I am inspired to dance

I have been super drooling on the sublime stitching and Mr Xstitch blogs and am inspired to give their style a try. I have picked a couple of sayings that I would like hanging on my wall and just need to pick some decorative bits to add. The sayings are

"Life is not passing you by, it is trying to run you over!"

"one whiskey, two whiskey, three whiskey, floor"

I am thinking very tattoo inspired designs. Sublime stitching is helping by having a cool half off sale. bye bye paycheck......

Lessons learned

I entered the artisans showcase at Uprising. I am still alive to tell the tale. Lessons learned...

• Don't wear the day before what you wish to showcase the next day.
• Don't wear your best stuff, display it.
• Don't sit next to people displaying better work then you, sit next to the blacksmith or pottery.
• It is a good idea to empty the pavilion when it attempts to become airborne. The Uprising staff is so smart!

It was a good event. I found a lovely gold gown for Gwyn at the consignment booth and some very nice glass bottles that I plan to use to display cordials at the next showcase. The kids have new toys for their castle box and I didn't get sunburned until the ride home.

Unfinished projects

I have been working hard on a goal I set for myself this year. The finishing of unfinished projects. Yes the dreaded UFO.... I have accomplished a lot I feel and even have pictures to share. I have finished a lot of hand sewing, finished a brown kirtle I have been ignoring for over a year which involved 40+ handbound eyelets, and threw away a few things that were just not worth finishing. I have a pillow I have been working for something like 5 years off and on and I am so close to finishing it that I went a bought the appropriate pillow form yesterday. I have pictures of the embroidery......but I can't seem to upload them. I will edit this post after I figure out what the problem is. The design is a DMC kit titled "Butterfly" and I modified the border using a blackwork design published in the Linn Skinners book "100 blackwork charts".

In other news, we have been fostering a couple of dogs and I have to say it is much more relaxing then fostering kittens. We usually get a big batch of orphaned or abandoned kittens to nurse and love every spring. Its like taking care of a dozen babies with round the clock feedings and potty training all thrown together. But this year we got a couple of phone calls from folks hit in the economic crunch and no longer able to care for their animals. We have never fostered dogs but knew the owners personally. So we have a pit bull terrier named Sadie and a toy poodle named Teddy. Sadie will be going home after her owners are able to buy a house. Teddy is waiting for his momma to get better and hopefully leave the nursing home she moved to. They are both sweet dogs and have only reinforced my insistance that we need a fenced in yard. They have gone camping with us and hiking with us and on family picnics, and I love them.

Happy New year

Goals not resolutions. That is what I make. I have not had firm goals that I work on in a little bit and I feel disorganized and without guidance. I love goals. I love lists because they are like little goals I can look at and work on every day. I need more long term, forest not tree, goals however. The big goal I have made is going to be super fun. I have decided to go to England for my 40th birthday. This is a little bit over 6 years away and will actually take a bit to accomplish. I have to

• Earn the money
• Plan the trip, ie. hotels, food, sightseeing, geneology
• Contact my family there
• Get out of debt so I can rack more up overseas!
• Lose some weight so I am more comfortable on the trip.

I have always wanted to make this trip and the year that I am 40 is going to be perfect for it. My kids will be grown, I have plenty of time to get excited, I can include lots of other goals and use the trip as my reward. I plan on some regular touristy stuff but I want to see all the places my family came from so it would probably be boring for most people. Everyone is wanting to come with me and all I can say is "Good Luck". I won't include anyone on my trip because I am selfish but if you happen to earn the money on your own and go the same days as me it will be great to get to occasionally see a fellow yankee. My mother was horrified when she heard I was going planning to go alone. My husband laughed his head off when she declared that I couldn't possibly be happy wandering the UK alone. He knows me so well.

Let me know if you have taken a trip to the UK and have someplace you really want me to see. This includes shopping eating drinking museums castles. Extra points if you have a place in Wales for me to see and can tell me in Welsh. Yep I know Welsh. Had to, to translate the geneology.