Happy 18th to my boy today!

 This kid is officially an adult today! Yikes, seems like just yesterday we were taking him home from the hospital... and then back to the hospital twice with high jaundice levels. It was a fun first couple of weeks with him. We are not too big on birthday's in my house, but I did get a few balloons and made a banner that hung outside his bedroom door this morning. Then I blew up orange and blue (Florida UF Gater colors) balloons to have in the hallway as he walked to the kitchen. Emily might have tossed a couple at him as well. 

His Dad made the requested cheesecake with raspberries as his birthday 'cake' yesterday. We will enjoy that later today.... although after school his academic team is doing a party with surprise baking entries and a few blind testers. He made something to bring in, and it will be interesting to see the results. I hear 9 are baking something for the challenge.

I seem to be enjoying the cross stitch and just working on that lately. I finally have a leaf of the 'quilt' nearly completed. Progress! No stitching happened while watching the Tampa Lightning game last night. Way too exciting. That reminds me... need to see if there are any tickets available later this month while we are over that way for the Indy Car races.

Brimfield Awakening

 I have had trainings online at work this week and finally remembered to put my BA stuff near my desk. I was able to glue baste these stacks during one training this morning. 

My tip so I remember - I started on the right side of the house top and went counterclockwise all around. That worked best for me.

I am hoping to have a good stack of at least the big house and the short ones to start stitching sets of 3 on the Winter Guard trip on Saturday. I said I'd chaperone and feel much better this week so should be able to go. Another long day - 8AM to 10PM is the schedule and the competition is a good 2 hours away. Stitching time on the bus is a possibility. 

Cross Stitch

 Cross stitch is a good cold weather project! I've been adding stitches on the inside of the quilt area but since they are white and light creams, they don't show a lot of progress. 

Someone thinks it's cold, and lets his girl cover him up. Anyone else, and he immediately gets up and lays on the quilt. Emily, and he snuggles down and sleeps!

Chilly Sunday in Florida

 It was 23 degrees and feels like 14 in north central Florida this morning around 8AM and it won't get above freezing until 11AMish. We are similar temps  tonight as well. Thank goodness for all the quilts in the house to keep us toasty!

Last Sunday I posted my cross stitch at this stage.

I've been doing a lot of stitching this week! I need to start alternating the colors with the background white and lights of the quilt area so I can make progress there. It is just more fun to stitch the colors as you can see the patterns emerge. 

I suppose I need to go break the ice on the chicken waters. The container for Bear (the dog) on the porch was covered in ice when I let him out. 

Linking up with Kathy and the other Slow Sunday Stitchers.

Stay warm out there.

Saturday...

 We lost internet around 1PM yesterday. Seems it was part of an outage in NC,TN,GA,FL, etc for 23 hours. Thank goodness hubby and I grew up without internet and can cope, but it does make you think of how dependent upon it we are. A little unnerving to think 'someone' could just turn that off and how would we get any news of what is happening in the world? 

That led me to miss my last hour of work. The kids were not happy when they got home... and since the phone signal is horrible at my house (we use the wifi) we were kinda stuck. Since we could not order food for takeout.... we headed to Red Robin for dinner. It was a nice family dinner... and one week before I have my oldest turning 18! I got the mushroom burger and garlic parmesan steak fries. Very yummy. Good family conversation which we have not had in a while with the kids crazy schedules. It doesn't allow for family dinners much. I still have a DVD/VCR player and pulled out the movies The Pacifier and The Great Outdoors to watch last night. 

I was listening to a downloaded audio book while doing some cross stitch yesterday afternoon.

Then I stitched up the prepped bear paws for Aidan's graduation quilt. I really need to get back to that one! This is 3 sets of 4 paws in green.

Today I measured the blue UFO quilt and it measured 67 or 68 x 81. I figured I need about 300 inches of binding so cut 8 strips to make the binding which matches the outer border. I pulled a 3 yard cut of light blue from MSQC sale a couple of months ago and need to press it and get it pinned for quilting. 

I downloaded a few free books from audible.... just so I have something to listen to! My Libby app was not cooperating to give me titles, so the internet is still a little wonky. Emily is complaining she can't do her homework. I think I'll listen to my new book and add some floss to the cross stitch this afternoon. Maybe make some zucchini bread. I made blueberry muffins this morning and a no recipe homemade potato and ham potato casserole for lunch. Its 53 in Ocala... the high for the day before it dips into the 20's tonight.

Stay warm, wherever you are!

Friday

 Not much progress on the cross stitch. I did not get any stitching time yesterday. After walking the dog and grabbing a shower after a leisurely morning wake up and scrolling, we did our normal Thursday visit of my FIL. We headed from there to his house with a lunch date included. We waited quite a while on the window of time for the color designer to meet us, but picked colors for the house painting on the outside. That should be able to happen now on the 9th. It was to be last week on the 20th, but this appointment got delayed and when they called Greg Sunday the 18th he relayed we never picked colors.... All set to go now. 

By the time we got home it was after 5. Both kids were late... so I popped to the store to grab a couple things to make a stir fry. Mushrooms were out at my last shop and Emily used the snow peas so I needed more. I love the rice at our Japanese Habachi grill and really wanted that Saturday night. I made some Sunday but it was more a chinese fried rice version. Some research led me to this sauce, so I found it at various places and got some last night. At home, I took the top off and it smells just like the sauce they use at the grill! Yea! I had some leftover rice so gave it a shot. Added a little water - tbsp or two. Some oil in the pan heated up, then smushed the rice into one layer to cook for a minute, stirred and smushed for another minute a couple of times. Added powder ginger and garlic powder and the sauce with a chopped up scallion and a scrambled egg. OMG! I am a happy camper. I can make it at home whenever I want now! I used it for the veggies and the chicken as well and it was yummy. Must get more of this stuff =)

My little bit of progress on the cross stitch. 

I had hoped to get my blue quilt top quilted this week. No progress so far.  We have a chilly weekend on tap. Maybe I can make progress on it this weekend. Right now, my toes are cold so must go find my slippers.

Mid week of chaos in the country.

 I am appalled that the US government is murdering and using chemical warfare against it's own citizens for using their constitutional rights to protest the illegal acts of this government. There is never justification to use chemical warfare against peaceful protesters who are documenting injustices. I hear they are taking photo's of people and license plates to build a database of US citizens who are against the tactics of this regime. This is against the law and all those in power who are allowing this to happen need to be removed and tried in a court of law immediately.

Onto more positive things. A sunset this week - they cleared the trees from the lots across the road in the shot and have already poured cement for 2 houses to be built. Right on the road that will eventually (if the county ever moves it along) be a 4 lane divided highway instead of the 2 lanes it is now. On either end of this segment - it is 4 lanes with a divided highway - sidewalk on one side and multi use path on the other.

I got all four of the purple hexagons completed. They join the stack. I believe there are 24 there now, so time to make them into pairs. I do have more of the hexagons prepped so can keep working on them this week.

I added a few stitches into the cross stitch. I started some of the 1/2 stitches in blue and green. The inside of the quilt has the light colors added as well. I'll get to the colorful leaf pattern soon I think.

Must set the phone and computer down and take a deep breath and stitch something instead.

FYI - they cancelled the senior trip to NYC,PA and DC that was to leave this afternoon through Monday night. The extremely cold weather and the potential for a noreaster on Sunday to Monday (their bus ride home would be all day Monday) led to the decision. Most of the kids don't have winter coats down here, so that might have factored into the picture - as well as a bus off the road in cold temps. They are all disappointed but he is trying to reschedule. Any of the 3 dates will conflict with existing events, so we will see what happens. Honestly, with all the crazy things happening in the country, I am ok with this delay.