Picnic Prep

I haven't picked up my needle this week after finishing Beach Cottage. Instead I've been preparing for our annual company picnic that we're hosting this Sunday afternoon. That means shopping for prizes and filling the children's gift tote box, so I've been to all the local bargain stores -TJ Maxx, Tuesday Morning, Target, Marshalls, Home Goods, Costco - finding lots of goodies and supplies for the picnic.

We'll be meeting at our Yakima manager's home as she has a pool, and the kids really enjoyed using her pool last year. Famous Dave's will be providing the food, and we'll have our traditional frozen t-shirt contest, watermelon eating contest, and Mexican bingo for the employees, plus corn hole, badminton, and water volleyball. Temps promise to be right around 90 degrees F., so great for pool activities!

Some of the prizes and gifts for the kids

We're looking forward to lots of fun on Sunday!

I've been thinking of the next wip to bring out and have decided to work on Red Velvet Inscription.

My version is very subtle, low contrast in comparison to other versions I've seen. But I'm enjoying it - my first project on 40 ct fabric!

And I'm considering a new start, so I'll talk about that with you once I've decided and pulled together all the supplies.

Last nite after work, Gary and I decided to visit a winery in a newly developing, old part of Kennewick. On Thursday evenings Palencia Winery stays open later and brings in music and a food truck. I've been wanting to get down there as the city is renewing this part of downtown with the wine village and now they've begun work on improving the landscape and adding parking, a public square, and a food truck cluster. It's located right next to the Columbia River by the picturesque cable bridge so an ideal place to attract people to spend some time relaxing with great wine and food!

We chose to enjoy our meal on the patio as the musician in the tasting room was on the loud side. Just as well, as the evening was beautiful and we could still hear the music outside. And best of all Palencia has a frose machine - yum!!

Well that about does it for this update, friends. I hope you all have a great weekend!

That Didn't Take Long!

Beach Cottage is finished! I'm trying to figure out why I put it away when I was so close to a finish, but most Victoria Sampler designs are what I like to call fiddly. Below is a snippet from the pamphlet that I made a working copy from. As I work my way through the design, I mark out the verbiage, as well as marking my progress on the chart. At some point, I get a little burned out on the backstitching here and there, color changes, etc. and I move on to a simpler design. But I always come back.

Beach Cottage by Victoria Sampler
stitched on 32 ct Frozen Fractals by Hand-Dyed Fabrics by Stephanie
using the VS accessory pack

I come back because the payoff is so sweet!

Wanna Stitch?

The last time I picked up a project was in April at the Victoria Sampler retreat in Sidney, BC. And before that I did very little since before the holidays. I just wasn't feeling like stitching. Part of me was dealing with the fact that my last daughter was getting married, and not only that, but she decided to share an apartment with friends for her last months as a single. All very understandable and even wonderful, but it left me with that empty nest that just had to sink in and then adjust to. I must have turned a corner the last few days as my bag full of projects came to mind, and the one calling to me is Beach Cottage by Victoria Sampler.

One reason I thought of this project must be the fact that the summer heat is finally turning on with temps well into the 100s for the next few days, so thoughts of the beach are especially lovely right now. There's not much left to finish Beach Cottage, just a lot of fiddly, detailed stitching that eats lots of time, but really does bring the design to life. So I'll plug away on this for awhile and see how much I can get done.

Looking forward to my first stitchy weekend in a long while!! I hope you enjoy yours too!

Event of the Year

At the beginning of the year, my youngest daughter got engaged to a terrific young man, Noah Farris. After much consideration, June 23 was their chosen date. I really wasn't eager to plan a quick June wedding thinking that we would have a hard time finding rentals and vendors. Much to my surprise, and their delight, June 23 was available for all the vendors we wanted.

We also decided we wanted an informal, fun wedding and reception. There's no place like home for feeling comfortable - in this case my oldest daughter's home which is on just over an acre of land, with wonderful neighbors to help with parking cars, because, well, they had about 370 people on the invitation list (including children). Most venues don't accommodate numbers larger than 250, and our working number was 300.

By ceremony time, most of the seating was shaded, but the weather was a perfect 87 degrees. Tri-Citians are used to desert heat, so 87 really is pretty perfect.

And when putting on an event like this, having a big family that pulls together makes it easier and more affordable. Mystie and her husband hosted, using the event as incentive to get the yard spruced up. She's also quite an organizer, so she served as the wedding coordinator. Her husband had the parking people in place and even ran a shuttle service from the neighbor's down to the event. My oldest son loves beer and provided that beverage for the reception. Melanie, our artist, did all the graphic work on the invitations and programs, as well as getting them printed. She also decorated the front of the ceremony, and the groom's best man made and put up a wood cross in the center. My middle son, Brendan, served as the DJ, and the twins helped with manual labor. And then there's our church family that helped in decorating, set up, serving drinks and cake, moving tables and chairs. We are so blessed to have all these people in our lives!

All the Paulson clan

Noah's mom and I bought matching dresses and didn't know until arriving at the wedding!
Great minds . . . !

Since Kirsten and Noah went out for tacos on their first date, we had Hacienda del Sol cater. Their Mexican food is delicious and is the preferred restaurant for our employees. Our guests really enjoyed it as we had absolutely no leftovers and some folks went back for seconds.  The bridesmaids really got the party going on the dance floor and everyone had such a great time! Soon it was all over and the happy couple left the reception for a few sunset pictures. The next day they left super early for a honeymoon on the Big Island of Hawaii.

Not So Routine

Okay, obviously I'm not back in the routine and it looks like things won't be routine for several months. I'm still working in the business, still teaching my ESL class, even still getting in some stitching - just not as much. The reason is - my youngest daughter is getting married in June!

Wedding planning is consuming bandwidth in my brain, lol! I was really lobbying for a fall wedding, but circumstances with our pastor's availability and family complications have bumped up the date to June. It's pretty late to be planning for June, but so far we've had good luck with our date being free for the vendors we've talked to. We're planning to have the wedding and reception in the back yard of our oldest daughter's home as they have just over an acre of land. Kirsten found her dress very quickly and easily - in and out of David's Bridal in 90 minutes, lol! The photographer has been procured and one by one the check list is getting shorter.

On to the other part of my life!

Promise of Spring

I did get Promise of Spring finished the first part of February. This was a nice little design, stitched on Picture This Plus Dapple with DMC floss. The end of January, Gary and I had a trip to Scottsdale, Arizona, for an insurance conference and I packed of Promise of Spring to work on during down times.

Yes, the weather was lovely and warm - just right for stitching by the pool.

But the cool mornings were warmed by fire pits all around the property. We were at the J W Marriott, Desert Ridge which is a gorgeous place for a conference and for kicking back in the sunshine!

And I came home with my Starbucks You Are Here mug. I just love these mugs, lol!

So I finished stitching Promise of Spring and I delayed starting another project. The VS Jingle Bell Xmas Tree Farm came out for a few stitches, and then I got a call from my local x-s shop. The Valdani floss set I ordered was in!

Oh boy! This is my first set of  Valdani floss and so far I really do like them. This set of colors goes to Rosewood Manor's Autumn Quaker sampler which was an impulse buy when I lingered a little too long at the LNS. In my stash I had plenty of 32 ct Vintage Country Mocha which seemed to be the best color choice I had available.

So here is the latest pic I have, although I've gotten several more motifs finished since I took it. With a 32ct fabric, I do have to strand the Valdani to two strands (Valdani has three) and that is a bit of a pain to not have an even number of strands in the floss. The end result is worth the effort tho. 😊

We celebrated grandson Knox's 8th birthday on Sunday, and yesterday he and I went shopping and out for lunch. We found a Star Wars lego set he'd been wanting, then went to Red Robin for a hamburger. Red Robin seems to be a favorite for the younger set, and I think this gizmo on the table has something to do with it!

Who needs crayons when there are video games on that screen! Somehow I was able to pry him away from it to get his lunch down and then we actually played a few trivia games together. He's a bright little guy and always a lot of fun!

So that pretty much wraps up my update! I'll keep plugging away at my blog reader and maybe someday I'll actually catch up with all of you.