get-together.  For some reason, the food always has a theme.  This time the theme is the beach.  I'm bringing a watermelon carved like a shark (as seen on Pinterest) and filled with watermelon and gummy fish.  I also had the idea of taking some goldfish crackers, serving them from a plain fishbowl.  I thought it was a brilliant and easy plan.  You'd think it would be easy to find a plain old fishbowl in the pet dept. of Wally's World but noooooooooo.  Hopefully I'll find one somewhere else without too much trouble.

I hope everyone has a fantastic week!

Meet the Family

This week I've been working on the family band of LHN's Family Sampler.  It's been fun choosing the colors for the eyes, hair, and clothing.  I see now that I didn't stitch in DH's mustache...I'll have to fix that.  Sorry the picture quality isn't great....I've been taking pictures of it on the stitching stand.  I'm really enjoying this piece and look forward to finishing it.  I've got a way to go, though.

Speaking of families, our bird couple's eggs have hatched.  For a while we only saw 3 babies but yesterday I saw the fourth...so all their eggs have hatched.  Mama and Papa bird have been very busy tending their babies.  It's fun to watch.

I hope everyone in the US has a happy July 4th!

Final Countdown to the end of the school year

Like it matters!  lol!  Two of our kids are taking summer classes.

Monday I had jury duty.  I brought along my Kindle and finished The Girl Who Played with Fire while sitting there and downloaded The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest. ( I love instant gratification!)  I came close but didn't get picked for the jury.

Thursday was another big day at our house because DS got his braces off.  (I read more sitting in the waiting room.  It was a good week for reading.)

There was another band concert last night.  This one called Band-o-Rama where every school band that "feeds" into our high school bands and our high school bands played fun music.  Some bands had costumed characters that went along with the theme of the music and cavorted around.  It's always a fun concert.

This am I spent 5 hours helping measure the kids for next year's badly needed new marching uniforms and loading coolers with pop and bottled water to prepare for the concession stand for next week's graduation.

We're also plodding along preparing for DS's Eagle ceremony.  Next week-end will be fun but very busy.  I'm sure it will fly by.

On the stitching front, I made a bit more progress on LHN's Family Sampler:

I also picked up another little wip, LK's Ride a Bike.  This one will be for my DD who enjoys long distance bicycling.  I hope to finish it as a little doorknob hanger. 

I hope everyone has a great week!

Stitching in the month of Mayhem

Thanks for reading and commenting on my blog.

I made a bit of progress on LHN's Family Sampler and also thought I finished a little sal piece...until I looked at the picture and realized I was a little "off" on part of it.  That sneaky frog!  It won't take long to fix and since I'll be here by myself tonight, I hope to fix it then.

We had a storm come through here last night and here's the surprise I found backing out of my driveway this am.  Luckily the tree fell at just the best possible place and no damage was done to the neighbor's house and nobody was hurt.

 The month of May is always crazy with all of the end of the school year activities and this one is no different.  A friend of mine came up with the term Mayhem to describe it...and she's right.

  Last night was the final band concert for DS.  This is Honor Band year for his band in which they have 3 chances to perform their concert pieces and then the directors choose the best performances for each piece and then submit the recordings for judging on the state level.  The "nailed it" last night as far as I was concerned.  I hope the judges agree.

They performed last Sat. in Austin for another competition.  (As many years as I've had kids in band, I can't keep all the competitions straight.)  T came home saying they won 28 medals and dropped one on the kitchen table.  I assumed it was a medal they gave all the kids for competing but thought it was a lot nicer thn past competitions medals were.  I found out yesterday that he won an individual percussion medal and that his name is somewhere on a state (TX) music site for winning it.  (I'll have to do some digging to find out exactly what it means.)  He played a pretty "cool" timpani part on one of their pieces.  (I call it when he goes crazy on the timpani.) and I suspect that's where the judges noticed him.

There are a few more tests and activities yet to come for him/us.

Our DS attending UT has a big paper to turn in today and he'll be coming home for bit until summer session starts.  (Both he and our HS DS will be taking college classes this summer.  They count as dual credit for our HS DS.)

Everyone have a great week!  Happy Mother's Day!

A little Friday show n tell

I finished the LHN model I was working on the other day so I picked up a couple of personal wips to stitch since then.

Coincidentally, Diane "revealed" a previous design that I model stitched for her, Spring Band Sampler.  You can see it on her blog here:

http://littlehouseneedleworks.blogspot.com/2012/02/february-update.html

I put a few more stitches in LHN Family Sampler:

...and a few more stitches in one of the PS Summer Samplers:

I may have mentioned that one of my DS's was hired as a model once for a drawing class at the community college here.  (It was a very interesting experience for him....a lot harder for him than he'd expected.)  I recently found out that one of the students painted a portrait of one of her sketches from that day and that she decided to give it to us after it was featured in an art exhibit.  I went to pick it up yesterday.  Now we have to figure out where the best place would be to hang it.  Right now "he" sits on my couch and I've startled a few times walking into the room and seeing "him" there.  (The real "he" is away at college.)  I think the artist did a pretty good job except she got his eye color wrong.  It will be a very nice keepsake for him.  (He LOVES playing his bass so he'll really like this.)

I hope everyone has a great weekend!

Finally Friday!

I love Monday holidays!  I seem to "pay" for them though b/c I spend the rest of the week "discombobulated" and SO ready for the weekend.  lol!

One of the reasons I'm feeling tired is I had to be out 3 evenings this week, 2 meetings and a (longer than usual for some reason) choir practice...or maybe it's b/c of the cloudy skies we've had this week.

 I'm (figure)heading a team that is busy planning a hospitality room (breakfast, gallons of coffee, lunch, drinks, and snacks) for the judges of the upcoming (next week) band solo/ensemble contest that our band hosts.  It's a good team and I anticipate that our part will go smoothly.

My walking buddy and I took 4 4 1/2 mile walks and 1 3-miler this week.  We're becoming addicted;  I really miss it when we can't walk for whatever reason.  We'd been doing 3 milers for quite some time and decided that after the holidays we'd increase our mileage.  We both agree that aside from the extra time it takes, we're glad to be walking more.  It's so flat here, it's not much of a challenge.  lol!  This week's weather fluctuated a bit.  We had a couple of mornings where we bundled up in layers and then a few more mornings where we worked up a sweat and swatted skeeters.



It's going to be a busy few weeks!  In addition to the contest next Sat., the band also holds it's chili supper fundraiser (including a silent auction).  During the supper, serveral of the jazz bands play and we wrap up the evening with a band concert.  Shortly after that is the Disney trip, and the weekend after that is the Belled Dance.  (DS was invited last Sat. via a cake-gram.)

I've been stitching mostly on LHN's Family Sampler and PS Woodland Santa this week.  I put a few stitches in Quaker Gone Tropic but not enough for a picture yet.  I seem to be on the home stretch of the PS so maybe I'll have a finish pic next time.  (or maybe not.....I will probably have another model to work on next week too.)

Thank you all for reading my posts and for the nice comments.