She's here!!

Introducing Miss Cassimera (Cassie) Lue L (she's named after her great-grandmothers).  She was born yesterday around 6:30 in the morning. 

Mom and Cassie are fine and home now.  Here's Jack trying out being a big brother (with some help from Mom):

This picture just warms my heart to no end

I so want to get to Michigan to see her, but as with everything right now, it will have to wait.  Thank goodness for all the social media platforms right now. 

Now I really have to come up with a way to finish up her birth announcement pillow and get it FFOd.

I have been working on her Christmas stocking and added a few baubles:

It was here last week:

And today it's here:

It's starting to look like a stocking

The colors in the before are much closer to true. 

I should continue working on it, but I am going to take tonight off and start Pandemic by Long Dog Samplers.  I didn't pick a terribly exciting color scheme - I'll be doing it on an 18-count Antique White Aida with Sulky 12 weight cotton petite in Sunset.  I don't need another huge project but this one was calling very loudly so I decided to give in.

I also had some progress on my sock:

 I got the gusset all done and have started on the foot.  As with all the other parts, it was easier than I thought it would be.  This has been my Teams project.  As it's just knit, knit, knit, I don't have to pay a lot of attention so it is perfect for those video conferences that are otherwise dirt dry. 

And one last horrible picture before I finish.  My computer faces a window that overlooks the front yard and the bird feeders, I caught a flash of red yesterday and looked up thinking it was a cardinal. It wasn't.

It was a Summer Tanager.  I had to look this one up as I'd never seen one before. The picture was taken through the window and screen so it's hard to see but here's a better picture from the Audubon Society:

   As he's a bug eater, I don't expect I'll see him again as I don't offer bugs in the bird feeders but it was a nice surprise.

I hope everyone is safe and healthy.

Bit of this and that and a check-in

I have been remiss in thanking everyone for their kind comments on my stitching and finishes.  As I'm a solitary stitcher it's nice to hear "nice job" from someone other than The Hubs who hardly looks up from whatever he's doing when he says it :-).

First, because it's time sensitive - RUN!! do not walk  to Long Dog Samplers website.  They have a freebie posted.  It's called Pandemic and is free until June 26th at 8:59 AM BST I had to look that up, it stands for British Summer Time which makes a whole lot more sense than my current Eastern Daylight Time.  It's a full size Long Dog, so REALLY BIG!  If you're interested click here and hopefully it will take you to the website.

I am still knitting away at my sock and am very pleased with my progress.  I have had to pull each section back at least once, but I did put in lifelines (in my case those are lines of dental floss that I put in after I finished each major section), so when I made an unfixable error, I only had to go back to that line and didn't have to worry about dropping any stitches so I didn't panic and just got better with each try which is good because I think that except for the leg, I did each section three times.  Today I'm here:

and because it doesn't show up too well:

that little cup the arrow is pointing to is the heel turn!!  I am waiting for a set of stitch markers (because there's a whole new world of practical and pretty things with a new hobby) they're supposed to be here tomorrow before I start the gusset decreases as they are different on each side and I don't want to mess them up - listen to me sounding like I know what I'm talking about :-).  I didn't mention in my last post but I am following the video series: Let's Teach Gerald How to Knit with Carolyn at Off the Grid Needlearts there's a bit of fangirl in the following...  You can find it on YouTube here.  I skipped right to the socks part as I already knew the basics.  Carolyn is the creative mind behind Evertote project bags and is hosting StitchNorth, a stitcher's retreat in Brampton, Ontario (it's been postponed to next spring and she has spaces available).  At Julie's suggestion, I am also following Christine at Winwick Mum's Sockalong directions and various of her other videos.  Between these two ladies, I will have a pair of socks soon.

Speaking of project bags, everyone on FlossTube shows their beautiful project bags and I kept thinking, "If that were me, I'd be showing my gallon project bag from Food Lion" (local grocery store, I think Ziploc makes their store brand bags). So, this afternoon after work, I went shopping in all the fabric I have from when I thought I was going to be a quilter and I made this:

for my sock and yarn to live in - this is a one skein sized bag and is from the tutorial by Hue Loco (a yarn dyer/store in Colorado).  I am planning to make some larger ones and maybe, if I feel adventurous one or two flat bags for a couple of my cross stitch projects .  Like the sock, it has some issues (the lining got a bit too close to the zipper in a couple places so it is a bit of a chore to unzip and I now wish I had put the handle on it), but I am overall very pleased with it.

For a stitching blog, there's been an awful lot of knitting talk hasn't there?  That's mostly because, I've only been working on one project, BUT it does fit with the one SAL check-in that I'm only a little late for,   Yes, it's time for Gifted Gorgeousness.  Gifted Gorgeousness is hosted by Jo at Serendipitous Stitching.  It's a stitch along that highlights and thanks everyone that's given us something crafty, or things you won in a give away or a project you're stitching for a gift or anything you can shoehorn into the theme.  Vintage Baubles fits perfectly into the SAL as it is a gift for my new great-niece (we're on baby watch as her due date is the 23rd).  Last time you saw it, it was here:

and tonight, it's here:

These colors are much closer to real life.  I did get the beads and may start adding them tomorrow but will see how I feel.

We're in a stretch of "unsettled" weather so it looks like I'll be staying in and stitching this weekend oh darn.  Remember to get that Long Day freebie and I hope you and yours are well.

It's been a while

So much for the thought that working from home would get me blogging more.  I've been stitching and crocheting and knitting and reading blogs and watching floss tube but I haven't been posting.  Mostly it's boiling down to I think that because I've gone One-at-a-Time it will be boring to see the same thing over and over.

While it may be boring to blog about, OAAT has been wonderful for my productivity.  In May I stitched every day but one and logged 116.5 hours of stitching time.  30 of those hours were finishing up Candy Nutcracker and the rest were for Sweet Pea.  When I posted last, Sweet Pea was here:

and on May 31st, I finished her/them I have always thought that this looks like a mother celebrating her child

Here's a better idea of what the fabric looks like:

This picture is still not very good as the green is more vibrant and there are areas of gold sparkles (you can see them in the before photo).  Not sure why it doesn't want to photograph, but it's 32-count Water Color Meadow by Sunny Dyes Fabrics - I really like their fabrics and they provided wonderful customer service helping me choose a fabric for this piece.  I used all the called for threads and beads.  Mom has requested it be made into a pillow so once I have the baby's name and birth day I will finish it up.  I'm thinking of doing a narrow border around the piece and printing the baby's name and birth day on that piece and then the main pillow color (which I have no idea of yet).

Having finished Sweet Pea, on June 1st I started Vintage Baubles by Shannon Christine Designs:

This is the toe area.  It's stitched on a 28-count white Jobelan with the called for DMCs and Kreinik (so much Kreinik).  The blank spaces in the pink and green ornaments are for beads.  I finally found a store that sold the colors I needed in less than massive quantities and am just waiting for delivery.  This stocking is going to sparkle.  This is another piece with fairly limited colors but the designer does a wonderful job combining them to make it look like there are more.

I have taken a little time from stitching the last couple of days to:

learn to knit socks.  This is about 1" of ribbing.  And no, you haven't seen any other knitting on this blog, I know how, but I'm not a knitter.  EXCEPT that years ago, I got it into my head that hand-knit socks were absolutely necessary and I was going to learn how to make them.  I've read books, watched videos, etc. but never felt ready to jump in and then I saw a You Tube video that used a 9" circular needle rather than DPN (double-pointed needles) or Magic Loop and it all suddenly made sense.  I bought a circular needle, grabbed one of the numerous balls of sock yarn I've stashed (I will, someday, have very warm, comfy feet all winter with all the socks I will knit from the yarn I have stashed) and started.   Maybe it's the video, maybe it's the needle, maybe it's my mindset, maybe Mars is in retrograde, I don't know, but it was all so much easier than I had thought.  I had added another little bit of ribbing after I took this picture but ended up tearing this all back and starting again as there was an error that I couldn't fix.  I'm okay with that as the next try will be better than the first.

My office has started Phase I of a three phase reopening but our director said that she doesn't expect any of us will be called back under Phase I or II and we should expect to work from home through June.  Each phase is two weeks and moving backwards is possible.  Based on previous HR issues, I was honestly expecting an all or nothing situation so am pleasantly surprised by the slow and cautious tone that has been set so far. 

I hope you and yours are all safe and healthy.