Another wildlife rescue attempt

Eight years ago, I took a duckling that had been separated from the mother to a local bird sanctuary where they were able to rehome him/her with another family of ducks. A week ago this past Sunday I came across a baby bird who was in even worse shape; it looked like he (I'll go with "he", though I have no idea what sex he/she was--I couldn't even tell what kind of bird he was, he was so little!) had been blown from the nest and a parent had tried to help him, but a hawk must have gotten the parent because there were "parts" scattered on the curb where the baby lay. :( I saw him as we headed out with the dogs for their walk, and cried when I saw him moving and realized what I was seeing. I thought for sure that he was a goner, but when I left for my walk about an hour later, he was still there and still moving, so I couldn't leave him there again.

The bird sanctuary has closed, so I took him to a wildlife rehab center in Green Bay. I held him in my hand the whole way up there, trying to keep him warm, and I could feel him moving and hear him cheeping off and on while I drove, so I knew he hadn't died on the way. Before I handed him over, I took a picture; right before this photo he stretched his head up and opened his mouth to be fed, so I'm slightly hopeful that he can be saved:

I'm debating whether I should call to see if he made it, because I know it will just make me sad if he didn't, but at least he got a chance he wouldn't have had if I had left him there. I learned years ago not to watch nature documentaries because there's just too much carnage, but there wasn't any way to avoid this situation--sigh!

On the stitchy side of things, I spent last week on a Heart in Hand model that I need to mail back today. Now I'm back to Nora Corbett's Mari:

I originally thought that I might get her done in June, as I started her for a June Pixie SAL, but with the week off I'm thinking that's no longer possible; I guess time will tell.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

June Pixie SAL

I received another Friendstitch model the afternoon of my last post, so I put aside Warm Wooly Welcomes for a few days to get that stitched and sent back. I then returned to Welcomes and am now almost halfway finished:

I would have happily continued with this project, but a member of a Mirabilia FB group started a Nora Corbett June Pixie SAL and for some reason it just called to me. About 10 years ago, when the first set of Bewitching Pixies came out, I kitted up all six of them but have only stitched two so far:

Gigi:

And Emi:

So I located the box with the floss for the remaining four pixies and pulled out an old Silkweaver solo that I always thought would look good with one of these; looking at the floss and fabric I decided that Mari's colors meshed the best with the fabric, so that is the one I chose:

I didn't have a lot of stitching time this past weekend, but I did make a bit of progress on my new start:

It will be fun to see how much I can get done during June; the sheep are still calling to me, but I'm going to try to stick with Mari for at least the duration of the SAL.

We're still trying to determine what is going on with Murphy, as shortly after my last post the vet called and said that the test they had done the previous week showed that he didn't have Cushing's. Since then, we monitored his water intake for a three-day period and found that he is drinking more than he should be, which is obviously why he's peeing inappropriately (i.e. in the house). We are having more bloodwork done this afternoon, and if that doesn't show what they're looking for then the next step is an ultrasound. So, still up in the air, and not great because I feel stuck in the house, trying to take him out at least once an hour. More stitching time, I guess...

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Silver Moon Tea is done

All the momentum I gathered at the retreat paid off and I was able to finish her up on May 8 after languishing in the WIP bin for 12 years:

I still have one gift certificate to my framer, so I'm hoping to take her over when the mood strikes and have her framed--not that I have any wall space left...! The fabric is 28ct opalescent Lugana Rosey Glow from Colours of the Outback (no longer in business); I normally prefer 32ct, but all those beads around the moon fit really well on the 28ct so I'm glad I used it here. One of these days I need to dive back into the WIP bin and see what other beauties I could pull out and actually finish.

The same day I finished SMT I pulled out Heart in Hand's More Any Town Tiny Town, framed it up, found my starting point and stitched one little cloud, but it doesn't show up very well in the photo:

I'm stitching it on PTP Demoiselle Belfast, and I'll be stitching the first Any Town Tiny Town on it, as well. The day after I started this one, I also started Amy Bruecken's 365 Days of Warm Wooly Welcomes, with the plan of alternating between the two pieces; however, I love Wooly Welcomes so much that I've been working solely on it for the past week and a half:

This one has quite a bit of back stitching, but it's fun watching it bring the designs to life:

This is being stitched on Fragrant Lilac Collection Belfast from Nicholas Flamel Design, using the recommended WDW flosses. It is such a fun stitch and has brightened my days over the last week or so. It looks like my Murphy has Cushing's disease, so it's not great; right now, we're waiting on some test results that I think will determine the dosage of medicine he'll be taking to try to treat some of the symptoms. Still pretty uncertain on the prognosis at this time, so I'm just trying to give him extra love (and treats) while we figure things out:

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week, and Happy World Bee Day!

Came home sick from the retreat...

...ugh!! While I was driving home on the 28th I felt a little off but thought I might just be tired; by Monday I could tell I was actually sick and by Thursday it was pretty bad. I'm feeling better now but am still coughing quite a bit while it clears out. I had a bad feeling when I was in the elevator of the hotel and a little girl sneezed--I could picture those germs just going everywhere and wreaking havoc!

The retreat itself was a fun time; the stitching room was open from 10a-11p Thursday, 8a-11p Friday and Saturday and 8a-12p Sunday, which was a lot of stitching time to enjoy. I didn't do any stitching on Sunday, though, because I just wanted to get the drive over with at a reasonable time, get home and get my laundry done. I stopped at Stitchville on my way into town and found it was probably the best shop I've ever visited; it's a shame that it's closing, as I'm sure local stitchers will feel pretty bereft without it.

I wasn't particularly thrilled with the hotel that the retreat was held at, as it's right by the airport and there was no way to walk to any restaurants, or even any close drive-thru places. It was also too warm in the personal rooms; the AC hadn't been turned on yet, so the lowest temperature I could get my room to was 72F, and it wouldn't even stay at that, so I didn't sleep very well because I was just too warm. They're going to hold the retreat again next year, in May, so maybe the AC will be turned on by then--I'm not sure if I'll go again or not at this point, I'll have to think about it for a while.

I think my gift bags were well received; I ended up with an extra one because we only had five people at our table. Then Saturday morning a woman staying at the hotel came into the room to look at all of the stitching and really liked it, so I ended up giving her the extra bag and a needle so she would have everything she needed to try cross stitching for the first time--perhaps she's a convert by now!

I did get a lot of stitching done on Silver Moon Tea; this was about where she was when I left for the retreat:

And this is how she looked when I got home:

I stitched a couple of small models last week for the upcoming Friendstitch event in September, and then I went back to SMT, so as of last night she looks like this:

My dog Murphy is having a medical issue right now, so I'm not sure how much stitching time I'll have in the near future as the vet figures out what further tests are needed. I'm trying not to get ahead of myself and worry too much, but it's always hard when a pet is ailing. At this point in my life, I'm really feeling like I don't want dogs anymore because I'm just kind of tired of being needed too much from too many sides, so it's a difficult time.

The day I left for the retreat I got an email from Faye Riggsbee that my Tiny Towns were finished; these are the photos she attached:

Didn't she do an amazing job on these? The fabrics and the embellishments are perfect; I especially love the shell and starfish on the top of Seaside Tiny Town--so cute!

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Almost time to Get Your Stitch On

This Thursday is the start of Needle Bling Design's Get Your Stitch On retreat, and I am both excited and nervous. The other night I had a dream that I forgot to take stitching with me, and even my sleeping brain must have known that that was ridiculous as it morphed into having my stitching but someone had purposely taken just the clamps from my Qsnaps, so I couldn't frame my fabric and stitch--too funny!

I haven't been to very many retreats over the years since I am a pretty extreme introvert, but I've always enjoyed them when I've gone. I never participate in any exchanges because that's just too much pressure, but now it seems to be a thing to have gifts for your tablemates, so I made my first foray into that custom. I got some cards with small designs that would be suitable for stitching on perforated paper, small easels and canvases that could be painted and then used to display the finishes and the floss and paper needed to stitch the designs, and I made some counting pins; this is the result:

Credit for the counting pins goes to Honeybee over on her blog, where she explained her process for making them; I just bought a couple of strings of beads and went for it:

Now I just need to pick up a few groceries to take with me, gas up my car and pack. I'm happy that I can drive to this one, as it's just about 4.5 hours away, which is part of the reason I decided to go. I am also hoping to go to Stitchville while I'm there--the store is closing and I'm not sure how much will be left, but I'd like to see it one time before it's gone. The retreat starts Thursday at 10am, so I'm driving over on Wednesday and will try to get to Stitchville then. I also need to look into the location of Welcome Stitchery relative to the hotel; I used to shop there when it was located in Illinois, so I'd kind of like to stop in just for old times' sake. 

I decided that I would take Mirabilia's Silver Moon Tea with me to work on; I had taken it to Charlotte last October, but then didn't work on it very much since I started the retreat design there. I pulled it out last Friday to put it on the Qsnaps and stitch on it for long enough to figure out where I was in the chart and get a feel for the symbols; this is where I started:

When I started this back in 2012 I used to do all the back stitching and beading at the end, but now I do them as I go so this weekend I had fun bringing her face to life:

I am hoping to make a lot of progress at the retreat, and possibly even finish her sometime in May. I don't want her to disappear into the WIP bin for another 12 years!

Speaking of finishes, I do have a couple since my last post; the first is Mill Hill's Puppy Love, which I wrapped up the day after I wrote that post:

And I finished Nora Corbett's Miss Pink Mushroom, which was good because I needed the Qsnaps for Silver Moon Tea!

The fabric for this is Autumn Leaves on 36ct linen from NicholasFlamelDesign on Etsy. At one point I did get a bit worried that it was too similar in color to the design, but I'm very happy with the finished piece.

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!

Tiny Town #10 is done

The day after my last post I finished Just Nan's Enchanted Hearts:

This was such a satisfying stitch: a variety of different stitches, each band went fairly quickly, that band of lace hearts at the bottom is such a beautiful touch and just the overall feeling of community as I worked on a class project with notes from 30 years ago. I've stitched quite a few of Nan's smalls over the years, but this was my first band sampler and now I'm already looking forward to picking another one to start.

Once that one was off the Qsnaps I immediately loaded them up with Heart in Hand's Frosty Tiny Town, to which I added the separate Frosty Frill chart. Every time I stitch a Tiny Town it becomes my new favorite, and this one was no exception. I chose a Silkweaver solo on Belfast linen from my stash; it was a darker gray than the recommended fabric, but I liked that because I wanted the snowflakes to really pop, and it had some nice mottling with even a tinge of purple in it; I finished it last Thursday:

I did have an issue with two of the flosses being too similar in color; my Deep Fennel was a bit too dark, so it didn't have much contrast with the Chesapeake Bay. I had already stitched the first snowman's house when I pulled a different skein of Deep Fennel and tried a bit on a different house; it was definitely lighter, so I made the difficult decision to do some frogging and restitching:

I'm glad I took the time to make the change. because I think it looks better with more definition between the two colors when they're used next to each other. I did make just a few changes to this piece: I added a purple that I used for the scarves on the snowmen (one that was complementary to the tinge of purple in the fabric), I used orange for their noses instead of brown (carrots instead of sticks!), I used a button for the pom-pom on the first snowman's hat and because I switched the second snowman's scarf from red to purple I was able to change the blue jay into a cardinal without having too much red in that area.

This is my 10th Tiny Town so far, five of which have been made onto drums and four of which are at the finisher waiting to be "drummed". While I've already stitched the Any Town Tiny Town, I'm going to stitch it again as charted (I previously did a modified version where three of the buildings were based on shops local to me), and there is a now a More Any Town Tiny Town chart, so I have both of those kitted up (they use the same threads except for one used in just one of the designs) with a piece of PTP Demoiselle Belfast, ready to go when the urge strikes.

I've also done a bit more on Nora Corbett's Miss Pink Mushroom; all of the orange is now stitched so there's just greens left to do:

I was going to keep working on her until she was done, but this past Saturday I played pickleball for the first time and managed to get hurt almost right away! I played tennis in high school and college, and racquetball with my husband after that, but it's been at least 25 years since I've done anything on a court and it turns out I can't make those quick feet adjustments when a ball comes right at me--somehow my lower legs/feet got twisted together and I fell like a tree trunk right onto my right side! My hip took the brunt of it, but I definitely squashed the tendon in my shoulder, so I have limited range of movement for now. I thought at first that I'd have to go to the doctor this week, but so far it seems to be improving so hopefully that won't be necessary; I have a stitch retreat (Needle Bling Design's Get Your Stitch On Retreat in Bloomington, MN) coming up in a couple of weeks, so I really hope it continues to feel better. To add insult to injury, later on a ball bounced up off my racket and hit me in the nose, which made my nose bleed--that's when we called it a day!

Since my right shoulder is very sore, yesterday I pulled out another Mill Hill kit and worked on that, using my left arm to pull the perforated paper to and fro instead of pulling the floss with my right hand. My Callie was not impressed that I'm now working on the Puppy Love kit instead of Kitty Love:

I'm just glad that I was able to stitch on something, and made good progress:

I'll probably have this done by the time my shoulder is completely healed, which is hopefully soon...

Hope everyone has a great stitchy week!