The past 3 months in 30 seconds...

September....

Mom and Dad headed up to Oregon for Dad's 50th high school reunion.  I joined them for the first leg of the journey (in the motorhome) and we stayed at Seal Beach for 4 days.  While there we....

Went to the Getty Center

Went to the Getty Villa (my personal favorite)

(you can sort of see the backside of mom 

through the glass - in the red shirt)

Went to the Queen Mary for dinner one evening

and Mom and I had afternoon tea another day

and we went to the Long Beach Aquarium

Annie and I then headed home for 3 weeks of bliss, I mean 3 weeks of uninterrupted studying.  Oh, I almost forgot (don't tell Shawn) but  a friend came out to see me from Chicago.  We did the Zoo, the Midway, a walking wine tasting tour of Temecula, Food Truck Friday dinner, and a quick tour of Balboa Park before he flew back to Chicago

The 'rents got home and 2 days later I headed up to Utah for the Shepherd's Bush Retreat.  The theme of the retreat was home for the holidays, and it really was home for me.  The ladies at the Bush were my family for the 4 years I lived in Ogden.  It felt great to be back with them, and Teri put me right to work.  Oh woe is me, what a hardship it was to have Paulette Stewart all to myself for half a day (extreme sarcasm there).  Poor Paulette had to put up with a borderline stalker fan picking her up from the airport and acting as chauffeur for the day.

Mindi and Paulette, picture "borrowed" from Plum Street Samplers

Mindi and Jill, with Midge and Gidge,
picture borrowed from Plum Street Samplers

Yes, if you look closely you can see I was wearing my budha pendant on the day I picked Paulette up and took her on a tour of the Temple grounds.  You can't visit SLC without stopping by, its beautiful.

From Utah I drove down to Arizona to meet my parents in Sedona.  For some reason I can't seem to find the gazillion pictures I took, except for the few on my phone.  Oh well, I guess they're on the camera memory card and didn't make it to Dropbox or Picasa.

"Eat more Beef" at one of the artist colonies in Sedona

Typical pose for Annie and Dad in the evening when motorhome camping.

I also got a chance to stop by The Attic to drop off some donations for their charity auction and drool over all the samplers on the walls.  I tried really hard to not look, my budget was already blown.

Early October I went to Las Vegas for my annual geek fest, otherwise known as the SOE Fan Faire.  Its really just a chance to see friends I only see once a year and to have some fun going out to dinner.  Not quite as much fun this year on an extremely limited budget, not to mention I haven't played my geek game (Everquest) in about 9 months.  But, it was good to see friends.

We went to the Mob Museum

Had a "Dark Dining" experience (that's Shawn with me)

No, those aren't bras on our heads, just fancy sleep masks.

Somewhere in all that I did some stitching, a few exchanges, a few finishes, and ripped out half the backyard to prep it for artificial turf.  Pictures on all that next post, if anyone still reads this blog.

Super Ninja-Quick post

September has been a crazy month for me, and its not over yet.  It started out with a trip up to the LA area, to meet up with a group of Southern California stitchers.  It was my first time meeting them, and it was a very enjoyable day of stitching and chatting.

I combined that trip with a short RV-camping trip with my parents.  They were on their way up to Oregon for my dad's 50th high school reunion, but they started out by staying for a few nights at Seal Beach.  While we were there, we visited the Getty Center, the Getty Villa in Malibu, the Queen Mary, and the Aquarium of the Pacific.  I then got to drive back down to San Diego where Princess Annie and I got the house too ourselves for a few days.

A friend came out from Chicago to stay for a long weekend and of course I jam-packed the time with fun things to do.  A tour of the Midway, a wine-tasting walking tour in Temecula, an evening of dining at the La Mesa food truck gathering, and of course a trip to the zoo.

Another few days alone, then the parents get back from their trip and I immediately leave for a drive up to Ogden and Park City, UT.  Yep, the Shepherd's Bush Retreat.  I've been looking forward to this for ages, and had budgeted my pennies for it.

Anyway, I'm slowly getting the hundreds of pictures I've taken the last few weeks organized, and needed to post about an exchange I participated in earlier this summer.  It was my first exchange with Stitched With Love Exchanges, and I really enjoyed it.

I received a lovely pillow from Loretta, who obviously paid very close attention to my profile sent out with the exchange information.  She stitched my a Blackbird Designs pattern (one of my favorite designers) in red (my favorite color).  Lots of other goodies were included, and I can't wait to try the Carrie's Creation's silk she put in the package.

I stitched Summer Splendor by LHN for Cherise, since that was one of her favorite designers, but I brightened up the colors a bit since one of her dislikes was "dull" colors.  I finished it into a small stitchers tray, and also included a coordinating crushed walnut pin cushion and fob, using motifs from the design.

LHN Summer Splendor, stitched on 36 ct linen with assorted overdyed floss;
 finished as a stitchers tray with coordinating accessories

Hopefully soon I'll get some pictures posted from the various outings, or at least uploaded to a public album.  The jaguar babies at the zoo are so adorable, and one of them was being very adventurous while we were there.

Somewhere in all this madness I've been doing stitching for an Animal Antics exchange, 2 Halloween exchanges, and working on the 3 packages for my blogoversary winners.  Oh, and of course school too.  I'll probably spend all of October posting pics and catching up from what I did in September.

Niky's Mystery

Earlier this summer Niky hosted a mystery project.  I was a bit late in getting started on it (as usual delaying my start until I had all 3 parts), and then even later getting the finishing done.  Errr, let me rephrase that, getting mom to help with do the finishing for me.  Honestly, she was really just supposed to show me how to do the piecing for the front, but then it sort of escalated.  I think we made this project a bit harder than it needed to be.

Lined, with pockets.  Handle attached with vintage mother of pearl buttons.  A small touch of jute trim across the back from Victorian Motto.  I knew exactly how I wanted to finish this before I even started stitching it.

USS Midway

I'll just say up front this isn't a stitching post, and no stitching pictures.  Most of my stitching the last month and a half has been for exchanges or for the giveaway I just had.  Hopefully in a few weeks there should be a flood of stitching pictures.

San Diego is a Navy town, but strangely enough, my father was never stationed here in his 27 years of service.  One of the attractions downtown is the USS Midway Museum.  I got the chance a couple of weeks ago to be a last minute fill-in for a neighbor that wasn't feeling well, and attended a Steel Beach Party with the neighbor's husband and my parents.  I've never been on the Midway before (in fact I've never been on any carrier before), and unfortunately the museum portion was closed during the event, but it was still a lot of fun.  Dad never had a tour on the Midway, but he had been on it before during missions in Vietnam.

One of the neatest things about the Midway is my dad's plane is on deck.  No, not just the same type of plane, but his actual plane he flew.

Dad with his A-3 baby

Dad and Bob, the neighbor, talking guy stuff

There was a live band to greet us, and we also received leis as we walked into the cookout area

As you can see by the crowd, it was quite a popular event, and the weather was absolutely gorgeous for us.

As the sun went down, the lights on the ship came on and the city was absolutely gorgeous.

Hawaiian and Tahitian dancers for our entertainment

The Midway staff promises this will become an annual event for the museum members, and I've already put in my request with dad for a ticket to next year's Steel Beach party.

Winners

No, I didn't forget about my giveaway.  I swear names were drawn out of a bowl by mother on Sunday, I've just had the scraps of paper sitting by my keyboard since then, taunting me.  I've been diligently plodding through my eCommerce class project, trying to get it finished.  If it isn't schoolwork in front of a computer then I've been ripping out vegetation and demolishing a backyard getting it ready for some landscaping.  Oh, and I've been breaking out in hives.

Enough excuses and blathering on about boring stuff, here we go.  There were exactly 3 times as many vintage lovers as funky (39 entries for vintage, 13 for funky).  I ended up feeling a bit sorry for all those vintage lovers, so I had mom draw 2 names out of that batch.

Faith was the lucky funky winner, while Linda and Sharee were the vintage gals.  I'll be sending out emails to you three asking some questions and to get addresses.  Thank you to everyone that entered, and welcome to my new followers.

Gather, Gobble, Give

Charlene posted posted a progress pic of her Gobble, and has already stitched Give.  I really love the colors she's chosen.  Anyway, she posted a link to my blog about my finished series, and it was driving me crazy trying to figure out where I has posted them.  Duh!  It was a blog header pic last autumn, so they never made it into the actual blog and received a label.  This post is more for my own peace of mind!

Plum Street Samplers Gather, Gobble, and Give
Stitched on 36 count HDF linen with HDF silks

The photo was definitely altered with some color effects and textures.  The 3 pieces are still unframed and un-finish finshed, hopefully waiting on mom to do some quilting magic and turn them into a wall hanging.  Maybe I'll gently prod her by picking out some fabrics and setting them on the sewing machine.

Hmm, maybe I should go pull Ghoul out of my supply of charts I brought with me....

Speaking of photo editing, I finally got brave enough to use Photoshop Elements (which I've had for a year now) and made my own custom blog header using different layers, textures and clipart.  On a different test blog (for my current eCommerce class), I came up with a custom blog background and a header.  Sorry, that blog is private since its a real business and I don't want people getting the test blog confused with the real business blog.  Its a lot of fun!

Sad loss

Marilyn Leavitt-Imblum died this past week.  While my tastes have changed over the years, and don't currently lean toward her designs, they were true works of art.  She managed to chart very detailed designs and get fine shading, without resorting to the dreaded blended needle, or excessive use of fractional stitches.

Marilyn was a forward thinker, sometimes ahead of her time.  She spoke out against the evils of digital piracy of patterns back in 2000, way before many designers even had a web page of their own.  If more people had been proactive and thought about new approaches to take to selling designs, we might not be suffering through the current crisis some designers are facing.  Instead, the needleworking community chose to just carry on as normal.

One of my first ever "large" finishes was a Lavender and Lace project, Celtic Noel.  It took several years of on and off stitching, with the live-in boyfriend of the time yelling at me about needles stuck in the arm of the sofa.  Other than that, he was a pretty decent guy about supporting my cross stitch obsession.  At some point, once I get a job again, I'd like Jill Rensel to do her magic on this piece.  That is if I can ever get it out of my mother's possession.  It somehow ended up in her house a few years ago, after years of me telling her no!

Lavender & Lace Celtic Noel, stitched on 32 ct
natural linen with DMC floss, metallic floss, and beads.

Marilyn, you will be missed for your artistic talent and what you gave to the needleworking community.