One project finished

I'm so proud to announce this cross-stitch project is finished. I started it in 1999 and finished the stitching of it last year. I got it framed when we got our house so we could hang it as our first picture. Even though it's for Christmas, I've worked so hard on it that we're keeping it out this year until then, and then we'll put it away.




Here's a close up.



I really enjoyed working on this Santa because of the bright joyful and cozy Christmas colors. My only regret is starting it on Aida. I'm doing all my future projects on linen.

I LOVE school supplies!

Every fall I long to buy fresh new school supplies, especially in bright colors. This year John's work had a donate school supplies thing, so I got to go shopping! I had an absolute blast! I found these cool folders, and I love the colors.

Lots of roses

Today I picked roses from OUR rose bushes. There were lots to chose from. They even smell pretty nice.

Quilt

Here are the promised pictures.

The third picture shows the detail of one of the Hardanger squares. It is stitched with ivory thread and has a light beige behind it.

I have the middle part of the quilt quilted. All I have left to do is finish quilting, tie the threads on the back, and do the binding (which I'm scared to do - I don't quite understand the instructions I've read about it yet). Tomorrow I'm going with my Mom to her chemo treatment that lasts all day, so I'm taking the quilt to hand tie the threads on the back. It will help to get all those hidden as it looks like a mess right now!

I plan to have it all finished by the end of the month.

Finally! I get to share with you...

A year and a half ago I started a quilt with 5 Hardanger squares for my parents' 30th anniversary that was this week. I couldn't post any progress pictures because it was a secret! But tonight I presented an almost finished quilt to them, so I can now post about it. Yeah!

However, it will have to wait one more day because I'm very tired. Time for bed!

Lots of veggies

Today I picked 14 pounds of vegetables, 11 of which were tomatoes! I couldn't believe it! The other vegetables are cucumber, zucchini, some of our first corn, onions, and anaheim peppers. We're making a huge batch of salsa tomorrow. Weee!

Our fish

Here's a picture of our fish in our pond out front. We have two black goldfish, two red/orange goldfish, and three koi. I'd like to name them, but I'm having trouble picking names. I thought it'd be cool to name the four goldfish with G names, and the three koi with K names. From the personalities, the two darker koi are male, and the yellow one is female, at least that's what I think. The goldfish could be either sex; they don't have much personality to determine it; maybe they're really high-tech plastic android fish?

Can anyone give me some ideas for names?

Thirty years

Today is my parents' 30th year anniversary. Hooray for them!

My Brother-In-Law

Meet Tim, John's younger brother. This picture is a little older, but I wanted to post it because it was taken from the bridge over the river that's really close to our house. This was after we made the offer on the house, but before we got the keys. Tim came to town for a short visit and to see the house. Then we took a walk to the river.

This was also before his trip to Brasil where he met a special friend of the female persuasion. Take a look at his blog for some pictures of Edneia (pronounced Esh-ney-a; sorry, Tim, if I didn't get that quite right) and Brasil. He was very excited to talk about her, and we're very excited to hear about her. He also talked about looking at house prices down there. Sounds like I need to get my passport ready for a Brasil trip!

Less than two weeks left of school

This summer I'm taking an online accounting class at the community college. It's almost over! Yeah! John said he's looking forward to the class being finished because than I can start unpacking boxes. While I have gone through a few boxes, it is true I haven't made much progress because I've tried to focus on school. And it's paid off because so far I'm getting an A. Yeah!

Macy loves her sun spots!

Isn't she cute?

See how our corn has grown!

You can see how much our corn grew in first few weeks we were in our new house. It was so nice to have a garden started! We've already enjoyed several zucchini, cucumbers, and John made a yummy salsa from the cilantro, onions, tomatoes, and anaheim and jalapeno peppers, all from our garden!

Cuddling picture

Okay, okay, here are some pictures.

First, meet John and Macy. Macy is very picky about her cuddle time. When she decides to cuddle, you just can't say no.

Lots of work to do

We've been in our house almost a week now. There's lots of work to be done! It's so exciting, so overwhelming, and so tiring all at the same time. We're getting everything moved this weekend, then we can start to settle in. I can't wait to organize and decorate my craft room. I'm also excited to pick out paint colors, although that is one of the most overwhelming things on the list.

We are so grateful to our family that has helped us move all our stuff. With my husband not being able to lift more than ten pounds after his back surgery, we really appreciate all the hours and sore muscles they have sacrificed. Thanks guys!

It's finally here!

Today's the day we get the keys to the house. Last week we were counting down the days, and Friday we started counting the hours. The deadline is 5 pm tonight, but if the owner's get done moving out their stuff, then it might be earlier.

The homeowner has agreed to do a walk-through with us to show us operating procedures, like for the sprinkler system and hot tub.

We get to spend a week cleaning and doing any kind of fixing, painting, or personalizing before we have our movers come help us. And by movers, I mean family. :)

We're so excited!

Fun animal quiz

You're a Donkey!

Loyal and helpful, you are capable of carrying heavy loads for
others. At the same time, you're a bit ornery about being asked to do things and can
sometimes be a real, well, you know. Regardless, many see you only for what they can
get you to do rather than actual personality attributes you might have. Some media
influences make you seem very funny, while others have made people think it would be
a horrible punishment to end up like you. When you were young, you always seemed to
end up getting hurt at birthday parties.


Take the Animal Quiz
at the Blue Pyramid.

Fun Sesame Street quiz

You Are Bert

Extremely serious and a little eccentric, people find you loveable - even if you don't love them! You are usually feeling: Logical - you rarely let your emotions rule you You are famous for: Being smart, a total neat freak, and maybe just a little evil How you life your life: With passion, even if your odd passions (like bottle caps and pigeons) are baffling to others

The Sesame Street Personality Quiz

We're getting a house!

Yeah! We finally found a house we love, and we're in the middle of the process of buying it! In less than a month, we'll be in our very own home.

As the date comes closer, I get more excited! Yesterday I went to The Home Depot and bought our first new appliances: refrigerator, washer, and dryer. Although it was a little disapopinting to go home with only a receipt and a delivery date. As soon as we get them delivered, I'll take pictures to post. That's assuming I can find my computer underneath all the packing boxes, of course. :)

Oh, by the way, this house is not the house from the previous post. We found it while we were still on the back-up list of the other one. While we were frustrated and disappointed with not getting the first house, we were really excited about finding "our" house, so we decided to go for it. It has a bunch of features the other house didn't: a better layout, more square footage, a master bathroom, a two-car garage (the other house only had a one-car garage), a hot tub, a separate family room, and a fourth bedroom. It's such a great house, I even get excited just typing about it!

Now my evenings and weekends are spent packing and cleaning. I usually dread packing, but I keep telling myself how much I'm going to enjoy our new home. That get's me going. Hopefully moving day will be a breeze.

House hunting

I haven't posted in awhile. Part of the reason is we've been very busy looking for our first house. I have some exciting news, and some not exciting news. The exciting news - we made an offer on a house we really love Saturday morning. The not exciting news - the sellers didn't accept our offer first, but instead put us in a backup position. If we accept the backup position (we will because we love the house), then if something happens with the first position buyer then we get a shot at it. It might take up to two weeks to know if the first position buyer isn't going to be able to buy the house for whatever reason.

I will update when we know more.

Cool marble machine video

This is such a cool video! I love things like this. It's going around the blogging world quickly, so I apologize if you've already seen it. Wait, no I don't. It's so good it's worth seeing more than once!

Click on the watch button in the Incredible Machines box. Enjoy!