May Turtle Trot

Good Morning! And Happy Mother's Day a day early to the mothers out there. I'll be going to church in the morning then go see my mom in the afternoon so won't be at the computer tomorrow so the Mother's day greeting is a day early.

On Turtle Trot I do have two finishes 1)You Are My Sunshine by
Dimentions.

2) U.S.S. Arizona Memorial by Stoney Creek

Now for progress pictures 1) America before

America in May

2) Hope in April

Hope in May

3) Friends are the Garden of Life in April

And last but not least I did start a new project. It is Baby Squirrel by Stoney Creek

Well here you have my Turtle Trot for May. Hopefully it all went the way it was suppose to. I know this is picture heavy.
Thank you for reading my blog, I really appreciate it. Also thank you for the comments they really encourage me. Now to go read some blogs while Saturn is enjoying the fresh air. I have my deck door open so he's sitting by the screen looking out. I was gone all day to my mom's so he's enjoying the fresh air. Love the spring weather!
Well...until next time Happy Stitching!

U.S.S. Arizona FINISHED!

I was so glad to finish this piece. The clouds and water drove me nuts! I also had to do improvisions. I'm not real happy with outcome but I hope Love Quilts will still use it. Now I just need to kit up the squirrel for Quilts for Older Children and Adults.

Well...until next time....Happy Stitching.

One Last Update on USS Arizona Memorial

Good evening! I've stitched a lot on this piece this past week and am more then ready to have it finished! I'm getting tired of it and it's no fun to stitch anymore. Besides I'm getting anxious to start something new. I have six more quilt squares to do and 5 haven't even been started. Hopefully by the end of the week this will be finished and I'll start one of them.

Well....our Youth Pastor is leaving our church now. Not sure what to think. I really like the couple yet he made me so angry over the food pantry. He was in charge of the food pantry. I'm concerned about the youth though. Hopefully someone will step up to the plate. In the past year 3 of our 4 pastors resigned. The 4th one is getting up in age and his health isn't great so I'm concerned about him too. But we do have an Interim Pastor that just started yesterday. This year has been a rough year with our church. We've had so many people leave plus some key people died. Pastor Nate's timing isn't the best but God is in control.

Yesterday my mom, brother and I went to Holland, MI. It's Tulip festival time. We didn't get out of the car except at the Mall to see the art exhibit, my brother had two photography pieces in. But for the tulips, we just drove through. They are so pretty.

Well....until next time Happy Stitching!

Progress on USS Arizona Memorial

Good Evening. After a busy week last week, it is good to get back to normal now. My cat is much happier to have me home with him too. So this morning I woke up and did my dishes and cleaned my bathroom then was able to stitch rest of day. Tomorrow I'll probably vaccuum and mop the floors and then stitch. I tend to do a little each day. I also may vaccuum the furniture now that I got a dirt devil. I want to keep this place clean and I enjoy cleaning it too when it isn't overwhelming.

I laid down Hope as I need to get going on these quilt squares. I have this one and 3 others and the other 3 aren't even started yet! So I plan to keep at this until it's finished. I really am not enjoying this piece too much and the pattern will be retired when done. The water and ground seem to be the most difficult part and that's over half done now.

Well....until next time.....Happy Stitching!

Hope Progress

Good afternoon! It's been a busy week a lot happened this past week. Some good some not so good.
I didn't have a whole lot of time to stitch this week but did get some progress on Hope and on USS Arizona Memorial. I have laid down Hope for the time being to get some of these quilt squares done. I'll show progress on USS Arizona Memorial sometime next week.

A month ago my cousin's husband came down with Bacterial Menengitus. After a month of ups and downs, they made the decision to take him off life support Wed. afternoon. He died early Thursday morning. Don was the rock of that family and we are concerned about Judy as she has bipolar and Don really was the stable one and kept her in line. She does have two grown sons, so hopefully they'll give Judy the support she needs.

My sister came to town Tuesday, and left just an hour ago, she has to work tonight. We got some shopping in. Of course, got floss and material at Jo Ann's and got a Dirt Devil from Kohls with a gift card I got. I want to keep this place clean and I can clean my sofa and chair with it since I don't have attachments to vaccuum cleaner.

My brother got into town last night from MO. So this morning we went up to the cematary in Hesperia to my dad's grave. We had our aunt and uncle meet us there, then we went to eat in Hesperia. Daniels was celebrating their 11th anniversary this week so had a special on some things. We got smelt for 11 cents a piece. We all got at least 10 pieces, ( the men got 20. Plus fries or onion rings to go with. Anyway for 7 people the whole meal only costed $27.00 and some odd cents. That's less then $4.00 a person. Can't beat that. It tasted so good. I had been hungry for a good fish meal! And I got it today.

Tomorrow is our mom's 81st birthday so we'll celebrate that tomorrow. (I need to find her card don't I). We're going to Hobo's for that. She might get a free meal or a good discount anyway.

We'll until next time....Happy Stitching!

A Small finish

Hello again. I finally finished this piece. It was a mall, but very detailed piece, and I made my share of mistakes on it. This is actually a Dimensions kit for waste canvas and to made into a wind chime. But I did it on aida cloth and it will be a quilt square for a little boy we are doing a quilt for at Caring Stitchers. It was fun but also irrirtating at times. Anyway I'm glad to have it done.

Well....until next time....Happy Stitching!

Progress on Hope

Good Afternoon! We woke up to snow on the ground this morning. I called it a belated April Fool's Joke. But the good news is the snow will not last, in fact a good portion of it is gone. The rest of week will be 50's! That is so much better than we had a couple of weeks ago.

I have been stitching on Hope by Ursulla Michael the last couple of weeks and probably will until sometime next week. I love working on this piece, and it really reminds me of Easter. It's so pretty.

I had noticed a brown spot in Saturn's eye, and his other eye was runny, so I thought maybe he might have a cold plus he had been sneezing off and on. So I took him to the Vet yesterday and he's fine. She said there was nothing to worry about. So I was relieved. It'll be two years tomorrow that I had to put Whiskers down and I went to Pet Smart and met Saturn. I brought him home two days later and I haven't regretted it. He's a near perfect cat.

We are getting an Interm Pastor at our church. We voted on him last Sunday. I guess it's a trial bases for May, and if it works out then he'll stay until we get a pastor. We needed to do something quick as man we've lost so many members that either left the church or died. Some of those that left, could have been the ones to see our church through but they chose to leave. Our CE Pastor is leaving end of May to work with our former Pastor. We will miss him, but he's doing what is best. Our church couldn't pay him but a very little, and he was working 2 jobs and it was getting hard on him. He worked hard for our church for only getting $100.00 a month. No pastor worked harder than him. Our former pastor and him were best friends since college, and he brought Dale to our church so we figured he'd be leaving eventually to join Shane. Pastor Shane offered him a full time position so he can quit his other job.

Next week my sister will be coming in from other side of state, and my brother is coming in from MO. So it will be a fun weekend. Kay will be here Tues.-Friday and Ken Thursday-Sunday. So they'll see each other a couple of days.

Anyone watching Dancing with the Stars. I love this year. Only thing is I feel the Ice Dancers have an unfair advantage over the others, but I do really like them. I expect them to compete against each other for the trophy. I loved Disney night last night.

Well...until next time....Happy Stitching!

Showing the remaining Turtle Trot pieces

Hello! Sorry for two posts at once but I thought I better show the remaining TT pieces since I just joined officially. And hope I do it right this time.1. America by Sue Hillis
2. Red Bird by Stoney Creek.
3.Swallow Tail by Stoney Creek
4. Red Bird by Stoney Creek
5. Friends are...Kit by Jannlynn
6. His Eye is on the Sparrow by Leisure Arts
7. You Are My Sunshine

Joining Turtle Trot

I am finally going to join Turtle Trot and since I already put in my link I better post this a day early. Usually it's the 10th of the month. I have already shown the 10 pieces I'm going to do through earlier posts so I'm just going to show the ones I've made progress on. I'm not use to doing Multi images so if there are any blunders I am sorry.1. America as of March 10

2. Progress of America

3. Hope in March 4. Hope progress in April

5. USS Arizona Memorial in March

6. USS Arizona Memorial progress as of April.

And last but not least I did have a finish. I finished Minnie Mouse

So this my TT post and sorry about any mess ups. Like I said it's new to me to post so many pictures.

Well until next time....Happy Stitching!

Page 2 of America finished. 10 more pages to go!

Good morning! I am happy to say page 2 of this piece is now done. I never thought I would finish it, it was so hard all full of confetti stitching! Why that is necessary I don't know, as it sure makes the back of the piece so bulky. Anyway the other pages don't look to be that hard. I will go down to page 5 in a few minutes.

Slowly but surely I am getting spring cleaning done. I like having a clean apartment.

The other night I went to see Noah with some friends. I heard them talking about it on Good Morning America that morning and thought I would like to see it. Later a friend called me and asked if I wanted to go and I said yes. It was not at all what I expected! I expected some variation of the Biblical account but not like that. The only thing they got right was the animals going in 2 by 2, and the rainbow in the end. The rest of it was bad. They totally destroyed Noah's character and two of his sons didn't look good either. And where in the Bible does it say fallen angels helped Noah build the ark, and that someone from outside Noah's family would sneak into the ark. Just to say a few of the differences. Well you can guess my opinion of that movie. We talked about going to see God is Not Dead in near future. They say that movie is much better. Well you have my opinion of that movie, don't waste your money on it. The acting was good but that's about it.

Well....until next time....Happy Stitching!

You Are My Sunshine

This is one of the kits my friend from church gave me. It's actually done on Plastic Canvas as a wind chime, but I'm doing it as a quilt square on aida cloth. I've got it going good now so I've gone back to stitching on America and will do this in the afternoons.

It looks like Spring has finally sprung! Granted we still have quite a bit of snow on the ground but it's melting slowly. On my deck the snow was almost as high as the railings, now it's one small strip and probably will be gone today, tomorrow for sure. Probably most of the snow on the ground will be gone later this week, just the snowbanks will remain. Well that's my prediction anyway. This week I am going to get serious about spring cleaning. I'm in the mood for it.

Yesterday we had a baby shower for or our former Pastor and wife. They just recently adopted a baby boy. We were so happy for them as they've wanted a baby for so long and finally got one. You'd never know he was adopted as he looks so much like her. They got a lot of cute clothes for him.

Speaking of babies, I keep forgetting to post my nephew and his wife had a baby girl, Friday, Mar. 21. Her name is Aubrielle Grace (Aubrey for short). Not sure I like the name but it will grow on me. This is their 2nd child. They have a son, Wyatt who is 3 and is adapting very well to the baby. He'll be a great big brother.

For a couple of days I was really worried about Saturn. He was sneezing and just wasn't acting like himself, although he did eat and drink good. But today he seems much better and back to normal. He even is more of a pest today than usual. I tried to stitch on America earlier this morning and he sat right on it, and made me pet him and talk to him. He was so cute!
Well....until next time.....Happy Stitching.

Finally A Finish

Good afternoon! Finally after all my starts I have finished Minnie Mouse. It was a fun stitch and she turned out so cute.

Also Finally our weather is turning the corner. Enough of my whining about the weather. It's going to be most 40's even 50's the next several days. Maybe this winter has finally turned the corner. Our snow should seriously melt some what now.

Well...I'm going to go kit up my next piece so until next time....Happy Stitching!

Turtle Trot's 9 and 10

I just realized I never posted 9 and 10 so here they are. One is America by Sue Hillis and the other is His Eye is on the Sparrow by Leisure Arts and the last is Count Your Blessins by Leisure Arts

Strengthen Me (Phil. 4:19)

Good Morning. This is #10 for Turtle Trot. We are doing this at one of the groups I'm in. This piece is in memory of my dad as this was his favorite verse. Now I have all 10 pieces selected and started, I can just keep on stitching one of them to the finish. So I think my next post will have a finish.

Yesterday we had a big pancake breakfast at church. We had pancakes, scramble eggs, sausage, and sausage and gravy over a biscuit. I had never had sausage and gravy over a biscuit, but I tried it yesterday and it was really good. I probably ate a bigger breakfast than I ever ate before as I had one helping of each. I didn't eat again until 6 last night and that was a light supper.

Also we will be getting an Interm Pastor I think. The speaker yesterday told us we would be voting on him in a couple of weeks for Interm Pastor. I hope he goes through, I think he will. He's someone the church knows fairly well, he's spoken at our church many times through the years.

Our weather is a little on the cool side yet. We'll have a day or two where we get 40 but then drop back into the 20's. It does melt the snow slowly so we don't have a flooding problem. And the snow has melted quite abit. Some spots we even see small patches of grass. (I forgot what grass looks like...haven't seen it since Nov.!) The snowbanks are now about my height so they are down quite a big. This week each day is suppose to get a degree or two higher then end of week (Friday) it is suppose to hit 50! and then drop into 30's. Maybe after tomorrow we will be done with the 20's. After all it is heading into April time for spring to come.

Well....until next time....Happy Stitching!

USS Arizona Memorial Well underway

Good Afternoon! I stitched a lot on this piece to get it going good. It has an awful lot of white in it and that sky drove me crazy. It's still not all the way done, but when I pick it back up it will get finished. Needless to say, I've turned into a serial starter for the Turkey Trot, I've started #9 now and will start #10 probably Sat. as Strengthen Me is going real well. Strengthen me is in memory of my dad as it's his favorite verse (Philippians 4:19),

We had another funeral at our church yesterday, of a long time member. His wife died just a couple of days before my dad did. Dan's death shocked everyone he died suddenly. He had been in the Navy for 30 years I think and was in Afghanistan for Desert Storm. He got a full Military Funeral including 21 gun salute, which shook the neighbors up as they thought someone was being shot. Man so many of our church members are dying off, this is 5th one since Jan. plus so many have left the church. We really need to find a Pastor soon.

One of the Stitching Groups I'm in is going to do Turtle Trot starting Mar. 24, so I'm excited.

Well....until next time Happy Stitching.

Another piece for Turkey Trot

Can you tell I'm excited about this Turkey Trot. It just entreats me, plus will make me finish some pieces I started years ago. Although I am not officially a member of the Turkey Trot since I can't seem to add my name to the list, I'm doing it on my own and just letting the members know I'm doing it. I'll post my progress on 10th of month. This piece really I'm sort of cheating as it's one of the pieces my friend from church gave me half done because of her eyesight. (She also was the one that gave me Amazing Grace piece.)

This piece I'm working on in the afternoons, and in the morning I'm working on USS Arizona Memorial. That one the colors aren't so interesting. I'll post progress in a few days. It's coming along well, but just so much white and boring. So it's been done along side of a more colorful pattern.

I'm in the mood to get some spring cleaning done. My sister bought me a Shark cleaner a while back, so I got that out today, and tomorrow I'll put it to use on the kitchen and maybe the bathroom. One of those two rooms anyway.

Spring is just a few days away and yes the weather is getting warmer well 20's and 30's are warmer than what we were. We'll hit 40 a few days in the forecast, then it'll be 30's again. The snow is melting very slowly. The snowbanks are about my height now so they are shrinking. Thing is we don't want a big warm up or we'll have flooding problems, so we're not complaining about this. We just complain when it snows.

Dancing with the Stars starts tonight! Hooray. I can't wait. This time they have a good cast.

Well....until next time Happy Stitching!

Another new start Hope

Good Morning! I have been up since 5:30 am and started right in. I had Home Made Bean Soup in the Crock Pot, cleaned my bathroom, got dressed and even stitched some. I'm thinking about vacuuming now it's 9 but I'll wait.

I am wanting to join Turtle Trot but cannot figure quite out how to do it. I did leave a post on the site and asked a member but haven't heard back yet. I just did it last night so I may hear yet. Anyway I have most of the 10 pieces selected. Rather or not Minnie Mouse will be one I don't know, she may be done by March 10. Anyway if anyone who is a member can tell me how to join or if it's too late, I'd appreciate it. You can e mail me at Barb k 28 at yahoo dot com. Oh and tell me how to put a link on the site for it. Thank you. Tentatively the 10 pieces I'm selecting are 1) America by Mystic Stitch, (that may be on for 2 or 3 years it's huge), 2 The Skater by Lynn Nicoletti, 3)Red Bird by Stoney Creek 4) Amazing Grace by Stoney Creek 5) USS Arizona Memorial by Stoney Creek 6) Squirrel by Stoney Creek 7) Strengthen Me by Diane Arthurs. Those 7 for sure. I'm debating on the final 3 but will decide before Apr. 10

My sister was in town for a couple of days. As usual I had to have her take me to Jo Ann's for floss. Why is it I have a thousand extra skeins of floss yet I always need more. And I don't think a thousand is exaggerating either.

Oh another group I thought about joining was Stitch from Stash but they allow $25.00 a month for patterns. I don't want to spend any more money on patterns for a while. Of course this month I spent over $100 on the patterns I ordered from The Stitchery earlier this year and over $50 on material and floss. So I pretty much spent my allowance for almost the year.

Well....until next time.....Happy Stitching!

Minnie Mouse Start

Good afternoon. This Minnie mouse will go on a quilt for a lady we are doing at Caring Stitchers. She likes baking, Nascar racing and Disney. So I am doing this Minnie Mouse. I may possibly do a food square for her a little later we'll see.

It seems so nice to have the weather warming up. Most of the week will be 30's or upper 20's. Today is 40's and later in week it'll be 40's one day anyway. So our snow is slowly melting. Well I guess Wed. and Thurs. are suppose to be record cold. We don't want a big warm up or we'll have a flood problem as we have over 16 inches of snow on the ground even after some melting. Mar. is an up and down month as far as weather goes and this Mar. is no exception.

Tomorrow my sister is coming back into town for a couple of days. Later she is going to Hawaii. Her and her husband have been planning this trip for their 40th anniversary. They didn't get to last fall so they are now.

Oh, I almost forgot....I changed browser's because my other browser was terrible after I upgraded it. I love this one, I can open my mail with no problem, come here and post with no problem, and go to my Yahoo groups with no problems. Only two problems I can't play Jigsaws on Facebook anymore (or any game) and I can't go to my dashboard here, so I just go through my blog roll and pick some blogs to read, I try to catch those I know post regularly. I wish I could figure out how to update my blog roll. Some have not posted in over 2 years, 3 or 4 have died unfortunately, so I'd like to delete some but add others. Anyone know how I can get to my blog roll please tell me. Thank you. (See I lost my bookmarks when I changed browsers but have no problem getting to my sites.)

Well....until next time.....Happy Stitching!

Cross Stitch Gifts

Isn't this beautiful. This morning I was working in the Food Pantry at church and this lady came from our church came down with some books, and patterns for me. Two or three pieces she had started but because of her eye site she could not finish so she gave me her books and these pieces. This one Amazing Grace by Stoney Creek she had only the bottom border to finish. So I'm going to finish it off. In talking to my mom, we thought maybe we'd get it framed and give it back to her. After all she did most of the work and it's beautiful I hope I don't ruin it I'll be happy if my stitching looks half as good as hers. This is only the top half. When I finish it I'll have someone piece it all together for me or have my brother take a picture of it.

Well....until next time. Happy Stitching

Back to stitching on America

Good afternoon! It seems nice to see some sun today. We are in the 20's today and most of the week will be 20's and 30's much better then what we've had. Also not that much snow in the forecast so maybe some of this will melt. It's warm enough to melt some but not too fast. They say March comes in like a lion out like a lamb, comes in like a lamb out with like a lion. Well it came roaring in like and lion! Everyone is so sick of this winter even those who like winter are sick of it. My cat is a happy cat too, he's running around here playing with his ball, even he says it's nice to see the sun more.

I have gone back to stitching on America. I was so sick of winter I didn't want to work on the ice skater anymore until next winter. I was anxious to get back to this piece. You can see the Statue of Liberty come to life more and more. Almost getting too long for one scan now. Page two is almost done. I really am enjoying this piece but there is so much confetti stitching. I like challenges though. The only problem with that much confetti stitching is it makes the back bulky, and will be harder for the framer of frame.

Our group leader and I were to provide something to eat today after Bible Study. I said I'd bring my pizza casserole. I kept changing my mind between that and 7 layer bars. I finally decided on pizza casserole because I had all the ingredients and didn't know if I'd get to the store. Well I got to the store fine and spent way too much on groceries because I bought for 3 different meals for today and I'd have everything I needed for whatever I decided. I really really really wish I would have just stuck to the 7 layer bars. I made the pizza casserole fine. But when I went to put it in the refrigerator to save it for today it all landed on the floor! I was sooooo upset. I scooped it up but I couldn't bring it today! I couldn't do that. So I made Hodgepodge soup and hoped and prayed the ladies would like it. I wasn't too confidant with the soup as I had never made it for anyone but me before, and just put in it what I want. It went over real well. The ladies loved it some went back for 2nd and 3rd helpings. I had a big crock pot full of it, and went home with maybe enough for lunch tomorrow..

Well, until next time Happy Stitching!