I finally finished Gathering Honey on 10/19/09. There was alot of backstitching and french knots. I have moved on to the next project in my rotation, Freight Train. I now have 2 open slots in my rotation and will be adding 2 more starts when they come up.

Saturday I went to Ball State to visit my daughter. Went to the Dean's List ceremony and watched her get an award. Her grandparents also made a surprise visit. Their first time on campus. They seemed to have a good time in spite of being against her going to college.

Then I drove home and attended my neice's 16th birthday party. I had a full day Saturday as I didn't get home from the birthday party until 10:30pm. I had a nice visit with my brother and sister-in-law and their 9 kids.

I hadn't stitched in a week and picked Gathering Honey back up Sunday and finished it up Monday (had the day off). I am still using up vacation time.

I worked on more backstitching on Gathering Honey this past week. I am so close to a finish that I will continue working on it until it is done. I am saving all of the french knots for last. I am in the process of kitting up more new starts. I now have 11 designs in the kitting up stages. I need to find some smaller projects as these will all take awhile and I might not have any finishes for years.

I didn't any stitching done this past week. Tuesday after work I had to drive to Ball State to get my daughter. She was selected for Jury Duty on Wednesday. We drove home in a driving rain storm. She did not get picked for the Jury so after work on Wednesday I drove her back to Ball State. My son rode along to keep me company on the drive back.

Thursday morning I left with my sister to go to Turkey Run State Park and Shades State Park. It rained steady all day Thursday. We went hiking at Shades State Park anyways. We were the only ones hiking. Back in the woods and ravines we were protected from the rain and only got damp.

Friday we went hiking at Turkey Run. There were a few other people hiking even though it did rain off and on during the day. Once again the trees protected us from getting really wet.

Now I need to catch up on all of my housework. I will also be working at the school carnival on Sunday. Hope to get back to my stitching next week.

I finished Orchids on Friday, 9/11/09. I enjoyed stitching this one because of the bright colors. I have been looking thru my stash making a list of what projects I want to start kitting up. I have picked out 8 and will work on gradually gathering the supplies. Of course another project could catch my eye and jump into the line up. When this empty spot in my rotation comes up again, I will begin a new project.

The weather has been beautiful this weekend. I mowed the lawn yesterday and hope I burned off enough calories to cover the cookie I had today. I have lost another 3 lbs on my diet for a total of 13 lbs. I find exercising harder to do than watching what I eat.

This week I will be stitching on the Cat Ornaments.

This is how much I accomplished on my new start - Freight Train by Patricia Gaskin. It is being done on 18ct Ivory Adia using one strand of floss. This will be a long skinny piece - 527w x 83H. There is a lot of shades of gray and black in this one. This one will be in my rotation for a while.

This week I am working on Orchids which is a nice change because of all of the color. I have a short work week, off today for the holiday and Friday for vacation time. Hope to get alot done this time around.

I went bike riding yesterday with my son. Did a couple miles on the bike trail and then off to Dairy Queen for a treat. I have to bribe him to get him off of the computer. We did play Wii for a couple of hours Saturday night. He beat me every game even though he had never played them before. He is quite good at video games.

I worked on Gathering Honey this past week. I am now down to backstitching the inner garden. I also have some french knots to do. Yuck. I might see how beads would look. Definitely want to get this one done before the end of the year.

I started a new project today, Freight Train by Patricia Gaskin. I am stitching it on 18ct Ivory Aida using one strand of floss. Not to many bright colors in this one. Will post a picture after my week is up.

This past week I worked on Pinecones. I didn't get much stitching time but did get a little more done. It is really a struggle for me to work on this one - it is on linen (which I don't usually stitch on) and it has speciality stitches. I switched to my next project early - Gathering Honey. I am backstitching away.