Marriage Samplers

I've been married over 37 years now (wow, does time fly!) and over the years I've stitched a few marriage-themed pieces.  I had them interspersed throughout our home. I decided to put them all together on a display wall in our bedroom and I love how it turned out. Having similarly-themed items in one place seems to call attention to them more. It's also turned into a display of how my stitching has evolved over the years. My first piece was a stamped cross stitch pattern, then I graduated to doing counted cross stitch on Aida cloth.  Now most of my pieces are some sort of evenweave or linen. It continues to be a very relaxing hobby for me.

This is my first cross-stitched piece, a stamped piece.  I remember doing this right after we were married!

I love these "marriage rules"!

This one has special meaning for me, I finished it in the hospital while my Hubbers recovered from a stroke.

 

Cross Stich Progress....Or, Lack Thereof!

I had such good intentions the start of this tax season to keep up with my cross stitching.  In late January I started on a marriage sampler and made pretty good progress.  My goal was to get some stitching in every few nights, for relaxation, if anything.  Well, life and other projects got in the way! I joined a quilt sew-along so have been (barely) keeping up with each week's new block.  I have had three eye surgeries since January, none planned. Days off for the procedures, doctor visits and recovery meant I got behind at work.  I've been working very long hours and weekends. So I haven't gotten as much done as I had hoped! I started on the second row in February and that's as far as it's gone!

I did manage to finish two projects that have been gathering dust in my to-do pile. They didn't need much done to finish them, I just got bored with working on them.  They are now ready to go to the framer.

This very bright piece will go in my craft room. I love the little bee and ladybug!

This hummingbird piece took me forever to finish.  There are 45 different color threads in this and I stitched it on a piece of high-count (think small stitches!) linen. I was continually changing thread colors so it felt like I was never making progress.  Finally done and it will go in our guest bathroom where my other hummingbird stitcheries reside.

Three more weeks of tax season to go!  I have so many projects waiting!

33 Years!

Yes, I'm still alive.  There isn't much going on in my kitchen or craft room at the present time.  I've had popcorn for dinner twice this week, I'm almost embarrassed to say.  I did make a pie last night, my office staff will let me know at lunch if it was a success or not. Unless you've worked in an accounting office during tax season, you can't imagine the stress and tiredness we feel.  Five weeks from today and tax season 2015 will be a wrap! Lots to accomplish between now and then but we can see the finish line.

33 years ago, my Hubbers and I ran away to Reno to get married. Why, during tax season, you ask?  We were buying a home and needed to be married in order to qualify for a Veterans Administration loan. We got married on a Friday night and were back to work on Sunday.  Our anniversaries have been similarly celebrated.  We will go to dinner tonight and try to (1) stay awake and (2) not talk business!

One of the first cross-stitched pieces I made is a wedding sampler.  It still hangs by our bed.

These past 33 years have flown by.  Three children, four grandchildren, lots of memories. If I had it to do over again the only thing I would change would be the date! It sure would be nice to have a romantic getaway on my anniversary!

Stitching for Jakey!

Ever since I knew we were getting another grandchild, and that it would be a boy, I've been sewing and cross stitching. Making things for a little boy has been a new adventure for me, we have three granddaughters.  Since their births I've been sewing dresses and ballet bags, using a lot of pink. But I can adapt easily and have managed to do some cute things for our little guy.

My son is a big New England Patriots fan. Now our family has always been into football but we've always been San Francisco Forty-Niners fans. Our Sundays revolve around football. My son fell in love with Drew Bledsoe and the Patriots in the 90's and he hasn't looked back. I can roll with it, at least it's not the Dallas Cowboys! I made Jakey this little blanket out of brown minky material, very soft and cuddly.  The other side has Patriots fabric.

I sewed a few bibs.  My daughter-in-love is a school teacher so a few of the fabrics were a nod to her profession.  The jeans bib was made out of a pair of old jeans I still had hanging in the closet (I hate clothes shopping, as a result I wear my clothes for a long time!) I have a picture of me wearing them, the first weekend I had them, at a race in Canada that my son was also driving at.  He had a very hairy ride on one run, doing a big wheelstand and getting out-of-shape.  It was an anxious moment for his mom. I guess there was a reason I was saving the jeans all these years, now little Jakey has a bib from them!

I first learned to do counted cross stitch when I was pregnant with my son. Over the years, I've stitched at sports and dance practices, racetracks, in the front yard while the kids rode their bikes. I always have a project in process and it always travels with me. This stitched piece didn't take long to do and I hope it's something that Jakey will always have to remember his Nana by.  The buttons used on the piece came from my Grandma's button box, which my Mom has.

There is one more baby shower to honor my daughter-in-love, to be held in two weeks.  Its theme is Mickey Mouse. I'm sure you can imagine the type of fabric that has been flying around in my craft room lately!

Be Yourself

This cross-stitch piece came together in no time, very easy project, unlike the hummingbird piece that I'm still trying to finish (almost done)! Once framed, this will go in my craft room. I fell in love with the simple sentiment on this as I think it says a lot.  In my opinion, so many people are unhappy with their lives because they are always striving to keep up with others' perceived successes or they compare themselves to others.  We are all unique, we all have our own set of talents, we all have worth, we all have our own set of struggles.

 Embrace who you are. If you are happy with yourself, life becomes easier. Like others, I've had my moments of insecurities.

My non-racing friends don't understand my drag racing addiction.  I'm very domesticated, even old-fashioned, which is getting less and less common these days. I'm most happy at home, rather than out and about. I worry am I a good enough wife? Mother? Daughter? Accountant?

I've learned to not worry as much and I'm very comfortable with who I am. We are all one-of-a-kind.  Celebrate that, just be yourself! 

Procrastination 101

I'm normally a very organized person. I plan ahead, make to-do lists, have household routines and pretty much stay focused on what needs to be done (I even have a list of crafting projects I want to get done in 2014). 

However, when it comes to some of my crafting projects I tend to procrastinate on getting them done. I think this procrastination can be explained by two things; intimidation or dislike for a certain procedure.  If a certain procedure or technique in a project is something I've never done before or that looks too difficult I tend to put it off.  And if the procedure is something I'm not real fond of doing, that gets put off, too!  The end result is I end up with a few works-in-progress that take up space in my craft room and in my mind.

This past weekend I vowed to get through some of these projects.  My Hubbers was away on a bike adventure so I had five whole days to myself. No more excuses that I had chores to do or places to go. It was time to get things accomplished! As is usually the case,  once I got involved with things I found that it was easy to finish and I shake my head in disgust wondering why it took me so long to get to this point! I'm quite pleased with my progress as I have no more WIP's laying around my room! (I do, however, have plenty of unstarted projects!)

This cross stitch project has been moved around my craft room for 14 months now.  All it needed were the beads on top of the firecrackers. Doing bead work is not my favorite thing to do though I love the effect bead work has on a stitched piece.  Little needle, little beads, old eyes. It's a precarious combination. In about 30 minutes I had it done and it is now at the framing shop.

My youngest granddaughter will be four in September.  These cross-stitched pieces will make up a birth sampler for her.  It is done on perforated paper which threw me for a loop at first.  All it needed to be finished was to stitch her name and birth date in the blanket and cut out all the paper-stitched pieces. I set up shop in my living room chair, turned the TV on to the day's drag racing coverage and got it done. It, too, is now with the framer. The pieces will hang from a string clothesline, with little clothespins.  It's going to be adorable!

I started these strawberry pincushions before tax season overwhelmed me.  They sat next to my sewing machine for three months, just needed the leaves to be glued on and the flowers cut, beaded and glued on.  Took me no time to finish!

A year ago I bought some Annie Sloan chalk paint (Emperor Red) with plans of painting this living room table. I'm intimidated by the whole process even though I've read many tutorials and viewed many You Tube videos. My Hubbers will be going on another biking adventure in July.  I'm bound and determined that when he returns home this table will be red! As the little engine said, "I think I can, I think I can!"

 

Please join me at a Stroll Thru Life's Inspire Me Tuesday!

Football and Stitching! What Could Be Better?

Well, the Niners being in the Super Bowl would make it better but that's not meant to be this year! Darn!

I tend to get a lot of cross stitching done during football season.  I spend most of my Sundays, on the couch, watching football.  (And EVERY TV in the house is tuned in so I don't miss a thing as I'm cooking, doing laundry or other household chores!) Yes, I am serious about my football! I have a hard time being idle so I sew, it keeps my hands busy, therefore I'm busy and I have something to show for my hours on the couch (besides a softer behind!) I've been working on a hummingbird project since last spring, keep getting side-tracked with other crafting things.  At the beginning of football season I made major progress on it.  As the season got farther along and my Niners started marching towards the playoffs I found I couldn't work on this project.  It has a small black & white chart, lots of color shading and needle changes (44 different thread colors!), took a lot of concentration. I was making a lot of mistakes, having to re-do things so I did something I rarely do, I started another project.  Usually, I can only handle one project at a time!  But this project is super-easy and I've managed to get a lot done on it in the last few weeks.

One more game to go this year and then I'll get back to my more-complicated project. I've started on one of the hummingbirds and there is another to go. 

How will I spend my Sundays now?  At work. I think there are three seasons in my life...summer, football season and tax season! And tax season is here, time to buckle down and count the days until April 15!

Christmas with the Stitch 'n Bitch Girls!

As with most groups of friends, the Stitch 'n Bitch girls have a little Christmas celebration each year. It's nothing fancy, we just cut down on our stitching time and  have a gift exchange. Usually our gifts to each other are homemade or a vintage treasure found at an estate sale. Every year I give the girls a jar of my pomegranate jelly and supplement it with other homemade goodies.  This year I decided to make them pincushions. I used this pattern as a guide, substituting some of the sewing directions for ones I thought would be easier and using small beads rather than making French knots. They were easy to make, turned out cute.  Now I need to make a few for me!

I don't keep a large variety of wrapping paper, preferring to use kraft paper or bags.  This means less things to store and the kraft paper goes with everything! Today I used lunch bags and embellished them with a doily and ribbon.  Cute, cute, cute!

Now one of the things we do at Stitch 'n Bitch is eat! Some days it's a complete lunch, other days might be a salad or even just some munchies.  But we must always have dessert! I firmly live by the motto that life is short, eat dessert first! For this gathering I made a chocolate cream pie.  It can be topped with either a meringue or whipped cream.  Today I used whipped cream, adding a little crushed candy canes to the topping for both color and taste. It instantly converted a basic chocolate pie to a holiday pie!

 

 

 

Chocolate Cream Pie

 

1 pie shell, (9-inch), baked

3 cups half and half

2/3 cup sugar

1/8 teaspoon salt

3 tablespoons cornstarch

4 large egg yolks

4 ounces semisweet chocolate, finely chopped

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

 

In a medium saucepan, over medium heat, heat 2 1/2 cups of the half and half, the sugar and the salt, stirring or whisking often to dissolve the sugar, until tiny bubbles appear around the edges.  Remove from heat.

 

In a medium bowl, sprinkle the cornstarch over the remaining 1/2 cup of half and half and whisk until dissolved.  Whisk in the egg yolks.  Gradually whisk in the hot half and half mixture, and return to the saucepan. Cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until the custard comes to a boil. Reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer, stirring constantly, for about 1 minute.  Remove from heat; add the chopped chocolate, butter and the vanilla, and stir until the chocolate melts completely.

 

Pour mixture into the baked pie shell and smooth the top. Butter (or spray Pam baking spray) on a piece of plastic wrap and place it, buttered side down, directly on the surface of the filling (this keeps a skin from forming on the filling).  Cool completely.  Refrigerate until chilled, at least 4 hours or overnight.

 

Top with meringue or whipped cream.  Garnish as desired.  Serve chilled.

 

On Tuesday I am linking to A Stroll Thru Life!

A Fall Treat for Stitch 'n Bitch

Now that summer is over we've resumed our bi-weekly gatherings at friend Kathy's house.  I refer to these sessions as Stitch 'n Bitch. Surprisingly, we do more stitching than bitching!

I've looked forward to getting back into the stitching groove again. My summer was crazy and chaotic so I did very little stitching.  I'm still working on the project I started last spring! (In my defense I do tend to get more stitching done in the fall & winter months as I watch football!)  Kathy, in the meantime, has  gotten 5 or 6 pieces done and framed! Kathy & I both cross-stitch. Linda is very versatile and brings various kinds of projects.  Today she was working on a "block of the month" quilt.  Each month has the same shaped house but done in fabrics to correspond with the month or season.  Her hand applique skills are amazing.  Here is one of her fall blocks (my photography skills are so lacking that you get the extra bonus of seeing my nicely-pedicured feet!)

I love the button and embroidery detail!

For today's gathering I made a Caramel Apple Pound Cake from the September issue of Southern Lady. It's a "keeper" recipe, we really enjoyed it. Of course, anything with a cream cheese frosting can't be bad, right!

The layers of spicy apples in the cake was so good!

Caramel Apple Pound Cake

1 cup sugar
1 1/4 cups firmly packed light brown sugar, divided
1 1/2 cups butter, melted
4 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon apple pie spice ***
1 teaspoon salt
3 cups chopped Granny Smith apple
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Spary a 12-cup fluted pan with nonstick baking spray with flour.

In a large bowl, beat sugar, 1 cup brown sugar, and melted butter at medium speed with an electric mixer until combined.  Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in vanilla.

In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking powder, apple pie spice, and salt.  Gradually add flour mixture to sugar mixture, beating until combined.

In a separate bowl, combine apples, remaining 1/4 cup brown sugar, and cinnamon.

Spoon one-third of batter into prepared pan and one-half of apples, repeat layers.  Top with remaining one-third of batter.

Bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour, or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean.  Let cool in pan for 10 minutes.  Remove from pan, and let cool completely on a wire rack.  Top with Cream Cheese Icing.  Garnish with chopped walnuts and caramel topping, if desired.

Cream Cheese Icing

1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, softened
2 cups confectioners' sugar
1/4 cup whole milk
1/4 cup caramel topping

In a medium bowl, combine cream cheese and confectioners' sugar.  Beat at medium-low speed with an electric mixer until smooth.  Beat in milk and caramel topping.

Note: In my opinion this made more than enough icing for the cake.  I had leftover.  It would be really good on pumpkin cupcakes!

*** I don't carry a lot of pre-mixed spices in my pantry.  I usually make my own.  The spice mixes usually consist of spices I already have and mixing my own is an inexpensive way to get different mixes and rubs.  This is the recipe I use to make apple pie spice.

Apple Pie Spice

4 tablespoons ground cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoons ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cardamon.

Combine spices in a small bowl, mix well to combine.  Store in a small jar or spice container.

Stitch 'n Bitch

I first began cross stitching when I was home on maternity leave with my son...30 years now. I find it very relaxing, I can unwind from a busy day with the repetitive motion of making cross stitches while also creating something beautiful. I always travel with my latest project, what little television I watch is done while stitching. I'm not very prolific, only get a few projects done a year. Perhaps if I didn't have so many other hobbies I would be more productive! So many projects, so little time!  That's ok, it's not a race (I even take my cross stitching to my drag races, stitching while waiting for my next run!)

About 10 years ago a group of 5-6 women began meeting 2-3 times a month.  I nicknamed our gatherings "Stitch 'n Bitch".  It really should be "Stitch, Bitch & Eat" because we do all three! We sit and work on our latest projects, whether it be cross stitching, appliquing a quilt top, knitting or crocheting. We usually have lunch together, each of us bringing something. Often we will share a pot of tea or two after lunch. It's nice to get together with other women who share a love of handwork.




Kathy's sampler.



Linda's appliqued quilt blocks.

I made dessert this week, making a favorite of ours from Martha Stewart, Meyer Lemon Crepe Cake . It's 15 alternating layers of crepes and lemon curd cream. Though not a difficult recipe it does take some time as both the crepe batter and lemon curd cream need to be made ahead of time. You can use your favorite crepe recipe or Martha's recipe.  The lemon curd cream has a little gelatin added to it which, in my opinion, is needed to give the curd a little more substance so that the crepe layers don't slide off! If you are a fan of lemon curd (and I am!), you will love this recipe. My husband got the leftovers and told me I should make it more often!

 

I kicked it up a notch by topping each cake slice with some sweetened strawberries. See all the layers?

 

And my latest cross stitch project? I started this back in January but the grueling demands of Tax Season 2013 kept me away from my thread and needle. I've barely got one flower done, in what will be many flowers and a hummingbird.

 

I'm linking up to Foodie Friday! Be sure to check out the other great recipes posted there!