Drunk with Sunshine & some goodies coming!

Hello my friends! Yes, I am drunk with sunshine (finally spring has almost morphed into summer!) and the garden is looking lovely. I have been busy with stitching 2 exchanges so no photos to show yet.

This is a quick catch up post. I had thought I would post more while I was off work but it turned out I did a lot of 'around the house' type of work - spring cleaning inside and out. As a result, I am having a giveaway next month - ha ha - yes, June is only a day or so away. Please come back next week as I need to put the 'bundle' together.

First, I want to thank Snip for this lovely award which she gave me well over a week ago. You know when you're dazzled with sunshine you just lose all sense of time!

Then I have to show some gardening shots as I have to say right now "Happiness is a Garden full of flowers".
These beautiful irises are from my MIL's garden. I got them probably 20 years ago and have given 'cuttings' to various people over the years. She is no longer with us but whenever I see these irises I am reminded of her. That's what I love about gardening - you can pass on plants to friends and they will form their own memories for the gardener. See that little pink peony in the lower right hand corner? It looks like this when opened...
What I love about this beauty, beyond the colour and the fragrance, is that it was free! It was in the same pot as another peony that we bought and this is the first year that these bloomed. What a lovely surprise!
I love these giant white poppies with purple centers.

So, how can one not be happy when surrounded by such lovely happy flowers? I really do feel very happy when I am puttering away in my garden. In the fall/winter, stitching is my solace.

While waiting for my giveaway, you can go and visit Yuko and she has some beautifully stitched goodies she is giving away.

One question I do want to ask - do you have any good books to recommend regarding traditional samplers? I would like to learn more about traditional samplers.

Thank you for stopping by and I hope you are enjoying some sushine as well!

Tulip for my Love

Here we go! "Tulip for my Love" for our 25th Anniversary. Finished it this morning! Happy Happy Dance!

The whole thing, personalized for the occasion. The photo below is the original design so you can see the changes I made.

The original design by Examplar from the Heart

The Right Side

The Left Side - I think the hardest part was to replace the numerical portion with these designs for our anniversary. I substituted a bird from Blackbird Designs, then the vine with heart was made up by me. I love it - the colours are actually brighter than how they show up in these photos. It was well worth it hunting through all the charts to find just he right thing. In the end, it was just a hodge podge pulled out of a hat!

The linen I used is 'Reindeer' by Lakside Linen, exclusive for Shakespeare's Peddler. I had to adjust the colours of the floss a bit as the linen is darker than what you see in the original design.

While I was stitching 'Tulip' I listened to Sissy Spacek read "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee. What a treat! I love how Sissy Spacek narrates the book - there's a certain cadence to her narration which sets the mood just right. The book is wonderful of course!

Now, for some stash. First a belated photo of a birthday gift from Miss Jane. Thank you! (Can you guess the weather chez Miss Jane's?)

Winter Woolens by Stacy Nash Primitives

Next two photos are the OOP charts I purchased last week while in Victoria.

Alpha Bird
Alpha Menagerie
Alpha Sheep
all by Sheepish Desgins

Fruitful Clusters by the Goode Huswife
Seven Sailors by the Goode Huwsife
Honesty, Loyalty by Birds of a Ffeather

Let me gloat for a moment. It's so rare that I get to an LNS let alone find some OOP charts. If anyone is looking for the last 2 Alpha charts from Sheepish Designs, this store had a few copies available. The best thing to do is to phone them if you are interested. I think the website is somewhat out of date.

Now I have 2 exchanges to do as they are due end of next week! So no stitching photos for awhile.

I am eagerly waiting for the new designs from Primitive Needle! I keep leaving comments on Lisa's blog - when, when will they be released?!!! I somehow think Siobhan will have the first one stitched up lickety split, eh? Such fun to be had!

There's a new freebie from Blackbird Designs too - check it out! Ooooh-la-la!

Checking the blogs, everyone seems very busy at the moment with end of school year things, weddings, and of course maybe some work here and there! I hope you are catching some time to pick up the needle and stitch. Thanks for dropping by and thank you for your comments, especially the flowers my son bought for me. You know, moms, miracles c-a-n happen! It just might take a wee while longer than you'd expect! :-)

A lovely start to the R&R week

Yesterday when I got home from a business trip, tired and cranky, I was greeted by a enticing package waiting on the hall table for me. At first, I'd thought it was from some online shopping but then I read the return address and it wasn't from anyone I knew. It took a few minutes before I figured out it was from one of my exchanges. More precisely, from the PS Exchange. Andrea sent me this beauty, and I will unveil it slowly.

First, the package and the lovely card
Notice the pretty wrapping and the pretty card.
Good thing I read the card because it warned me not to be shocked if it looked like it had a cold.

See what I mean?
Andrea had carefully tucked rolled up tissues so that the ribbons wouldn't be crushed! How clever and it worked beautifully, as you can see in the next 2 photos.

I tell ya - I was sooooo happy! I was just beside myself. This piece is absolutely beautifully stitched and beautifully finished. This is the first flat-fold finish that I have seen in person and I am thrilled with it. I have never tried this finish but now I will have an excellent model to follow.

Thank you so much, Andrea! I love it!

It was a great start to our long Victoria Day weekend. I also have the rest of next week off so I'm doubly happy. I so very much need a break to decompress! I also need to catch up on my stitching, including 2 exchanges due end of this month!

I have made some progress on Tulip for my Love, AND I got some great OOP charts when I was on my business trip in Victoria. I will show them to you in my next post.

In the meantime, I will show you the flowers my 'boy' gave me for Mother's Day. I was shocked because he went to buy this himself without any prompting - my, he is growing up into a nice, charming young man!

By the way, a shout out to Glenna - thanks so much for offering to get me the floss (and opening that LNS here - YGG!). It did arrive and I was able to finish stitching the Quaker star motifs.

Thank you to everyone for dropping by! I will post again soon. Enjoy the weekend!

Stitches and Blooms!

The last while has felt very strange. I'd felt like I left Planet Stitching and landed in some boring black and white world of work work work! Oh - I'm just kidding (slightly). Bad back, and no computer (or limited access anyway) equal no fun!

I now have a new laptop. I'm not completely set up yet as DH is very careful about what he installs, how he installs it, and all the security precautions he has to take. I'm glad he's doing it and not moi! However, I was standing by, trying not to tap my feet too impatiently! Another thing is I'm adjusting to how differently the keyboard and 'mouse' work on the laptop. (I just lost half of this post by accident and must re-do!)

I've been taking care of my back and my back is still not completely happy yet. I missed probably 2-3 weeks of stitching but I've gotten back into it ...slowly. So, with no further ado, here's a progress pic:

Tulip for my Love
by Examplar from the Heart

I took this photo late Friday afternoon. Since then I've completed all those red stars except one and I have run out of that floss! I hope my order comes next week! I was trying to get this done for my anniversary - in about 10 days time! So maybe I will have to be happy just to finish this month.

Now I want to show you some photos of my garden. I haven't been gardening as much as I'd like due to really bad seasonal allergies this spring (affecting so many people it made the local news!) - something to do with a long winter and the plants were busting to bloom so the pollen went like fireworks when the weather warmed up.

I will first show you my "Mom's Garden" which my DH made for me about 3 years ago.

It used to be an unused weedy strip between our house and the neighbours. Now it's a little tranquil space with just enough sun to get some flowers, but it offers lots of cool shade during the day. There are still things to fix up here but it's nice to do it bit by bit through the years.

Waiting for those lilacs to bloom!

Pretty white bleeding hearts in Mom's Garden

Now I will show you some flowers blooming in our sunny backyard.

These beautiful sunset coloured Lewisia are at the bottom of the stairs to the backyard.

Stunning huge blooms from the Japanese Tree Peony

These pink clematis came with the house and are very old but very healthy. They form a huge clump against the back wall of our house. Best of all they have a sweet vanilla scent!

Well, that's it for this post. I have inadvertently deleted parts of this post THREE times due to my not being used to the sensitivity of the touchpad! I'd better go before I do more damage! Thank you so much for your visits and comments - I sure do appreciate them!

Have a lovely Mother's Day and a wonderful week!