A Stitching Year in Review

One of my New Year's Resolutions is to be more organized with my stitching. Last night I actually started cleaning my closet. Halleluiah!! First task was to refile all my DMC. I now have 8 Sterlite Shoeboxes filled with DMC. I could probably actually even extend that as some of the boxes are pretty stuffed. James looked over it all and pronounced it "excessive". I told him he didn't understand that all these colors were different and you "need" to have extra skeins of each color in case you run out. I also explained to him that my mom gave me all her DMC when she decided she couldn't see anymore and the lady at Eva's daycare gave me 3 huge boxes of her grandmother's stuff, so it wasn't like I actually purchased much of it. I did find a bag full of DMC and a receipt for like $3 and showed him that too. That was from one of those good JoAnn sales and the cashier and the manager were having problems and couldn't get the thread to ring up and after much beating of the register they just charged me $3 for all of it so they could get to the next person in line. That was so worth the trip to New Orleans. Anyway, I think he felt a little better about it once he realized I wasn't spending thousands of dollars on thread.

Next, here's what I completed over the last year:
You Have Stolen My Heart
Victorian Valentine
Petal Fairy
Cherry Blossom Fob
Bunny Buns
I Love Strawberries
Happy 4th
Bug Collector
Teacher’s Row
Pretty Posies
Wintery Mix
True Friends
Coeur Romantique
Welcome Freebie
J Monogram
Nature Alphabet
Tis the Season
Princess Pine Mountain Pillow
Hinzeit Princess
Christmas Elf
Subversive Ornament
Psychedelic Ornament
Stitcher’s Lane RR: 4 houses
Open Theme RR: 3 pieces
Band Sampler RR: 3 Band Sections
Alphabet RR: 4 pieces

My Works in Progress are:
My Mirabilia RR Square (this will be finished by 1/3)
A Dimensions Daydreams kit
A freebie Bird Sampler
Lizzie Kate's Needle Nick
Mother's Tree
Peacock Tapestry
Brown House Studio's Black Cat
Mirabilia: Angel of the New Dawn, Under the Friendship Tree, Titiana, Enchanted Mermaid, Queen of Peace and Maidens of the Season
Doro Theos

I need to look at the Dimensions kit, there was some reason that I stopped working on it. I think it was a thread issue. Otherwise it shouldn't take very long to finish. The bird sampler is one of those French freebies. It's barely started. It's monochrome so it really shouldn't take too long. Needle Nick, sigh, I have about 1/3 done if I'm being generous. It's dull and boring and I'd like to get rid of it, but it's too expensive just to put up for adoption, so if anyone wants to buy it let me know. Mother's Tree, that'll get done. Peacock Tapestry, I think I have one side of one border done, I may need to reconsider my fabric for that one. Black Cat, I think I'm definately going to restart that one on a different fabric. It's just not working for me. Angel of the New Dawn, no excuse on that one, I just got bored working on it. She's probably about 1/2 to 2/3 done so I really need to just get back working on that one. Under the Friendship Tree, I need to remeasure my fabric, I think I stopped working on it because I started worrying about having enough fabric, because it wasn't cut straight. Titiana, no excuse really, just got bored with it. Enchanted Mermaid, I got side tracked on that one, I need to pull it out again. Queen of Peace, the fabric got damaged. It was packed in box in the garage and it got wet and there was some mildew on part of the fabric. I think I got most of it out, I need to give that one another good look before I decide what to do with it. Maidens of the Seasons, it's barely started, but I don't think I'm going to continue with it. I may just cut off the little bit I have done on it and salvage the rest of the fabric. It doesn't really appeal to me anymore. Doro Theos, I have the first medallion done, but then I started having color issues with the second one. I think I have that resolved now, so that shouldn't take too long to finish either.

Last night I also put all my printed freebie patterns in page protectors in a binder. Part of my stitching resolutions is also to do more freebie patterns. I have a ton of them. Actually, I'd bet I'm pretty close to SABLE on freebies.

I went through all the freebies that I like and intend to stitch, and the patterns that I hope to get to this year, and made a list of all the threads that I will need to acquire to finish them. I posted that list on my Shopping/Wish List.

My official January Goals are:
Complete and mail out my Mirabilia RR (this will be done by Jan. 3)
Complete and mail out Jen's OT RR (I have pattern picked out, I just need to pull threads)
Complete and mail out Kathy's OT RR (I need to look over the available patterns)
Complete and mail out Sandy's SL RR (I think I'm changing my mind on the pattern I picked out)
Start next Mirabilia RR
Work on any other RR pieces that come up
Finish Dimensions Kit

Sometime over the weekend I hope to finish up cleaning my closet. I need to get the two boxes of books out of there and put them somewhere else. I cleaned the office yesterday too in order to have bookshelf space for one of the boxes of book. Then I called the used book store to see what their policy was. They'll take books for store credit only and only a "bag or two at a time". That was fine with me. I filled up a Wal-Mart bag with books and I'm going to take them over there. There's another used book store near my house, so I might need to fill up another bag and get an account going there too. I have about a gazillion paperbacks. I used to read books more than once so that's why I kept them around, now I'm lucky if I read them once. Actually, I'm reading more so that's good. In fact, I think I'm going to put a thing on my Sidebar about what I'm reading.

So, once the books are out, I need to decide the fate of my WIPs. Then I need to sort through my fabric. After that, I'll work on kitting up some of my future projects.

I will be organized!

Mother's Tree

Here's where I am. I think Jen asked before, it's 40 ct. linen worked one thread over two. The fabric is Cinnamon Roll and the thread is Dark Chocolate (GAST I think). The picture really isn't that great. I was having a really hard time getting a photograph that show the true colors. It kept coming out sort of green looking and there really isn't any green in it. I think this is where I'm going to stop for now. I need to get back to my round robins!

Christmas Check In

We had a pretty good weekend. Saturday night I stayed up to get all the Christmas presents ready. I was pretty pleased how it all turned out. It looked very nice. Eva woke up at about 7 am and looked at everything and then got in bed with me. Once James woke up, she said "Let's wake up the babies!" Then it was like an explosion at the toy factory. They all seemed to be pretty happy with what they got.

We went to church with my parents who are Baptist, although we're Catholic. We decided to do that since I knew my parents would like it and we knew it would be easier to get a seat as their congregation only has about 30 members and our parish has several thousand. It wasn't a real service, it was mostly singing and the preacher did a short sermon. It was nice, but I told James I'd rather not do that because it didn't feel right. I think that repetitiveness of the Catholic mass is comforting. Plus, I much prefer traditional Christmas music and at my parents church there's a husband and wife who do the music there and they're sort of countrified.

Then it was on to my grandparents for lunch. I won't even begin to vent about my frustration at people who do not show up at the designated time even though they have much of the food.

We went home and cleaned the house, then went to my parents house. More present opening there! The girls got so much stuff. Although, their house got really messy and there were a lot of people there. That really stresses me out. So we left and I was so thankful that we had cleaned the house before going there. I think if I had to come home to a messy house after that I probably would have had a meltdown or something.

Anyway, it was a good Christmas overall. I bought myself some good presents. Eva got a ton of stuff and everything she wanted. Lauren and Maria made it through the day in good spirits and between the two of them got more toys than they could probably ever play with. They got a table and chairs for their room that is just wonderful. They played tea party with their new tea set. It was so cute.

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On the stitching front, I did finish names 1-4 on Mother's Tree. My goal is to have #5 done today. My plan is to work on that until Dec. 30 to enter it in the Silkweaver showcase, then switch back to my Mira RR. After that's mailed out I'm going to work on my other RRs. I'll catch up! I will!

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Other little tidbits from the weekend:

The LSU Tigers were trying to leave for Atlanta for the Peach Bowl and their plane got stuck in the mud. They had to wait for another plane to show up and they were 5 hours late. That's not a good omen. That and the fact that the starting Quarterback got hurt at the last game and isn't playing.

There's some weird phenomenon going on in St. Bernard Parish. There are watermelons growing all over the Parish. They don't normally grow this time of year. Something happened during Katrina and the seeds got spread all over the parish and there's something that's making them grow even though this isn't when they normally grow. Although, they are asking people not to eat the Katrina Melons.
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And Congratulations to Tracy!!

Psychedelic Ornament

I told Eva to pick out a thread and I'd make her an ornament. Of course, she chose Gloriana's Ada's Rainbow. So I was a little stumped as to what to do with it. Here's the fruit of my labor. The pattern is from Crystal Creations by Vintage Bliss Designs.

A Compliment and a Huge Rant

First, my compliment goes to Mary at M Designs. I ordered some of the name trees and not only did I get them very quickly, but she also sent me another chart of her's and a nice Christmas card. I thought it was very sweet.

Now for my rant. Remember M, the lady that I complained about before? Well, last night she really took the cake. First, she declared to the room that she thought that women who dress provocatively are asking to be raped. The room went silent and someone had to check to make sure she was kidding. She said no, and repeated herself. I think the Mississippi River may have shifted it's bed a little closer the collective intake of breath was so strong. How can one say something like that to a group of women? Anyway, she said that's what kept her off a jury. I think the attorneys probably agreed she was too ignorant to serve. Then I mentioned how I had never been called for jury duty. She said that was terrible I wasn't serving my country. Hello? It's not my fault I haven't been called. I registered to vote and I vote in nearly every election. What else am I supposed to do? I'm the only person there that WANTED to be on a jury. In both instances you could tell everyone was really peeved, but nobody wanted to start a fight, but several of us tried to explain to her that rape was a crime of domination and power and not of sexuality. I don't think she got it.

Oh and I have another gripe. Well, it's not even really that. Twice in the last week on my way to work I had a car behind me pass me. On a two lane road kind of passing. Now, I'm not usually really fussy about that. However, the reason I'm going slow is because I'm in a LONG LINE OF TRAFFIC. Do they think I'm going slow because I have nothing better to do at 6:30 am than drive 25 mph pissing off other motorists?? I love when traffic stops and I'm right behind them. Hello dumbass! Those are the times when I wish I had a bullhorn so I can tell them how idiotic I think they are. The first one, traffic had stopped because a car in front of me was turning left. The guy who whipped around me, nearly plowed into him. I wish I could have asked him if it was really worth all that just to get one car ahead in the huge long line of traffic.

Morons.

More things you see driving around

There's a crossing guard, actually a traffic cop near my house. He always amuses me because he looks like a stereotypical southern sheriff. He's not the sheriff, but anyway, he's got this big ole pot belly and he wears cowboy boots and since it got cold he started wearing a cowboy hat too. He normally stands between two traffic cones and directs traffic in and out of the school in the afternoon. I noticed yesterday he had decorated his cones so that they looked like Christmas trees. I thought it was pretty cute.

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Not much stitching yesterday. I finished the second line of Mother's Tree and worked more on my Mirabilia RR. I also got Kathy's RR yesterday from Kari. So, after the holidays I'm going to start/finish Jen's and Kathy's RRs and then mail it on to Kathy and that RR will be all done for me.

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I'm so ready for Christmas to be here. At least Thursday, Eva has a party at school Thursday and she just can't wait to bring her little presents to school and she's kind of driving me crazy about it! Last night I let the girls decorate gingerbread men. My MIL gave them a cookie decorating kit, it came with cookies, icing, little candies and sprinkles. They were all doing really good until the sprinkles, what a mess that was! Anyway, they had fun and their cookies looked pretty interesting.

Mother's Tree

First, my chocolate balls came out great and they were a big hit. I'm going to get more creative with them next time I make them. Maybe put a cherry or a mint in the middle.

I started working on my Mother's Tree again. I finished the first name on the second line Friday. Then I switched back to working on my Mira RR. Then the girls got orange stuff on it so I washed it and while it was drying, I went back to my Mother's Tree. I finished the last name on the second line and then I started looking at my charts. I charted this all out several years ago and then had problems with the program I charted it in, so all I had were some screen shot pictures of the pattern. I realized a name got cut off and I couldn't find my notes or anything to fill in the gap. So I was freakin' out all weekend trying to figure out what name got cut off. I couldn't find any family trees online that had the full list of children for the mother that I had. This was back in the 1600's when people had like 16 kids, so it's not uncommon for some of the trees to not list all the kids. I was getting all upset thinking that I was to get another subscription to Ancestry.com, which I really didn't want to do because it's like $80. Finally, I got a link to Rootsweb.com which is the free version of Ancestry.com. I was able to get all the information that I needed. Elizabeth Hebert (b. 1698) was the name that I was missing.

So here's my list:
1580 Renee Courtin mother of
1603 Catherine Vigneau mother of
1641 Andree Martin mother of
1674 Isabelle Pellerin mother of
1698 Elizabeth Hebert mother of
1715 Brigette Apart mother of
1735 Susanne Boudreaux mother of
1760 Marie Rose Benoit mother of
1782 Marie Solange Prejean mother of
1813 Marcellite Marie Derouen mother of
1835 Genevieve Louviere mother of
1859 Octavie Bonin mother of
1887 Eunice Hebert mother of
1925 Sylvia Margaret Hebert mother of
1956 Karen Ann Guedry mother of
1977 Me!

Someone in my cross stitch group was complaining that you couldn't do this if there was a generation that didn't have any girls. I kept thinking that was wrong, but couldn't figure out why. But, everyone has a mother, if there were no girls in a generation, the mother line would have ended. You only can't continue it if you yourself are a man and you have no sisters, or you're a woman that only has sons.

Anyway, whenever I do this research I always wonder what kind of people these women were. Renee Courtin moved from France to Canada and I always wonder why. Around the Isabelle Pellerin/Elizabeth Hebert generation they moved from Acadia Canada to St. Martinville Louisiana. I know why, but I always wonder what that must have been like. Everybody else down that line was born and died in either St. Martinville or Opelousas. Until Eunice Hebert, then they moved to Donaldsonville, Louisiana. Then my mom, my girls and I were all born in Baton Rouge. That's pretty amazing that so many generations were born and died in such a small geographic area.

Big Trouble

Terri is in big trouble for pointing out Industrious Ladies! I'm so in trouble because I really really want it. James is ok with me using part of our Christmas money for it though. Otherwise, he'd be in big trouble LOL

I finally got Eva's Christmas picture in. I think it looks pretty good. She's barefoot because we couldn't find her shoes that morning. LOL I can be such a loser mom sometimes. The daycare manager assured me that most of the kids were barefoot though, so I felt better.

Annmarie has a pretty funny post about Chuck Norris. I liked these:

"Chuck Norris sold his soul to the devil for his rugged good looks and unparalleled martial arts ability. Shortly after the transaction was finalized, Chuck roundhouse kicked the devil in the face and took his soul back. The devil, who appreciates irony, couldn't stay mad and admitted he should have seen it coming. They now play poker every second Wednesday of the month."

"Chuck Norris uses ribbed condoms inside out, so he gets the pleasure."

This one is kind of stupid, but it makes me laugh
"Chuck Norris's girlfriend once asked him how much wood a woodchuck could chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood. He then shouted, "HOW DARE YOU RHYME IN THE PRESENCE OF CHUCK NORRIS!" and ripped out her throat. Holding his girlfriend's bloody throat in his hand he bellowed, "Don't f*** with Chuck!" Two years and five months later he realized the irony of this statement and laughed so hard that anyone within a hundred mile radius of the blast went deaf."


I'm hoping to get a lot of stitching done this weekend. It's going to be cold and rainy. The weather people are forecasting "Wintery Mix" for Wednesday LOL

Miscellaneous

Once again I have forgotten the Christmas pictures that I'm supposed to be sending out to friends and family. Oh well.

I picked up my framing yesterday. I'm pretty happy with it.

Mirabilia's Christmas Elf Fairy
Elizabeth Designs Nature Alphabet
Just Nan's Wintery Mix
Hinzeit's Princess

Yesterday with work we went to a Christmas Party at a different company. I look forward to it every year for the meatballs. I guess they're really easy to make (I think it's teriyaki sauce and grape jelly or something like that), but I'd rather just eat someone else's. They also had these chocolate balls there (not chocolate salty balls) that were so good. All you do for that is throw a bag of oreos and a block of cream cheese in the food processor until it's all mixed up. Then shape them into balls, dip them in melted chocolate and put them in the fridge to harden.

Sunday we're going to the inlaws to do Christmas early. James volunteered me for dessert. So, I think I'm going to make the Chocolate Ball thingys. I need to make something else too though. I guess I'm going to have to go pick up some Hog Head Cheese. Yes, supposedly it's exactly what you might expect. I refuse to eat it or even try it. The only other thing that I've heard of that's worse in my opinion is Blood Boudin. However, these are the people that served frog legs a couple of years ago and when I asked where you buy frog legs from they laughed and told me they caught them down by the bayou near their house. I didn't eat those either.

There was this guy at the Christmas party that I felt really bad for. His house had been burglarized. They stole EVERYTHING, including the Christmas presents. He was more irritated because he couldn't file an insurance claim because he had just filed one because a tree went through his roof during the hurricanes. And he said they totally ransacked the entire house. That'd really suck to have to clean up after something like that.

Kristen mentioned how it was hard to get in the Christmas spirit when it's 80 degrees and you look out on the beach all day. Earlier this week it was like 75 here and the kids are running around in shorts and T-shirts. We got a huge storm last night and it's much cooler now. I just heard some mention of the possibility of some freezing rain. We'll have to see....

Pictures

The weekend was ok, nothing exciting. I was going to post some pictures, but apparently Picturetrail is having issues this morning. I got some pictures of Lauren and Maria in their Christmas dresses. They would never sit for professional pictures. Eva got her school Christmas pictures in and I think they look really good even if she isn't wearing any shoes. Also, I sent Kristen an ornament that I made from a pattern from Subversive Cross Stitch and I'm assuming that she's gotten it. However, the post office seems to be having issues as well because the tracking number keeps coming back as invalid. So, I'll post that picture if I ever can.

Ok, finally

Lauren and Maria (1)
Lauren and Maria (2) I like this one better, but it's a little out of focus.
Ornament (warning adult language)

Yaton Rouge

That's quickly becoming Baton Rouge's new name. New Orleanians are knowns as Yats. It has something to do with the way they say "Where y'at?". I guess there's been a more accurate census and Baton Rouge has approximately 80,000 new residents. A lot of New Orleans businesses are packing up and moving up here. They had an interview with one business owner that restarted his business here. He said that some of his old regulars are still his regulars because they've all moved here.

Today a judge is hearing arguments from evacuees that are being evicted from hotels. They feel that the January 7th deadline is "premature". Puh-lease. I guess the hotel owners are also starting to get very angry because these people won't leave. Reports are that the hotels are getting torn up. Supposedly the Governor of Texas is offering all evacuees a one way bus ticket out of the state because the hotels in Texas are having the same problems. To say the situation is getting frustrating is putting it mildly.

Traffic is still really bad. They've been talking about how since Katrina traffic accidents have doubled or tripled or whatever. Crime has gotten pretty bad too. There seems to be a lot more murder. I don't know if it actually has increased, but it seems like it has, common sense would indicate that it would. I think New Orleans was somewhere in the top three for most dangerous cities in the country and Baton Rouge was like 11th, so in just those numbers it seems like we'd shoot straight to the top of the list. Add to that a overcrowding problem and a uncertain future, and you can only imagine. I know that was another thing that prompted the Texas Governor to offer the bus tickets.

I'm starting to think that New Orleans isn't going to get back on it's feet. At least not anywhere near what it used to be. Too many businesses are failing there. They can't get employees to work, because there's nowhere for them to live. They don't have enough customers. Supplies and merchadise shipments are irregular. I saw an interview with some hot shot lawyer and he said that some parts of the city are back to normal on the surface, but instead of having his power lunches in a crowded restaurant, he and his guests might be the only ones there, and it takes 3 weeks to get his suits dry cleaned.

Attempts at tourism have been met with disdain. Greyhound bus line has started running Katrina tours. For $35/person you get a bus tour of the damage in New Orleans. They're trying to organized Mardi Gras, but Nagin is shopping for a corporate sponsor for the entire event. So it could be something like The American Express Mardi Gras. Gag me. I'd rather it be some small event with local people than some big corporate sponsored event.

So that's my Katrina update

The Wake

The girls and I went to the wake this evening. Heartwrenching doesn't even come close to describing it. There were hundreds of people there. Fortunately, we didn't have to wait in line. We were able to go to the family area. I've never been such a mess over a death before. I guess because everyone I've known that died were either old or sick so it wasn't so unexpected. I got more details about what happened. He was in a head on collision with another car. He was killed instantly. It was an open casket wake and you could tell it was bad. If I didn't know that was him, I would have never recognized him. It didn't look like him at all. His family seemed to be holding up well though. Everyone seemed to be in good spirits. His mom seemed a little out of it though, she did recently break her foot so that didn't really help matters.

We discussed how none of should have been too surprised about him dying so young. When he was little, like 3 or 4 years old, he would tie down the gas pedal on the 4 wheeler to drive it around. Since he couldn't brake he would just jump off or run it into a tree to stop. Then when he was a little older, like 5 or 6 he stole the car keys and wrecked the family car in their yard. I also remember a time when he was probably around 10 or so and they took the bouncing part of the trampoline out and rigged up a barrel with bungee cords on the springs so they could pretend like they were bull riding. I think he broke his arm doing that. New Year's day 2003 he was riding in the back of a pick up truck going 80 miles an hour down the interstate and he fell out. The only thing that saved him then was that he had been drinking and he didn't tense his body when it happened. I saw him a couple months after that happened and you would have never even known it had happened.

Anyway, he'll be truly missed by our family.

Darren Bennett

He's a boy I grew up with, I've known him since he was born. He died Tuesday. He was killed driving a motorcycle he had only bought the week before.

He was a wild guy, he partied too hard, drank too much, but he was a very good person. He was nice to everyone. At Mardi Gras, he would hold Eva on his shoulders and take her up to the floats so she would get the good stuff.

It's going to be so hard on his family. They've endured so much heartache already and this is just going to be devastating to them.

His Obituary

Odd Things You See Driving Around

Yesterday on my way home I was driving down the street and was coming up on the back of a house. I saw something on the roof that I assumed was some sort of Christmas decoration. As I got closer, it was a Golden Retriever all curled up on peak of the roof. As I was wondering how that dog got up there, I realized there was a poodle sleeping on top of the garage. Isn't that funny?

A Female Welder Walks in to a Bar

Not really, she walked into our office looking for a job. Normally, they don't even let females even try out for the job, but I guess they need some welders. She was sent out to the shop to see how skilled she is. Now my grandmother is over there fretting about how this could be a bad situation. Hello? She might be better than everyone else out there. Give our guys a little credit that they could handle working with a woman. I didn't get a look at her, but maybe she's better looking than my grandmother and that's the bad situation LOL That she won't be the cutest girl around anymore LOL Anyway, this has been amusing. Oh she just came in again. She's fairly decent looking.

Amongst all this my grandmother is freaking out about all these bills that are supposedly not in the computer. Well, they are. I can see them. She's just not looking hard enough, but I can tell she's trying to act like it's my fault or something.

I'm ready to quit my job

Yes, it's a plum job, but I'm so sick of the attitude around here. I have no idea how to even go about it. I need to look for another job first. I don't want to quit and have no options. I'm just so frustrated and concerned about the reprecussions. Any advice? Keep in mind that I work for family...

A Ho Hum Weekend

Well, LSU lost so that sort of put a damper on things. It was a bad game. It was like the team didn't even show up. I think they're just tired. They've played for 11 straight weeks with no open dates. There were too many injuries. Anyway, they did very well in the season overall. Especially considering how the season started.

We didn't do much. James and I went shopping Saturday morning for the rest of the big Christmas stuff for the girls. My grandmother wanted to get Eva something big for Christmas since she got Lauren and Maria a really nice table and chair set for their room. I proposed a portable DVD player, but James said no way, that only spoiled rich kids had those. So my next idea was a new TV for her room. Her current TV is a monstrosity with a broken VCR. Since we rearranged her room she wants to move the TV, but we can't because it doesn't fit anywhere else. So we decided to get her a smaller TV. When we get to the store though, James starts looking at even bigger TVs. I'm like hello?? Those are what spoiled rich kids have! Anyway, we settled on a very basic 14". We got her some new movies with the leftover money and one of those joystick things with the games built in.

I need to start shopping for some stocking stuffer type things. I had a $50 office depot gift card (signing up for that Advantage card thing has really been profitable, that was my second $50 card). So I got each of the girls some crayons and markers, all washable of course LOL, and I picked up some new Leap Pad books. All three girls love that thing.

Hmmm, I had a pretty good stitching weekend. I received and finished Lisa's Band Sampler Round Robin, and then I got it mailed out this morning. I worked more on my Stitcher's Lane Round Robin that I'm starting over. I guess I'm about half done with my house. I need to start working up my letter for that one. Then I put that aside and started working on a couple of Christmas presents. One was a very basic pattern. Only 3 DMC colors on white fabric. Can I stick with that? No! I switched out the fabric and changed the thread to a rayon, a metallic and a over dyed Silk. I should finish that later tonight. Right now I'm working on a different ornament...the TW Celtic Inspiration Ornament. So far so good. If it stitches up quick, I might make a few for different people.

I guess that's about it for now!

Fun Friday

LSU is playing for the SEC Championship this weekend so Georgia is being roundly abused today. I heard a couple of amusing jokes.

How do you know if a Georgia Bulldog has a girlfriend? There's tobacco stains on both sides of the pick up truck.

Why doesn't Florida break off? Because Georgia sucks.

How do you get a University of Georgia alumni off your porch? Pay for the pizza.

And another one that has nothing to do with Georgia...

Why does Mike Tyson cry during sex? Because mace has a tendacy to do that to you.


And one of those things that make you go hmmmm...

There are approximately 6,600 people from Louisiana missing in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. There are approximately 6,000 Louisiana state workers that have not checked back into work since Hurricane Katrina. However, many people are speculating that those 6,000 state workers never actually existed or died many years ago. It makes you wonder who was collecting their pay.

Nip/Tuck

I've been watching Nip/Tuck and sometimes I wonder just what in the world are the writers thinking. Could Matt get ANYmore screwed up? I can see how his experiences could have driven him to where he is, but seriously a Neo-Nazi? In real life that kid would need some serious help. And why aren't his parents getting him any on the show? And what's up with Julia knowingly letting him have sex in their home? Isn't he still only like 16 or something? He's still in highschool but the botched lesbian threesome, Ava, the transexualtransgender phase, and let's not forget the hit and run incident, can sort of make him seem a lot older. I mean really, how many kids go through that much stuff before they're even out of high school.

Same thing with Christian, all these awful things keep happening to him. How much worse can it get for him? The whole Carver and the detective things, what happened with that? All we saw was her in the doctor's office and I think that's the last we ever saw of that. Of course, now he's back and he's got Kimber. I glanced at the message boards and looked over all the theories on that one. I'd have to say that it's possible that Christian could be the Carver, he could have found Kimber after the "wedding" and made her send that letter as an alibi. Do I think Christian is the Carver? No, he's too heterosexual and the rape thing, he would have never made up.

Whatever happened with Julia and Sean's daughter? I don't think she's even been in Season three. I really thought when she became "Princess Menses" that some type of sexual abuse would have come in to play there. I'm sorry, in a 9 year old girl, abuse would have been the first thing that came to mind, not that processed foods are making her develop too fast.

Anyway, it's one of those shows that I always watch, but it drives me crazy at he same time. These characters are so screwed up, you just can't help but watch and see how much farther they'll go.

Katrina's Exposure

Ok this is a huge rant that has been festering and today's radio discussion is just driving me over the edge. There are thousands of evacuees that are still living in hotel rooms, but FEMA is getting to the end of that programs so they're letting these people know that they need to start clearing out. Well, that's started this whole huge uproar about where am I going to go and what am I going to do? Ummmm GET A JOB.

Now, I know some people may be thinking that's easier said than done. Seriously, they are so desperate for workers around here, that you don't have to have any skills. You don't even need transportation. That's being provided.

They've been having interviews with people living in the hotels. It's enough to make you tear your hair out. These are young, healthy, able people who are complaining that they have nothing to do all day but either SLEEP or tell stories all day (or play with all their electronics and listen to the CDs that they bought with their FEMA and Red Cross money). It's been 3 months and that's all they've been able to find to do??? Can you imagine living in a hotel for 3 months for free? Beds made, linens washed, every day? Access to pools and work out rooms and room service??

There was this guy that called in this morning about the shuttle that's running FREE from Baton Rouge to New Orleans. They'll pick you up in the morning, take you to New Orleans to work and bring you back. This man said there are only 25 people on that bus every morning and they're ALL WOMEN. What is wrong with these men?? And what's wrong with these women for letting them get away with it. If my husband told me that he was going to sit around drinking all day and chumming around with his friends while I go to work, I'd have to kick his ass.

In my opinion they need to just cut all these people loose. Nothing else in going to spur them into action to actually take care of themselves.

Holiday Weekend

There's Eva after her Thanksgiving Play. Tomorrow I'll try to get the Santa pictures up.

We had a fairly good weekend. Pretty uneventful. Thursday we did Thanksgiving. All I ended up bringing was the cheesecake brownies that no one ate. The pumpkin fudge didn't set and this other thing I tried just didn't work either. So as a last resort I made the cheesecake brownies because our family cheesecake maker insisted he wasn't going to bring anything. Well, he did, so everyone ate that. My mom ended up taking the brownies home...and then they ate them all. All I got was one little tiny corner. Oh well.

Friday, my mom and I woke up early and took the girls shopping. We hit Michaels for 6 am and got a bunch of ornaments. Then we went to the mall. It wasn't too bad. We went to the "old mall", so there weren't as many people there. I wanted to go there because they have a Children's Place there and we did really good at that store. Lauren and Maria got a fancy sweater and skirt set each, a Fair Isle sweater each, a sweatsuit each, a shirt each, and a body suit each and then a free teddy bear and all that came to just over $100. Eva got a pair of shoes at Stride Rite. That was it. We went to go take pictures with Santa and they got all high tech. You had to sign up and get a buzzer. So we went eat while we were waiting for the buzzer. We ate at Chik-fil-a and then got a cookie at the Great American Cookie Company. We got coupons for both of those places with the pictures so we should have waited LOL The pictures didn't go over so well. Eva got all shy, Lauren was crying hysterically, Maria was totally oblivious because Santa gave her a sucker. So, it didn't make for the best picture.

We went home, napped, then took out the Christmas tree. There must have been some great ornament migration or something because it didn't seem like we had very many. So I got my mom again and we went to Hobby Lobby and got more ornaments. By then we were pretty tired.

Saturday and Sunday we didn't do much of anything. We just bummed around the house and watched movies. We've all had this cold that's just been lingering.

Last night I fell asleep at 8:00 so I didn't watch any of my shows and I didn't do any stitching. I'm nearly done with my Christmas Elf Fairy. I just have some beading to do. I got a 25% off coupon for my framer so I'm bringing some stuff there today to see what I can afford to get framed. I just don't get why framing is soooo expensive. Anyway, that's about it.

Happy Thanksgiving!!

We're not doing anything exciting. We're just going to my grandparent's house. I'm making Pumpkin Fudge. I'm considering making Cheesecake Brownies and Cinnamon Toast Blinis.

Eva has a Thanksgiving pageant this afternoon. The younger 4 class are dressing up as Indians and the older 4 class are going to be the pilgrims. So that should be fun.

Yesterday we got our new fiber optic cable put in. Somehow or another they managed to cut the electrical lines for the dishwasher. Don't even ask, I don't know. Anyway, I had to wash two sinkfuls of dishes by hand. I know I know, life is so hard. LOL

Tuesday Eva told her teacher that her parents died. That made for an interesting afternoon since the manager remembered me dropping her off. She does that a lot when she's playing, she'll tell me her baby is sad because her parents died,etc. I think she must get it from Disney movies. Parents are always dead in those. I know at some point it made a big impact with her, because she stopped believing me that Simba's dad was just sleeping. Anyway, the teacher was saying how serious she was when she said it. If that child doesn't grow up to be an actress I'll be really surprised. When she's playing she gets totally into whatever character she's making up.

Lauren and Maria are sick. I feel so terribly for them. They would never get sick, now they've been sick with several different things in the last couple of months. I actually got a pharmacist to give me a dosage for them for an over the counter medicine. Normally they won't do that until they're at least two, but once I posed a dosage to him, he said that would be a good dosage for them. So, hopefully I won't have to call the doctor, since it's just a cold, but they have a nasty cough.

Oh well, we have a good long weekend!

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A Successful Birthday Party

Saturday was Eva's 4th birthday. She had a really good party. Some of the pictures are located here. The spacewalk was a big hit. Definately worth the money. If you decide to get one and wonder how easy they are to set up, extremely easy, save yourself the delivery expense and do it yourself. She had a good turnout and got lots of presents. Her favorite is Good Morning Sunshine My Little Pony. She says it's the greatest present she's ever gotten. All the parents that came kept telling me how nice and sweet Eva was. Obviously, she's a completely different kid when we aren't around. Dorian, there's a picture of Eva and Dorian in the photo album, loves Eva, he thinks she's just the sweetest girl. I find that really funny because Eva hated Dorian so much when she first met him. So anyway, a good time was had by all. I didn't have a complete meltdown having all those people at my house. So that was good.

I pretty much slept the rest of the weekend. I'm getting a cold or something, and all the girls are under the weather. We're all looking forward to a nice quiet LONG weekend.

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

******possible spoilers**********







I went to see it this morning! 12:01 AM. A 2 1/2 hour movie with 16 minutes of previews. I didn't get to sleep until 3:30 am and I'm kind of dragging this morning. The movie was excellent. The best by far. I'd say it deserved it's PG-13 rating. There were parts that were pretty scary and gory. I found the Hungarian Horntail part to be really tense and I think it might upset little kids. However, the special effects in that part were just amazing. That dragon looked very real. In the first couple movies I didn't like the Quidditch scenes because the computer animation was really obvious, but in this movie they really stepped it up a lot and it looked fantastic. Some parts of the story line were changed, some parts left out (like SPEW and the Sphinx), and some parts just not explained at all. I guess they just assume that the people who are watching to movie have read the book and understand how certain events came about, like how Barty Crouch Jr. got out of jail. I found that this director had a sense of Rowlings excellent foreshadowing techniques. The Voldemort coming to life thing was pretty well done. Very much like the book. I thought that Ralph Fiennes did a good job as Voldemort. I didn't like the way he looked though. It's exactly as described in the book, but I just didn't like it. It creeped me out. Although, I guess you aren't supposed to like it. Mad Eye Moody grossed me out. That eye was nasty.

Bottom Line: Two enthusiastic thumbs up!!

So much to do

I'm still working on the menu for the party. I think it's finally coming together though, so I just need to make a shopping list and figure out how I'm going to cook all this stuff and only cause minimal mess in the kitchen. I am so tired of cleaning the kitchen.

I have a ton of stitching stuff to do, so I can't wait for this 4 day weekend coming up next week.

I had my stitching night last night and the Bama lover was there. However, Rudy Niswanger's mom was also there. Plus two LSU Football season ticket holders, and a former Tiger Band member. So, she was pretty subdued. I sat way far away from her so she wasn't much of an issue.

I took a picture of Eva's new bed. As a point of reference as to how huge this bed is, the dresser next to it is about chest high.





And if anyone is curious...here's my progress on my Christmas Elf.

Weekend Round Up

This will probably be long because I have a lot to get down

Friday....I went to my stitching group Friday night. (Sandra, my LNS is Cross Stitch Corner) There are these two women that started showing up recently. Well, let's back up. There was this lady that I used to hate with a passion, we'll call her B. However, I've gotten over that and she doesn't bother me so much now. I actually think she's pretty ok, unless she starts talking politics and then I just want to beat some sense into her, but then I feel bad for her for not knowing that you don't talk politics in mixed company especially when you have radical views. Anyway, this one woman started showing up and I didn't think I would dislike anyone more than B, but this one really takes the cake. She's loud, she talks over everyone, talks about stupid stuff, and repeats it continuously. She's always blabbing on about what a good Christian she is...not only a Christian, but a Baptist Christian....that drinks LOL (baptists aren't supposed to partake in alcohol). She also constantly babbles on about her political appointment. I really didn't know much about the position so I asked around and understood that it's no big deal and most people who are in that position don't brag about it. She's also a huge Bama fan that hates LSU fans (yes, she announces this to a room full of people in Baton Rouge, Louisiana), she went on and on about how much she hates LSU and how awful LSU fans are and how mean they are blah blah blah. Then her and this other woman (who I swear is her spiritual twin or something) started going on and on about how much they both hate LSU and they hope Bama tears them a new one and on and on it went forever. I was so ready to tell the both of them off. However, I'm a lady LOL and I don't do that. I will however, be sure as hell to make sure that I keep bringing up that LSU beat Alabama this weekend. Now, if all that wasn't bad enough, they're both huge racists. I've never heard two people go on and on about the evils of black people, not just Friday night, but on several occasions. I decided I was going to fashion a KKK hood and next time they started up I was going to put it on and say I didn't realize the meeting had started already. Not really, but I thought that would effectively get the point across. I just don't get how two supposedly educated women can get on the rants that they do. Anyway, next time I'm going to sit with B, even though she's not really my favorite person, I know that no one else likes her so I won't have to deal with those other two and their stupid crap.

My parents were buying a full sized bed for her birthday because her crib converted from a crib to a toddler bed to a full sized bed. So they were buying her a mattress and box spring for her birthday. So I bought her a sheet set and comforter etc. So the sheets came Friday and Eva got the box. I told her to just put it away that it wasn't for her. At some point while I was gone, she opened the box. James swears that she opened up the sheets and put them all on her bed by herself. Somehow, I don't really believe that. So anyway, the whole birthday surprise was ruined.

Saturday....I took Eva to a schoolmates birthday party. She had a good time. They had a race car theme. They made race cars out of diaper boxes. Then they raced them around the yard. It was pretty cute, but then Eva fell and scraped up her elbows. It was high drama. I called my mom and told her about the sheet incident so they could go ahead and get the bed whenever. They purchased it that morning and James picked it up later that afternoon. We watched the LSU game late that afternoon. It was a really nice day so we had all the windows open. When LSU won, it was like surround sound. There was all the cheering from the TV, but then you could also hear all the neighbors cheering from their houses. It was really funny. Oh and I confirmed a spacewalk rental, so that's one thing to scratch off the list.

Sunday....The day started really early. I took the girls to Wal-Mart to order Eva's cake (another off the list) and I finally bought a huge bucket for all the toys in the living room. Then we went to lunch at a Chinese restaurant. When we got home, we started a huge cleaning project. We cleaned and rearranged Eva's room. Put together her new bed. Moved her bed where the fouton was, moved the fouton to the living room for her party next weekend, but I don't know what we're going to do with it after that. I also folded and put away about 10 loads of laundry.

The carpet cleaners are coming today, so yay, when I get home I get to finish picking up everything off the floor. I'm sore from yesterday, the thought of going home and working more is not pleasant. Then later tonight after the carpet people are done, I have to go shopping to get the girls Christmas outfits. Eva's school is doing Christmas portraits Tuesday morning and I called the photographer and asked if Lauren and Maria could be in the picture too. She said that was fine with her if it was ok with the school. They said it was ok, so I have to do that tonight. Also on Tuesday the phone people are coming to switch out all our cable and internet from the cable company's coaxial cable to the phone comany's fiber optic lines. It's supposed to be superior and we'll be getting a ton more services for about $10 less per month. The cable has gone down 3 times in the last 2 weeks so when it went out Friday that was the last straw.

Ok, I'll stop rambling! I just have so much going on and I'm kinda freaking out, if you couldn't tell :)

Evil Forwards

I can't stand forwarded emails. I don't care if my leg falls off if I don't forward an email to 10 people. I'm not going to muck up their inboxes with crap. (HINT HINT to people that forward me stuff LOL) This was something I ran across today that I actually liked.

A TRUE FRIEND
Are you sick of all those sissy "friendship" poems that always sound like Hallmark cards, and never come close to reality?Well, here is a series of promises that really speak to true friendship:

1. When you are sad - I will help you get drunk and plot revenge against the sorry bastard who made you sad.
2. When you are blue - I will try to dislodge whatever is choking you.
3. When you smile - I will know you've finally had sex again.
4. When you are scared - I will rag on you about it every chance I get.
5. When you are worried-I will tell you horrible stories about how much worse it could be and tell you to quit whining.
6. When you are confused - I will use little words.
7. When you are sick - stay the hell away from me until you are well again,I don't want whatever you have.
8. When you fall - I will point and laugh at your clumsy ass, but I will help you up.

This is my oath...I pledge it till the end. Why, you ask? Because you are my friend.

Ha ha ha ha

Geaux Tigers!!

I'm so excited for this weekend's game! It should be a really great game. Whenever LSU plays Alabama it's a big deal because it's a huge rivalry, but both teams are ranked in the Top Ten so that makes it even better. My grandmother used to hate Alabama so much. She swore they cheated and she called them Goddamn Alabama like it was all one word. My mom said that she didn't realize until she was 8 or 9 that it wasn't one word.

I saw my doctor this morning and he increased my medicine without me having to kick his ass. I just told him I didn't think I was at the right dosage and he was just like Ok, we'll increase it, no problem. And Lord bless the man he let me start taking birth control again. Last time my blood pressure went through the roof and I had to stop taking it. This morning it was 100/70 so he said that because it was so low that even if my BP does go up, I have a lot more leeway than I did last time. He also prescribed a different kind. AND, if wasn't wonderful enough already LOL He told me to just keep taking it continuously rather than taking the iron pills so I don't have to have my period. (sigh) I'm so happy today.

And to make my day just as good as can be, James took off work today. I talked to him earlier and he was at the grocery store. So that means I'm not going to have to do that this weekend. Plus, I know when I get home he'll have cooked supper and if I'm really lucky, he may have even cleaned the house.

And on top of ALL that, there's a stitch night at my LNS tonight. I may or may not be able to go, we'll have to see about that one.

It's a good day all around!

I've got fear in my heart

NOT!! LOL Since Katrina there have been obvious gang issues, Baton Rouge gangs, New Orleans gangs trying to protect their turf etc. etc. I find it just so ridiculous. The incidents that I find most laughable are those that are occuring at Baker Middle School. Baker is where they've set up a huge FEMA trailer park so there are a large number of New Orleans kids going there. Well I guess the Baker kids are a little resentful that they're there. So the school has apparently broken up into two "gangs". The 504 boys and the 225 boys. 504 is the NO area code and 225 is the BR area code. So all the gang graffitti has 504 and 225 in it. I'm sorry, but if I were part of a gang or some other entity whose intent was to inspire fear in my enemies, I'd have a way scarier name than the 504 boys or something like that. I'd be like The Hilary Clintons or the Ebola Virus. Anyway, all this came out because someone found a loaded gun clip at the school. No gun, just a gun clip. So everyone is freakin' out all worried about an impending gang war amongst MIDDLE SCHOOL kids. I can so see how this happened. This was probably an extra clip that some kid got his hands on and brought it to school to show off, yes, I know that means he could probably get his hands on a gun, but he didn't.

On a related note, there's a big controversy brewing about a trailer park that they're considering setting up on a place called The Island on False River in New Roads. This is causing a big uproar over in New Roads because it's just the stupidest idea ever. New Roads itself is a very small town. They have a little tiny hospital, a Wal-Mart, and a Piggly Wiggly and a Dairy Queen and that's pretty much it. They've got no public transportation and no large employers anywhere near by. Most of the people who live in that area (most of my inlaws) are either farmers or they work in Baton Rouge which is like 45 minutes away. So they're planning on dumping all these people who have no transportation in a place where there's nowhere to go, nothing to do, and pretty much zero job opportunity (not that that's a huge issue apparently). The owner of the land is offering the land to FEMA because he and his wife feel like it's the Christian thing to do. My thought was that he was going to get a pretty hefty chunk of money for doing that, probably some huge tax deduction, and his previously undeveloped piece of property was going to get developed for him for free. So pardon me if I feel like he's probably got other reasons for doing it.

All that said, a friend of mine and I have found the ideal business. A lot of the evacuees have been complaining that there aren't any convenience stores within walking distance of many of the parks. So we're going to start a beer truck. Like an ice cream truck. We figured we could stock it with beer, cigarettes, maybe some marijuana, and nudie magazines. If that was legal we'd be rolling in some serious dough LOL

Ok, anyway, Maria apparently had roseola. She broke out in a rash yesterday. She's doing fine. She's back to her normal mischievous self. My Christmas Elf is coming along nicely. I was having serious doubts about some of the colors, but now that I'm almost done with the dress, the colors have come together very nicely. I called around to endocrinologists and found out that the earliest appointment I'm going to get is like February. So I have an appointment with my primary care tomorrow morning and I'm going to have to be a little more forceful with my opinions.

Cranky

Blogger sucks! Gosh! (In my best Napoleon Dynamite voice) It took me all morning to finally get to the Create Post section. No, I haven't watched it lately but something got that movie in my mind and now it's stuck there.

Maria's doing fine. The doctor couldn't find anything wrong with her other than the fever. He said if it doesn't get better to call him back, but it has. However, now she's just really cranky. So is Lauren. They've both been really demanding, but they don't have the skills to communicated exactly what they want. It's very frustrating.

Eva has developed this really annoying habit and I'm determined to quash it. Whenever I tell her no she argues with me and then when I say "I told you no" she always answers back with "I told you yes". Oh my god, it sends me through the roof.

I'm not sleeping again which is also really annoying. If there was a hotel room to rent I'd probably take one to sleep for an afternoon. I might need to find one of those hooker hotels and just pay by the hour or something.

Ooops, it's Wednesday, time for Captain D's! Gotta run!

Deep Thoughts

Was it Deep Thoughts that Jack Handy wrote on SNL? I haven't watched that show in forever. Although, I did watch The Longest Yard yesterday (Adam Sandler/SNL). I thought it was pretty good. Predictable, but entertaining. I haven't seen the original yet so I can't make any comparison. I also watched Dog Town and the Z-Boys. This is a documentary about the rise of the skateboarding culture in the 70s. I watched the Lords of Dogtown last week, so now I'm thoroughly educated on the subject.

Today I'm in search of an endocrinologist. Pregnancy was rough on my body and my thyroid pretty much crapped out after Lauren and Maria. I don't feel like my Primary Care doctor is aggressive enough in treating the situation. So begins my search. I've called two of the approved doctors by my insurance and one has his phone line temporarily disconnected, what the heck does that mean? The other is some really complicated phone tree for the entire hospital. I think I'm going to call the Indian doctor that's in a stand alone office. They always talk about how doctors that are educated in India are more creative than American doctors so maybe he'll be better anyway.

Maria is going to the doctor today. She was still running a fever this morning. It's weird, other than looking tired and burning up, she doesn't seem to be having any other symptoms. She's not even acting like she's sick.

I did make good headway on the Christmas Fairy. The use of hand dyed threads on such a project does add a different dimension to the piece. It's sort of weird because you have to pick what part of the thread you want to work with. And one color is a blended thread. So it looks even more different (is that a phrase?) depending how you line them up. Speaking of the blend, I'm not too keen on it. However, that's often the case, and in the end the designer is nearly always right so I should just trust it.

I guess that's all that's on my mind today

So so weak

I've been waiting for the new Mirabilia Fairy kit to hit my LNS ever since I saw the first picture. I had to have her, she was just so cute. They finally got it in late last week and Saturday they were having a sale so I was able to get it for 20% off which help considerably with the $50 price tag. Which I will say is definately within reason considering the contents of the kit. There's 11 or so Crescent Colors which retail for like $2/ea., a card of Whisper, 2 packs of Mill Hills, a pretty generous cut of fabric and then the chart obviously. It doesn't have a full spool of Kreinik, but it's only used in a little tiny spot and they have just a cut of it, but still that's ok with me.

Anyway, so with all this stitching that I have to do, what do I do? I come home and start it immediately. It'll be a quick stitch. Not a whole lot of color changes. I'm being spurred on by the hope that I can resell what's left over while she's still popular. I think in most colors there will still be a ton of thread (there might be about 3-4 that will be mostly used I think). I'm sure I have the beads in my stash, I know I have the Kreinik, and I have a card of Whisper too. I also swapped out the fabric for Silkweaver's Winter Sky. So, nearly everything would still be included so I just need to decide on a fair asking price.

On the family front, James and I actually went out last night. Just a company dinner, but it was fairly fun anyway. I got the giggles really bad at one point and he couldn't stop laughing either. I thought that was even funnier, because he never laughs out loud.

Maria's sick though, she's running a fever. It was 102 this morning, but she has no other symptoms than looking a little run down and she's a little fussy. So I called the doctor's office and they just said to treat the fever and if it doesn't break before tomorrow morning to bring her in. So that's what we're doing and she's sleeping right now.

Well, I need to stop wasting time and go stitch something. Oooh I do have a happy dance to share, but not until next week (it's a secret until then)!

More to add to the list

Yesterday I had another panic attack, not really, but I realized that my dad, grandfather, and cousin Kate all have birthdays in December. How frustrating is that?? My dad and my grandfather are the two hardest people in the world to come up with gift ideas and I have to get each 2 in a month. My dad buys himself whatever he wants and my grandfather I don't think likes anything. Kate should be easy as she's only 3 weeks older than Eva, but she's a lot different than Eva. She doesn't play with dolls or anything, she's sort of a tomboy I guess, I don't know. Despite my aunt's initial desire to have Kate and Eva be best friends, I try to keep Eva's contact with her somewhat limited. She's really bossy and manipulative (and she's only 3!). I can see her talking Eva (or Lauren or Maria for that matter) in to doing something horrible and Kate getting herself out of it.

Let's see...I finished Shepherd's Bush Happy Birthday kit, only one day! I'm working on making it into a needle roll. I finished the top and bottom edges and I pulled the threads for the ribbon. So tonight I just need to do the seam in the back, threading the ribbons and stuffing. This will be my first actual finished needle roll. Today I'm working on my Mira Border. I got Sandi's Stitcher's Lane RR today so I may do that this weekend. I'm thinking about doing the house from Victoria Sampler's Heirloom Homecoming Sampler. I've been wanting to do that one, but it didn't work on any of the ones I've been working on recently. On a related note, Sherrin emailed me to say that it looks like mine is lost. I guess it was mailed several weeks ago and never showed up at Susan's house. I'm disappointed, but I'm not crushed like I felt when Lynn's RR never showed up at my house. I feel bad that other people did all this work on it and it's maybe gone. I'm undecided about starting it over. I guess if the other participants are willing to do it over, I will. I'll hold out a little hope though, there was a RR in another group that showed up something like 2 months later because it got rerouted to Tortuga or something.

Angi sent me a nice package too! She sent some Gloriana Threads. She sent Fall Foliage, Lavender Ice, Pacific Blue and Deep Blue Sea. Gloriana is my absolute favorite thread. It's like silky butter or something. It's wonderful and the colors are just so beautiful. I might use the Fall Foliage for the VS Heirloom Homecoming House!

I'm freakin out!!

First, let me say Thank You Stasha!! She sent me a lovely package :)

Now, Christmas is going to be here way too soon. I don't have time to do everything I want/need to do. Plus, Eva's birthday is going to be here soon. So, I'm working on a To Do list. And I have started planning, and even started some Christmas shopping. I think I'm going to put my To Do list on my side bar but so far I have...

-Confirm Spacewalk rental with Lindsey's (I can't do that until at least the 4th because someone has reserved it for the day I want it, but as of Tuesday she hadn't paid) It's a really cool one, Disney Princess Castle. I'd link it, but they have a really annoying website.

-Get party supplies for the birthday party, think of some games for the kids to play, find and order a cake (E wants chocolate), and get her birthday present (a new sheet set for her bed, as my parents are buying her a new mattress and box spring)

-Stitch Kate's Christmas Present. I'm going to do another Hinzeit Princess for her. I had ordered an extra one by accident. That should only take a couple of days.

-Finish my Mirabilia Round Robin Layout and my section on it.

-Do more work on my Mother's Tree

-Find and work on something for my grandmother for Christmas. I noticed Patternsonline.com had some new Rooster patterns, so that might work.

-Figure out what I'm going to get for my parents, my sister, my grandfather, aunts, James (although we'll probably do a family gift rather than individual gifts) and anyone else I think of between now and then.

-Dig out the Christmas Cards and get them ready for mailing (I stocked up last year at the after Christmas Sales)

I think that's all I can think of so far....It'll be a constantly changing list I think.

I have started my Christmas shopping for the girls. I ordered several things from Amazon which should be in next week. I got Lauren and Maria the Baby Bratz Twinz, I think those are so perfect for them. And I felt lazy doing this last year, but now I feel pretty good about it. We had to get a fake Christmas tree so the kids wouldn't eat the pine needles. So, last year, I took the more fragile ornaments off and put the entire tree in the garage when Christmas was over. So now this year, I just have to dust it off and put it back in the living room. LOL I'll probably let the girls rearrange it, but otherwise it won't be a huge hassle. Ok...everything will be under control...I just need to calm down.

Actually, the thing that got me riled up in the first place, was Tom Benson (NO Saints owner)...again. He sent an email to the NFL stating that he would not attend any Saints games that take place in Baton Rouge. He would not set foot in Tiger Stadium. He felt like he and his family were threatened. Ummmm hello? He's the one that attacked a camera man and got in a shouting match with a fan. Go! Go now! Good riddance to bad garbage.

Halloween Pictures

Eva as Tinkerbell





















Maria



















Lauren

The longest weekend ever!!

Ok, so Saturday wasn't so bad. I took the girls to the library, which as my mom says immediately qualifies me for Sainthood. LOL It was pretty bad. Then I met a friend of mine and we went to lunch and picked out thread for my Mirabilia Round Robin. LSU won big time so that was good.

Sunday, that extra hour you're supposed to get when you're sleeping, that didn't happen. It happened some time Sunday afternoon. I was so tired I was falling asleep sitting up. I worked on fixing all the Halloween costumes. They're still a little big for Lauren and Maria, but I think it'll be good enough for a few hours of trick or treating. I was really disappointed that Desperate Housewives was a rerun. At least Gray's Anatomy wasn't. I love that show! It was a good episode.

Well, the Saints lost bad in their first Baton Rouge game. It was terrible and there were huge chunks of empty seats. I think the people that were there were to see Nick Sabin coaching in Tiger Stadium again. Apparently, Tom Benson left the game early and knocked down a camera man and got in a fight with a spectator, he's just a moron. Devry Henderson wasn't having a good game and he was an excellent player for LSU so he of all people should have been at home. I'll just blame it on Aaron Brooks. I don't like him that much either.

Oh Eva got her school pictures in.




So I was killing time this morning...




Jolly good, wot! Anyone for tennis? That'll be ten ponies, guv. You're the epitome of everything that is english. Yey :) Hoist that Union Jack!

How British are you?

this quiz was made by alanna

Ewwwwww (I hope I don't look like him...especially my teeth!)



You're Captain Barbossa, or should I say, First-mate Barbossa. Aren't you a little old to be playing pirates? With the Captain's hat seems to come being cruel, mean and cursed. Ah well, better you than Jack.

Which POTC character are you?

this quiz was made by alanna

Do you cluck or do you roar?

this quiz was made by alanna
I thought it was funny that the hobby question included cross stitching with blunt needles because sharp needles are scary. You can still do serious damage with cross stitch needles. I ran one under my fingernail the other day and that hurt for days!

Gummy Bears

You may be smooshie and taste unnatural, but you're so darn cute.

What Kind of Candy Are You?

Your Pimp Name Is...

Silky Glider

What's Your Pimp Name?

Ok...so why is there a picture of a monkey with a gun? Wouldn't a picture of a shark make more sense??

Your Animal Personality

Your Power Animal: Shark Animal You Were in a Past Life: Polar Bear You have a strong character - you are an aggressive, ambitious, go-getter. You were born to lead.

The Animal Personality Test

All About the Numbers

110-120 mph. I finally found a map today that had the wind speeds from Katrina. That's what we experienced at our house. Apparently wind caused more damage than water, which is really hard to believe.

1068. That's the current number of fatalities from Katrina. It's still going up every day. People are returning home to New Orleans and are finding dead people in their houses, which must be really horrifying.

11% That's the current unemployment rate in Louisiana. Which, just further confirms to me that there are a bunch of lazy ass people around here. If you want to work, you can find a job around here. Baton Rouge has help wanted signs EVERYWHERE. I'm not lying or exaggerating when I say nearly every business I go into is seeking some type of help. I was just reading in the Baton Rouge Business Report (one of my favorite magazines) that restaraunts and retail stores have tripled their business and just can't keep up. The evacuees are getting free transportation so that can't be an issue. They just opened a free shuttle from Baton Rouge to New Orleans. Yesterday they had some huge job fair in New Orleans. They're so desperate for people to come back to work. People are all mad about all the Mexicans flooding in to do clean up work, but apparently they're the only people willing to do it. But I guess when you have FEMA paying for your room and board and every other charitable organization taking care of every other need and/or want, you don't need to worry about working.




Jenny, I've been thinking about your question and I really don't know. Somewhere the expectations of FEMA changed. I remember Rush Limbaugh talked about this right after Katrina hit and he was talking about how just several years ago immediate action by FEMA wasn't expected. It would take weeks or even a month or two for FEMA to show up after a disaster. I have this distinct memory of a flooding incident somewhere on the mid-Atlantic seaboard and one of the beer companies stopped bottling beer and started bottling water for all those people. Now, that wouldn't happen, everyone would expect the government to do that. Plus, people don't seem to worry so much or prepare for these things, it's expected that the government is going to take care of you. They were talking about how in Florida people started lining up for ice and water only 6 hours after the hurricane passed (which I'm assuming is true) and people were questioning why they didn't stock up on this sort of thing before the hurricane. I don't know the answer, other than a lot of people just aren't self-reliant anymore. As for response time, I doubt that's changed much. You can't position the rescue effort in the path of the hurricane. It's all the same problems, you have to wait for the water to recede, you have to cut up all the downed trees, make sure the downed power lines aren't live, etc.

Disgusting

That's the new word around the house. Eva learned that word and now uses it liberally to describe everything from her supper to the outfit I picked out for her to the mess on the floor. If it wasn't so funny it'd probably drive me crazy.

She's getting so excited for Halloween and her birthday and Christmas. The next few months are going to be pretty crazy I think. Eva's going to be Tinkerbell for Halloween. I looked and looked and looked for costumes for Lauren and Maria and couldn't find anything. My mom suggested dressing them as a brown blob and a purple blob and call them Peanut Butter and Jelly. I wasn't too keen on that. Finally I walked past the Barbie aisle at Target and they had those Barbie dress up outfits. I got them some of the Fairytopia costumes. They're a little big, but they're pretty cute and better quality than most of the Halloween costumes. This year I went to Sam's to get Halloween candy and got 3 huge bags instead of 2 since we ran out last year. I think we're going to have even more kids this year since we still have a lot of evacuees living around here and I'd bet they don't have a lot to do to entertain the kids.

Apologies in advance to Kristen and any of my other Florida friends, but Louisiana is feeling a little bit of Karmic Justice right now. After Katrina, and to a lesser degree, Rita, all these people in Florida (particularly Jeb) kept talking about what a bunch of loser idiots we were in Louisiana because we don't know how to handle a hurricane and how they were soooo prepared and nearly experts in how to handle such a catastrophe. Well, well, well, what do you know? No water, no ice, no gas, no elecricity, lack of phone service, different agencies not being able to communicate, dumbasses that didn't/wouldn't/couldn't evacuate. Anyway, so I think there were a lot of people offended by the comments (which I think were really political but a lot of people took them personally) and now are feeling a little better today.

Who Turned Off the Heat??

I've turned into such a baby about being cold. This morning it was 36 degrees and was freezing half to death. And of course I have a cold. I always get a cold whenever the temperature drops really fast.

And where the heck did October go?? I can blame the loss of September to Katrina, but October went by alarmingly fast too. November and December always go by fast so next thing I know it's going to be the first of next year. sigh

Yesterday my car ignition thingy broke. I was sitting outside a contractors office and couldn't turn the key to start the car. So I did the turning the wheel thing, made sure my car was in park, my emergency brake was off, etc. Still nothing. So I called my dad, my uncle, my grandfather, the car dealership, and a locksmith. None of which could help me. The locksmith did tell me to call Pop-A-Lock. So, I did that, and voila! After waiting for two hours he showed up, fixed it in about 10 minutes and only charged about a 1/3 of what the dealership estimated. So I used that two hours to alternatively nap and stitch. It was pretty nice LOL

The Kentwoood Water guy told us that you can now go down to New Orleans and drive around and see what you can see. I hope to maybe go down this weekend. I've been hearing about all the decorated refrigerators so maybe I can get some pictures. I guess people have been painting and wrapping the refrigerators that are awaiting pickup. My grandparents went down last weekend and they were saying it was probably going to take years just to pick up all the trash. Apparently the trash piles are higher than many of the buildings. There was this guy at Sam's last week that was saying he was a dump truck driver and since Katrina he's made $97,000 just hauling debris. He said he was working 18 hour days and back and forth all day every day. I didn't think to ask where they were taking all that stuff. Here's a rather morbid graphic of where the dead were found in New Orleans.

Trash pick up outside of New Orleans is still a big problem. At home ours seems like it's back on track, but in Baton Rouge it's obviously not. You still see tons of really overflowing dumpsters. At work we finally paid a passing garbage truck to come get ours.

I think most things are getting back to normal. People who can move back to New Orleans have and those who can't seem to have settled down elsewhere. Traffic is much better. There doesn't seem to be that sense of panic everywhere. The grocery store is mostly stocked now. There does seem to be some random things in short supply. Especially toiletries for some reason. Those aisles at the store always seem to be nearly empty. And kitty litter. I don't know if that's used for some kind of cleaning or something, but kitty litter is hard to find.

Well I suppose I should go and actually work or something....

Traffic Cop

I found this via Kelley's blog. This is one of those really bad funny blogs (there are some adult pictures in it so be warned.

Traffic Cop

An Uneventful Weekend

Ok is anyone else having trouble with Blogger and getting to the page where you add your post? I've been having trouble getting it to open.

Friday, James and I had lunch together which was nice. We went to an Indian Restaurant, which is a testament to my love for him. LOL I just don't like it. We've been several times and I've been brave, but just can't find anything I like.

Saturday we just kinda fooled around. We played outside with the kids, then went to Sonic for lunch. Then we took them to the playground near our house. They were so dirty by time we got back home.

Saturday night we tried to watch the LSU game at my parents house, but Eva was being really bad so I took her back home. We finished watching it at home. What a nail biter!! I was just thrilled that they won again! After the game ended someone started running up and down the street yelling. I was ok with that. Then the people that live in the trailer across the bayou took their party outside which probably wouldn't be too bad, but the acoustics of the huge expanse between their house and ours magnifies the noise somehow. Then after they quiet down I realize someone is playing rap music really loud. I couldn't even figure out which house it was coming from. It was mildly irritating, but I was watching a movie (Van Helsing) so I couldn't hear it unless I got up.

Sunday, more of the same, just cleaning, lunch and grocery shopping. We did do some fall clothing shopping for Eva. She looked so grown up this morning. I was so thankful I bought so many clothes for her when she was a baby. Lauren and Maria are all set for pants and jeans and a few sweaters. I'm going to get them some new shirts though so they don't have to wear all hand me downs.

It got cold over the weekend. It was like 90 Friday afternoon and today at noon it's only 53. And it's WINDY. I got out of the car a little while ago and everything blew out of my arms when I opened the door. I felt like a fool chasing everything down.

Stitching wise it was a pretty good weekend. I finished the tree on Mother's Tree. I started the first name. 1580 Renee Courtin. I got to the u in Courtin. I think the names might go fairly quickly.

If anyone is curious how I managed to go back so far, it wasn't through a huge amount of my own work. My great aunt had started the family tree and she had done a great deal of work including press clippings and pictures many generations back. However, she was doing the entire family tree and I was trying to get just the mother line. So I used her material as much as I could. Then I hit Ancestry.com. What an excellent resource! Between that website (and some of the people I corresponded with from that website), the resources of the geneaology department at the Bluebonnet Libaray, and all the people who tracked the Acadians exiled from Canada, I was able to get the names of all these women. I hit a wall because Renee Courtin was born in France and either I would have physically go to France to search old church records or hire someone to do it. Neither of which were very affordable. Anyway, I worked it backwards and forwards several times over many months so I'm fairly comfortable that my information is correct.

I was bad and I started Doro Theos (thanks Marjean and Anita!) this weekend. I changed the colors from the recommended blue, pink, and purple to red, green and gold. I'm stitching it on Silkweaver's Purely Primitive. I'm a little iffy about how the gold looks on that fabric, but the gold thread has a very slight greenish cast, the fabric has a slight greenish cast, and then I have a green thread next to it. So I think it'll work. I need to stop stressing about these things. I've never had anyone say that they hate my fabric choice so I don't know why I worry about it so much.

I guess that's about it. Although, I do have something sort of trivial and random on my mind. I just heard that "officials" (whoever that may be) believe that most of the cars used in car bombs in Iraq are cars stolen off the streets of the United States. How would so many stolen cars get over there? I could understand if they were stolen from say Saudi Arabia or something, but it seems like it'd be awfully difficult not to mention costly to transport so many cars overseas.

It's pretty quiet around here

There's not much going on around here. I've been stitching like a crazy woman trying to catch up with everything. I finished Hinzeit's Princess Mini Block. It's stitched on Silkweaver's Rock-A-Bye Opalescent Lugana. Instead of using the Needle Necessity thread required I used DMC 603. I also finished a Round Robin that was killing me. I hated it so much. It's that Alphabet one with my stitching group and the pattern chosen was Cricket Collection's Christmas Alphabet. I stitched O,P,Q. I don't think I posted this on here, but I also finished my section on Crystal's Band Sampler Round Robin. The color is a little washed out in that picture, but it's really pretty and it's going to be gorgeous when it's done. So now I'm working on Marilyn's Stitcher's Lane RR and I hope to finish that up today. Then I'm going to go back to working on my Mother's Tree. I really want to finish the tree maybe this weekend. I'm pretty close to being done with that part. Then I'm going to need to start with the names, which is going to be quite the challenge. I think I was able to go back 16 generations.

I just saw a pattern I HAVE to get. Isn't Love Song gorgeous?? I just broke down and ordered Rhapsody in Blue and now they come out with another one?? I just love love love the border.


I just heard this on the radio...it cracked me up

Tom Benson if you move the Saints
After all this State has been through
Read between our cajun fingers,
This bird is for you.

I can't stand Tom Benson, I hate that the State is fast tracking the renovation of the Superdome when housing in New Orleans is still in limbo, just so he doesn't move the Saints. Let the go!! Seriously, no tears would be shed around here. I always thought this was another one of those New Orleans vs. the rest of the State things. There was a salesman yesterday in our office who said most of New Orleans is happy to let them move too. So if nobody cares? Why is there all this hysteria that they might move now that they have an opening in their contract that would let them move? There's some sort of disaster clause that would allow them to leave and Katrina would fit the bill. Benson has always wanted to move to San Antonio, they're playing most of their home games there, and SA wants them. So what's the deal? Just go! It would save the State millions of dollars every year. Money that might actually get spent on schools instead...what a novel concept! Hmm...apparently Nagin wants the Saints to stay and the owner to go. That could work too I guess. Benson is the one that causes all the problems.

I've requested my recall Blanco petition. I haven't gotten it yet, and I don't know if I'm going to sign it when I do get it. I'm so severely disappointed in her on so many levels. My most serious beef with her is her new Rebuild Louisiana Commission or whatever it's called. The Governor of Mississippi hired the 10 Ten Urban Planners in the country to give their $.02. What does Blanco do? Appoint a bunch of politicians and political hacks. There isn't a single urban planner, architect, engineer in the whole bunch. She has just insured that not a single penny of any federal help is going to be put to any good. I almost hope they don't approve that aid package.

Anyway, I guess that's about all. I do have this picture of Lauren that I think is so cute. Those are her new pajamas and she loves those glasses.

Weekend Update

We had a pretty good weekend. The weather was gorgeous.

Saturday morning my mom took Eva to a local nursery that was having pony rides. She took some pictures (which again I'm having trouble uploading). I think she had a really good time.

Saturday afternoon was LSU Football. It was a really great game and I was so happy that they won.

Sunday we went to the in-laws house. It was pretty nice. The weather was nice and she always cooks really good food. We spent the afternoon picking pecans. Maria preferred acorns so there were a lot of acorns mixed in. We all got so dirty. They had burned their cane field earlier in the week so we were all sooty. But now my mom has a bunch of pecans for all her holiday cooking.

Do you realize that Christmas is only about 2 months away??

Weekend Update and Other Things

Well, this is probably more than just the weekend.

Lauren and Maria had their 18 month check up. They're doing really good. The nurse measured them as having an inch difference in height, which I don't believe. They only had about a one pound difference in weight which surprised me, because Lauren feels so much heavier than Maria. Anyway, Maria was in the 50th percentile for height and the 25th for weight. Lauren in the 90th percentile for height (that's where that one inch difference came in) and the 50th for weight. Anyway, for preemies, they're doing great. They've finally figured out the talking thing and seem to pick up several new words every day.

Something weird was going on with them this week. They kept breaking out in these bumps. It wasn't really a rash, but it looked like small clusters of blisters. Anyway, Lauren first broke out right before we went to the doctor, but by time we got there, they were gone. I figured it was just bug bites or something. Then at the doctor she got a bunch across her face. He gave her some antihistimines and she was fine. The next day she broke out again. And so did Maria. As quickly as they'd show up though, they'd be gone. We decided it must be something outside, because in all the instances they had just gone outside. But Friday I let them play outside with no problem. Saturday and Sunday they were outside with no problems either. They haven't had any breakouts since then either.

Eva's doing great. She's getting to be more popular than us. We went to dinner one night and there was this little girl there that she knew. Then we went to the zoo Saturday and there was a girl there she knew.

She has picture day Tuesday. I got her the cutest little dress. She tried it on and she looked like a little lady. I can't wait to see the pictures.

Work, is just unbelievably busy. It's a combination of my sister leaving and the hurricane aftermath. We have just so much work. More just keeps coming. I imagine once all the debris and buildings get torn down, our work load will just keep increasing.

Speaking of debris, one of the lingering effects of the hurricanes is that we haven't had trash pick up in weeks. The trash people can't keep up. So we have all this trash and nothing to do with it. We don't have dumps where you can go and take your own trash. I guess since we live outside of any city limits we could burn it, but I don't think I'm ready to resort to that yet, although, some of our neighbors have. We have private contract garbage, in Baton Rouge, you don't have a choice, but where we live there is an alternative and they've been able to keep up, even though they've been working what must be really long hours. I know they start at about 4 am and they've been hitting our neighborhood at about 8 pm. So, if ours doesn't get picked up I'm going to call our service and see what the deal is and if they don't come I'm going to switch.

So this weekend we went to the Zoo. I was rather disappointed. The Baton Rouge Zoo seriously pales in comparison to the New Orleans Zoo, but we were thinking that some of the animals were evacuated to the Baton Rouge Zoo so there might be more animals there. That wasn't the case. I don't see why they bother keeping it open. Less than half the exhibits have animals in them.

Saturday night we watched LSU. It wasn't a really exciting game. I knew LSU was going to win so I just read instead. I should have been stitching, but I just haven't been in the mood for that.

Sunday we just went out to lunch and grocery shopping.

Anyway, I guess that's about all. I do have a whole topic about embarassment and the many levels that I'm embarassed for my state. Maybe I'll get around to that tomorrow.