here I sit, looking through the window. It's getting very dark outside and we're under tornado watch until 10PM. The mayor sent city employees home at 2:30 PM so we can all watch the storm coming. It's 80 degrees outside but is supposed to be a little cooler tomorrow. Michael came by to pick up the football tickets for this Saturday's game: Alabama (yea) vs. Tennessee. He'll be leaving tomorrow after work for the trip to Tuscaloosa.
Since there's not a lot to do right now-I avoid housework-and I'm taking a bread from stitching, here's a look at the last few day's activities.
This is a piece that I did years ago-the 80's, I think-and I decided to frame it for the kitchen. Amazing how one's taste changes over the years.....
Now for a look at some progress. Houmas House is moving along. It's an easy stitch (not a short one!) and is really nice. The shading is so subtle. And really looks like the house itself. I'm using the threads called for: DMC and Weeks overdyes.
A Summer Ball is lookin' good. I am changing some of the dress colors and am planning to watch P&P later to see what other colors men wore for dress suits back in those days. The pattern calls for black and white but that's BORING!!! We'll see.
And here's a belated birthday present I've given myself. Diane at my LNS gives a 25% discount during a birthday month. I've really been wanting to do this for a long time: it's the mate to the Quaker Christmas that's already finished and hanging. I did it in shades of green with touches of red and gold. This one will be in shades of blue with a mahogany brown for the lettering. It's kitted up but I have no idea when I'll start it.
And last but not least: here's the answer to the $64,000 question. The Totally Useless SAL is just what the name implies. Stitchers collect a lot of trash. Little bits and pieces of thread (called "orts"), broken needles, thread labels, etc. Those belonging to the SAL save them in special jars, or whatever. Once a month, at the New Moon, we report our savings. This past month was a busy one for me. Sometimes I don't do a lot of stitching and there's not a lot of little treasures. Every month I move the stuff into little glass Christmas ornaments which I place in the bowl up side down. I have a very LARGE glass jar and at the end of the year I'm going to move all those little balls to the jar. The only scary thing is to see how many scraps there are. And the colors are really nice when combined all together.
