Friday, July 10, 2009

Getting There...

This title is so appropriate for so many things around here lately...

My father in law is getting there in his recovery. He was given a clean bill of health by his general practioner earlier this week. He is going to PT a couple of times per week to regain muscle strength and balance.

Our road is under reconstruction...makes "getting there" a challenge some days (which way do I turn out of the driveway to get off the road???).

And Blackstone Fantasy Garden (BFG) is getting there...got two more sections of the blackwork completed and only have 8 small and one larger (the final corner which I've started) to complete...




I'm thinking I may actually finish this by the end of next week (and depending on when I get to Vermont this weekend for work and how many registrations I have to enter for work before my co-workers get there, maybe this weekend but I doubt that one!!)...

I love this pattern and can't wait to have it finished, frame it (myself because I have too much Scottish in my background to pay some one else to do it!! LOL I don't mean to offend any of my Scottish friends with this one!! ) and get it hanging on my wall...

Have a great weekend all and hopefully my next post will be with a finish (or maybe two if I get the alpha blocks done too!!)

Sunday, July 5, 2009

Missing Stitching Mojo and Dad in law...

WARNING...this is a LONG post!!!

Boy I've been MIA for quite awhile...Thank you to Sadie for her email checking up on me...you don't know how much that meant to me to hear from a stitching friend across the pond that hadn't seen hide nor hair from me here or on the stitching groups in a bit...

In my last post about the auction I mentioned about a family member being ill...well, let me tell you that was an UNDERSTATEMENT...

The Monday before that last post (Memorial Day here in the states) my father in law was admitted to Yale-New Haven Hospital to their neurological intensive care unit. He was on that unit for over 3 1/2 weeks and here we are at the brink of six weeks when he was admitted and we still don't have a definitive diagnosis. It all played out like a BAD episode of the tv show "House". One day we'd have one diagnosis, then the next it was ruled out because some of his symptoms didn't line up with the day before's diagnosis. At one point we thought we were going to lose him and another we were given a 50-50 chance that he'd survive. The good news is he began improving as fast as he had gone downhill. On June 19th he was transferred to a Rehabilitaion center (through this whole ordeal he's lost over 40 pounds as well as muscle strength and coordination) and even better news is he was discharged from there to his home on July 3rd! He still has to do some outpatient rehabilitation to continue regaining his strength but he is now home in comfortable surroundings. It has been a roller coaster of a month for sure!!

Well, while all this was going on with him health wise it had put quite a damper on my stitching mojo. Between worrying about him, worrying about my husband and his dealing with his dad (and mom's state of mind- she doesn't deal well with doctors, hospitals, etc) and keeping my kids calm as well as dealing with keeping my house going and making theirs look lived in, I just couldn't get my self in the swing of things to stitch. Even sitting in the hospital with my mother in law, I figured I'd get a lot of stiching done but truthfully only a minimum of stitches went into anything during that time.

Well, in the last week I seem to have made up for some lost time...

I got bored with the alphabet blocks I was working on, so I switched back to Blackstone Fantasy Garden.




At this point I estimate I have only about a quarter of the backstitching/blackwork to go and I'll be finished with it! I'm challenging myself to get it finished before we go on vacation to the shore at the beginning of August. That gives me a little over 3 weeks to finish what I've got left, do you think I can do it?? I do...

And once I do finish it then the big decision...do I start in true ernst Cirque de carreaux (which I'm going to try doing over one- and I've cut the material to that size already) or do I go back to working on the Patchwork Sampler by Catia Crafts (catiacrafts.com) that I started last summer and but to the side to finish Boink and do Blackstone??? Such decisions to be made...and of course I have those alphabet blocks to finish too (they are almost done with the stitching and then it is a matter of assembly)...

Until the next time (and I plan on it not being such a long time between posts!!)...