Let the Stitching Begin!!!!!

Its Wednesday, but its Friday for me!  Tomorrow is Canada Day a holiday for the nation.  I took advantage of it being on a Thursday and took Friday off from work.  Tomorrow I'm heading out to stitch with Rebbecca and on Friday Bonnie will be joining us (a small portion of the Travelling Stitcherhood).

The plan for the weekend?  Stitch. Eat. Sleep!

So here's where Celestial Dragon stands before I pick it up for the long weekend!

Holy Stitching Batman!

Unfortunately I don't have a "before" picture for you this week, but let me assure you my dragon pretty much looked the same from last Sunday until this Saturday.  It was a busy week, and an exhausting one, I went to bed very early on several occasions which is very unlike me!

On Saturday I finished off the backstitching on the 2nd quarter of Celestial Dragon, and officially had 1/2 of the dragon stitched up.  I really got into a stitching groove today and just stitched from getting up to just now!  Sad to say, today's workout was sacrificed for stitching (yes Deb you can kick my but by e-mail)  I did contemplate going out for a nice long walk, but things didn't look favourable on the radar in terms of rain.  So I sat and stitched!

This past week I did okay at the scale I lost 0.5 lbs not a lot but movement in the right direction.  I probably won't be where I want to be by this week's weigh in and will have to pay again at my Weight Watcher's meeting.  I'm hoping now that the end of school year dinners, celebrations, etc are over I'll be able to make better progress.  In terms of being active I am achieving those goals, trying my best to do something active 6/7 days a week.  This week I only managed 5/7 but that's okay too!

Another Weekend Comes and Goes

I had a great weekend.  It started out with Friday night's usual running around, starting with a trip to the gym then groceries and dinner out with Christin.  While we were out and about my friend Tracey wanted to know if I wanted to Antiquing with her on Saturday.  She got in touch with me about a change of plans for Saturday and I told her if she wanted to talk to me, that I was on the patio at a pub close to her house.  The next thing I know Tracey and her husband joined us for a beer and we firmed up our plans.  It made out for a really nice evening.

Saturday Tracey and I set out nice and early, we drove down to Cornwall to check out an Antique store where.  At this shop Tracey found one of the items she was looking for then we decided to cross the border into Massena, N.Y. and check out the mall there.  We got a great deal on a pair of jean capris, but I have to say the mall there is pretty disappointing.  Then we followed the river to Ogdensburg and crossed back into Canada there.  It really was a great day, it was casual and easy going not rushing from place to place.  Hopefully we'll do it again!

I did find some stitching time as well, and of course Celestial Dragon got all of my attention!  Here he is as of Friday before I picked him up.

Here is is as of quitting time tonight I've finished all the cross stitch in this 1/4 and have started the backstitch.

I'm hoping for a good week ahead.  Things are wrapping up at work, exams are almost done and the grad ceremonies are later in the week followed by the end of year staff party and last staff meeting.  This means that soon all of the teaching staff at work will be gone and I'll be left alone to my music and whipping the library back into shape!  I've made a strong effort to eat well and move lots this week and I'm hoping I'll see the results at the scale on Tuesday!  I was down 1.5lbs this past week and if my body follows the trend it has been I'll be down again this upcoming week but up the following week.  I'm trying a number of things to shake it up a little and break this cycle I've gotten myself into!

Amy... need to sharpen any more pencils?  ;-)

June's Ornament & Celestial Progress

I had a very nice, quiet stitchy weekend... my favourite kind!
Sunday I managed to finish up the ornament I started on Saturday, unfortunately it did not keep me enthralled the way Celestial Dragon has.  But I stuck to my guns and finished it.

Peace

cR&P

Stitched on : 40ct linen

Stitched with : DMC 115

Of course as soon as I finished up with this little beauty, CD quickly came back out again!  Here's where I stopped late Sunday night.

Before the Weekend Began

I had meant to do this post Friday night, but I was just so happy and content working on Celestial Dragon that I didn't feel like opening up the laptop to blog, just stitch.

So here is where CD stood before I picked it up that evening.  I worked on it until very late on Friday, I'm hoping to pick it back up again today.  I spent Saturday and hopefully just this morning working on my ornament for the month of June.

This past week was another rough one for me, I was up yet another pound on Tuesday, my weigh in day.  I attribute it to eating out once a day Thursday-Sunday, and I only managed to get out for a walk once on those days because of the rain.  So far this past week I have stayed away from restaurants, and I've either done some running or gone to the gym every day (not done anything yet today).  I'm getting a little tired of this three pounds off/ three pounds on I've been playing it since March and its getting a little tiring.

My close friends will know I've not been myself for quite awhile.  I just haven't felt like being me, happy, easy going, and so on.  Finally on Friday I felt like myself!  For the first time in ages!!!  I hope this continues.  I prefer to be myself not this stranger who has been living in my body for more than a month now.

Adventures of the Travelling Stitcherhood

I had a wonderful stitchy weekend!  Back during our last two Timberhouse Retreats Sheila started talking about having us all out to Georgian Bay (an amazing part of Ontario!) for a stitching weekend, this weekend it became a reality.

Matilda and our hostess Sheila meet for the first time

Christin and I drove down to Brighton and hooked up with part of the weekend's group.  We got into the car with Beatrice and Kathy from there we met up with Barb, Judie, and Angie and started our secondary highway tour to the Georgian Bay area.  For the first time (like ever) I wasn't a driver!  It was a gorgeous, leisurely drive with a nice lunch break!  At our lunch stop at JUST Eddie's we officially named our group the Travelling Stitcherhood and that we had to have t-shirts made up.  As the weekend went on we decided our group needed a motto : Stitch.Eat.Sleep.  From the motto it moved onto a mission statement : Resistance is Futile.  Then by the end of the weekend we all had nick names!  I am now officially the Dragon Lady!

The Travelling Stitcherhood

Back L to R Trista, Bonnie, Christin, Angie, Rebbecca

Middle L to R Barb, Ann, Sylvia, Judie, Clare

Front L to R Me, Kathy, Beatrice, Sheila

The House

The Cottage

Wonderful ponds just off of the house deck

Luckily the frogs stayed in the pond... all weekend!

In the end once everyone arrived we were 14 stitchers in total!  In attendance were : me, Christin, Kathy, Beatrice, Barb, Angie, Judie, Ann, Sheila, Clare, Sylvia, Rebbecca, Bonnie, and Trista.  Sheila has an amazing home and cottage on her property on the shores of Lake Huron (one of the Great Lakes).  There was plenty of room for everyone and we all had beds too!  Some stayed in the house and some stayed in the cottage.  Not only was her home beautiful, the grounds were lovely, and the view amazing!  It was hard to keep focused on all the stitching we needed to do when nature was dazzling us each time we looked up.

The Amazing View of Georgian Bay

Judie and Beatrice settling in to stitch on the deck

Plenty of seats outside

Christin and Beatrice stitching in Sheila's huge sun room

Matilda made the trip as well, she's hoping the weather will clear for us

The weather didn't exactly co-operate for being outdoors and enjoying mother nature, but on the other hand we were there to stitch!  We certainly accomplished that!

Angie working hard

Over the weekend I managed to finish up Jason's Wedding sampler in under two weeks!

Wedding Row

c2006 Bent Creek

Stitched on : 28ct Wichelt Dried Time Joblean

Stitched with : DMC

Then Celestial Dragon Came out to play

During the drive home CD was a little too complicated so Art Deco Spirits got some love.

Matilda supervised, making sure we all were focused on our stitching

Checking out the cool stuff online with Kathy

Sheila's dog Molly cuddling up with Trista for a snooze

We were all sad to leave, but Sheila's husband treated me to a ride on his Spider (3 wheeled motorcycle, two wheels in front one in rear) which really brightened my day and made leaving all that more harder!

I can't wait to go and visit Sheila and Jim again!

Oh boy it was hard to come back to the real world when there's heaven on Earth!

Meh, Tuesday

Well my car seems just fine, we got to work and back with no problems today!  Thank you everyone for your comments and notes of concern!  I do really appreciate it!

Its the start of a new month so its time to talk about stitching goals!

May Review
Work on Celestial Dragon - Yes finished 1/4
Stitch an ornament - Yes
Work on Beatrice's Mirabilia RR - No I don't have any patterns with enough "bling"
Start Jason's wedding gift  - Over 1/2 done!

June Goals
Finish Jason's wedding gift
Stitch an ornament
Find something for Beatrice's RR
Work on Celestial Dragon

This week I lost my battle with the scale and I'm right back to where I've been trying to get away from since mid March.  I'm back up 2lbs (after successfully loosing 3 in the last 2 weeks), not something I can explain easily as I feel slimmer, Todd says I'm looking slimmer and I don't feel a 2 lbs gain in my clothes.  I know the scale is not a science and not the best measure of one's body.  But boy it puts a bummer on my day, to the point that at the end of the day when I got home... I polished off those delish chocolates I was showing you yesterday, then took a nap, followed by 32 minutes on the treadmill, and some weights in the basement.

What could of thrown the scale off?  Well I did eat out Thursday-Saturday, trying to make the best choices but there are so many hidden calories in restaurant food!  Thursday was a pizza lunch with my DR kids to celebrate the end, Friday was battered haddock with salad, Saturday was fajitas for lunch, and a late night grilled chicken sandwich with only 1/2 the bun... and cake at the stag.  So there are these foods that I can only guesstimate the point value of, also high sodium.  I've been having a lot of headaches and migraines lately (more than usual), also the last two nights I have not slept well.  Also though I'm not trying to get too stressed out/worked up over this weight thing I'm sure it is getting to me.  All of these things are factors that can affect weight.

I knew I'd be eating out quite a bit, and had hoped to compensate with exercise... at least stay the same.  However I guess 7 days in a row of physical activity didn't make a difference!  Last week I did a combination of running, walking, Taekwon-Do, and spinning.

So I've put my big girl panties back on after my pity party today and I'm back at it again.