Well, the time went somewhere...

I am unsure how it got to be the middle of December, but here we are.  I missed a couple of SAL check-ins, again, but will not try to make them up, will just have a fail for the year for a couple of them. I took the first week of December off to do all my baking and crafty Christmas things.  I am happy to say I finished everything.  DSon texted to say he got his boxes and was binging on cookies (I send all but a couple of each cookie to him - they look much better on him then they do on me!!). I still have to get the cards in envelopes and mailed, but they are made. I went a bit outside my usual for the cards but enjoyed designing and making them. Here's a not very good photo of a finished one (and the mess that is my crafting area - also known as the dining room table):

Unfortunately, not a lot of stitching happened during my time off or this past week.  My focus piece has been Plum Street Samplers 12 Days mystery. I managed to get it from here:

to here:

The first photo is closer in color to the piece even though the second one was taken in natural light.  Oh well, DSon is the photographer in the family not me. I am using Victorian Motto Sampler Shoppe's threads for the first time on this and like the subtle variation in color. I am having an issue with tangles, but I think it's more an issue of my thread being too long (user error) rather than an actual issue with the thread.

We are having ridiculously warm weather.  We're supposed to be near 70 F (21C) today with no major cold snaps predicated - it's great for my electric bill as the heat hasn't kicked on in several days, but it's not doing much for my holiday spirit. Looking out the window, there are still large patches of green in the yard and a flock of about 50 robins (that's the American version, which bears very little resemblance to the European variety) just flew in - they're about six weeks early. 

I am still puttering around with my stitching plans for next year.  I will be cutting back on the number of SALs I sign up for if that sounds familiar, I said the same thing last year about this time, and will be doing some major project changes in my rotation to get the promised Christmas stockings finished for next Christmas and try to get a little ahead on the wedding piece stitching, but for this weekend, I think I will work on Christmas Presence  and the 12 Days sampler.