The top twenty

Greetings.  The grass gave up and is covered.  The birds are shivering.  The cats are back inside.  They say it won't last long because it will climb to 40 degrees today.  Oh boy.  Get out the sandals.

Melissa at Words and Blooms asked - if you have 20 years to stitch one big sampler a year, what would they be?   That's a tough question. I would like to list samplers that I want on my wall, but someone else stitched.  I know that many of my wants are projects I would never tackle for whatever reason.  Lack of patience for a BAP, lots of over one stitching, beautiful borders requiring color changes every few stitches, to mention a few.  Is my aging a factor and would I have stitched more intricate samplers years ago?  Maybe.  But I'm still drawn to marking samplers because of their simplicity.  That's why I label myself a stitch wimp, and if I attempted some of these questionable projects, I may finish them without incident, but my gut tells me otherwise.  It wouldn't hurt to try, but I will only list samplers that I feel may actually be stitched, not just wishful thinking.

Could you choose a favorite from your completed samplers?  Even tougher!  Look at the samplers from Margaret, Glenna, Carol Sims, and bloggers that continue to work on the bigger and fancier girls.  Each one a treasure.  Hannah Breed is at the top of my list, but what about Lydia, Fanny, Mary, Safrona, Mary, Eunice, Mary, Thankful, Eliza, Margaret...the list goes on.  I love them all.

Isn't Liberty sweet?  Time to start thinking about who will be next.

Thanks for the kitchen comments.  When I saw that Penny has Smith's work in her home I had to stop myself from turning green.  He's in Ohio, I'm in PA and I'm sure I could have contacted him.  I've been visiting his site from the very beginning. The problem - we're retiring and I can't see justifying the cost of an entire new kitchen when we need to replace the cedar siding and windows. We're adding additional cabinets and details to what we have, which are solid wood and well built, new appliances, counter, sink and faucet. 

Still lots of decisions to make throughout the house and I have to wonder.  If I ever had the chance to build another home, would I be able to decide on a design?  Yes!  Starting with a clean slate is so much easier.  

I wonder how many items I will misplace today because the sampler bucket list will be distracting me.  Hopefully, no more than four.

Have a good one!

Thanks for visiting.

 

 

 

My buds are frosted

Stop snowing!!!!  Those aren't flowers on that crab tree, it's white crap.  All the trees and plants are coated but the greening grass refuses.  After being covered under a heavy blanket for so long, it is not allowing this stuff to smother any longer!! 

Dominic wasn't grasping the details or the design -so more days of relentless graphing and cardboard cabinets and templates of various sizes and foam board cutouts, ended with basics.  I give up. Working with existing sizes and a guy that doesn't deviate from standard wasn't easy. Tomorrow, only three cabinets will be built.  Good enough for now.  I drew the specs for the third cabinet while in the car outside the bakery.  Done. 

Five cabinet makers, and not one answered yes to my question .. "are you familiar with David T. Smith, Kevin Ritter, or Sunderland?" 

Liberty is almost completed and I hope to relax and catch up with the world this evening.  Right now I need to clear the kitchen of the mess and put a heat pack on my neck.  Tomorrow I will give in and buy bigger panties.  Hopefully there won't be a bakery close by.

I hope your week has started out well~

thanks for stopping by.

Hingeing on more decisions

Happy weekend to you.  Ours will be warm and sunny, hopefully drying some of the mud from the rain which is packed into little paws of a princess that doesn't bathe very often.  As you can see, I'm still getting attitude.  Today I have to make a decision on hinges.  The ones originally chosen many moons ago, are discontinued.  Of course they are.  So I found three options, two of which show just the barrel and the other is the iron H.  Might be nice for a change since the cabinets are painted.  Currently they are barrel only and painted the same as the wood so not noticeable at all.  I can always paint over the hinge as I did in the dining room. 

The kitchen's doors are 3/8" offset but Acorn makes the usually flush H for those also.  The only thing for sure is they will be black as will the counter top.  Barrel or H?  I'm leaning towards H but may fall over and bump my head causing a change to barrel. 

Coming back from another trip to the county courthouse (which is so beautiful) we stopped at the antique shop in Volant and I bought this tall cheese box.  Not extremely old but I don't care.  I like old wood and had an extra $20 in my pocket.

 

 

 I just love my gourd bowl/spoon and vase from Fanatic's Country Attic.  No wonder I couldn't find the beans for the French Market soup.  You know how we walk around with something in our hand, get distracted, set it down, and then can't find it?  Yesterday I went into my craft closet and there it was.  The coffee cup that had been missing for quite some time, along with some dried up green stuff inside. 

And here's Liberty.  I have to say that for all the dips - both dye and bleach - that the DMC endured, you really can't see much difference in the new stitching compared to the abused.  The 221 is slightly darker so I dipped that skein, only because of it being the border.

This weekend is also decision time for the slide in range, hammered copper sink, and new faucet.  Am I making a mistake going with copper?  I would like to have a quartz counter top with an undermount sink in the same material and color but so far have been told NO.  I've found that some salesclerks don't look further than the store shelves.  Absolute black granite is second choice, but all the suppliers are telling me that honing it to take off the shine is a mistake and they don't like to do it, costing quite a bit more. Does anyone anywhere give the customer what they want?  And the range quandary - stick with Jenn Air downdraft or install a cabinet depth slide out ventless hood?  Jenn Air has such bad reviews and I need to consider that.

Sorry I dump all my boring stuff on you but that damn cat ignores me.  No help at all.

Have a great weekend and thanks for visiting!

That's better

My name is Marlene and I am a colorholic.

But I wanted to start over on 30 count anyway, so if it didn't work, no big loss.  Floss doesn't grab as quickly as the linen and except for the border, I'm not concerned about a slight difference.  Well.  I just dipped a WIP 9 times in various blends and in Clorox twice.  I guess you could say I'm not concerned, period!  With all the work I have here, I am spastic enough to work on this instead.    BUT!!  I made a decision on the trim color - I'm sticking with the Studio Taupe that is in the first room.

 I found this on Pinterest and love the color.  This is putty!  But I can't do this any longer and have exhausted every paint manufacturer.  All my sample jars will be thrown into a gallon can and shaken.  It may end up being the perfect shade for the bathroom.  Dominic called and my cabinets will be started next week.  They will not be what I want but again, I can't wait any longer.  My search for a true cabinet maker that is willing to go a tiny bit outside the box is over.  There is no one left to call.  Think how bad it will be 10 years from now.

Right now I need to get the dyes put away and clean up my mess.  Mark will be home from golfing soon, walk in, and see that nothing has been moved.  I'll just quietly grind my teeth and he won't dare ask anything. 

Have a good weekend!

Thanks for visiting.  

  

 

 

Liberty

The sun is shining and it's warming - I hope your day is just as bright.

 

I started Liberty with errors right from the start.  The chart is very crisp and bold so I didn't bother to look closely.  The first symbol in the alpha is not what I thought it was.  Remove the browns for the correct blues?  Then I realized that the same symbol is used twice with one being in bold type.  Change that color too?  I had the cross that is between the two single rows of the border off one.  Already corrected that.  I chose 35 count and I wish I would have used 30.  

 

I did because my little Kessel and Simpson samplers on 35 count, are the same in size and I wanted to add Liberty to the group and hang all three together.  Did I check the linen color first?  Of course not.  Does this bother me?  Of course it does.  The linen color is very nice, but not with the greenish cast of the others.  I doubt I will group them now.  I don't mind different shades of linen together, but this green makes the other look pink.

 I've told you many times that I am a color cuckoo.  In fact, since I decided to paint the walls beneath the chair rail, I haven't been able to find that just-perfect-for-psychotic-painters-shade.  It's putty-without the green -not so dull it's gray -not so taupe it's pink -not so warm it's gold -not so light it's beige -not a color on the face of this earth, putty.  I have been stuck in limbo for so long it's really starting to get me down.  The cabinet maker - no return calls.  I know he will do them.  He will.  He works from his home workshop and is very nice. 

Anyway, I have three large drawers filled with rolled linen of all sizes and don't want to look for the greenish 35 count, not even sure there is any left, and I hate that chore.  I wish everything was already planned and ready.  Do I purchase kits?  No.  Why?  Because I want to pick my own linen color and count.  There is definitely something wrong with me.  Ya think?  

My day started off good until I drove past the veterinarian's and saw an elderly gentleman crying as the doctor tended to a dog lying in the cargo area of his SUV.  So I started.  When I got to the lab for my bloodwork, there was a baby crying so hard and mom just couldn't care less.  Now the emotions are really taking over.  Inside the lab, waiting my turn, is a feeble man in his 90's, alone and very sad.  Breaks your heart!  After the prick tech guy finally pricked the right spot, I settled down.  Stopped at JoAnn's for DMC 3747 only to find the store was completely, and I mean completely, different.  I couldn't find anything.  I walked around in a stupor.  I'm old.  I don't like change even if it's for the better.  Stopped for coffee and came home.  The End.

Except for a nagging thought.  When I looked up the post on Kessel to snag the photo, there it was.  The recipe for the peaches and cream dessert.  After a weak and sobbing morning, do I have the strength to not make it?

 

Enjoy your day.  Bake something sweet.  Take some to an elderly neighbor.

Take the rest to a lonely person. Hold the door open for the next guy.  Pray for the babies.

Never wear a mood ring during menopause.  They explode.

Stitch wimp strikes again

Hello hello hello!  How did your weekend go?  Anyone still seeing the white stuff?  Today was sunny and wonderful, hopefully a preview of coming days.

I'm wimping out again and decided on another small and simple marking sampler.  Either of these.  One is under 7"x7" and the other is 6"x8" on 28 count.  Perfect.  Eliza and Ann Wragg are still on my mind and will be coming up soon.

 

 

 

 

 

I have this old PS design, The Fox and the Grapes from 1986 done on 14 Aida.  I want to stitch it on linen and instead of spending $4.50 on Ebay for the card, I will stitch from this piece.  They don't call me a bonehead for no reason.  But the symbols on those small cards are sometimes very hard to see and the stitchery isn't.  All those years ago, I discarded my charts (including the Scarlet Letter's) after completing so I doubt if I still have it.  This is easier to see anyway.

I also have a gripe to air. Most of my old charts are leaflets in plastic bags.  It irritates me when I have to remove the chart from the bag to search for the stitch count, and tightens my britches even more when there is NO stitch count.  I want to see the count on the front or back, not inside, so when I'm browsing I can compare sizes and what linen pieces would be usable.  Instead, I have a mess and most times need to count and estimate finished size.  Am I nit-picking?  Be honest.  I can take it.  Tomorrow, I am going through all these samplers and adding a note with this information so I no longer have to put up with these tight panties.  They've gotten tight enough on their own and I REFUSE to purchase a larger size.  I don't care if they cut off my circulation and make new varicose veins, I am not getting a bigger size.  As long as I'm complaining, I might as well throw in the floss.  I love GAST and other variegated threads, but since the beginning I have been using DMC skeins and pulled out what I needed.  So easy.  I do not like having to untie and re-tie, or wrap and unwrap, but I've decided they are too nice to forego because of that.  I am old and set in my ways, but I guess I will move them all to floss cards and get over it.

I feel very drafty today.  My hair used to be coarse, thick, and wild ~ now it is soft, fine and limp.  Damn hormones. Or lack thereof. I thought if I cut a little off the heavy back, it would take off some weight and lift it.  I grabbed the entire mid section of the back and held it between two fingers.  Unfortunately, I cut on the wrong side of my fingers.  There's a hole now.  At least the Walmart cut is now blended.

No word from the latest cabinet maker. Again. I was as accommodating as I could be, told him to use the wood of HIS choice, on HIS time....I was nice dammit!!!  When I asked for a feature and he stalled, I said forget it - no problem.  It killed me, but I was nice.  I'll give him until Tuesday to call me.  I know where he lives.

Geez.  Lots of complaining for a wimp, no?

Hope your week starts off good and gets better.

Stay safe, thank you for visiting!