I arrived back from my holidays to find a wonderful LHN exchange waiting for me, it was from Katrina. A big thank you, I love it. I've admired these floss tags for a while, and even stitched one, just not made it up, but this one is so nice. Katrina stitched my initials on it, and if you look on the pic below, she also stitched her initials on it, and sent me some wonderful extras. I was thoroughly spoiled.
Look at all these extras, whoo hoo.
And this is the wonderful bunch of threads and complimentary LHN charts I received. The threads are all the DMC needed to stitch all of these charts-how thoughtful is that, I don't know where to start first. LOL
I have just spent a wonderful week staying in this cottage in Dorset. The weather was wonderful too. And my trusty old banger got us there and back! That's my car parked outside. We had a great journey there and back, and only got stuck in traffic going, which meant the journey there was slightly longer. The cottage had a wonderful thatched roof, and we had the heating on all week, even though it was great weather, the cottage was a little chilly, due to it's thick walls and small windows, it didn't let any warmth in. The cottage was in a small village a few miles inland from Weymouth, and Lulworth Cove. We visited lots of places, probably far too many to mention, but I'll give it a go. There was Monkey World, Tutankhamun Exhibition, Mummy exhibition, Water Gardens, Kingston Maurwood Gardens,
Swanage Railway.
We visited Weymouth, Bridport, Lyme Regis, Lulworth Cove, Wimborne, Swanage, Poole, Dorchester, Osmington Mills, Portland, Abbotsbury, and Wareham. We walked for miles, and travelled miles too. It was 312 miles to the cottage, and then of course home again, but I want to do it all over again.I arrived home to gifts. There was a wonderful LHN package, I was well and truly spoilt. And I also received floss from my Make a Wish partner, who was unable to make my wish due to health problems - it was not necessary, but I thank you very much for taking the time to send it. I hope you feel better soon. My LHN exchange was also delayed due to health problems, so I hope you're feeling much better soon, too. I'll post pics tomorrow. I returned to work today, having been off for a wonderful 18 and half days. Unfortunately, during this time I had to visit the dentist 4 times - ouch. I won't go in to details, but my first appointment was in May, and so far I have been to visit my dentist (my new best friend)6 times, and will return again in August (hopefully) - although at the moment I'm thinking it may be sooner, but I can only hope that it isn't. I've had two courses of anti-biotics in this time, and the outcome may well be an extraction.
I hope to post pics tomorrow of my exchange, and I am also hoping that my RR comes back this week.
My holiday also turned out to be a stitching holiday too, as in NO stitching. I didn't take any stitching with me, as I just couldn't make my mind up, I also knew that the cottage had small windows, and would be quite dark so the light wouldn't be good enough for stitching. I've made up though since I came back, and I've got on with a Make A Wish, I'm loving the colour of this, and hope to do a bit more on this tonight.
I've also been granted two awards today for my blog-I'm a bit overwhelmed by this. Thank you very, very much, and I'll be back with more on this tomorrow. I need to do lots of thinking about who I can pass these on to, which will be very difficult to choose. My blog list gets ever longer, and there are a few non stitchy one's on it.
I finally found pictures of the Make A Wish that I granted Vonna, they had disappeared into the depths of the PC. I took the photo's on dd's camera, and they got saved elsewhere. Now Vonna received this 3 or 4 weeks back, but I haven't posted it here before. This is Country Garden by Blackbird Designs, although I didn't stitch the flowers below the border. I loved this, and I will definately be doing it again for me. So many to stitch, so little time.
I have now decided to grant another Make A Wish, this will be my third and this time it is for Su. I haven't completed number 2 yet, but I have it kitted and know where I am going with it. I can't wait to stitch it.
I just wanted to say that sometimes life gets in the way. We cannot always make deadlines, or even meet challenges, but I have yet to meet someone whose life goes smoothly 100% of the time. When things like this happen, it's best to be open, and just let people know that you are unable to meet commitments, and I really appreciate people who are open and honest. And I want to say a big Thank you to those who have been. I appreciate it. I know sometimes it is harder to say you cannot fulfil a commitment than to just bury your head. You may wonder why I say this. Well this week, I have found out that the last stitcher on my RR is unable to stitch on it, the stitcher who granted my 2nd Make A Wish is unable to fulfil, and it is highly likely that my HOE LHN exchange won't be met. I actually have found it quite funny that this has all been in a few days. And they say things come in three's. LOL
I heard from Marjean that she received my LHN exchange, for the HOE group. I'm so please that she liked it. I knew exactly what I was going to stitch for this exchange, and when I came to start it I realised that the design was by CCN. So I had to come up with something else, this pattern is from the JCS ornament magazine, and I decided not to stitch the red berries on it, so that hopefully it doesn't look too Christmassy. Actually, I was really pleased with how it came out, and may even stitch another for myself. The extras included Calender Girls chocolate, with each one showing a different month, these were sold in aid of Leaukemia Research.
I finished this on Sunday, it was quite quick stitch. Although I did think I was going to run out of thread, and was thinking if I ordered more, it would be a different colour, but I ended up with 1.5 inch left. Phew!!
I have plans of how I want to finish this, and it includes a trip to the wood yard, and my handiwork with a chisel, but if I'm honest I'll probably never get around to the making up - we'll see. I have dropped hints to dh, but he's too busy in the summer with his allotment.
Now, if there's anyone who would like this pattern, I'd love to trade it for LHN The Sampler Lady, Stitcher's Prayer, School of Needlework, Home of a Needleworker, City Stitcher Country Stitcher, or Thread Gathering.
