Today we had a very nice lunch at my mothers house. She cooked my very very favorite meal. Rolls of beef with red cabbage and potatos.....yummmiiiiieeeeh :-)

I made a nice progress on Winter Snapperland last night. :-)

Tonight Manuela phoned up and told that she want to stitch on Winter Snapperland tonigt. And as usual it wasn't hard to persuade myself to take mine out of one of my WIP-boxes :-)

This is where I start tonight...oh no, the pic is a bit older the outlines of the house are stitched already.

We had a very nice Christmas Eve yesterday. My mother in law and my mother came for dinner...a very early dinnner because we wanted Lisa to be with us. Though, she was really tired from handing out the presents earlier in the afternoon :-)

After dinner I took out my Hearts and Flowers by Carriage House Samplings. Carol, one of my favorites as well :-)

And it would be great to do a Deftly Wrought SAL in 2007 with you! I'm looking forward to this one :-)

Back in the "blogging-mode" ?!?!?!

Hello and Merry Christmas to all my blogging friends :-)
First of all I want to thank you very much for your caring words concerning my fathers death. Your mail, emails and comments meant so much to me!

During the past two months I didn't stitch a lot. Lately I started something new to get back into stitching and it seems as if it works right now :-) It is a lovely desing by Carriage House Samplings. I will scan it later on. Now Lisa is in bed and as we are having a very old scanner he's really loud... so I will have to wait till she got up.

I just changed to Beta-Version but it seems not to be much different....does it?

My beloved Dad passed away this morning in hospital. I will miss him so much....Daddy, I love you so much!!!!
Lieber Papa, ich hab dich so lieb und wir vermissen dich so sehr.....



Dear Outi, I received your wonderful parcel. Thank you so much!! It was a little light in the dark of the past weeks. I will write to you within a few days. Please, don't be angry with me...we had a hard time.

Gingerbread Garden Sampler finished :-)

Yesterday in the evening I sewed on the little pearls. Now it needs to be pressed and than I am going to send it to Anja. She makes a winter and christmas show in her shop on october the 14th and asked me to send it to her. Im so pleased that she wants to show my bellpull :-))))

Last weekend (friday till monday) we spent in Berlin. It was the marathon weekend. We were 10 persons from our sportsgroup that travelled there by train. Due to my dad beeing in hospital in summer for such a long time I wasn't be able to run the whole distance. I knew this before starting but I paid the fee so I wanted to run a few kilometres at least. It was a big fun.



The wee one ;-) on the left is me. Right to me is DH.






DH in front of a Berlin Marathon poster.











We stayed at Hotel Gates and I can just recommend this Hotel to you. It's really good! On Sunday evening I visited Gabriele a fellow stitcher living in Berlin :-) We had a nice evening in her craftroom....

We short-termed decided to do a short holiday at the Baltic Sea to make our automobile camper safe for the winter on the campground. The campground will be closing this year on October the 15th and checking our calendar we realized there was no other possibility for us to go there than from September 7th till 15th. And so we did :-) As usual we had a great time there. I even managed to meet Kathi and Sonja-Maria two fellow stitchers living in this area. We had a very nice afternoon chatting and eating in a very good Italian restaurant. And of course, we showed each other some of our WIP's :-)
As you can see on the pics we had nice wheather. Sorry, the pics are a bit dark. I don't know why...







Here are some pictures showing Lisa on the playground. That day was the coldest. On nearly every other day we were able to wear a T-shirt and shorts.

Carol , I would love to stitch Deftly Wrought as a SAL with you. When do you think we should start stitching on this one? Do you prefer to finish one of your other SAL's first?

Last week Manuela visited me from thursday to Saturday. We had planned to stitch on Catherine Agnes. But when Manuela was here she offered to stitch 5 squares on DT's Sampler Gameboard and I'll have to finish her Catherine Agnes. And as usual I was persuaded by hee :-) .
The next sunday progress pics on Sampler Gameboard can be visited on Manuelas blog.
This is my CA:



















And this one is Manuela's CA:



















During the past week I made a bit of progress on this Christmas Sampler. I changed the colors to the traditional red. The original used a variety of rose shades.

Blogger didn't allow me to tell the complete story yesterday..... About half an hour later after stitching a bit more, I went upstairs doing a bit of homework. Hubby had to take care of Lisa, about a quater of an hour later he shouted that I should better come down because Lisa made some mess with my stitching.... :-( She found some scissors as well and this was what it was looking like then:




I cut another piece of linen and started again the same evening. I had to restitch the ruined piece and use the threads again because there are not so many threads in VS's accessory packs.
Now I have the new one stitched as much as the first one was when Lisa got it in her little hands.
Cindy, yes, I have seen the freebie pattern and I like it very much. Maybe I'll stitch it some time as well.

I started Gingerbread Garden Sampler by Victoria Sampler saturday in the evening. And this is what it looked like sunday in the afternoon:

Birthday Gift and House Exchange

I received a lovely belated birthdaygift from Carol. She sent me the chart "Deftly Wrought" by Midsummer Night Designs. And I like it so much. I never heard of MND before but I will look for more of their designs. :-) She also sent the needed fabric for it. You spoilt me so much.....Thank you very much, Carol!!!!!



And I received even more wonderful things..... My House exchange with SBEBB was in the mail. Paula was my exchange partner. She sent this wonderful pillow and and piece of fabric she used for the back. So I can make a companion house pillow for myself ;-) There was a nice chart by Drawn Thread with it as well. It’s one of my favorites. Thank you so much, Paula. I love the things you’ve sent me!!!!















I just found out that my exchange partner Karoline got hers as well. This is what I stitched for her:

It’s called 1831 Pincushion by The Goode Huswife. But I made a few changes :-)

Finally I put the backstitches in the chimney. It took nearly 2 hours ....though you can't even see them, they are there ;-)

. 


This is how the complete ABC is looking now.



The next one to stitch on it is Manuela. We are going to meet each other next week when she's back from her holidays. We want to visit our (not so) Local Needleworkshop. Maybe I can find a nice frame for my Quaker Garden. ;-)






This is the other project I put some stitches in. I started this one a few weeks ago and plan to stitch every month a little piece on it.

In my last post I missed to thank CathyL, Cathy, Carol, Moune, Annemiek and Lynn for their caring words about my dad. They meant so much to me!!!! Thank you!

I'm so happy I had some time yesterday to get out my Sampler Gameboard and put some stitches on it. Not much progress....better less than nothing:

 


I can't wait to see Cathy's Sampler Gameboard. Cathy, are there still some more people stitching on this one with us?

Dad is still in hospital. And I'm going to visit him in the afternoon.
Today in the morning DH brought Lisa to her granny (his mom) and we both went out for a run with some friends. I'm not as fit as a fiddle and so I took a shortcut and ran only 10km instead as the others 30km. When Dereks comes home we are going to pick up Lisa at her granny and having lunch together.
Now I'm back home way earlier, had a shower, made a cup of cappuccino and bowl of soup and heading off for my sofa to do some stitches on DT's Sampler Gameboard....lucky me :-)
 

We had - and still are having - a very busy time...

After my dad's endocarditis was under control the doctors diagnosed him with cancer of the colon :-( He was operated 3 days later (one day after his 71st birthday).... he was in a very, very bad condition but he slowly got better. 2 weeks later, over a 5 days period he got every day chemotherapy. On july the 21st after 5 weeks in hospital I could pick him up and bring him back home to my mom. It was a wonderful day!!!!
On july the 26th I celebrated my 34th birthday. Dad wasn't be able to participate because he still was a bit weak. The next day on mum's birthday, Lisa and I visited my parents just before lunch and Dad asked me to drive him to the doc because he didn't feel very well. I went to the phone to call the doctor to let him know but when I got out on the terrace again I realised that Dad's condition worsed so much that I wasn't be able to get him into the car any more. I called the ambulance vehicle and a few minutes later I had to call them again to come more speedy. It was terrible! Within 20 minutes his condition changed from feeling "not so good" to not recognizing my mom and me....
Now he is still in hospital. He is much better again but not good. I do hope so much to have him back home soon.... My poor beloved Dad.
You see there wasn't much stitching time for me visiting Dad twice per day in hospital...

Yesterday we went to hospital in the afternoon and I had no appointment in the morning...I just had to do some houswork and could spent the rest of time playing with Lisa and stitching ;-)



Today Lisa and I go to her toddlers group and in the afternoon we`re going to visit my dad again.

Thank you so much for your kind words to my dad's health problems. Unfortunately they told us today that they think there must be more than that. But they don't know what it can be by now.... :-(

Last sunday I stitched 2 squares and two letters. So this is what my Gameboard Sampler looks like now:



During our holiday I stitched my third A Prairie Christmas Ornament. I like stitching these small Prairie Schooler pieces very much. They are a quick fun stitch.

















All the cross stiching on the chimney on Ilse's ABC RR is done but I forgot the instructions for the backstitches so I have to do them now at home.














And here is an update of another big fun project. Catherine Agnes by Indigo Rose. It's a bit tricky but entertaining :-)

And last but not least an update on MTM. BUT as you see I really didn't stitch much on this one. I just put the missing stitches in part 1 and filled most of the arches of part 2.

 

Back home again :-)

We had a great time and a lot of sun and fun :-) Searching for a nice pic to post I realize that we took only very few pictures. This one is Lisa and me one morning in our caravan in bed ;-) She looks so happy that's why I choosed it.



When we got home my mom waited for us to tell that my dad's in hospital. He is having an inflammtion in his heart. That's what kept me busy from coming home till now :-( But he is a bit better now...... All my thoughts are with him.

Of course I found some time for stitching as well. I started and finished Quaker Garden by Blackbird Designs. I fell in love with this design when I saw it on Donna's and Carol's blog.














Of course I spent every sunday stitching on DT's Sampler Gameboard. I'm very nosy how much Cathy's Gameboard grew ;-)















I'm going to tell and show some more pictures tomorrow because blogger makes uploading pics a bit difficult tonight.

Goodbye :-)

Now I'm switching off the computer and we're leaving tomorrow for a 3 weeks vacation to the Baltic Sea.
Cathy, I worked on the Sampler Gameboard on sunday but no new pic now. Of course, I'll work on it on sundays during our holiday and I'll show a picture when we are back home.

Hopefully, I'll have to show some more stitching pics then :-)))

Have a good time my dear friends :-)

And this is the second exchange I received last week while having this bad cold. It arrived two days after Outi's mail. I think it was thursday. It's Melanie's Exchange from PattiNH. Thank you so much to Patti. Isn't it just stunning? I really love this finishing technique and hope Patti will let me know how it is called. And the Chart she added....WOHOOO!!! It was on wishlist :-)))) You really spoilt me! Thank you so much!



And a big sorry to Outi for writing Outi from Norway.... of curse, it isn't Norway but FINLAND!!!! Land-of-Lordi :-)))
When I wrote the post there was a little voice in my head telling me that I made a mistake but I didn't find it....

While I had this very bad cold last week I received two wonderful exchanges. The first one in the mail was from dear Outi from Norway. For sure you remember that she's my adoptee with the SBEBB's Adopt a Stitcher program. She stitched this oh so lovely scissors fob for me. Thank you so much ! I really love it :-) She spoilt me so...... she as well sent a chart and the needed linen band, a card making set and a very springy colored linen called Spring ;-) Thank you so much for this wonderful gift! It was the second mail I received from Outi and I can tell you I'm so glad with Outi being my adoptee :-)))))

Hello, it's me again :-) Thank you Cathy and Carol for your thoughts. I was so much on the way since my last post. On Tuesdays and Thursdays Lisa and me were off to the toddlers group and nearly every of the other workdays one mom and her little boy visited us.
DH and I signed up for Berlin Marathon in september and now I'm struggling to find some time for stitchng beneath gardening and running....
Last Sunday I wrote a long post in a word document to put it up when finished. I didn't hit the save button and when DH was on the computer during my absence he made a mistake deleted it. I wasn't able to get it back *grrrr *
I stitched a bit on GBS the 2 last sundays:



And I finished the second one of A Prairie Christmas Ornaments by Prairie Schooler. This should have been finished since february.... Actually you can not see the thread from star to star this is just visual on the scan.


















And I started the 3rd one: