Looking Back and Looking Forward

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO THE BLOG!

Living the Good Life blog began a year ago today on June 19, 2010. As I wrote my first post on the blog, I was in the midst of stitching Bridezilla in the Halloweenie series, I had just met Paula Deen, and Andrew and Anna had only been married two weeks. I have Andrew to thank for encouraging me to start a blog. He knew I would enjoy sharing my enjoyment of stitching with people of a like mind. And I have - more than I ever imagined! The blogisphere has been a very friendly place this last year! I appreciate all of you who have stopped by the blog and followed my progress on various projects. Whether you have commented or not, your presence has been noted and I thank you.  I finished quite a few projects since June of 2010. The Halloweenies Home Study was completed not to mention the Noel Canvas and the Fall Trees. There's a lot to look forward to this year as well - the Creepy Characters from Needle Deeva and Robin King and, in the fall, the Melissa Shirley Christmas banner from Amy Bunger. Hope you will continue to stop by the blog to see what I'm working on next!

If not for the blog's birthday, I might have started out this post with "It was a dark and stormy night...". We have had two nights this week that were dark and stormy. Wednesday night was particularly bad with very damaging winds. Many trees were lost around my neighborhood but, fortunately, I escaped any damage - only nine hours without electricity. Last night was a different story as another storm barreled through the area. I woke up this morning to find one of the heavy wooden double doors on my garden shed hanging by one hinge. One more thing to add to my growing list of jobs for a handyman. Just wish I had a handyman!

On the stitching front this week, I spent an afternoon working on the Queen's ruffled collar. It's a little "over the top" but, then, what isn't on the Queen? Jill emailed from Amy's to let me know that the gold ribbon for the Queen's sleeves had finally arrived so everything is coming together for a big finish for Her Majesty.

I also found time to work on Peony Collage and finished up all of the boxes. 

The only difficult part of this project so far is the counting! Now that the foundations are laid, I look forward to filling in the boxes with interesting patterns. My only problem is that the main thread is back-ordered but I will start a search for it this week to see if I can find it elsewhere.

I had planned to start working on "Keep Calm and Carry On" during April, but here we are inching towards the end of June and I am just now starting it. Back in April, Amy gave me a wonderful stained glass pattern to work as the background. I gave the pattern a try but quickly realized that there was so much compensation involved that it would hardly do it justice. 

So, I switched gears and went in search of another pattern. I found what I was looking for in an old Maggie Lane book. She calls the pattern "Flat Stitch with Diamond Cross Filler". The flat stitch uses Splendor and the diamond cross filler will use Kreinik braid and/or Petite Very Velvet. I'm finding the nice, flat lavender stitches to be very soothing - appropriate for this canvas, don't you think?

Guess who's vacationing in San Francisco? Dev L. Mann and Sarcoph A. Gus. They've gone to see Marlene who will complete their finishing. That just leaves Dr. Acula and W. Herr Wolff and they are anxious for their turn to visit with Marlene. Halloween will be here before we know it. This was evident to me as I walked through Hobby Lobby yesterday and saw the Fall garlands and wreaths hanging in the floral department. At least the Christmas decorations had not been put out - yet!

I'm looking forward to an afternoon of watching the US Open and getting lots of stitching accomplished. Hope you have an enjoyable afternoon planned as well!

I've got to go now - there's a cupcake calling my name! Happy Birthday to my blog!