A Sweet Surprise

Hi friends! A sweet surprise arrived in the mail for me yesterday. All the way from Canada. Our dear friend Anne sent me a few lovely, belated birthday gifts.

Anne crocheted me a fabulous, pink cup cozy. Madeleine actually put it on Henry for a scarf! The poor 6 pound boy! Not very macho. And yes, you read that right. He is now 6 pounds. When he came to us he was 4 pounds. The vet said he was too skinny and needed to add weight. :)

Anne also included a lovely Crescent Colours 'Clay Pot'. Her friend made that sweet bird card.:) And I am happy to announce to you that I have finally had a black tea that I like! This is from Anne also. It is called Cream Earl Grey. It has the prettiest purple bergamot petals in it too. :) Thank you again Anne.♥

Yesterday was our dear Emerson's 18th birthday! We had the family over for cake. He wanted marble cake. I made a chocolate pudding type frosting for between the two layers. I frosted it with chocolate cool whip to keep it lighter. Had to make my own chocolate cool whip. Can't find it anymore.

I finished reading A Man Called Blessed by Ted Dekker. This is the sequel to Blessed Child. Another older book by Ted. And another one I recommend. I really enjoyed it. :)

Tomorrow morning I am subjecting myself to more pain and torture. When I had an exam from the pain management PA two weeks ago, she pressed on my outer, upper thighs. I thought I might scream. YIKES! She said I should not have pain there at all, and that is unusual. She says those are my bursa. What?! They are fluid filled sacs that cover your joints in your body. So I am having cortisone injections tomorrow by the doctor in both hip bursa. I hope and pray this takes away the pain completely in my hips. She said it will do nothing for my back pain. I understand that. I am willing to try this. ONCE at least. I hate to go through the whole sedation/IV thing, so I opted not to tomorrow. However, I tend to get myself worked up ahead of time. I do not want to, I just kinda do it. So now my stomach is starting to hurt. I am second guessing that decision.

If you care to, would you please pray this goes well for me and ACTUALLY WORKS? I will take pain relief of any kind!! I would love for the pain to go away for a few months. That is a possibility. Thank you!

I am so glad you stopped by today.  Take good care of yourself! There is only one you!

Stitching and praying,
Vickie

Two poodles on Winky Watch(Madeleine's parakeet).

Birthday Present

Hi friends! We have been busy around here. Emerson's graduation was a wonderful celebration on a beautiful, sunny day. He got registered for fall classes this week. He likes his schedule too. He will be commuting to Concordia University in Mequon. It will take him about 25 minutes to drive. Not a bad drive. No expressway driving. A little city driving. Mostly country roads. Lovely scenery. When we drove there on Tuesday, we saw deer, cows, horses, and Sandhill Cranes.

I received my first birthday present this year in the mail this week. I do not usually open presents early. We are busy preparing for Emerson's upcoming graduation party, and I decided to go ahead and open my package from our dear friend June, as a little reward for my hard work. ;)

Beautifully and perfectly packaged in pink! I agree! That card IS just for me! =) Madeleine and I enjoyed looking through the Vintage Teatime Recipes book. It is filled with beautiful photographs.

Look at these most perfect poodle patterns June has given me from her British cross stitch magazines! I had no idea. I love them and will DEFINITELY be stitching these sweeties up!

Isn't this nativity pattern lovely? Thank you June. What a precious friend you are! Always so caring and thoughtful of others. God bless you my friend.♥

I did finish up 'Rendevous In The Park' by Kissy Cross. I just have to do the finishing on it. No pictures of that today. I have begun another small stitch. It is to be a gift, so no pictures of that one either.

I have been getting into the garden every day that it is not raining. Not for long mind you, but I want the flower beds to be looking perfect for the upcoming party.

"Cocoa" in the Chocolate Garden ;)

I have thanked God for you today! Thank you for your kind words. I love to hear from you. And if you are interested in my giveaway, there is still time. See my prior post.

Stitching and praying,
Vickie

RAK

Hi friends! I received a RAK from our friend Carol. What a happy, beautiful surprise. :)

Carol tells me that she admires how I live my life to the fullest in spite of my chronic pain. So she stitched me this LHN "Hope" virtue. She hopes and prays that some day my pain will be erased altogether. Oh me too Carol, me too!

I cannot even put into words the excellence of this little pillow. I am NOT exaggerating. I told my husband that this is the finest stitching and finishing I have ever seen. Carol also included an extra bit of cording so I can use this pillow as a Christmas ornament. What an excellent idea! I will do just that. :) You can also see the pretty, little note pad she gave me.♥

Busy times with Emerson. He graduates in less than two months. Then on to Concordia University Mequon.

The campus is right upon the shore of Lake Michigan. He will live at home and commute. He is going to major in History, so far. ;) He decided not to major in Art. He was also accepted at the Milwaukee Institute of Art and Design. He loves art and history. The choice was his to make. And he waited as long as possible, let me tell you! He is definitely not done creating art. We will see what God has in store for Emerson.

I finished my least favorite Springtime chore. You still have a chance to guess what chore that is for a free chart I am offering here.  I will draw a name tomorrow. :)

Plodding along with the beading of Theotokos. THAT takes a long time!

Well off to worship on this beautiful Sunday morning. I hope you have a lovely day in the Lord my friends. Thank you for stopping by.

Stitching and praying,
Vickie

Emerson's Awards

Hi friends! It is snowing yet again as I type this. You may recall last year I told you of Emerson's achievement in art in this post. Well he has done it again! He has won another Gold Key Award  and an Honorable Mention Award in the Scholastic Art Competition. This is a national art competition. There were almost 2,000 entries from our state of Wisconsin alone. It is for grades 7-12. His Gold Key piece will go on to National Competitions for Gold and Silver Medals. This is the painting he won a Gold Key for in painting.

He has titled it 'Captured'. Perhaps you are familiar with the Prince Valiant cartoons in the newspapers here in the U.S. that have been running since before I was born? Well Emerson always reads that and truly admires the artwork in it. So he painted characters from the series and created this. I know I have never shown pictures of my kids. This is the closest you get! ;) Emerson has painted himself into this piece, next to Prince Valiant. I love the Vikings expressions he created. This next one is the Honorable Mention.

He calls this 'The Merchant'. =) I was with Emerson all the way on these pieces. He works at the kitchen table when not working on them at school. Mom stitches at the table and he draws and paints there. So cool to see these things come to life.

We will be attending the award ceremony at the Milwaukee Art Museum on Saturday. 'Captured' is hanging there already.
 
 I received a special RAK from Donna! She made me a sweet, pink Valentine. She found "Matilda" the poodle candle while thrifting and thought of me. =) She also sent some nice variegated pink floss and yummy Candied Caramel Pecan wax cubes to melt. Thank you so much Donna!

I finished Little Town On The Prairie. Another great read. Laura cross stitches a gift for Carrie in this story. ;)

This is my progress thus far on Theotokos.

Thanks for indulging me today friends. I just had to share Emerson's wonderful artistic talent. =)

Have a stitchtastic day! I have thanked God for you today!

Stitching and praying,
Vickie

I Finished Love Notes, Would You Like The Pattern?

Good Morning my friends! We  have been in the 100's for a week! Thank goodness, a cool down started last night. Today it will only get in the 90's. ;)

Jacob is at Marquette University right now. We took him Wednesday afternoon and will pick him up at lunch time today. He is participating in Project Beyond. It is a federally funded program to encourage leadership skills in the nursing field for men, first time college students and minorities. Jacob qualified for two of those.  He gets to sleep in a dorm with the only other young man who came. All meals are covered. They invited 25 and only got 7! Jacob's roommate is Matt. His parents both came from Thailand. Oh, such nice people. Brian and I really liked them. Jacob and Matt really got along too. Jacob and Matt are the only guys there. The other five are young ladies!! I asked the teacher how many of the one hundred nursing students enrolled this year are male. 5! The grin on the faces of Jacob and Matt!!! Oh boy!!

I finished stitching the French pattern of Love Notes on Thursday.(There are three patterns included.) I did the finishing on it Friday. This is a gift. As soon as I saw this pattern on Mii's blog for a giveaway, I knew I wanted to stitch that French Pincushion. Only not make it into a pincushion. And I wanted to stitch it for our Emerson. Yes, Emerson. He has taken French for three years and will begin his fourth year shortly.

We are a close, loving family. I tell the kids I love them most every day. And today is Emerson's birthday. My baby boy is 17!! He will be getting this gift tomorrow at his birthday party with family.

It says "I love you with all my heart" in French. I thought a bookmark for his Bible was a very good use for this. I chose a dark chocolate linen for the back. I used small patches of French General fabric from my stash.

 I decided to stitch this one over one, on a mystery 30ct Lakeside Linen. I used the dark red DMC called for but replaced the pink (gasp!!) with creamy white DMC 3865.I used a somewhat stiff fusible stabilizer.

This is the only pattern of the three I am stitching. Would you like the pattern? I received this pattern in a giveaway from Mii, who received this pattern in a giveaway from Sally, who received this as a gift from Barb! ;) If you would like to be the next stitcher, please be a follower of mine and leave me a comment here on this post. Please also pass this chart on to another stitcher after you are done with it. =) This giveaway will end on Friday, July 26th.

Crazy Daisy struggling in the heat wave

No, not rain, just watered.

Milk Chocolate Daylily

Well, I better shove off. I have a marble cake with chocolate buttercream frosting to make!

Baking and Praying,
Vickie

Somebody needs a haircut!!♥

 A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. John 13:34

So Very Proud

Good Morning my friends! I hope you are well. I am praying specifically for some of you.♥

Last night our Jacob returned to us from the Kairos retreat he went on with school. This time he was a group leader. This retreat is lead mainly by peers, so it is secretive, you don't really get to know what it is about until you go yourself. Former participants can come back as leaders after over a dozen hours of training and developing.

Last night was the closing ceremony at the chapel at school. The parents are all there to welcome them home. I cannot believe I forgot to bring tissue again!! Each child can come up to the "open podium" to share if they choose. There were at least 5 of those students who bravely shared that they had doubted God existed. They said that God found them and they now believe. Oh geesh! I am crying again. (I cry from everything. No really, EVERYTHING!!)

The parents were asked to write a love letter to their child ahead of time. These were read aloud in front of the group at the retreat. There was one young man last night who told us because of that letter, he knew his family loved him. He said he never knew that. Stop right there friends. Can you imagine that? No, really? This quiet young man was a very troubled young man. You could see it. What is his story? I watched for him to leave later. He left alone. Where were his parents? Who welcomed him back?

So we are very proud that Jacob is moved enough, that he is Christian enough, to share his faith and to help others come to faith.

Well our Emerson has also made us so very proud.  He has won a Gold Key in the Scholastic Art Competition. There were over fifteen hundred entries from our state of Wisconsin. It is for grades 7-12. There were 325 winners of Gold, Silver and Honorable Mentions. The Gold Key winners go on to National Competitions for Gold and Silver Medals. This is Emerson's drawing.

You can click on it for a better look!

It is hanging in the Milwaukee Art Museum. The award ceremony was there as well, in this grand reception hall, The Windhover Hall.
 
 This is located directly below the Calatrava-designed Burke Brise Soleil.



Have you made it this far friends? Well, alrighty then! I made up this little sweetie.

one over one on 28ct ?pink? evenweave

This is a freebie found here. Um, that's not the exact page, but I am not truly sure I have fellow poodle stitchers out there. I may be the only NUT! ;) But if you are interested, have a look around the site. I actually, yes I really did squeal in delight when I found these. My husband doesn't see the charm in the refrigerator bottle cap magnet COLLECTION so much anymore. "Don't we have enough?" ha HA HA! Yes, remember I did say I am a poodle nut!!

I have had this teeny, tiny pom pom trim waiting for it's moment. I did change the chart colors around a bit. I have mentioned before, but I will say it again these are the large 2 inch bottle caps. They are found at JoAnn.

Still stitching on my Valentine project. It is adorable. And no, there are no poodles involved. ;)

If you have not seen, I am having my 200 follower giveaway here.

I hope your day is filled with wonderful, stitchy goodness, and more importantly LOVE!♥

Stitching and praying,
Vickie

45 count......any ideas to help me??

Hey everybody! I finished stitching up all the black of the little poodle for my next magnet. I began the pink to fill in her fur. Oh my! It was nearly impossible to stitch it straight. The black went so smoothly.

I began on her front foot. I removed all the stitches last night. Oh man! That was horrible! What am I doing wrong? Does anyone know how to fill in all those lovely swirled poofs of poodle fur with pink DMC?!? I just don't see how I can get the stitches in there all straight and orderly like the black stitches are. It was all warped and lumpy and bumpy looking. Yucky poo! If no one can give me a helpful tip to get it done well on this 45ct linen, I think I will just have to finish the magnet off as is. Now you know I just love the pink. So I will incorporate some more of that pink velvet ribbon I have in my stash. Last time I was in JoAnn's they were discontinuing it! I love that velvet ribbon!

I thought I would show you this slate we hang at the back door. I have 4 of these slates that I bought about 15 years ago. One for each season. Well I realized that I was never crazy for the summer one. Sorry Beth, it's a bee hive with a bunch of bees. They are all hand painted by an artist. I thought about it and realized I could get our artist, Emerson, our almost 16 year old, to paint me Mabel on the backside of it.

 Didn't it turn out great?! I love it! ♥

 

 

Fuchsias that my husband surprised me with last month. :)

Pinks!!! or dianthus

Well that is it for today folks. Please let me know if have a tip for me on 45 count I appreciate it. Hello to Michelle my newest follower. So glad to have you. :)

Stitching and praying,
Vickie