is it the thought that counts . . .

So I know it was just last week when I stated that Mondays were good for blogging days. I was doing so well with two Mondays in a row . . . and then this past Monday hit.  I had every intention of posting.  I even knew what pics I'd share and what I'd say . . . but life.  You feel me, right?  And then Tuesday was a chemo day.

Look at Todd smiling for the camera! Tuesday night was tough and Wednesday I stayed home with him, so here it is on Thursday and I'm playing catch-up. Harrumph. Thursdays just feel like a good time for a new post.  LOL!  :)

Last week started out fun. The Merkel crew came by work on Tuesday (during the week of National Afternoon Tea), and so we had a tea party!

It was baby brother's first tea party (with all the trimmings) with Neesey.  He did a great job of holding that tea cup, sitting in the chair, and was very polite at the table!

I'd stopped at Peggy Ann's Bakery on the way in, and picked up some suitable tea treats. Their petit fours are unarguably the best around! Everyone at our tea table agreed with me.

Thursday was the annual MBA Clerk's Conference. I host this event annually for all the church clerks in our association. The MBA provides lunch and I always spend (too much) time picking out goodies for favor bags for them. This year I decided to do a "My Favorites" favor bag, and had a lot of fun collecting my favorite things to share . . .

So if you've known me for any length of time, you aren't surprised to find that there's a pumpkin front and center.  HA! These cute little pumpkins were a $1 at Dollar General!  I'm going to go back and get one for each grandchild and fill it will treats-no-tricks! In case you're wondering, those Moser Roth wrapped bars are chocolate. It's made exclusively for Aldi grocery stores, and it's marvelous.  The dark chocolate with orange and almond bits is heavenly! And you'll notice the leopard print pen.  It's a TŪL pen, and they are my very favorite writing utensils, whether it's pens, pencils, highlighters, markers, whatever.  And y'all ... my love language is paper and pens, so my opinion is strong! 

Friday, Joc had a babysitting emergency, so I headed over there for the afternoon/evening. We had a fun time. I love it when I get there, and all four kids spill out the door hollering, Neesey! Neesey! Such love! Joc had made arrangements for pizza to be delivered and we did pizza and a movie.  I was so tickled to see the girls pull out the picnic quilt!

This is *exactly* what this quilt was created for! 

After dinner we went upstairs and got baby brother into bed (and I did it, first try!), and played and talked and giggled until it was time for the girls to go to bed.  

Love these kiddos and so thankful they're close by so I can run over there when there's a need!

Saturday morning I had a church brunch with our ladies . . .

Isn't that a beautiful spread??  It was lovely.  From there I spent time with my mom, then on to my part-time bookkeeping job, then home for some down time and slow stitching. Phew. I'd completed the stitching part of my Mason jar sunflowers, but it still needed to be *finished*.

I'd wanted a mug rug, but didn't want the sunflowers to compete with a print. I had the brilliant idea to blanket stitch the Aida to wool!

Y'all ... I'm so pleased with how this turned out!  Aida is perfect for stitching, because you can be SO precise with the height and width of your blanket stitches!  And the wool I used is just delicious.  If you can enlarge the photo and look at it closely, you'll see what I mean.  It was the perfect pairing!

So, now I'm mostly caught up and will try again on Monday to get my blogging on. We're hoping, even though Todd had chemo on Tuesday (and will just get his pump out today), that he'll feel up to fishing tomorrow.  We've had a break in the high heat/humidity, and the weather is supposed to be glorious!  Then Ellie is coming over on Saturday to spend the rest of the weekend with us, so I should have things to share!

Toodles!

:)

swap happy . . .

It's said that it's better to give than to receive, and believe me, I'm all about that. But if you've ever been in a swap with Janet of Rogue Quilter fame, you know it's awesome to receive, too!  Janet and I did a little swap between our birthdays (mine is early in October and hers is later in November). I stitched up a mug rug for her and she stitched up one of her marvelous pin cushions for me. We both stayed in our comfort zones!

Along with this beautiful pin cushion (which reminds me of swirling snow), she sent a ton of lovely goodies, including some of her fabulous soaps, a lovely set of Temecula note cards, a note pad (I use the heck out of note pads in the Nook when I'm trying to figure out dimensions or measurements), Orange & Cinnamon Spice tea that's just lovely and smells like this holiday season, patchwork pins (because who can have enough of these?!), and a bag of raspberry flavored, chocolate dusted almonds.  YUM!

See what I mean??

Janet's mug rug was my secret stitching over the past couple of weeks . . .

I love this sweet Kathy Schmitz pattern!  It paired nicely with the patchwork, too.

And of course, I padded my envelope.  It tickles me how similarly we think when gifting each other! She's a precious friend. 

Monday was Veteran's Day.  I shared this pic (along with a couple of others) on social media . . .

Look at the tiny waistline!  This is March, 1985, right after I graduated from boot camp.  Just a baby. Of course, I didn't think so at the time!

I had off on Veteran's Day, but Todd didn't, so I took advantage of the alone time and walked through the woods.  This is one of my all-time favorite trees on the camp's property . . .

Todd believes it's close to (if not older than) 200 years old.  It's a massive oak.  I found a sprouted acorn under it.

I'm taking it to Joc for her to plant in her yard!  A walk deeper into the woods shows how green the trees still are were. (The bitter cold snap we had on Monday night took care of that!) 

The beech trees stay green longer than most everything.  And after they change, they stay on the limbs until spring!

It was a pretty afternoon for a leisurely hike.  I love that I live where I do and have access to God's creation like I do!  The afternoon netted me a good handful of great acorn caps for some more woolies.  

These have a lot of character!  They're all dried out and ready to craft!

Monday night I put stitching away and pulled out the makings for cream cheese mints:

Joc needs them for a baby shower she's hosting tomorrow evening.  The things we do for love! ♥

But last night I was able to pull out the stitching again.  Making very good progress on my pumpkin . . . 

I'm very pleased with it!  I just need to finish stitching the leaves in the acorn panel and do the pumpkin outline and then it's done.  Still not sure how I'm going to use it (the pattern intends it as a pillow, and I didn't want a pillow), but I'll figure something out, eventually. ;)

Have a great day -- make good choices!

:)

day four . . .

It's MY turn for sharing on the Witchy Stitchy Blog Hop!  Annnnd . . . it also MY BIRTHDAY! 

♥  Local grandgirls visited for a birthday eve visit yesterday!  ♥

Hexie Pumpkin Mug Rug
(this is the fourth or fifth I've made...but this one is for ME!)

A birthday means there's a giveaway in here somewhere. ;)

So when I signed on for this hop in July, I gave myself a couple of hours  several days  weeks  until five days ago to figure out what I wanted to make/share.  I love autumn and the less ghoulish elements of Halloween and I didn't want to do anything too creepy or ghoulish.  

I adore ... no seriously ... I ADORE pumpkins in all their glorious colors, shapes, and sizes, but pumpkins didn't quite seem to fit the Witchy Stitchy theme, so I could start there, but I couldn't end there.  With a little inspiration from where I live (Camp MACOBA) as a year-round camp host and from one of my favorite quilting books, I got an idea.

Spiders . . .

Oh yeah, no lack of live, creepy, crawly inspiration there!  *shudder*

I mean, c'mon...what respectable witch brews a cauldron of brew without a pinch of spider or a dash of web?!  Or at the very least, keeps a spider on a leash as a pet??!

Exactly.

So being that I'm a small project person and adore a darling mug rug (or two or ten) for *every* season, here's my offering:

A spiderweb mug rug and a couple of yo-yo spiders.  These yo-yo spiders are so super cute and easy to make!  

I found them in Simple Fabric Folding for Halloween, along with a lot of other spooky fun projects!

The pumpkin is also super easy ... one roll of toilet paper, one fat quarter, and a nice sized twig for the stem.  

They're a GREAT way to decorate when you have little, curious hands around, as are the yo-yo spiders!!

Okay, so I know I mentioned it was my birthday and a giveaway.  That's the kind of birthday girl I am!  I want *everyone* to have a happy day on my birthday!  So here's the deal.  Leave a kind birthday greeting in the comments and follow me in some shape, form or fashion (and let me know you do), and I'll draw a winner for a copy of Simple Fabric Folding for Halloween for your very own! I'll accept entries through the 11th and announce a winner sometime on Sunday the 13th.  :)

Many thanks to Carol of Just Let Me Quilt for coordinating another super blog hop! These are a lot of work to put together and she does a beautiful job of  it!  Be sure, also, to visit the rest of the blogs that are hopping today:

Beaquilter

Homespun Hannah's Blog

MooseStashQuilting

Cynthia's Creating Ark

It’s A T-Sweet Day!

this is me!  ---->Count it *all* JOY!

Bethni L. – Hosted at Just Let Me Quilt

Thank you for stopping by . . . and I'll have the final list of participants posted if you come by tomorrow!

Bewitchingly stitchingly yours,

:)

this, that, and some more . . .

The calendar has been full, full, full, but I've still been managing to daily get at least (at least) 15 minutes of time towards some aspect of stitching.  It makes me so happy to be able to do this!  I did manage to finish my bee quilt in time for the guild's "parade of mystery quilts" . . .

Not great pics, but I'm so in love with this layout ... it's very pleasing to my eye.  I'll use this again, soon.

We had a great wrap-up of our mug rug swap, too . . . 

It was fun to end the guild year on a high note!

I've spent a lot of time with the girls, too. They started school last week (homeschool on Monday and Classical Conversations--their weekly trek--on Tuesday):

Two weekends ago I stayed with them Saturday and Sunday, and Evey, Ellie and I made clothes for Piglet and Owl.

Edith got a woobie.  Or as she refers to it, a tendu.  Yes.  When she got it, she exclaimed, "Mom!  Neesey made me a tendu!"  LOL!  Love these girlies!

The California crew headed back to school and Kim sent me first day pics . . .

All three are in the same school this year -- can you believe that Olivia is in Kindergarten?!  They're loving their new school!

This past weekend was spent at a friend's mom's house on the lake.  It's her birthday weekend and her mom opens up her house for a mini-retreat.  What a blessing!  

As per my usual optimum retreat experience package, I just brought handwork. I finished up block one of Barbara Brackman's Hospital Sketches, from Civil War Quilts blog, which I'm doing scaled waaay down and in wool . . .

I'm so in love with this!  I forgot to bring the templates I'd painstakingly printed, so I had to settle for finishing the one and moving onto something else.  I finished up one of last year's Attic Heirloom ornaments . . .

And prepped two hexie oven mitts/mug rugs . . .

Aren't these fun?  Easy to prep ... not much to the stitching, either.  I'll finish them up sometime this week and share later.

We also to a field trip into town on Saturday and hit Wilson's Fabric.  

I found some fun things--a LOT of purple! (Including another pair of embroidery scissors which I forgot to take a picture of.)  From there we went to lunch . . .

It was a very fun group of ladies and it was a lovely, laughter-filled, productive weekend.

And now let's conquer Monday!

:)